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Glitchometry
In Glitchometry, I manipulate simple shapes (black squares, circles, triangles, stripes) in a sound editor, breaking them down into new forms. The earliest work in the series is here. The tumblr is where new work appears.
It has done more to emancipate women than anything else in the world
The Bicycle Craze of the 1890s had a significant impact upon women's lives. Leaders of the women's movement saw bike riding as a path to freedom. Many women cyclists enjoyed the freedoms and experiences bikes gave them. Although many health experts recommended biking to women for its health effects, other health experts and some moralists saw dangers in letting women venture off into the wild blue yonder with and without men, danger in potential physical damage to women's bodies, disaster in letting them adopt "unfeminine garb" - and of course, they might enjoy it TOO much.
Vanity Site that is configured in the form of Amazon.com product page
A while back I remember coming across a really novel vanity site that somebody had come up with. It was a vanity site configured as an Amazon.com products page. It had an identical layout and a place for reviews where former employers and co-workers could write their "product" reviews of this person's work. At the time I came across this site, it was somewhat of a meme and people listed it as a creative way of standing out from the crowd with all of their usually boring sites.
Does anybody remember this or have the link to it?
Thanks
What to name our RV blog?
We're transitioning into living full time in an RV and several people have expressed interest in reading a blog about our experiences. I know the kinds of things I want to write, but I'm stumped on a name.
Senseless: on the lack of forward progress in bicycle helmet design
"Bicycle helmets do an outstanding job of keeping our skulls intact in a major crash. But they do almost nothing to prevent concussions and other significant brain injuries—and the very government agency created to protect us is part of the problem. The time has come to demand something safer."
"Best day at work ever."
Motor Trend has put a considerable amount of effort and money into their YouTube presence (autoplay) over the last year or so, and have pulled up a decent batting average for quality videos. However, one of their series stands head and shoulders above the rest: Roadkill (also autoplay). Starring Hot Rod Magazine's Editor in Chief David Freiburger and Staff Editor Mike Finnegan, Roadkill is a roughly 20 minute web series, typically posted the first Friday of every month, and is essentially two hot rod/muscle car guys taking on self-imposed amusingly bad ideas - such as throwing a dart at a map and trying to buy a car and drive home on only $1,500 - or occasionally chronicling the goings on at major Hot Rod Mag events like Hot Rod Drag Week.
For years I played as white characters.
Because New Leaf’s tanning doesn’t seem to happen in real time, and because it seems to take days instead of hours now, trying to get a particular mid-level skin tone is more precarious than maintaining a pale complexion. Not only is the outcome hard to predict, but someone who wants the default skin to stay only has to bring a parasol around with them in the summer sun. They literally have access to tools and methods I don’t. It is very hard not to just write “DO YOU GET IT?” over and over again. I don’t have a tanning booth, or tanning lotion. I certainly don’t have a way to lock in my current tan level.
The other implication is that it might be the case that tanning is a disincentive to overplaying. I hadn’t realized it until my friend with the cobblestone roads pointed it out. Let’s say, hypothetically, that you’ve kept your game running for five straight hours for some odd reason. You might notice that your town’s other villagers will greet you with an admonishment. You look tired they say, you should take a rest. You should stop playing. There is a strange, formal parallel between this directive and tanning. Both come only after hours of uninterrupted play. The same activity results in both outcomes. Coupled with the fact that players are outfitted with ways to prevent, but not cause tanning, it’s hard not to draw some connections.
My argument isn’t that Nintendo has gone out of its way to be racist, it’s that the question of race seems to have never been brought up to begin with, and that has its own problems.
Me, On The Screen: Race in Animal Crossing: New Leaf
The other implication is that it might be the case that tanning is a disincentive to overplaying. I hadn’t realized it until my friend with the cobblestone roads pointed it out. Let’s say, hypothetically, that you’ve kept your game running for five straight hours for some odd reason. You might notice that your town’s other villagers will greet you with an admonishment. You look tired they say, you should take a rest. You should stop playing. There is a strange, formal parallel between this directive and tanning. Both come only after hours of uninterrupted play. The same activity results in both outcomes. Coupled with the fact that players are outfitted with ways to prevent, but not cause tanning, it’s hard not to draw some connections.
My argument isn’t that Nintendo has gone out of its way to be racist, it’s that the question of race seems to have never been brought up to begin with, and that has its own problems.
Me, On The Screen: Race in Animal Crossing: New Leaf
It's so loony, it might work
Project Loon: Google is testing an Internet access system mediated by stratospheric balloons. They are starting in New Zealand with 30 balloons.
They are way cooler than you’ll ever be, basically.
The Avant/Garde Diaries interviews
Jarad Dawkins, 11, and Malcom Brickhouse, 12, aka the metal band Unlocking the Truth. Here they are performing on Totally Biased With Kamau Bell [via]
A test for the mind as much as the body
The Self-Transcendence race starts today.
It's a run around the block, 5,649 times around the block.
Runners cover 3,100 miles, running 6 am to midnight over 52 days, at least 60 miles a day over concrete. The best runners average 75 miles a day. All the runners seem to have the same mantra.
The first race was in 1997, “The first couple years, the kids threw things at us.”
Changing Perceptions, One Icon At A Time
The Accessible Icon Project seeks to change public perception of the disabled by subtly redesigning the traditional blue-and-white accessibility icon. New York City is one of the first to embrace the new design.
Also: OpenDyslexic, a free font designed to lessen confusion between visually similar letterforms.
Also: OpenDyslexic, a free font designed to lessen confusion between visually similar letterforms.
Hobbit-ception
Kellie and Alex, better known as Kili and Fili on the Tolkein fan site TheOneRing.net, are sisters who run the webseries Happy Hobbit. They filmed themselves watching the trailer for the new Hobbit film and posted the resulting video on their facebook page. Peter Jackson came across said video, posted it on his facebook page, and then filmed some of his cast as they watched it. Of course this then required a reaction-to-the-reaction-to-the-reaction video.
Dear AskMe: Thanks.
I don't know y'all's addresses so I'm sending my thank-you note c/o MetaTalk.
Indistinguishable from Magic
Random Weekend Project shows how to seemingly make magic by creating instant ice from flowing water. [slyt]
Before there was a [US] national museum, we had a nation of savers
"In the early 1800s, a hammer was kept near Plymouth Rock for the pilgrim who had forgotten to bring one. By the end of the 19th century, what was left of the rock was fenced off within a memorial." "The United States, it turns out, was a nation of casual plunderers from the start. Visitors to Mount Vernon snapped splinters from the moldings; beachgoers in Massachusetts chiseled off chunks of Plymouth Rock; tourists snipped fabric from the White House curtains. By the early 19th century, newspapers were referring to illicit souvenir hunting as a “national mania.” "
Better to keep most money in Personal or S-Corp account?
My friend and I were talking the other day about the best way to arrange his personal and corporate accounts for his Corporation he formed to write and direct under. There are no employees and overhead is small to nothing.
He says he feels better having the majority of his money in the corporate account in case he gets sued, but isn't that why most people DONT have all their money is that account? I thought most people in his situation started an s-corp to protect and keep their personal assets safe. Am I wrong?
Being the nerd that I am, I was itching to crunch some badass numbers
Debarghya Das, an Indian student at Cornell, wanted to impress his friends by obtaining their examination marks for the Indian Certificate of Secondary Examination and the Indian School Certificate and, thanks to some poorly written javascript, discovers the entire database containing the grades for 200,000 Indian students, as well as potential evidence of widespread tampering.
Best website for purchasing website/wordpress templates?
Helping friends set up their small business website. I am not a web designer/developer, just fine with tweaking, dependable and honest--unlike their last web person. They don't need a lot of fancy stuff, but I would like to move them off of google sites and get them something
1)more professional 2) still easily updatable. They are hosted on godaddy with redirects now, which is wasteful. The godaddy webbuilder software does not impress so far.
A jam band concert worth of work
Locating the scene from The Grateful Dead's Workingman's Dead album cover
required an insane amount of research, painstakingly detailed by Bob Egan. He's done this for other famous locations (previously).
How to slow down the speed of time inside your head?
When I looked at the calendar and noticed that this year was half gone, I started to feel panicked. I remember being a child and feeling like each day would never end, now I feel like I can't blink without another week being gone. I know that the feeling that life is speeding up is quite common, and it's a little scary for me. Beyond mindfulness techniques and seeking out novel experiences, I am wondering if people can share ideas/hacks for how to fight this effect. How do I stop feeling like time is passing me by too quickly?
Houghton Library Tumblr
We're constantly digitizing new material at my library, which is Harvard's largest for rare books and manuscripts. I post about larger collections on our blog, but I wanted to have a place to put interesting single images as well. Right now, I plan on posting one new item per day. Each image links to the record in our online catalog, for anyone who wants to know more about the source or come in to see it in person.
Makes your rice go bling!
The most astonishing automated sushi roller commercial you'll see today.
Wedding ceremonies for the non-religious?
What did you, a non-religious person, do for your wedding ceremony? What was the basic structure? What resources did you use to help you plan?
Give me some life-long exercise habits to squish into my very busy life.
My life is crazy busy (whose isn't?) with school, small children and work, so often exercise is the thing that gets cut. I want to make my daily life more active, so that when I can't "exercise" I have still not been totally sedentary.
I loved this question; I now stand like a flamingo every time I brush my teeth. But the question asks for general life tricks, and I am looking for exercise-specific habits. I am having a hard time googling for tricks because I am not looking for tricks or habits to implement while "exercising" or to get me to exercise.
2cool4school
Last spring, Chance the Rapper got suspended from High School for 10 days. Faced with an ultimatum from his Dad to make real progress as an artist or drop it and get serious about his studies, Chance spent his suspension making the mixtape #10Day, a critical hit. Now, Chance has released another mixtape, Acid Rap, that delves even deeper (and with even more complex wordplay) into his favorite subjects: hallucinogens, nicotine addiction, the 90s, his mom, and the current dire situation of the south side of Chicago. Many critics are calling it a masterpiece. Download for free here, or listen here.
Oracle of Mefi
The Oracle of Mefi is a collection of intelligent, insightful, funny or otherwise interesting comments from all over Mefi.
Vector tile river map
I made a tutorial for open source maps with vector tiles. The result is a slippy map of American rivers and some pretty static maps of every US river. But my real goal is the tutorial source code, to help other developers learn to make their own vector maps from geographic data.
A New Start
"Arrested Development's fourth season is triumphant when it's not completely falling apart." That seems to be the critical consensus, which sees the season as ambitious but flawed—a "hot mess", if you will. The American Prospectcompares Season 4 to the housing crisis; Daniel Fienberg simply calls the season's length "exhausting". But how has binge watching affected the critical response? Showrunner Mitch Hurwitz asked viewers not to watch the whole season in one glut: "[Y]ou can’t really laugh the whole time. You have to take a break. There’s so much material." Some critics agree with Hurwitz; others argue that this season is "essentially a 7-1/2 hour long episode" and that binge watching is the only way to appreciate the new show. (Sadly, Hurwitz's original plan—to have the new episodes be watchable in any order—fell through.)
Google Maps, Now Customized
For years, Google Maps has been the map of our world in a historically unprecedented way. The new Google Maps (announcement) will eschew the uniformity of the old Maps and instead customize the map experience based on a user's behavior. Some are concerned how this artificial narrowing will affect the way we experience places and relate to our urban spaces. Others believe the customization makes the new maps more honest. Most, however, will probably just want to comment on the huge overhaul to the interface.
The memorial that no one wanted built except the veterans
Although ranked tenth in "America's Favorite Architecture," compiled by the American Institute of Architects, the Vietnam Veterans Memorial - sometimes referred to as simply 'The Wall' - was the at the center of political and artistic controversy and opposition from the time of its announcement in 1981. The Wall, situated in Constitution Gardens adjacent to the National Mall, is "...often referred to as the veterans 3rd battle. The 1st being survival in Vietnam. The 2nd, was dealing with the rejection experienced upon returning home from war. And, the 3rd, building the Wall."
How do I avoid driving into my garage with my bike in the roof rack?
I just bought a roof rack for my bike. Without some kind of alarm in place, I will drive into the garage with bike on the roof. I will destroy the bike and damage my house and I want to avoid this. I need some kind of directed sensor such that when the bike breaks the line of the sensor a light flashes to remind me not to drive into the garage with the bike on my roof. Any ideas along these lines or better?
My problem has been that better bikes kept coming...
James McDonald of Toowoomba, Queensland, Australia, collects bikes--at least one from every era of bikemaking. "If there were 200 bicycles here," he explains, "they would have been culled down out of probably two to three thousand bicycles that I've brought home over the last two years, and those two thousand would have been culled down from maybe tens of thousands of bicycles that I've gone to look at and left behind." Check out this 3 minute video for more!
Loaded like a fright train
Nowadays, fortified wines are the butt of jokes. (previously) However, there was a time when they were considered mainstream and there were even a few commercials made.
Of course, we can't leave out the best commercial for fortified wine ever made.
Just saw "Total Eclipse of the Heart" for the first time. More, please.
While settling a disagreement over whether Total Eclipse of the Heart was a duet, I just saw the music video and it blew my mind. I grew up without cable, and am pretty much ignorant of everything but the "classic" music videos from the 80's; please let me know what I'm missing.
Gone to Carolina and they're fined
While national media coverage of state politics has focused on hot-button topics like gun control and gay rights, a storm has been quietly brewing in Raleigh, NC, where the NAACP has organized protests calling attention to the regressive agenda of the Republican governor and NC General Assembly. Known as "Moral Mondays," these protests have resulted in nearly 160 arrests -- and they're getting bigger each week. With the GA taking a break for Memorial Day, the next showdown is set for June 3.
The Universal Measure of Land Area
As you may know, large areas are measured in Rhode Islands. For example. Now a handy web site will tell you how big countries are using this vital geographic method. Plus, you will learn some fun facts about Rhode Island.
Dum-de-dum-duh-dum. . .
Not to make you feel old or anything, but The Breeder's Last Splash just turned 20. Time for a deluxe reissue and a tour!
The many ways of showing how we get from A to B
Transit Maps.
Designer Cameron Booth's blog and review of transit maps, diagrams, design and artwork from all over the world.
A Recording Venue, Not the Popular Post-Processing Effect.
Hello. DJ Flula (who's commentary on English idioms was discussed previously on MeFi) has discarded the conventional wisdom that the best place to make your recordings is the bathroom, choosing instead to record in cars.
Precise yet Arbitrary Places
In 1998, Bruce Myren bought a portable GPS unit, and began a project he had been dreaming of since 1991: photographing each of the whole longitudinal degree intersections along the 40th parallel using an 8"x10" camera.
In June, 2012, he ran a successful Kickstarter campaign to raise money to finish the project.
He completed it last December, 21 years after conception: The Fortieth Parallel
Star Wars Kid breaks 10-year silence
The '00s were a the decade for people to laugh at overweight teenage boys. We all remember Numa Numa kid and Star Wars Kid. Well guess what - Star Wars Kid is now Star Wars Man, and he's speaking out.
CSS Zen Garden is 10 years old, open for business
Today is the 10-year anniversary of the CSS Zen Garden
Originally created to showcase and inspire the kind of design possible with CSS2 and standards-based design, the CSS Zen Garden is 10 years old today.