Favorites from Foci for Analysis
Subscribe:
Displaying post 651 to 700 of 753
Coin Rules Everything Around Me
In 2014, Bitcoin (BTC) has become established as increasingly "real" money with government regulatory interest, law enforcement, and growing acceptance in commerce, but also as the reserve cryptocurrency for hundreds of "altcoins," making them also convertible to legacy money. Foremost among these is Litecoin (LTC), which introduced the scrypt hashing algorithm to cryptocurrency, democratizing coin mining by being best suited to common GPUs rather than Bitcoin's dedicated mining equipment. Recently donated LTC paid for a forest in Madagascar. Peercoin (PPC), next in prominence, introduces "proof of stake" where less energy is spent mining and existing coins pay interest. Dogecoin (DOGE), a fork of Litecoin (previously covered on Metafilter), continues heading to the moon, with more transactions than all other coins combined, thriving markets in digital goods, tipbots, an upcoming party in NYC's Bitcoin Center on Wall Street, much charity, and the recent announcement that new Dogecoins will be generated indefinitely. A selection of other foremost and interesting cryptocurrencies is within.
The Unsolved Murders of Jeff Davis Parish
Who Killed the Jeff Davis 8? A serial killer has allegedly been preying on Louisiana prostitutes. But a new investigation reveals a far scarier theory.
Bollywood Inspired Film Music from Hausa Nigeria
The Hausa people of the north of Nigeria like Bollywood films so much that around 20 years ago they started making their own local productions. The films of Kannywood (for Kano, the capital city) feature song and dance - and the incredible music that defines Northern Nigeria: autotuned robotic vocals combined with frenetic drum machine rhythms and intricate, interwoven synths in a hybrid of local styles and Indian influence. Hear a generous sampling of it here.
Exploring the Architecture of Doom and Urban Failure
Architecture of Doom is a Tumblr that collects images of "bleak/ gloomy/ forbidding/ desolate/ unfortunate and totalitarian architecture" from sources like Fuck Yeah Brutalism and Failed Architecture. The latter bills itself as a "research platform that aims to open up new perspectives on urban failure – from what it’s perceived to be, what’s actually happening and how it’s represented to the public" and offers some interesting essays and case studies – for example: Hotel Jugoslavija: Spacio-temporal Mosaics of Memorabilia, Function Follows Form: How Berlin Turns Horror Into Beauty, and The Poetry of Decay.
Just for a second, honestly
Japanese folklore and horror stories are known for their psychologically terrifying ghosts and monsters that prey on the minds and bodies of humans. But there’s also a lighter side to Japanese folklore, where bumbling spirits cause only mild annoyance, actually enhance your daily life, and otherwise generally botch the whole job of haunting mankind and teaching vague moral lessons about treating your parents with respect and such. 8 Hilariously Nonthreatening Monsters from Japanese Folklore
Oh something good tonight will make me forget about you for now.
Writer Teju Cole, perhaps inspired by Agha Shahid Ali, has continued his Twitter experimentation by using out of context retweets to create Ghazals.
"The Simplicity And Banality of Paper"
Shigeru Ban: ‘People’s architect’ combines permanence and paper"
Generally speaking, an architect’s style is defined by particular forms or shapes. There’s Frank Lloyd Wright’s prominent horizontal lines, for instance; Le Corbusier’s simple white boxes; or, more recently, the deliberately abstract masses of Frank Gehry — of Guggenheim Bilbao fame. But in the view of Japanese architect Shigeru Ban, such formal elements are ultimately little more than reflections of current trends — in the first two cases above, Modernism, and in the third, “blobbism,” or the recent taste for irregular shapes made possible by computer-aided design. According to Ban, the only way for architects to keep their work free from the influence of such transient fashions is to come up with new ways to actually build things — new materials, for example, or new approaches to structural engineering. His own answer? Paper — or, to be more precise, cardboard tubes.
Random Togetherness
Dennis Hlynsky is a professor of film and animation at RISD whose most recent work, titled Small Brains on Mass, looks at bird behavior, particularly how they interact when flying in groups. To better understand how flying as a flock is achieved, Hlynsky filmed the birds and then stacked the images on the same frame for a set number of frames, the results show each bird’s flight as a trail, but synchronized with the flock. The results are often pure poetry.
An Observer's Guide To Pony Fanwork
How much My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic fan content is there out there? LET'S FIND OUT. A few highlights:
What I Learned Today, morals to episodes
Twilight adjusts to a Season 3 plot development
Apogee, random, catchy
Celestia and Luna play Resident Evil 4 (repurposed from Two Best Friends)
The best of Sweetie Bot, from Friendship is Witchcraft
Slice of Life, a very well done fan Tumblr
How much more could there be? Well....
What I Learned Today, morals to episodes
Twilight adjusts to a Season 3 plot development
Apogee, random, catchy
Celestia and Luna play Resident Evil 4 (repurposed from Two Best Friends)
The best of Sweetie Bot, from Friendship is Witchcraft
Slice of Life, a very well done fan Tumblr
How much more could there be? Well....
They tried to silence me 34 years ago, but I'm louder than ever.
"My last meal was a half a bowl of ice cream. I put it in the freezer so I could go get my sis. That bowl stayed in our freezer three years." Sister of teen murdered in 1980 tweets at @billcomeans. Story here.
"By almost any measure, the world is better than it has ever been."
The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation explains 3 Myths that Block Progress for the Poor in their 2014 annual letter.
Pond, et al.
Pond provides end-to-end encrypted forward-secure asynchronous messaging that uses Tor to resist traffic analysis, i.e. metadata collection (threat model, technical, github).
The Wild and Terrible Cry of His People: The Evolution of Tarzan's Yell
As the body rolled to the ground Tarzan of the Apes placed his foot upon the neck of his lifelong enemy and, raising his eyes to the full moon, threw back his fierce young head and voiced the wild and terrible cry of his people. ― Edgar Rice Burroughs, Tarzan of the ApesERBzine, "the official Edgar Rice Burroughs Tribute Site," brings us The Evolution of the Tarzan "Yell."
Follow the world.
@Sweden is run by a different Swede each week. But what are the other @countries and @territories up to?
Who is ANNA?
Warning: Graphic footage. Little is known about the origins of the Abkhazian Network News Agency, ANNA. What we do know is that the agency, nominally from the breakaway Georgian republic Abkhazia, has been covering the brutal Syrian Civil War while embedded with the SAA on its Youtube channel (be sure to enable English captions). Defiant and unapologetic about its pro-government position, the videos nevertheless provide a unique perspective on what is perhaps the most well-documented war in history. Brief sample: GoPros mounted on tanks, civilian traffic driving by tanks, near misses, and close quarters combat. Sometimes the other side is taking a video too.
[via /r/CombatFootage and /r/syriancivilwar]
Heal inside your sacred space
Sean Tejaratchi (of LiarTownUSA) brings you the Vermont Pleasures catalog, which answers the vital question "What if the Body Shop made Sex Toys?" (NSFW all around)
What's the nastiest shade you've ever thrown? "Existing in the world."
You may have heard the music of House of Ladosha, but that's just the beginning. This family of artists applies their fashion school and NYC nightlife roots to everything from printing t-shirts and performing spoken word to mocking Mapplethorpe.
When Dosha Devastation and Cunty Crawford LaDosha aren't performing as a hip hop duo, they like to do each other's hair and ki.
Juliana Huxtable is a Tumblr queen, DJ, model, legal assistant by day, cyborg, priestess, and witch.
When Dosha Devastation and Cunty Crawford LaDosha aren't performing as a hip hop duo, they like to do each other's hair and ki.
Juliana Huxtable is a Tumblr queen, DJ, model, legal assistant by day, cyborg, priestess, and witch.
Craig Strete: transmuting anger into art; Native American sci-fi
Jorge Luis Borges called the stories of Craig Strete “shattered chains of brilliance.” Salvador Dali said, “like a new dream, his writings seizes the mind.” First published in1974 and then again in 1977, [The Bleeding Man] has its foreward written by none other than the great Virginia Hamilton who dubs him “the first American Indian to become a successful Science Fiction writer” and says that “the writing is smooth and unassuming, and yet the fabric of it is always richly textured.” The Bleeding Man and many other out-of-print titles by Strete are available in eBook format[s (PDF, PRC, ePUB)] for free.
To Simply Be
Reddit's Slow TV channel offers long videos of continuous coverage by fixed cameras on a subject or event from start to finish. Take train rides, go the beach, watch fireworks, ride the Autobahn, visit the aquarium, check out a hot spring at Yellowstone, fry up some bacon or, tour the islands of Cat Ba near Ha Long Bay in North Vietnam
Edge.org Annual Question 2014
"Ideas change, and the times we live in change. Perhaps the biggest change today is the rate of change. What established scientific idea is ready to be moved aside so that science can advance?" WHAT SCIENTIFIC IDEA IS READY FOR RETIREMENT? (171 essays; 125,000 words)
On Being Ugly: An Argument for the Total Irrelevance of Beauty
"Ultimately, feeling ugly or feeling beautiful can feel like the same thing, as long as you don't feel like either one of them has to get in the way of what you can do and of who you can be. Because they shouldn't, and they don't." (SLYT, autogenerated transcript available via the transcript button below the video.) via Socimages
Dust, Devil : The Rise of Valley Fever
"All you have to do is take a breath at the wrong time. It will impact your lower lung, and the infection starts from there [...]. If you roll down the window driving from San Diego to Seattle, you could catch cocci while you're driving through, no question. That could happen, and it has happened." Valley Fever (coccidioidomycosis) is a fungal infection endemic to certain areas of the Southwest. The CDC has described it as a "silent epidemic"; between 1998 and 2011, reported cases increased tenfold. It's often misdiagnosed, but even when correctly-diagnosed, the prognosis can sometimes be grim: there is no vaccine, the price of the first-line drug has skyrocketed, and the treatments for more-severe cases often carry their own punishing side effects. While many groups (including NASA) seek to halt the spread, the disease continues to infect 20,000+ individuals each year. "It destroys lives,” said Dr. [Royce] Johnson [...]. Divorces, lost jobs and bankruptcy are incredibly common, not to mention psychological dislocation."
Thank you Mario! But our princess is in another… SYSTEM FAILURE
In Super Mario World, if you make the right series of moves with the right game objects, you can cause the game to execute arbitrary code. A particularly delightful use of this feature was recently shown by Masterjun, a tool-assisted speedrun enthusiast. He unveiled the speedrun to the world using an unmodified game cartridge and a Super Nintendo Entertainment System with eight controllers connected through a multitap system at the Awesome Games Done Quick 2014 event. Hack A Day explains the technique. Masterjun explains it in more detail.
DEA and the cartel
DEA Negotiated With Mexican Drug Cartel Members
"An investigation by El Universal (in spanish) found that between the years 2000 and 2012, the U.S. government had an arrangement with Mexico's Sinaloa drug cartel that allowed the organization to smuggle billions of dollars of drugs while Sinaloa provided information on rival cartels."
As the instrument of DOET I became responsible for their salvation
The Cult of the Peacock.
It’s easy to forget that at one time all videogames had manuals. I used to like reading manuals. Manuals were cool. Now, instead of manuals, we have interactive tutorials. They take about fifty times longer to produce, three times longer to consume, and players hate them so much that their highest aspiration is to become completely transparent. Currently I spend most of my waking hours developing them. It should come as no surprise that I hate them too.
Waste Watching: Robin Nagle's Discard Sudies
Discard Studies "is meant as an online gathering place for scholars, activists, environmentalists, students, artists, planners, and anyone else whose work touches on themes relevant to the study of waste and wasting." It's about hoarding discourse. Migrants' material trails. The stewardship of repair. Flood level markers. And so much more, thanks to the trashiest anthropologist in New York.
They Must Sleep in the Center of the Bed
Would you take a mentally-ill stranger into your home to live with you like family, possibly for the rest of his life? What if your town had been doing it successfully for 700 years? Welcome to Geel, Belgium.
By the minute
London's first pay-per-minute café, Ziferblat (photos) costs 3 pence (5 cents) per minute to be there. Part of a chain from Russia. A Moscow cafe for example.
The Awareness - A Techno Thriller Short
A short film about a lowly janitor recruited by the first fully sentient computer to stop itself from destroying humanity. via io9
Thoughts and tools for the startup
The internet is full of mediocre, self-aggrandizing, or plain bad advice about how to found and manage a startup, but there some really useful collections out there. The annual collection of best links by Tom Eisenmann of Harvard (also: 2012, 2011, 2010) is very good, as is the 30 best posts by First Round Capital, and the many readings available in Stanford's E145 class. On an ongoing basis, the Startup Management blog is a good place to look, plus, inside, there are...
ipython notebook - a web-based interactive computational environment
"The IPython Notebook is a web-based interactive computational environment where you can combine code execution, text, mathematics, plots and rich media into a single document". It can be installed faily easily with anaconda or on Amazon EC2.
Various interesting notebooks are to be found at the official Notebook Viewer site
Another collection of interesting notebooks on many topics.
Symmetry: a palindromic film (SLVimeo)
This film has been written symmetrically.
The second half is strictly like the first, but played backwards and mirrored.
The second part doesn't act like a simple rewinding, but as the following of the first.
It explores all sorts of symmetry: compositions, shapes, sounds and music, scenario, colors, actions, time...
Richard Pryor: that clown can really sing the blues
Richard Pryor moved to New York City in 1963, where he performed regularly in clubs alongside performers such as Bob Dylan and Woody Allen. He even opened for singer and pianist Nina Simone, who talked of his early nervousness, when she put her "arms around him there in the dark and rocked him like a baby until he calmed down." You can see something of that young man in this clip of Pryor singing a bit of jazzy blues in 1966. The performance is also available on YouTube with slightly better quality, but faded in from different scene.
Ghost Stations of the Tube
The allure of abandoned Tube stations. The eerie empty platforms and booking offices have enthralled photographers.
The worlds oldest undeground metro sytem has more than its fair share of abandoned and unopens stations all over the network (abandoned stations, Brompton Road and Kingsway previously).
- A Trip Down Aldwych
- Inside St Mary's disused underground station
- Down Street Tour (Part 1 and Part 2)
- Taking a Special Look at the disused Jubilee Line platforms at Charing Cross
It’s not just a food, it’s a lifestyle
The Best of L.A. Taco: L.A. Taco looks back at the best tacos, art, music and people celebrating the taco lifestyle.
Peter Scott (1947-2013), developer of HyTelnet
Peter Scott (February 14, 1947 - December 30, 2013) worked in the Systems Department of the University of Saskatchewan (Saskatoon, Canada) Libraries from 1976 to 2005. One of the early library weblog writers, Peter is most well known for HyTelnet, an interface for Telnet services he developed from 1990. In his 1991 video, Peter demonstrates a later version of HyTelnet, while an archive lists the resources available through the service.
Digital Black-Bag Ops:
Der Spiegel reports on the NSA's "plumbers" at the Office of Tailored Access Operations, who collect and deploy exploits to infiltrate computers and even redirect shipments so they can install malware and hardware backdoors on electronics ordered by those they are targeting.
Jacob Appelbaum [AKA ioerror] reports on the NSA's 'catalog', which ranges from $30 monitor cables that send back screenshots, to exploits for network security hardware from Cisco and Huawei, to backdoored BIOS code and firmware for all major hard drive manucfacturers. While some of the NSA's malware requires physical access or proximity, much of it is remotely installable over the Internet.
At the 30c3 conference in Hamburg, Appelbaum gives an in-depth talk about the NSA's Tailored Access Operations hacking activities and its 'interdiction' process, whereby computers are tampered with during shipping or as part of a 'black-bag' operation. Appelbaum, a Wikileaks affiliate who has reported on documents leaked by Edward Snowden, has been personally targeted by such operations, as have his family members.
At the 30c3 conference in Hamburg, Appelbaum gives an in-depth talk about the NSA's Tailored Access Operations hacking activities and its 'interdiction' process, whereby computers are tampered with during shipping or as part of a 'black-bag' operation. Appelbaum, a Wikileaks affiliate who has reported on documents leaked by Edward Snowden, has been personally targeted by such operations, as have his family members.