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April 2004 Archives
April 30
Boom! A master planned community. Boom! A big-box mall! Our Sprawling, Supersize Utopia. This article, by New York Times columnist David Brooks, takes a look at exploding suburbs and exurban migration. This migration is nothing new, author Joel Garreau wrote extensively about it in his 1991 book Edge Cities. The phenomonon really took off after World War II, during the period of post war prosperity, and is best represented by this famous postwar American suburb. A veritable army of "suburban sprawl critics" has emerged over the years including Jane Jacobs and James Howard Knunstler plus many others including some who are predicting the immenent demise of suburbs because of oil depletion. For Brooks the critics of suburbs "just regurgitate the same critiques decade after decade, regardless of the suburban reality flowering around them" but you can't dismiss what the architect Paolo Soleri says about American society that "we have a society that is moving very rapidly to the super-, super-, super-consumptive."
It's pilot season! Each May the networks announce their fall schedules. Here are the many, many shows battling for a prime time spot. (continued inside)
outbreak [note: flash, advertisement] play this sim and struggle to protect your network from a hacker onslaught.
The European Union welcomes 10 new members! As I write this, the celebrations have started as Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia become members of the EU today. While some folks are gonna party like crazy, others are warning of doom and gloom. What do you think? Will this have significant effects on global culture, politics, and economics - or will it merely represent a paper change within the rarefied world of European diplomats, with little other than localized effects on day to day life?
Lightcycle deathmatch! If you've been looking for an excuse to parade around in your Tron underroos or are just plain sick and tired of that little room you've been locked into, hop on a lightcycle in SWRON and play some chicken. single and multiplayer
How many systems does Google have? It depends on how you look at their S-1 filing and estimate their buying patterns... any way you look at it there's some serious computing power there.
'Laser vision' offers new insights Directly spraying light onto the retina, basically a heads-up display on your eye. And it's a step closer to the sunglasses Chevette stole in Virtual Light. Said glasses being wired up to display metadata about the world around you -- if you have a gardener set you walk through and look at the plants and everything has little labels with the common names and names in Latin.
The Battle of Antietam is the single bloodiest single day battle American history. Historically told in words, the battle illustrated in pictures [SVG required] shows jostling strategies that resulted in a loss of over 20,000 troops in 13 hours.
"High court says man shot himself during interrogation".
In reversing the lower court decision, presiding Judge Toshinobu Akiyama of the high court said it was technically possible for Yanagi to snatch a bullet from a plastic bag placed on a table as evidence, when the two interrogators were not looking.And yet, there might actually be an argument here. As seen in the Fark thread that followed their initial posting of this Japanese case, Alexander Jason (a forensic analyst) completed a rather detailed analysis and found the scene at least not incompatible with the suicide theory. This Alexander guy's quite interesting -- have to respect a guy whose home page opens up with a gun pointing at a mannequin's head (full research paper here, not entirely safe on a full stomach).
Bitkraft.com This is the best webdesign/use of flash I've seen yet... I just started poking around in here. (Via igiveashit.com)
The oddest bit of Friday flash that I've yet seen. It's apparently an ad for Kikkoman soy sauce... but it's the most bizarre ad I've ever seen. A caped superhero type guy with a whole fish for a head rides on a motorcycle, pours soy sauce on people, apparently drives a cute little kitten to suicide, then goes to bed with the condiment-based superhero world's answer to Sailor Moon. Deeply weird.
Vending Machines of Japan PhotoMann recently decided to 'collect' images of unique vending machines found in Japan. They are everywhere. Estimates suggest there are 5.6 million vending machines which works out to be one for every 20 people in Japan. Sales from vending machines in 2000 totaled $56 billion! The most common are drink and cigarette machines followed by machines with pornography
Part 4 of the Mario brothers tragedy is up! A follow up to this post. Finally, no more sleepless nights.
Serendipity saves lives and holds a lot of things together. Harry Coover, an Eastman chemist, was trying to develop a plastic for gunsights. Instead he discovered cyanoacrylates otherwise known as Superglue. It's been sticking things and people together since 1952. Harry is being inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame in Akron, Ohio.
To commemorate the end of National Poetry Month, today is Poem In Your Pocket Day. And for us ItarWebby types, it's also Poem On Your Blog Day. via Sharon at Watermark
Simple English Wikipedia: the free encyclopedia with simple words and grammar.
A glowing tribute honoring Bob Edwards on his final day as anchor at NPR's "Morning Edition" ... from the
bastards people who fired reassigned him in the first place. (Sorry to start your Friday on a downer.)
Pre- and post- explosion satellite images of the Ryongchon train station in North Korea.
I'd like my left bollock to go to Julie and my right one to Children in Need. Quoth Davy Saville.
Don't ever die, it's horrible is Øystein Runde's chosen epitaph.
Greg Derrick would like to be disposed of as follows ...chucked in the water float for weeks as my corpse rots. Only to wash up on a beach in the coasta del sol.
I want my Dad barred from my funeral. The mans a cun*... says Mark Reed
mydeath.net is a site which allows people to specify the arrangements after their death. From food and dress code to disposal and famous last words. Read or contribute your own. [Contribution requires quick registration]
Don't ever die, it's horrible is Øystein Runde's chosen epitaph.
Greg Derrick would like to be disposed of as follows ...chucked in the water float for weeks as my corpse rots. Only to wash up on a beach in the coasta del sol.
I want my Dad barred from my funeral. The mans a cun*... says Mark Reed
mydeath.net is a site which allows people to specify the arrangements after their death. From food and dress code to disposal and famous last words. Read or contribute your own. [Contribution requires quick registration]
April 29
Design exhibits, design guru, and designologue.
Flash required.
Flash required.
Foetry: American Poetry Watchdog "Exposing the fraudulent contests. Tracking the sycophants. Naming names." But they, er, remain anonymous themselves. The site went active a few weeks ago, complete with forum, and has caused a bit of a stir [find "foetry"] in the poet blogger world.
Indian mercenaries serving in Iraq. Can you really outsource a foreign occupation?
The Slack Album The Slack Album is the latest (for the next ten minutes) in a slew of Jay-Z Black Album remixes and mash-ups. In this case, the Black Album is melded track-for-track with samples taken from Pavement's 1991 lo-fi / indie classic Slanted and Enchanted.
You decide is a webpage that walks you through both sides of an issue. Interesting and well done way of not only seeing where you stand but appreciating the other side of the debate.
Are you a typoholic? It starts so innocently. One day you're mildly interested in the difference between display and text typefaces. Soon you can distinguish between teardrop and beak terminals. Suddenly you're annoying everyone in the movie theater by yelling out the names of all the fonts used in the credits. What's so scary is that you never saw it coming. You, my friend, are a type freak.
The Veridian Room is Toshimitsu Takagi's long awaited sequel to The Crimson Room. Point and click puzzlers to destroy your brain. Just in time to eat away your whole Flash Friday. Mirror here. Via my mate Duncan, who got it from Albino Blacksheep.
Vilnius in Old Photographs, including panoramas, monuments, and environs, as well as an informative history of photography in Lithuania. Part of a larger virtual exhibition of Lithuanian cultural heritage.
Click -- MeFites, click the link of Wolfgang's new endeavor,
murderous, doomed, that cast as Achaeans countless actors,
hurling down to the House of Death so many sturdy souls,
blonde-tressed, open-helmed *. Will careers be made carrion,
feasts for the dogs and birds,
as the time of Bush is moving toward its end?
Begin, crows, when the trailers first were aired,
Agamemnon, some guy, and Brad Pitt, Achilles.
[a wee bit more inside]
murderous, doomed, that cast as Achaeans countless actors,
hurling down to the House of Death so many sturdy souls,
blonde-tressed, open-helmed *. Will careers be made carrion,
feasts for the dogs and birds,
as the time of Bush is moving toward its end?
Begin, crows, when the trailers first were aired,
Agamemnon, some guy, and Brad Pitt, Achilles.
[a wee bit more inside]
Apple iTunes 4.5 was released yesterday, bringing with it several nice new features, such as a live-updating "Party Shuffle" playlist — as well as not-so-nice features like attaching Music Store links to every artist and album in your library (I turned this off immediately). As for the iTunes Music Store itself, Apple has integrated its QuickTime features of music videos and movie trailers (this is related to music how?), shopper-created "iMixes" and for this month, a new "Free Track of the Day," a questionable asset being that today's artist is Avril Lavigne. ...Perhaps you'd rather have an album sung entirely with "meows".
Introducing: Low Carb Coke! *sigh*
Buying biometrically into big brother? Privium is an IBM-backed pay service at Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport that allows passengers to identify themselves by iris recognition and thus speed their way through security checks. This being the privacy-respecting Netherlands, the biometric information is not stored in a central database, but only on a card you carry with you; other countries may not be so enlightened. This could well become a standard form of identification. In the meantime, could the failure to buy this service qualify someone as a security or insurance risk?
I'm not a fan of followup posts, but this is cool enough to mention. Remember the challenging question of how to turn $14 into $1,000? BirdD0g has taken that noodle-scratcher of a problem and turned it into his personal challenge, and he's taking everyone along for the ride at 14bucks.com. He's got until April 15, 2005 to turn it over into a grand, which sounds like plenty of time, but that's a lot of profit to turn over (7000% return on investment). Who wants to take my $14 bet it doesn't happen?
Word on the street is google has filled for an IPO. Hot Damn!
"Other channels do what PBS [does], with the added bonus of doing it better." On the 50th anniversary of San Francisco's KQED, the SF Chronicle's TV critic Tim Goodman levels a blistering attack on the station and on PBS, calling it "one of the worst-run, thoroughly backward media entities in the country."
Claims vs. Facts Database
"Conservatives have spent the last 20 years distorting reality and getting away with it. That is about to change. The Center for American Progress has launched this new database project to chart the dishonesty and lies of conservatives – and compare them with the truth. In this database, each conservative quote will be matched against well-documented facts. And we need your help."
"Conservatives have spent the last 20 years distorting reality and getting away with it. That is about to change. The Center for American Progress has launched this new database project to chart the dishonesty and lies of conservatives – and compare them with the truth. In this database, each conservative quote will be matched against well-documented facts. And we need your help."
The Online Dictionary of Playground Slang. Includes not just slang words, but also all those obnoxious rhymes we sang. "My little Pony, skinny and bony..."
KAA-WHUUMPH! GGGRRRAAA! WHAM! A strange collection of comic book words, and citations as to just what comic they came from.
On tomorrow's Nightline, "we will show you the pictures, and Ted [Koppel] will read the names, of the men and women from the armed forces who have been killed in combat in Iraq. That's it. That will be the whole broadcast." Unfortunately, that means no broadcast whatsoever for Sinclair Broadcast Group's ABC affiliates. They've been ordered not to carry it because it's "contrary to the public interest."
Outkast's "Hey Ya" with Your Favorite Video Game Fighters!
Yes, its been done and had a fork stuck in it but this is pretty good and pretty entertaining as well.
via Intellectual Hip Hop Commentary
Yes, its been done and had a fork stuck in it but this is pretty good and pretty entertaining as well.
via Intellectual Hip Hop Commentary
One Iraqi prisoner was told to stand on a box with his head covered, wires attached to his hands. He was told that if he fell off the box, he would be electrocuted. Torture by Saddam? No, torture by American soldiers in Saddam's most notorious prison. After an Army investigation, courtmartials are likely, and a brigadier general may be forced to resign in disgrace.
Sharon...............as...................Sharon . Eastenders Lookalike Competition (nsfw).
Got GE? GE's new ads are great- esp. the piano with water drops. Any other Web ads impress you lately? I presume everybody remembers this thread.
The mind of the fundamentalist (streaming RealAudio) is an hour-long radio show featuring excerpts from talks given at a psychoanalytic psychotherapy conference in Sydney. Three speakers discuss experiences with fundamentalists, and driving factors behind their beliefs. It includes an amazing first-hand account of fundamentalist terrorism by a journalist whos plane was hijacked, and who later tracked down the hijacker and attempted to understand what drove him. The RealAudio-squeamish can find a transcript here.
Think Again: Al Qaeda - "The mere mention of al Qaeda conjures images of an efficient terrorist network guided by a powerful criminal mastermind. Yet al Qaeda is more lethal as an ideology than as an organization. 'Al Qaedaism' will continue to attract supporters in the years to come—whether Osama bin Laden is around to lead them or not." Foreign Policy, May/June 2004.
Coping with Asperger's Syndrome. The New York Times sheds light on this disorder that potentially affects millions of Americans. Many of them are bullied in school. Others simply have strange obsessions. Some find their niches in college, while others have to wait until mid-life to understand what is happening. However, it was only added to the DSM ten years ago. Since then, support groups and online resources have popped up.
April 28
A futuristic robot polices the chaotic streets of a developing nation in this [creepy] spec commercial/corporate video." Quicktime is involved. Also, people who are scared of robots might not want to watch, because there is a robot in this video.
Apparent terrorism threat to Los Angeles West Side. According to KNBC News 4 in LA, Federal authorities in Westwood have received a threat of terrorism against a local shopping mall somewhere on the West Side, to take place sometime tomorrow, Thursday April 29. Though unsubstantiated, the threat is being taken seriously enough that all local police forces have been notified and at least partially mobilized. I don't know about you, but I won't be shopping tomorrow.... are any other places in the US getting local threats like this, either now or recently?
Supermodel Personals. "Nervous short girl into fantasy novels and The Simpsons seeks quiet, sensitive guy to while away the hours with me in my library of cocaine." (NSFW)
The University of Minnesota is allowing students to create their own Movable Type blog with just one step. Just give your blog a name and a tag line, hit submit, and your MT blog is all set to go.
Visit sunny Molvanîa! The guidebook is here. Just don't mix them up with Moldavia. They hate that.
Grin And Bear It, Woman! Think Of England! Caesarean births in the U.K. should be severely curtailed, say the medical mandarins. Germaine Greer says, in a cracking column, that the new guidelines are misogyny pure and simple. Is it just my impression (think of American Pie-type teenage movies; advertising; "guy lit") or are hatred of women and beery, bozo celebrations of indifference to the feminine sex on the up and up?
Web Gallery of Art: European art from 1150 to 1800.
"Hubert Selby died often. But he always came back, smiling that beautiful smile of his, and those blue eyes of his... This time he will not be back. My saints have always come from hell, and now, with his passing, there are no more saints". Selby is the author of Last Exit to Brooklyn, (tried for obscenity in England and supported by, among many others, Samuel Beckett and Anthony Burgess), Requiem For a Dream, Song of the Silent Snow. He is being eulogized in the USA and UK, but also, massively (I've just watched a fantastic TV special) in France, where he is much more popular than in his native land (Selby's death was the cover story -- plus pages 2, 3 and 4 -- in the daily Libération today -- .pdf file): Dernière sortie vers la rédemption, L'extase de la dévastation. What makes all this kind of ironic -- in a very Selbyesque way -- is that Selby himself used to say, "I started to die 36 hours before I was born..." (more inside)
There is this wonderful Seattle group, Uncle Bonsai, who perform, among other songs, Cheerleaders on Drugs. Now, another Seattle group, the University of Washington Women's Softball team, has their own take on the subject.
Sterile couture. A Dutch architect designs surgical masks for the Japanese.
The Sinking of Tuvalu, by Kevin Maney. The bizarre story of an island nations sinking fortunes.
GPS Drawing. The world is your canvas.
Spirograph. Cat. The Magic Roundabout. Airplane ride.
Spirograph. Cat. The Magic Roundabout. Airplane ride.
It's not Christmas just yet, but get your hands on the Jesus Christ Action Figure. With walk-on-water action!
Time to blow the whistle. Is the "obesity epidemic" a medical emergency, or a big fat lie? Paul Campos says it's time to tell the truth.
Marcel Duchamp and William Burroughs take on Howard Stern and Rush Limbaugh at WPS1, art radio from New York's Museum of Modern Art. There's also a variety of music programmed by Elliott Sharp.
One of the finest poets in English, Thom Gunn, has died. Along with Philip Larkin and Ted Hughes, Gunn became famous as a young poet in England in the 1950s as part of "The Movement," writing fine poems in rhyme and meter. But then he fell in love with an American soldier, Mike Kitay, and followed him to San Francisco, where he crafted one of the most daringly original voices in the 20th century, handling taboo subjects like LSD, orgiastic sex, and his 50-year relationship with Kitay with the precision of a diamond cutter. Gunn lived in my neighborhood, and was a dapper, subtle, sexy and hilariously witty man until the end. Ten years ago, when I asked him what music he was listening to he replied, "Oh, Nirvana and Social Distortion. I'm a flighty teenager that way."
Veith v. Jubelirer affirmed by the US Supreme Court
In a 5-4 opinion, the US Supreme Court upheld that gerrymandered Congressional districts are legal and overruled Davis v. Bandemer. Full opinions available. For a background on why this is a structural constitutional problem and why we should be worried about it, read Gerrymandering - "The Great Contradiction".
In a 5-4 opinion, the US Supreme Court upheld that gerrymandered Congressional districts are legal and overruled Davis v. Bandemer. Full opinions available. For a background on why this is a structural constitutional problem and why we should be worried about it, read Gerrymandering - "The Great Contradiction".
White House "disappears" women's info. The Bush administration has quietly removed 25 reports from its Women's Bureau Web site, deleting or distorting crucial information on issues from pay equity to reproductive healthcare. There's a long article about it over at Salon, behind the premium wall.
That boy ain't right...
Recently -- for some reason -- I have found myself listening to the song Hazard by Richard Marx, and my interest in the murderous storyline has been re-piqued. This place has the whole shebang. Background information, conspiracy theories and even a kangaroo court!
Recently -- for some reason -- I have found myself listening to the song Hazard by Richard Marx, and my interest in the murderous storyline has been re-piqued. This place has the whole shebang. Background information, conspiracy theories and even a kangaroo court!
The Blissful Life in Utopia
SUGAR LAND, Tex. -- This is the home of Britton Stein, who describes George W. Bush as "a man, a man's man, a manly man," and Al Gore as "a ranting and raving little whiny baby." Forty-nine years old, Stein is a husband, a father, a landscaper and a Republican. He lives in a house that has six guns in the closets and 21 crosses in the main hallway.
Diary of a Freeper. Fascinating read. Insightful.
SUGAR LAND, Tex. -- This is the home of Britton Stein, who describes George W. Bush as "a man, a man's man, a manly man," and Al Gore as "a ranting and raving little whiny baby." Forty-nine years old, Stein is a husband, a father, a landscaper and a Republican. He lives in a house that has six guns in the closets and 21 crosses in the main hallway.
Diary of a Freeper. Fascinating read. Insightful.
"At some time in the past, according to both [redacted] and [redacted] the President suffered what one of his aides called "a very minor seizure" and as a result of this, the President has a very difficult time following any unscripted conversations."
Note: this link comes from a rather conspiratorial website [another source], but claims to be a report from a reporter with White House access. [/caveat] Via Easybakecoven.
Note: this link comes from a rather conspiratorial website [another source], but claims to be a report from a reporter with White House access. [/caveat] Via Easybakecoven.
Taiwan Cam. A geography of views for the people.
April 27
What's Making Blognews? This little web app scans 600 of the most popular weblogs, and ranks the news stories they're linking to.
online creativity self-assessment test
The questionnaire contains only 40 questions
Your personal score will be compared with the global average score
The test takes no longer than 10 minutes of your time
Do you feel ingenuous? Well, do ya, punk??
Macromedia Flash player is required to take the scan.
The questionnaire contains only 40 questions
Your personal score will be compared with the global average score
The test takes no longer than 10 minutes of your time
Do you feel ingenuous? Well, do ya, punk??
Macromedia Flash player is required to take the scan.
Images is a webzine devoted to pop culture new and old, particularly dealing with film and television. Along with their reviews of current releases is a growing archive of essays on varying topics such as blaxploitation films from the seventies, or film from throughout the world. Dare I post their list of The 30 Best Westerns?
One God, Many Names. An intriguing short paper (pdf) from the Nawawi foundation on names given to God within the Abrahamic faiths and beyond.
Genesis. "Life" from inorganic mixture. Full PDF paper : Spontaneous Formation of Cellular Chemical System that Sustains Itself far from Thermodynamic Equilibrium.
Chordie: Did OLGA leave you in the lurch? Or when she came back, did it just never feel the same? Do text-based song transcriptions make you rub your eyes and stumble over missing lyrics? [after the bridge, there is more inside]
"Who is this Loretta Lynn chick, anyway?". Jack White, in a skintight, red cowboy suit, seemed a little nervous when he came out to introduce his opening act. So nervous, in fact, that the White Stripes frontman offered a cautionary preface of sorts to the massive huddle of young fans at the Hammerstein Ballroom in New York. "Now I want you all to be very nice to my next guest. I think she's the greatest female singer-songwriter of the 20th century,". The crowd looked around at each other, visibly puzzled. In White, Loretta Lynn has found her Rick Rubin. Finally. Much like the producer who revitalized the late Johnny Cash's career with spare, homespun recordings, White has raised the notion of Loretta Lynn as a hip, renegade country artist. The transformation is of the same magnitude as Emmylou Harris's ethereal work with Daniel Lanois in the mid-'90s. more inside
Buy Douglas Adams' tent What I really want is his towel.
The Association Of Lincoln Presenters. Santarchy be damned, I want to go bar-hopping with these guys.
You Like Fish? Why Not English? A musical tribute to the Japanese people by George W. Bush.
(Warning: 500Kbps Windows Media stream. Also available: 500K bpsQuicktime, 80Kbps Windows Media, and 45Kbps Quicktime) [via VeryBigBlog]
(Warning: 500Kbps Windows Media stream. Also available: 500K bpsQuicktime, 80Kbps Windows Media, and 45Kbps Quicktime) [via VeryBigBlog]
DREAM WORLD Given that green tea provides a more effective and environmentally-friendly method of preparing computer hard disks, pulsars are used to study gravitational waves with great precision, solar cells made from nanocrystals are found to be much more efficient, and scientists have discovered evidence for the earliest known wildfire in Earth's history, 443 to 417 million years ago, it would be hard to make the case that what we are living in is not, in fact, a Dreamworld.
Where is Rusty? An abandoned community cries out for its creator to return.
Becoming Evil : Boston WTKK-FM radio's Jay Severin advocates genocide of American-Muslims - this is the advocacy of domestic terrorism. And not the mere targeting of civilians but the murder of over three million men, women, and children. Why shouldn't Jay Severin be arrested and charged, under the Patriot Act, with aiding and abetting US domestic terrorist groups which advocate such violence? [Scroll down towards the bottom of the Globe story for a transcript of the quote in context.]
James Waller has studied the process by which individuals and society come to commit mass atrocities , and says of his theories: "...[the] explanation simply allows us to understand the conditions under which many of us could be transformed into killing machines. When we understand the ordinariness of extraordinary evil, we will be less surprised by evil, less likely to be unwitting contributors to evil, and perhaps better equipped to forestall evil." Hesiod Lists some of WTTK's advertisers : Purina, Hilton Resorts, 99 Restaurant and Pub, A.T. & T. Wireless. Still, Orcinus is my favorite "rise of
extremist terrorist hate speech in America" news source. Germany has laws against such hate speech - which it believes to be so dangerous as to override free speech considerations - But we've got the USA PATRIOT Act, right?
James Waller has studied the process by which individuals and society come to commit mass atrocities , and says of his theories: "...[the] explanation simply allows us to understand the conditions under which many of us could be transformed into killing machines. When we understand the ordinariness of extraordinary evil, we will be less surprised by evil, less likely to be unwitting contributors to evil, and perhaps better equipped to forestall evil." Hesiod Lists some of WTTK's advertisers : Purina, Hilton Resorts, 99 Restaurant and Pub, A.T. & T. Wireless. Still, Orcinus is my favorite "rise of
Remember when you could create subversive campaign posters with the Bush campaign's very own tool? Wasn't culture jamming fun? Well now you can stick it to McDonald's and use their banner design tool to make up your own advertising message! (via NewYorkish)
Shortly after learning of the closing of Avenue Victor Hugo Books in Boston, a fire destroys Spartacus books in my former haunt Vancouver. Although obviously not related, the demise of these two institutions is sad, though Spartacus is trying to carry on through a series of fundraisers this summer. Good photos of AVH and Twelve Reasons for the death of small and independent bookstores.
Duchess's poison dell will lure visitors Provided that a duchess can see eye-to-eye with the Home Office on growing cannabis, strychnine and cocaine, Britain is about to get the most venomous and hallucinogenic garden it has ever seen. via neil gaiman's journal
Now that the terrorists are all caught, it's time to go back to attacking the real problem in America: Ravers.
"The Ecstasy Awareness Act (H.R. 2962) would throw anyone in jail who "profits monetarily from a rave or similar electronic dance event knowing or having reason to know" some event-goers may use drugs at the event. Similarly, Section 305 of the CLEAN-UP Act (H.R. 834) makes it a federal crime - punishable by up to nine years in prison - to promote "any rave, dance, music, or other entertainment event, that takes place under circumstances where the promoter knows or reasonably ought to know that a controlled substance will be used or distributed."ProtectLiveMusic.org has been setup to combat these proposed laws. The idea of busting anyone that promotes a concert where drugs might show up in the jackets of attendees sounds like a good safe law that would never be abused, right? On the bright side, we're now one bill away from Phish and the Dead never touring ever again. :) [via furdlog]
3-digit Interstate Highways - Everything you (n)ever wanted to know about the offshoots of the U.S. Interstate system, including naming conventions and the evil I-238. [via Fark]
This site has a real cool slide show of a bunch of graffitied Rudy Guiliani tv movie posters in NYC subway stations (under 'Other'). Some other good stuff by this artist to check out, too (Flash required).
My Life as Ralph Nader's Flunkie Ralph Nader believes an independent candidacy should "generate more understandings and support for major new directions for our country." His website says these new directions include "repeal of laws that obstruct trade union organization by millions of workers mired in poverty by wages that cannot meet their minimum family livelihoods." The site prescribes "a living wage for tens of millions of workers making under $10 an hour." But the perennial leftist candidate, whose name will appear on the presidential ballot for the third consecutive time this November, has not played by the same rules he strives to make binding for corporations and private businesses.
A Picture's Worth :: a slightly different kind of photo blog -- a single (often excellent) photo, accompanied by a short (often poignant) essay which explains the emotions, memories or thoughts that the photograph triggers for the photographer.
The grays, the mantises, the snake-skins, and the hybrids are just some of the aliens drawn by children at Aliens and Children. To note: thought screen hats will successfully prevent abduction by the mantis-like aliens, the servants of the mantis-like aliens, the snake-skinned aliens, and the Meek-Moks.
Laser-o-vision: A system that projects light beams directly into the eye could change the way we see the world.
Doomed to failure in the Middle East. 52 former senior British diplomats, probably the most experienced people on Middle East issues in Britain, sent a letter to Tony Blair, telling him he is very close to fucking up big time. Tony is trying to pass this as just «right of opinion». What next? Are we going to see foreign office people demonstrating outside Downing street?
Today (April 27th) is FREE ICE CREAM CONE DAY at Ben & Jerry's. Tomorrow night is FREE SCOOP NIGHT at Baskin Robbins.
"The Patriot Act defends our liberty, is what it does, under the Constitution of the United States" A saudi national is being prosecuted for maintaining web sites that advocated violent jihad. [nytimes, reg. req.]
April 26
The Iraqi Governing Council has unveiled Iraq's new flag design to almost universal disapproval. Not only is the US-appointed Iraqi Governing Council increasingly unpopular, but to some Iraqis the flag looks uncomfortably similar to Israel's. And, as Chris Allbritton points out, "damn, that's an ugly flag."
Bobst Boy gets evicted. Sort of. Steve Stanzak is an NYU sophomore who supplemented his living expenses by living in the Bosbt Library. Stanzak has been blogging about this, and after his weblogging was discovered by NYU administrators, he was given housing for the remainder of the year.
A Bigger Splash: What Sunny California Did To Miserable Manchester Man Morrissey. His new album, "You Are The Quarry", is released on May 17th in the U.K. and the next day in the U.S. But the problem is: does anyone still care? I do! [More inside.]
How to Get Out of Iraq by Peter Galbraith
Much of what went wrong was avoidable. Focused on winning the political battle to start a war, the Bush administration failed to anticipate the postwar chaos in Iraq. Administration strategy seems to have been based on a hope that Iraq's bureaucrats and police would simply transfer their loyalty to the new authorities, and the country's administration would continue to function. All experience in Iraq suggested that the collapse of civil authority was the most likely outcome, but there was no credible planning for this contingency. In fact, the US effort to remake Iraq never recovered from its confused start when it failed to prevent the looting of Baghdad in the early days of the occupation.
Much of what went wrong was avoidable. Focused on winning the political battle to start a war, the Bush administration failed to anticipate the postwar chaos in Iraq. Administration strategy seems to have been based on a hope that Iraq's bureaucrats and police would simply transfer their loyalty to the new authorities, and the country's administration would continue to function. All experience in Iraq suggested that the collapse of civil authority was the most likely outcome, but there was no credible planning for this contingency. In fact, the US effort to remake Iraq never recovered from its confused start when it failed to prevent the looting of Baghdad in the early days of the occupation.
Canada considers electoral reform. The Law Commission of Canada just released a report that recomended a Mixed Member Proportional system much like that one that New Zealand recently adopted. Along with the steps being taken at the federal level, the provinces are at various stages in the process. The government in Quebec has proposed a similar MMP system for the province, a commission in PEI recomended the same system, BC has convened a Citizens Assembly, Ontario now has a Democratic Renewal Secretariat, and Saskatchewan and New Brunswick are considering changes as well. For more information visit Fair Vote Canada.
Virginia is for lovers? Never mind marriage, Virginia is getting ready to end any kind of civil union for same sex couples. That means no property contracts, final wills, health care directives, powers of attorney... What to do? One man is calling on America to boycott the state-- starting with J. Crew.
After all the hoopla about increasing security, it seems that the requirement for biometric data to be included in passports of those entering the US from visa waiver countries will need to be extended for two years to allow other countries to catch up with the technology, as it seems most countries are unable to meet the deadline. Some countries have put on hold the new technology, while others seem committed to going ahead with it, despite doubts about the readiness of the technology. Of course, if civil liberties groups get their way, the biometric passports may never see the light of day. Specific religious issues complicate the matter to some extent, also. Given that, if the technology to produce biometric passports is available, will it really be that hard for forged passports to be created? Unless a massive world-wide database containing the biometric details of every person was used for data-matching, it is hard to see how these new measures will really make much difference to anyone apart from the companies selling the technology.
Prosser High School teacher sees 15 year old student's war artwork depicting President Bush as a devil and another decapitated. Captions include calling an end to the war, and support for Ralph Nadar. Teacher hands artwork over to school administrators, who in turn bring in the Secret Service. Because that's what you do when you've handed out an assignment to kids "to keep a notebook of drawings depicting the war in Iraq".
JPEG: worth a
1000 words $1M? "Our patent [for JPEG technology] was on the public record," says Compression Labs.
"News: Made a JPEG Image? You're getting Sued!" Is parent company Forgent sue-happy? Did it perhaps not disclose its patent properly? (-via GyrlFilter)
Fake Photos from Iraq. Or, do it yourself: Fun with Lcpl. Boudreaux.
Chris Leithner on the state of finance. Modern Portfolio Theory is central to most business-school investments curricula, but it has its detractors.(last link pdf)
Global Guerrillas breaks down Gabriel Weimann's study, "www.terror.net: How Modern Terrorism uses the Internet" (PDF).
Via Anarchogeek.
Via Anarchogeek.
Control Lightshow Over Dublin Sky From A Webpage. (link goes to /. with the story and links)
90+ Vietnamese general Vo Nguyen Giap buys 100 copies of "Vallee De La Morte", a board game recreation of the battle of Dien Bien Phu There actually are 2 competing board game recreations of the epic 1954 battle of Dien Bien Phu which was (by the French):
""....an attempt to interdict the enemy's rear area, to stop the flow of supplies and reinforcements, to establish a redoubt in the enemy's rear and disrupt his lines," says Douglas Johnson, research professor at the U.S. Army War College's Strategic Studies Institute. "The enemy could then be lured into a killing ground."....Hoping to draw Ho Chi Minh's guerrillas into a classic battle, the French began to build up their garrison at Dien Bien Phu..." General Giap - who led the Vietcong forces in that battle, prefers "Vallee De La Morte". Such games are played with large multicolored paper maps broken up into hexagonal grids, with cardboard pieces representing military units. The rules can be quite complex and some wargames ( such as Drang Nach Osten) have thousands of pieces and take thousands of hours to play (sometimes longer than the actual wars they simulate). More on wargaming.
""....an attempt to interdict the enemy's rear area, to stop the flow of supplies and reinforcements, to establish a redoubt in the enemy's rear and disrupt his lines," says Douglas Johnson, research professor at the U.S. Army War College's Strategic Studies Institute. "The enemy could then be lured into a killing ground."....Hoping to draw Ho Chi Minh's guerrillas into a classic battle, the French began to build up their garrison at Dien Bien Phu..." General Giap - who led the Vietcong forces in that battle, prefers "Vallee De La Morte". Such games are played with large multicolored paper maps broken up into hexagonal grids, with cardboard pieces representing military units. The rules can be quite complex and some wargames ( such as Drang Nach Osten) have thousands of pieces and take thousands of hours to play (sometimes longer than the actual wars they simulate). More on wargaming.
Are you trying to auction your brussles sprouts again? Take the picture from one one panel cartoon, add the caption from another, what do you get? Something almost funny. (Via bOINGbOING)
Then, in one of his unexplained flashes of clarity, he told Debbie: "I don't want to have Alzheimer's." On Saturday, John will be 57. Although he is in the end stage of early-onset Alzheimer's, he still enjoys simple pleasures: walking outdoors, eating ice cream, listening to music. His wife, children and church friends — some of whom have relatives with dementia — will gather at the nursing home for a birthday party. They will honor the man John once was, and the spirit that survives. And some will no doubt wonder if they are bearing witness to their own futures. Alzheimer's is a disease that can create nurses and chambermaids out of loved ones. Jim Broomall doesn't blame his mother. It's not her fault. She can't help it. No one with Alzheimer's can and caregivers must remember that, he says. "If you don't, you'll go crazy". Or maybe even die: home care for Alzheimer's patients is a major health risk for the caregiver spouse. That's the choice for the families of the Alzheimer's patients (4.5 million of whom are Americans).
Singer Wesley Willis was an artist as well. I'm not generally a big fan of "outsider art," as this might be called, but as raw as these pictures may be, they have a quality to them I don't think I've seen before. Enjoy. Via Monkeyfilter
Militants in Europe Openly Call for Jihad and the Rule of Islam The call to jihad is rising in the streets of Europe, and is being answered, counterterrorism officials say. In this former industrial town north of London, a small group of young Britons whose parents emigrated from Pakistan after World War II have turned against their families' new home. They say they would like to see Prime Minister Tony Blair dead or deposed and an Islamic flag hanging outside No. 10 Downing Street.
A picture's worth a thousand tweets, sure. But I still would like to know what happened here.
March for Choice - Estimates range from 500,000 to more than a million in attendance. With an all-star turnout and a lot of pink, it is one of the largest events to take place on the Mall in Washington D.C.; but how much of an impact will it have on history?
April 25
City-Data has a lot of statistics on about every city, town and village in the US. While there is nothing new about this service, I enjoyed being able to compare cities and towns of interest. What inspired me to post it here though, are the pages of random pictures submitted to the site from all over the country. Basically, you get a diverse collage of how people see their own locals. Here's a nice example.
My Secret LIfe as a Prostitute - A diary about my hidden life as an independent escort, erotic provider, prostitute, whore, call girl, hooker ... whatever you wish to call me. Updated practically daily. A truly fascinating read, probably NSFW, but no pictures save for the artistic one at the top and very little in the way of nasty sex-type words.
Aid world rethinks role in Iraq -- As aid agencies continue to evaluate their work in Iraq, many are coming to the uncomfortable conclusion that their decision to deploy was driven more by politics than local needs.
Not Just Whistling Dixie: Is The South, Like The Past, A Different Country? An article by Jacob Levenson in the Columbia Journalism Review retraces the obligatory, almost stereotypical steps of the innocent, enlightened Yank lost and confused in the South. Is it the usual shtick or is there something genuinely befuddled and even "foreign" to it?
This is what we do to looters (3Mb windows media video) This clip comes from Frontline, showing a US tank crew confronting some Iraqis taking some wood. I'll give a quick preview: it's probably not the best way for Americans to build US-Iraq relations. [via rc3]
A New Typeface for Yale The Yale typeface is available to Yale employees, students, and authorized contractors for use in Yale publications and communications. It may not be used for personal or business purposes, and it may not be distributed to non-Yale personnel.
The Avalon Project: Documents in Law, History and Diplomacy.
The Wal-Mart Myth (or, why higher wages mean higher profits.)
The maps of perception.
2nd link: java applet.
2nd link: java applet.
For those that use SpamAssassin, you may have noticed a degrading service since January 2004. As usual, Google has the Answer - it seems a spammer paid $200 an overly helpful geek on Google Answers to detail exactly how SpamAssassin works... I wonder if said geek ever got the money?
Stand up and Holla! Sponsored by the Republican National Convention. Word, G.
"With his blue ox, Emily Dickenson, Walt Whitman traveled across young America . . . and helped the nation grow into the angry powerhouse it is today." End of the year (2000), pressure from Mr. Farlow to take the class seriously and pick a real poet, Honors Student has 15 cups of coffee and cranks out a masterpiece . . . Not Walt Whitman. Anyone have any information on teacher, student, or their subsequent careers? (via Blogdex)
Victorian Light and Magic Thomas Weynants' Early Visual Media site describes and illustrates a range of nineteenth century technologies for producing and projecting images and illusions, including phantasmagoria, Pepper's ghost, optical toys such as anamorphoses, steroscopes and stereo photographs, imaging techniques such as the physiontrace, and genres such as diableries (visions of hell) . (Links in site labelled 'nudes' or 'risque' NSFW in a Victorian risque kind of way.)
Holding Pattern is a screensaver for Mac OS X that generates photo-realistic simulations of the view from a flying airplane window.
Hey Crackhead: An engineer rants. Via random($foo).
Ugandan Discussions. Forty years of covers from the British satirical magazine Private Eye, indexed by date and subject. Highlights include Lyndon Johnson (from 1965), Ariel Sharon (from 1982), the Diana car crash and September 11. But above all it's fascinating to see how the magazine's style of satire has changed over the years.
24 Hour Comics dot com: April 24 was 24-Hour Comics Day. Similar to weekend novels, people are supposed to gather and work on a comic and try to complete it, start to finish, within 24-hours (though there are some variations). Championed (or invented?) by Scott McCloud (previously discussed here), you can celebrate either by trying to do one on your own, or reading some written by others, including Neil Gaiman and Kevin Eastman.
April 24
Pictures from Iraq Allegedly from someone who served in Iraq.
London Booted - A tribute to the Clash. In the vein of the Grey Album, here is an album of mash-ups in tribute to London Calling. Especially good is the mix of The Clash's Spanish Bombs and Outkast's Bombs over Baghdad. After reading the background (and hopefully donating to one of the worthwhile sponsors), get your download on.
Return of badger badger badger mushroom mushroom: a live action take on the historic badger meme.
[12 megs mpg, via our pals at monkeyfilter]
[12 megs mpg, via our pals at monkeyfilter]
what is it about web games? they start as if-thens and then they become alive. i've been following this game for a while; just out of beta now, free to play. any other games of this sort out there? (perhaps not detective, but same click-per-page web app style)
What happens when 7 disposable cameras are released into the wild, passed from stranger to stranger, and mailed back home? Starting with "Emily", and continuing for several Tuesdays to come, Kevin Fox finds out. [slightly more inside]
Steamboy is a steam punk anime adventure by Katsuhiro Otomo (of Akira fame). Here's the synopsis. Here's the trailer. Looks hella-impressive. Kinda makes my pants shrink. Anybody else know more info on this?
Time to pull out the giant salt shaker - Evidence supporting Abrupt Climate Change theory builds (from a new study published in Nature Magazine, April 22 2004) : "Rate of Ocean Circulation Directly Linked to Abrupt Climate Change - A new study strengthens evidence that the oceans and climate are linked in an intricate dance, and that rapid climate change may be related to how vigorously ocean currents transport heat from low to high latitudes....(From the ever superb NASA Earth Observatory)
Yesterday, Iraq. Today, homeless in the Bronx. Welcome back, soldier, and god bless America.
The Zompist Phrasebook may well be the only phrasebook you'll ever need. Unless, of course, you need to say something other than "The bellboy won't score me any coke!" or "Don't 'imperialist pig' me, my good man." (note: zompist.com covered here way back in the dark ages.)
April 23
A new study (in a biggish PDF) from PRI states that most environmental indicators in the United States have improved dramatically since the 1970's regardless of the political party that controls the White House. Notably: "CO (Carbon monoxide) levels were the lowest recorded during the past 20 years" (EPA, 2002, pg 48), ambient lead levels have fallen 98% between 1976 and 2002 (pg 46), and sulfur dioxide has fallen 70% since 1976 (pg 44). (Mostly) Happy Earth Week, right?
(Via Easterblogg)
(Via Easterblogg)
Understanding polls. For those of us who slept through statistics.
The Green Party of Canada's living platform is their party platform... in Wiki form! It seems that only party members are able to participate in the Wiki, but the rest of us are still able to rank a plank and vote for their platform's priorities in the next election. Once the election date is set, party administrators will form the input into some sort of rough fixed platform, but until then, it's "what real democracy looks like".
After 25 years away, I've recently moved back to the metropolis of my birth, Houston, Texas, and have been reminded that a lot of my favorite buildings here are from the Modern Movement in architecture. However, many of these buildings--much less than a century old!--are now giving way to newer ones, and many unique residences fast being replaced with McMansions. Even the Astrodome's fate is in the air. HoustonMod is trying to preserve these buildings and their place in history. More power to 'em.
The truth that MeFites don't want you to know. As a follow-up to this post on "the Coffins GWB doesn't want you to see," it is revealed that many of the photographs that ran rampant over the Internet and wire services weren't of fallen American soldiers, but were of the crew of the Columbia.
Israeli Border Police use Palestinian kid as human shield. According to Rabbi Arik Ascherman: "The boy, crying, shaking from fear and eventually cold, was sat on the hood of a jeep and tied to the bars protecting the glass. The other three arrestees were bound and placed in front of a second jeep as human shields, to deter protestors from throwing stones at the jeep".
Blender Magazine lists the 50 worst songs of all time. Wait. Before you click the link know the the geniuses over at Blender only post songs 50 (Celline Dion's "My Heart Will Go On") through 41 (Color Me Badd's "I Wanna Sex You Up." Yeah, I'm going to go buy a copy just for this article, aren't you? Fortunately, MSN spares us the torment of not knowing what the worst song of all time might be. Ready? Starship's "We Built This City." Now recognizing that it's the job of critics to make choices, and this is an impossible one, surely we can do better than that, no? [via danieldrezner.com]
There are goofy news items every day, but once in a while you have some story that transcends them all. Teacher accused of ordering student thrown from window is quite possibly the silliest story I've seen this year. It's beyond the Onion. Teacher enters class and takes photo of students, one student objects, teacher makes a disparaging remark about the way the student looks and student hits an emergency button, then the teacher orders two boys to throw her out the window (where she suffered injuries). Best line about the boys "they threw the girl out the window because they did not want to be written up for disobeying a teacher."
First it was turkey parts, then pig waste and now straw added to the camels back. Thermochemical and biochemical conversion make use of natural processes such as enzymes, heat and pressure to create oil from garbage so one day landfills may become the new domestic oil fields.
Staking out the high moral ground, a bill would punish those wearing low-riding jeans. It seems that Representative Derrick D. T. Shepherd of Louisiana, a Democrat no less, wants to outlaw low slung pants. Plumbers beware, and stock up on Butt-Crack Caulk! Really, don't they have anything better to legislate besides fashion or holidays?
sniggle.net :: calls itself a 'Culture Jammer's Encyclopedia' -- its a fabulous compendium of forgeries, fakes, hoaxes, counterfeiting, spoofs, pseudoscience, and just plain weird stuff. Perfect fodder for killing time on a Friday afternoon.
Remember the woman arrested for allowing her kids to be sunburned at a county fair? What's she doing now? Sadly one of her children has died and it has been ruled a homicide.
No Communion for Pro-Choice Politicians
Apparently they have some issue with women having control over their own bodies so they'll deny communion to pro-choice politicians.
Hey, isn't John Kerry a pro-choice Catholic? This couldn't have anything to do with him could it?
Isn't a divisive move like this more likely to result in more people leaving the "faith"?
Apparently they have some issue with women having control over their own bodies so they'll deny communion to pro-choice politicians.
Hey, isn't John Kerry a pro-choice Catholic? This couldn't have anything to do with him could it?
Isn't a divisive move like this more likely to result in more people leaving the "faith"?
NFL player , who walked away from a $3.6 million contract in the aftermath of 9/11 to join his brother in the Special Forces, dies in Afganistan. Unselfishness personified.
GUI Olympics! several corporate sponsors (ATI, nVidia, and others) are offering up $15,000 in prize money for the best GUI skin any designer can come up with for a few applications. while i think it's great to push for newer and better user interfaces, who do so many of the designs seem to be pushing complexity over useability? wouldn't a better use of a GUI design prize be to encourage people to improve on a design rather than make it unintelligible? maybe the people pushing the designs need to take this quiz.
J. Robert Oppenheimer Centennial: It is telling that the first atomic test would be named in reference to a poem by John Donne ("Trinity") and the next series of tests would be labeled simply alphabetically according to military protocol ("Able," "Baker," "X-ray," "Yoke," and "Zebra"). It is indicative of the changing of hands of the bomb, moving from the responsibility of intellectual eclectics like Oppenheimer into the protocols of military rank and policy. See also the Oppenheimer Affair. Via Science NetWatch.
A sad story of self-interest and political naivete. A Washington Post feature about a small group of Chinese students and the government reaction to their political discussion group.
You'd think the return of the Japanese hostages from Iraq would be cause for celebration. Nope. "You got what you deserve!" read one hand-written sign at the airport where they landed. "You are Japan's shame," another wrote on the Web site of one of the former hostages. They had "caused trouble" for everybody.
London designers Steve Mosley and Dominic Wilcox present War Bowls. The conglomeration of warriors melted together in agonizing shapes could be taken as a statement of some kind.
Friday Folding Fun! Paper models of polyhedra (most of which I had never heard of before). When finished they look like this. In many cases it's a toss up as to whether they're easier to fold or to pronounce; dodecicosidodecahedrons, anyone? Also: polyhedra info, indexes; and stellated icosahedra by shape and plan.
"Your talent is so great that you can expect fruit and vegetables to be thrown at every performance." Long before William Hung haunted the American music scene, there were The Cherry Sisters, a Vaudeville act that people loved to hate. A review that read, in part, "The mouths opened like caverns, and sounds like the wailing of damned souls issued therefrom," so offended the sisters that they launched a lawsuit which resulted in an historic ruling regarding fair comment. Oscar Hammestein II proclaimed them "the worst act in the history of light entertainment." Alas, no recordings exist.
Friday nonsense: in a shock plagiarism of "Ask MetaFilter", but with added blue suede shoes, BBC Radio 2 hires Elvis Presley to answer listener's questions on moles, quantum physics, parrots and bread . Sadly, few arguments about operating systems or Iraq, but you can't have everything.... Real Player required
April 22
Doggie Perfume Sets Tails Wagging. Does this mean it was tested on humans first?
You just knew that as soon as gay marriages were legal they'd be screwing in the trees, and damned if it didn't happen.
Designs on the White House -- an online design contest, judged by designers, celebrities, and activists. Winning designs will be available for resale on T-shirts and other products, and all proceeds after expenses will benefit the John Kerry Presidential campaign. Impressive list of judges, including (so far) Milton Glaser, Chip Kidd, Ed Schlossberg, Atrios, and Tom Tomorrow. Designs will be online throughout May, with your votes determining the finalists. (Kerry's official shirts are lacking, imho) Maybe campaign memorabilia always has been?
Frisbees All The Champions. The collection presented here, still in its inception is a geniune showcase of frisbees promoting world champiionships, tv shows, movies, tournaments, food items, music, etc. [via Information Junk]
Heheheheheheee wipe oooout! The biggest moving mountain ever surfed.
This goes against all my flash hating instincts, but it is friday (local time) after all, and it is damned addictive: Floats.
Although the current 2003-04 season of New York City's Metropolitan Opera is winding down, there were two provocative additions to the existing repertoire. Previously banned and restricted from the New York stage (as well as other opera houses throughout the world), the MET offered new productions of La Juive and Salome:
Last performed during the 1935-36 season, the MET reprised Jacques Fromental Halévy's 1835 opera La Juive (The Jewess) after a 68-year absence. Set in 15th-century Constance, the story concerns a Jewish jeweler and his daughter's forbidden romance with a Christian Emperor's son. The implications of the libretto assert religious intolerance, betrayal, and persecution of Jews, where anti-semitism is the motivating force. Conflicting theories debate whether it was pulled in the 1930's to quell the conflagration of anti-semitism, or if trends were merely shifting away from French opera.
Also reprised was Salome, Richard Strauss's 1905 opera based on Oscar Wilde's 1891 play of the same name. During the performance, Salome performs the highly erotic Dance of the Seven Veils for her stepfather Herod, striping completely naked, and then molesting the severed head of St. John. During the 1907 premier at the MET, the production was so scandalous, that it was cancelled after the first performance. It was then permanently banned until 1934, and has only been reprised four times in past 70 years. The new production continues to reflect on past debates, flagging the licentious strip tease and immoral relationship between Herod and teenaged Salome.
Last performed during the 1935-36 season, the MET reprised Jacques Fromental Halévy's 1835 opera La Juive (The Jewess) after a 68-year absence. Set in 15th-century Constance, the story concerns a Jewish jeweler and his daughter's forbidden romance with a Christian Emperor's son. The implications of the libretto assert religious intolerance, betrayal, and persecution of Jews, where anti-semitism is the motivating force. Conflicting theories debate whether it was pulled in the 1930's to quell the conflagration of anti-semitism, or if trends were merely shifting away from French opera.
Also reprised was Salome, Richard Strauss's 1905 opera based on Oscar Wilde's 1891 play of the same name. During the performance, Salome performs the highly erotic Dance of the Seven Veils for her stepfather Herod, striping completely naked, and then molesting the severed head of St. John. During the 1907 premier at the MET, the production was so scandalous, that it was cancelled after the first performance. It was then permanently banned until 1934, and has only been reprised four times in past 70 years. The new production continues to reflect on past debates, flagging the licentious strip tease and immoral relationship between Herod and teenaged Salome.
"The Conscientious Objector Policy Act" just passed the Michigan Assembly, and awaits voting in the state Senate. The bill legalizes the right for a doctor, or any health provider, to deny treatment based on "ethical, moral, or religious grounds." In addition to the obvious notion of restricting abortion, in the most extreme example the bill technically allows doctors to deny treatment to gays simply for believing that homosexuality is immoral.
Aimez-vous Godard? That Is, If You've Actually Seen One Of His Films. Gilberto Perez's view of Godard is strictly personal, as all opinions of his work must be. It does highlight, however, how neglected the restless author's films have lately been. For people of my generation, he was absolutely essential. The supreme cineaste, both with an accent on the "e" (as a film-maker) and without (as a film enthusiast). Whatever became of the Nouvelle Vague? It seems to me that the contemporary cinema could well do with another blast.
Operation Fastlight: Piracy Crackdown [2][3] [4] Let the international war on Piracy begin. DOJ rules for computer seizures. Targetted Groups: Fairlight, Kalisto, Echelon, Class, Project X and APC. Overview of the warez scene. Previous anti-warez operation - buccaneer.
Archaeologists review the loss of valuable artifacts a year after the looting of the Iraqi National Museum. [Via dangerousmeta.]
A new report [complete PDF here] by the Center for Biological Diversity reports that 114 species have gone extinct in the first twenty years of the Endangered Species Act, mostly due to lack of enforcement and political ineptitude.
Here's a list of currently endagered animal and plant species, and an organization that tracks and lists known extinctions.
Here's a list of currently endagered animal and plant species, and an organization that tracks and lists known extinctions.
The alphabet like you've never seen it (quicktime movie).
Reflections On Our Media of Communication. Traditional news media vs. the internet. Are people really abandoning TV, paper, and radio news? Does the 'net really offer the best in free-press? The ever lovable Fred thinks so, and he's not afraid to tell you why.
Diaper Free! Natural Infant Hygiene and Elimination Communication are terms coined by author, Ingrid Bauer, to define an ancient, natural childcare practice for contemporary parents. They describe a gentle, compassionate and practical way to care for a baby's elimination needs from infancy, with or without diapers.
Swallow This, Deep Throat Why overuse of "unnamed sources" is killing decent journalism.
"They called me when I was ombudsman and said, 'Look, you've got all these anonymous sources in here — why shouldn't I assume that you made it up?' And when I would speak to people like Woodward and others at the Post and say 'This is a serious problem for us,' they say 'Oh you know people know they can trust me.' Well, people don't trust them."
"She was as easy as the Daily Star crossword," and other allegedly actual similes and metaphors from student essays, mangled like pigeons on Baltimore light rail tracks.
The Scoop on Poop and The Facts on Farts
:: via filmgoerjuan's blog, sort of ::
:: via filmgoerjuan's blog, sort of ::
Motorcycle Jumps for Scantily Clad Women [flash - potentially NSFW]
Here, kitty, kitty. Help control the pet population... buy a Sportka.
Red vs. Blue and Political Self-Segregation:
"Republicans and Democrats joke these days that they can't understand each other, that they feel as though they live on different planets. It's no joke. They do. One of the reasons American politics is so bitter is that Republicans and Democrats are less likely today to live in the same community than at any time in the last 55 years."The Austin-American Statesman's Bill Bishop begins a series of articles on the increasing political segregation across the US—a variety of segregation that has surprisingly increased while others (for example, racial) have declined. Timothy Noah of Slate has some thoughts. For background, it's been discussed elsewhere that the traditional 2000 election red vs. blue state map is misleading and that a gradated county map might be more enlightening. Here's one. Here's an analysis with a different take on the data. And here are some other interesting cartograms of that election's results. [Alternative Links Inside]
April 21
The coffins that George Bush doesn't want you to see. The Memory Hole filed a Freedom of Information Act request for photographs of American servicemen and women who died in Iraq. After an initial refusal, the request was granted. Over a hundred US troops have been killed in action in the last month alone.
Koolio is a traveling autonomous refrigerator robot ... a cross between R2D2 and a vending machine.
I shared life's Growing Pains with him, and even winced through a video taped copy of Left Behind after finding the books interesting enough, but even my Christian friends think that this is just plain over the top. Ah, the born-again B-list celebrity.
Hot Abercrombie Chick? Maybe not, "Something was amiss, and I had to prove that Hot Abercrombie Chick was either a) a totally different girl, b) a guy or c) some team of people creating an identity. And I was devoted to outing this fraud."
Decrease your Erdös number!!! An Ann Arbor complex systems researcher is offering the opportunity to bid on math's equivalent of the Bacon number - the winner of this auction will, upon research collaboration, obtain an Erdös number of 5. The bidding is currently at $83.00.
The Palace of Hana & Yugen: History and Theory of Noh Theater. [more]
The September Project -- On 9/11, libraries big and small will host events where citizens can participate collectively and think creatively about our country, our government, our community, and encourage and support the well-informed voice of the American citizenry. A Day of and for Democracy.
The Game. It's 4am. In the past twenty hours you've done everything you could ever have imagined-- been chased by black helicopters, climbed mountains, been scared out of your wits, broken the land-speed record for a mini-van, agonized over the inadequate size of your cranium, jumped for joy, and told your best friend off. Everything but sleep. You won't get to do that for at least another 8 hours. A combination of scavenger hunt, road rally and mental gymnastics, The Game sends six-person teams scurrying across the landscape in vans equipped with laptops and photocopiers, maps, bibles, walkie-talkies, GPS units, cryptographic cheat sheets and, variously, wetsuits, sledgehammers and blowtorches. Sound fun? Go for it!
The Horror of Blimps. This is just a short ROTFL funny story about a toy blimp gone bad. Brightened my day, anyway. (Thanks, Ken.)
The Land Shark. Three wheels, three seats. 250 mph on land, 50 mph in the water. Yours for only £10-16,000, once they start building them. At least you can get a shirt now.
communimage. A collaborative art project.
A huge number of internships are illegal. So claims a labor lawyer in this USA Today story. Are unpaid internships a form of white collar exploitation we should crack down on? Just how much of the workforce is unpaid, or working on tiny stipends? And is it like this in other Western countries?
Every culture can be kind of defined by what they drink in order to avoid dying of diarrhea. In China it's tea. In Africa it's milk or animal blood. In Europe it was wine and beer. Salon talks with Neal Stephenson. [premium/free day pass]
Citypop's a stay-at-home dad in New York City. While his medical resident wife grinds out 80 hour weeks, he narrates the hurdles (botched circumcision, apartment fire, roach invasions) of raising a boy in the strange universe of Manhattan's Upper East Side.
the biggest website rip-off of them all
paid for with your tax dollars. the CPA rips the excellent brookings institution. via the sleuths at tpm
paid for with your tax dollars. the CPA rips the excellent brookings institution. via the sleuths at tpm
10th anniversary of Mellow Gold, Beck's first major label release. Marked by streaming of entire album. Over the next two weeks there will be more about the history and making of Mellow Gold, featuring interviews from those associated with Beck and the record.
[Registration required but they are quiet happy with a bogus email address]
Learn how to play along with Beck here and read lyrics to and story behind all his songs, including Loser '....I started the song by writing the verses, and attempting to rap like Chuck D [of Public Enemy]. When [Carl] played it back I thought, 'Man, I'm the worst rapper in the world—I'm just a loser.'
[Registration required but they are quiet happy with a bogus email address]
Learn how to play along with Beck here and read lyrics to and story behind all his songs, including Loser '....I started the song by writing the verses, and attempting to rap like Chuck D [of Public Enemy]. When [Carl] played it back I thought, 'Man, I'm the worst rapper in the world—I'm just a loser.'
Trudeau removes B.D.'s helmet... and that's not all. Garry Trudeau's decision to have central character B.D. seriously wounded has riled some Doonesbury readers and, of course, many cautious newspaper editors. In the same panel as the one showing B.D.'s inury, he's pictured for the first time without his helmet. Maybe it's a gimmick, but it hit me hard.
Piri Reis Map I am a sucker for those books that hypothesize that Earth was visited by extra-terrestrials in the distant pass. One artifact that is brought up in nearly all of them is The Piri Reis Map, a document that seems to be a map includes parts of the world (such as Antarctica's ice-covered mountains) that were thought to be very recent discoveries. But, are they a hoax?
April 20
Draft machine parts, not people! The Industrial Art Gallery is a collection of vintage engineering drawings. Perfect cover art for all you emo/math rock types. [via mimi smartypants]
Kampung: 60 photographs of Singapore architecture.
In the first sweeping review of US Ocean management in 35 years the Presidential appointed U.S. Commission on Ocean Policy has released a report recommending creation of the Ocean Policy Trust Fund to be funded by off-shore oil companies in exchange for drilling rights to the tune of $5 billion a year. Initial reactions are mixed. All praise the reports acknowledgement of serious Ocean mismanagement problems, but some think the report has no teeth, or there is a hidden oil industry agenda. Whatever happens with this amount of money it will be big, the last report in 1969 led to the creation NOAA.
I don't bite....haaaaaard. Making the commuter train ride more interesting: Bluetoothing for anonymous sex. Called Toothing (message board, may be NSFW), randy Brits are using the wonders of technology to find themselves a bit o' fun after a long day's work. Just set your wireless device to discover other nearby devices, send out the 'standard greeting' and get ready to get bizzay. Why do it? Well, the Toothing FAQ says it all: "It's fun! And exciting! And you can meet some wonderful new people and make proper friends. " Well, of course! And don't think it's just a British thing, Toothing's goin' international! So, reach out... reach out and touch someone. Don't forget to floss!
In defense of television. Bob Sassone's response to all this TV Turnoff Week talk.
Norris McWhirter dies. A childhood hero, Norris co-created The Guiness Book of Records and was a knowledgable fixture on the BBC's Record Breakers for many years. "Apart from his family, his great loves were visiting the 1,049 offshore British islands and having a good game of tennis. He was energetic to the last."
An Island to Oneself: The Story of Six years on a Desert Island - Tom Neale
Can Spam Save the World? Mark Cuban, broadcast.com billionaire, owner of the Dallas Mavericks, and Donald Trump wannabe (though he says he's not) is set to host a new "reality" show called The Benefactor. The winner gets $1 million bucks. This guy, who bought the terribly optimistic cubansmillion.com domain, claims he has a "well thought-out" 4-step plan to use the money to save the world. It sounds to me like it was conceived by the underwear gnomes. He fails to explain just how sending 50 million spam emails a day "generates 250 million dollars annually for charitable causes . ($5 in annual earnings per member enrolled.)" I'd be interested in hearing what others with experience in email marketing think. A viable idea or just crackpot self-promotion?
The Art Millenium "The Encyclopedia was founded in May 1999. It contains more than 15,000 pictures and overviews of about 1000 artists. Total size is 2.5 Gigabytes" I was there in their Collections looking at Graphics (Dore, Beardsley, Cranach, Durer, Giger), specifically all of Max Ernst's Une Semaine de Bonte. I have not begun to scratch the surface.
Still romanticizin' the beat generation? Lovely shots from the Venice West Picture Essay - a photo chronicle of the beat generation in venice west, california circa 1958….from the out-of-print "the holy barbarians" by lawrence lipton
The only photographs known to have been taken immediately after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima.
The photographer's (Yoshito Matsushige) testimony from Hiroshima Witness, talking about taking the pictures. This article waxes on about how few exposures he made, how many he framed but did not take.
The photographer's (Yoshito Matsushige) testimony from Hiroshima Witness, talking about taking the pictures. This article waxes on about how few exposures he made, how many he framed but did not take.
Everything you [n]ever wanted to know about Silica Gel. With certifications suitable for fridge display.
Blurring the Line What do this fertility clinic and this publishing company have in common? Ask Lions Gate Films and BMW.
Jeremy Hinzman and Brandon Hughey are soldiers who went AWOL and fled to Canada. They share their stories on their websites. [Via Plastic.]
TRON becomes you... sort of.
(a beautiful obsession)
(a beautiful obsession)
Taboo Tunes :: an interesting exhibit of controversial and banned music recordings (and sometimes cover photographs), which is especially resonant in the interesting times in which we live. Be sure to visit The Gallery of the Forbidden.
Who is Fred Carlyle? Does he exist? How does he feel about food, love, miracles, the future? Will we ever find out? Maybe I only daydreamt his name.
British television presentation, past and present. For the lover of Channel 5, DOGs, presenters, and mocking in all of us.
SpamKing: Out of the Inbox and Into the Closet? I wan7 my XXXXXXXL sh1rt N0W.
This Is Where I Get My Read On Just in case MTV Cribs was coming to your, uh, crib.
April 19
What happens when you mix one part color and one part astrology? You get Pantone Birthday Colors.
UNSCAM: The scandal surrounding the UN and their oil-for-food program with Iraq hasn't received a whole lot of media attention and hasn't, surprisingly, even been brought up on MeFi. It boils down to Saddam Hussein taking the money from oil sales and using it to give kickbacks to France, Russia, and the UN itself, while Saddam built palaces and such, rather than buying food and medicine. It's complicated, but could be the biggest public financial scandal in history. It is unfortunate, but not surprising, that Russia is trying to block any investigation into the matter.
So You Think You Might Be A Writer? Just because you write? An astute essay by Joseph Epstein poses the uncomfortable question: are you weird enough? There's something very unnatural and unhealthy about writing (as opposed to reading, for instance) - but what is it? [Via Arts and Letters Daily.]
The Pentagon as Global Slumlord -- by Urban Theorist Mike Davis (author of City of Quartz and Ecology of Fear):
The battle of Fallujah, together with the conflicts unfolding in Shiia cities and Baghdad slums, are high-stakes tests, not just of U.S. policy in Iraq, but of Washington's ability to dominate what Pentagon planners consider the "key battlespace of the future" -- the Third World city.
His recent essay, Planet of Slums provides more on the ever-growing living- (and battle-?)spaces for hundreds of millions.
The battle of Fallujah, together with the conflicts unfolding in Shiia cities and Baghdad slums, are high-stakes tests, not just of U.S. policy in Iraq, but of Washington's ability to dominate what Pentagon planners consider the "key battlespace of the future" -- the Third World city.
His recent essay, Planet of Slums provides more on the ever-growing living- (and battle-?)spaces for hundreds of millions.
What's on TV tonight? Nothing! That's right, it's the tenth annual TV turn-off week. I've actually done this in the past three years, though last year I cheated and just watched everything a week later on TiVo.
There are numerous reasons proffered to drink juice. It's easier to drink a small serving of juice than to eat a large serving of fruits and vegetables; that much is intuitive. An oft-plagiarized article claims that juicing frees nutrients that otherwise could not be absorbed, cites 1940s research that chlorophyll can aid in hemoglobin synthesis, and claims that 1 cup of carrot juice has the nutritional content of 4 cups of chopped carrots (although cranking the numbers [pdf] gives an answer closer to 2 cups.) Skeptics argue that much of this talk is hype, correctly noting that juice is not a miracle disease cure as some hucksters claim, and that by juicing you are discarding beneficial fiber. But absurd juicing claims aside, is there any reason needed beyond the great taste? [more inside]
Amazing vintage microphones. Stumbled into this site looking for reference photos...what I found instead was detailed technical specs, vintage advertisements, old time photos, bios of audio pioneers....and lots of microphone tech-pr0n photos. Beautiful. This guy knows more about this than I will probably ever know about Anything. This page explains why it was built...and I think it is a great example of why the web works as a brainfood potluck.
Beer, like people, comes in all shapes and sizes. Now 2,246 beers from around the world to view, comment on, and admire. From the beautiful Negra Modelo to the insane 17% Samuel Adams Triple Bock. For a more American-centric beer review page, check out Beer Advocate. Full of beer snobbery that extols microbrews while pissing on all macros. Not that it's a bad thing, we all support our favorite microbrew, don't we?
The Goldman Environmental Prize has been awarded to seven people. Sometimes considered the Nobel prize for the environment, it's given to people from six regions of the world, each winning $125,000. The winners include Margie Richard of Norco, Louisiana, and Rashida Bee and Champa Devi Shukla from Bhopal, India, who have respectively fought two of the world's largest chemical companies for justice following chemical plant leaks in their towns (the Bhopal accident killed 20,000 people.)
Saudization is the process of hiring Saudi Arabian nationals to join the Saudi workforce and is an interesting counterpoint to the US phenomena of outsourcing. The goal of Saudization is to discourage reliance on foreign workers as well as to combat domestic unemployment, which is worsened by the rapidly swelling ranks of restive, undereducated youth. Unfortunately it's not as easy to put into practice as it sounds.
The 2004 Lyttle Lytton winners were announced. The premise is simple: write a terrible opening line (of 25 words or less) of a hypothetical novel. In case you're wondering the winners in 2003 and 2002 were discussed previously. [via kathrynyu]
Remember the weirdness with Bush's hypnotic rainbow tie last week? Now you too can experiment with creating mesmerizing patterns on Project LITE's Moire page.
[via j-walk blog]
[via j-walk blog]
Seamus Heaney's Top Hip Hop Picks. Sort of. (You know: Seamus Heaney.)
Batman and Robin have been spotted on the streets of Whitley england, saving damsels in distress, scaring wrongdoers and even chasing naked men from football fields. Other self-made superheroes making news range from the amusing to the disturbing. Even MTV and Stan Lee are jumping into the fray with a casting call for a reality TV show where contestants will compete against each other in a show designed to develop their superhero characters and test their mettle as defenders of justice.
More clash from the right. Political Scientist Samuel Huntington has gone domestic with his "Clash of Civilizations" (previous MeFi links here and here). In his new article, "The Hispanic Challenge" (soon to be a book entitled "Who Are We"), he highlights the threat hispanics pose to what he has decided is "the Anglo-Protestant culture of America."
Ennobling the Seeds. Can genius be donated?
Ice Age Floods Institute. In recent geological time immensely powerful, cataclysmic Ice Age Floods regularly swept across the Pacific Northwest. A proposed Ice Age Floods National Geological Trail is in the works. Virtual tour of Glacial Lake Missoula.
April 18
Blindfold Blog. One of the first steps to becoming a guide dog instructor is to spend ten days blindfolded, living in a guide dog school dorm with a class full of blind students who are there to learn how to use their new dogs. [via links clips notes etc.]
What do you mean Matt Haughey isn't on this list?
Time Magazine does a sequel to the 100 Most Influential People of the 20th Century with a list of the current Hot 100... Have fun raging at the inevitable bad choices and obvious omissions. For a more entertaining list, here's Parade Magazine's 100 Greatest Movie Characters.
Preemptive strike: Yeah, all "Top 100" Lists are lame, but critiquing them can be an entertaining way to finish off a boring weekend
Time Magazine does a sequel to the 100 Most Influential People of the 20th Century with a list of the current Hot 100... Have fun raging at the inevitable bad choices and obvious omissions. For a more entertaining list, here's Parade Magazine's 100 Greatest Movie Characters.
Preemptive strike: Yeah, all "Top 100" Lists are lame, but critiquing them can be an entertaining way to finish off a boring weekend
The Hospitality Club is a similar idea to CouchSurfing in that both sites provide a database of people offering free lodging to each other when visiting foreign countries. The Hospitality Club has been going for nearly three years and has over 12,500 members in 142 countries. The site has wiki-like features allowing members to edit travel guides for each country, region and city.
Bedroom Music for Bedroom People A veritable treasure trove of hours and hours of mixes of fine abstract headphone-fodder of varying flavours, be it compelling hiphop or weirdo IDM or just etcetera. A fine way to pass a lazy Sunday away ...
Cinemorgue - Proof that some people have way too much time on their hands.
Khaaan!! I have no idea why I find this amusing.
Murder for hire in professional hockey: After being eliminated in the NHL playoffs, St. Louis Blues player Mike Danton (formerly Mike Jefferson) was arrested by the FBI for "conspiring and using a telephone across state lines to set up a murder". But there's more to this sad state of events than meets the eye: Danton is rumoured to have been arranging the murder of his male lover supposedly to prevent his outing to the sports world.
Behind Diplomatic Moves, Military Plan Was Launched. An excerpt from the new book "Plan of Attack" by Bob Woodward. Amongst its claims are that Saudi ambassador Prince Bandar was informed of the plans for Iraq before Colin Powell, and that $700 million designated by Congress for the war in Afghanistan was used to prepare for the war in Iraq.
Watching Justice -- a new blog keeping an eye on the Dept. of Justice, drawing on the research and insight of a vast list of organizations, from the ABA to the Violence Policy Center, and brought to us by Soros' Open Society Institute.
Vitrum: Glass Between Art and Science in the Roman World , an exhibition hosted by the Institute and Museum of the History of Science in Florence, describes the use of glass in different areas of Roman life: technology, daily life, architecture, and science. Each of the items in the themed galleries is linked to a large, high-resolution image; some beautiful examples of 2000-year-old glass include: a decorative glass hexagon, a blue glass cup from pompeii, and a striped mosaic glass cup.
The Museum of Burnt Food. Celebrating the art of culinary disaster since the late 1980s.
April 17
World Domination LLC (is) a consortium of organizations devoted to the consolidation of global capital by a single cabal or individual, employing the tactics of terror and subterfuge...The most visible public face of our organization is www.villainsupply.com.
Cat + Rabbit != Love
Flash movie.
Flash movie.
Pillow Talk -- what blogs were like 1000 years ago.
The recent White House nomination of Allen Weinstein to become the next Archivist of the United States has produced some interesting reactions. Is this standard election-year politics, or is there something else going on?
What kind of quiz-taker are you? Find out what kid of Internet quiz-taker you are. While you're at it, find out what Hummel figurine you are and which industrial solvent you are.
Botticelli and Filippino : Grace and Unrest in 15th Century Florentine Painting.
Facewound is an excellent homebrew side-scrolling action game that's currently still in preview. It features zombies, bullet time, and a full arsenal of weaponry. It's not web based, but it does feature some nice special effects for those of you with good graphics cards (not required). Also, it's very friendly to custom maps and skins. Here is the download page for those who want to get right into it. All and all, a good way to waste a Saturday.
April 16
The Writings on the Stall :: a new compendium of bathroom graffiti
nosepilot's Al Sacui, master artist of vector and spectra, has a new online graphic novel for your visual feasting. note: intuitive navigation
The low-impact living initiative produces information sheets on a range of low-impact topics. Don't believe the hype.
Harvard's Institute of Politics has created a short test to measure where your political beliefs fit with college students across the country. You better sit down for this one: I am a Traditonal Liberal ! From Secular Centrist Matthew Yglesias. Take the test and see where you fall on the brightly colored chart.
Cicadas best served sauteed in butter and parsley apparently, or if you want to go more upscale: "The soft-shelled cicada, it's done just like a soft-shelled crab," says executive chef Frank Belosic, describing how freshly molted cicadas should be rolled in flour, pan-fried in olive oil, and finished with a sauce of white wine, butter and shallots.
Analogia - You upload your face and complex recognition software returns three celebrities you most resemble. Which are you? The software is surprisingly accurate! (Marginally NSFW: thumb nailed obscenity)
HR 3077 - unprecedented federally mandated intrusion into the content and conduct of university-based area studies programmes.
HR 3077 - "unprecedented federally mandated intrusion into the content and conduct of university-based area studies programmes."
"There is a great deal at stake for American higher education and academic freedom. If HR 3077 becomes law - the Senate will review the bill next - it will create a board that monitors how closely universities reflect government policy. Since the legislation assumes that any flaw lies 'with the experts, not the policy', the government could be given the power to introduce politically sympathetic voices into the academic mainstream and to reshape the boundaries of academic inquiry. Institutional resistance would presumably be punished by the withdrawal of funds, which would be extremely damaging to Middle East centres especially."
you didn't have reason to call your congressperson tomorrow? you do now. frightening.
via the excellent openbrackets.com
"There is a great deal at stake for American higher education and academic freedom. If HR 3077 becomes law - the Senate will review the bill next - it will create a board that monitors how closely universities reflect government policy. Since the legislation assumes that any flaw lies 'with the experts, not the policy', the government could be given the power to introduce politically sympathetic voices into the academic mainstream and to reshape the boundaries of academic inquiry. Institutional resistance would presumably be punished by the withdrawal of funds, which would be extremely damaging to Middle East centres especially."
you didn't have reason to call your congressperson tomorrow? you do now. frightening.
via the excellent openbrackets.com
I've run a marathon and it was hard. Then I learned about ultra marathoners doing 50 and 100 mile runs in one day. Then there are the marathons and ultra marathons in rough places, like Death Valley. Then there's the grand daddy of difficulty: The Marathon Des Sables. It's 6 days and 6 marathons long, run in a desert with temps topping 110F, you have to carry your week's gear and food, and you are limited to 9 liters of water a day. Here are some photos and blogger Ben Hammersley's current results are here. The event finishes tomorrow. [via jay allen]
Conflict Archive on the Internet: history, images, and more from Northern Ireland, 1968 to the present.
Wilco -- A Ghost is Born Forget SoulSeek or Limewire, stream the new Wilco longplayer right from the source. [Previously discussed here]
Two HIV Cases Put a Scare Into P9rn (LATimes) Several major adult movie companies — including the industry's largest, Vivid — have decided to stop filming for 60 days after two stars tested positive for HIV. But other companies dismissed the plea for a moratorium, calling it "paranoid" and "knee-jerk," and vowed to keep their cameras rolling. The industry, they said, was perfectly safe."I'm against any stop in production," said a producer "It will put a lot of people out of business. You'll have people who will start losing their apartments. It's just not fair." When do adult movies (a hugely profitable business where unprotected sex is often performed) end being sexy and start being "Russian Roulette on dvd" scary? The two actors who have tested positive for the HIV virus are identified as Darren James and Lara Roxx. Roxx (who's 18 or 19) had only been in the adult industry for three months. 45 actors and actresses who subsequently either worked with James or the women he had sex with after contracting the virus, which is believed to have occurred in Brazil (where, incidentally, star and director John Stagliano -- not completely work-safe link -- says he caught AIDS in 1997), have been identified, too. warning: except the Stagliano link, all the others are work-safe. (more inside)
Yeti Sports. The creators of the infamous penguin bat flash game have opened an entire site featuring music, e-cards, and most important, two new games. Excuse me, I'm off to spend Flash Friday doing horrible things to flightless waterfowl.
The 'nightmare' fall of Svend Robinson: Canada's first openly gay MP threw his career into doubt yesterday with a shocking revelation that he had stolen a piece of jewellery last weekend.
The Art Renewal Center is Very Upset. The Minneapolis Institute of Arts (MIA) has decided to sell a painting by artist William Bouguereau so they can acquire a painting by Albert Joseph Moore. The painting, Bohémienne was originally purchased for $3,500 by the MIA back in the early 1970's for the purpose of reselling it at some future date for a better work of art. Christie's expects it to sell for between $700,000 and $900,000. The sale of this painting has angered some who feel that a museum's role is to protect important artwork not risk losing it to private collection for a questionable gain. Does a museum have an ethical responsibility to prevent art from disappearing from public view?
Mr. Nobody is worth exploring.
And the apprentice is: Kwame Jackson!
Trump fired Bill for how he ran a tournament at Trump National Golf Club and hired Kwame for the way he put together a Jessica Simpson concert at the Taj Mahal casino in Atlantic City.USA Today makes an ooopsie.
Geek Prom Has been going on for a handful of years now, here is an older news story 'bout it. That is all, nothing earth shattering. Cheers
I have seen the future of Metal and it's name is Norselaw and their anthem "Sweet Home Scandinavia". Let the Berzerking Begin!
the sphereXP is a 3D desktop replacement for Microsoft Windows XP. Taking the known concept of three-dimensional desktops to its own level. It offers a new way to organize objects on the desktop such a icons and applications.
What do you do after you climb Mt. Everest? Climb it again from the other side, of course. The first woman to accomplish that feat. And then what? Cathy O'Dowd calls it the E to E Challenge. Everest to Everyday.
So let's round up a couple of friends, hitch up the dogs and mush from Styggedalen to Nordkapp across 650 km of Arctic wilderness to support the Nelson Mandela Children's Fund. And why not blog it daily with a website run from the back of a sled? Today, the sled fell in a river. Sure makes my life seem dull.
So let's round up a couple of friends, hitch up the dogs and mush from Styggedalen to Nordkapp across 650 km of Arctic wilderness to support the Nelson Mandela Children's Fund. And why not blog it daily with a website run from the back of a sled? Today, the sled fell in a river. Sure makes my life seem dull.
Oldest Jewelry Discovered In African Cave At least 75,000 years old, the find suggests that early humans had a complex sense of symbolism.
A viilage to reinvent the world : Gaviotas "In 1965 Paulo Lugari was flying over the impoverished Llanos Orientales, the "eastern plains" that border Venezuela. The soil of the Llanos is tough and acidic, some of the worst in Colombia. Lugari mused that if people could live here they could live anywhere.....The following year Lugari and a group of scientists, artists, agronomists and engineers took the 15-hour journey along a tortuous route from Bogota to the Llanos Orientales to settle."
"...they would need to be very resourceful. So they invented wind turbines that convert mild breezes into energy, super-efficient pumps that tap previously inaccessible sources of water [powered by a child's playground seesaw!], and solar kettles that sterilize drinking water using the furious heat of the tropical sun....They even invented a rain forest!" (from "Gaviotas - A village to reinvent the World", by Tim Weisman) Amidst the strife of war torn Columbia, Gaviotas persists and even flourishes. " "When we import solutions from the US or Europe," said Lugari, founder of Gaviotas, "we also import their problems."....Over the years Gaviotas technicians have installed thousands of the windmills across Colombia....Since Gaviotas refuses to patent inventions, preferring to share them freely, the design has been copied from Central America to Chile."
Gaviotas is real, yes, but it is also a state of mind - as if Ben Franklin, Frank Lloyd Wright, Leonardo Da Vinci - all of the great those giants who reinvisioned the possible - were reincarnated : as a small Columbian village on a once-desolate plain. "Colombian novelist Gabriel Garcia Marquez has called Paolo Lugari the "inventor of the world." "
"...they would need to be very resourceful. So they invented wind turbines that convert mild breezes into energy, super-efficient pumps that tap previously inaccessible sources of water [powered by a child's playground seesaw!], and solar kettles that sterilize drinking water using the furious heat of the tropical sun....They even invented a rain forest!" (from "Gaviotas - A village to reinvent the World", by Tim Weisman) Amidst the strife of war torn Columbia, Gaviotas persists and even flourishes. " "When we import solutions from the US or Europe," said Lugari, founder of Gaviotas, "we also import their problems."....Over the years Gaviotas technicians have installed thousands of the windmills across Colombia....Since Gaviotas refuses to patent inventions, preferring to share them freely, the design has been copied from Central America to Chile."
Gaviotas is real, yes, but it is also a state of mind - as if Ben Franklin, Frank Lloyd Wright, Leonardo Da Vinci - all of the great those giants who reinvisioned the possible - were reincarnated : as a small Columbian village on a once-desolate plain. "Colombian novelist Gabriel Garcia Marquez has called Paolo Lugari the "inventor of the world." "
CIA Warned of Attack 6 Years Before 9-11 Six years before the Sept. 11 attacks, the CIA warned in a classified report that Islamic extremists likely would strike on U.S. soil at landmarks in Washington or New York, or through the airline industry, according to intelligence officials.
Derelict London. A gently melancholy collection of photographs of abandoned shops, hospitals, housing estates, public lavatories, and much more. See also Britannia Moribundia, on the national obsession with dinginess and decay. This is where England most truly excels: in all the characterful shabbiness of its drizzled parks, soiled launderettes, frayed tailors, abject chemists .. and cowed solitary cafes.
The Intel IT Manager Game lets you manage an IT department (flash, reg. required, you don't have to enter a valid e-mail address). Here is another attempt (click "Simulation" at the top). For those who rather calculate than point-and-click, try the Ipas TCO simulation. [via Flex-MX Blog]
What is The Athenaeum? The Athenaeum is a humanities collection, mostly late 19th century European paintings.
April 15
Sketchzilla - a public collaborative online community art project.
(As with most public spaces, if you're easily offended, this may not be for you. It may be NSFW at any given moment.)
(As with most public spaces, if you're easily offended, this may not be for you. It may be NSFW at any given moment.)
Researchers have created a 3D search engine. Sketch the object you're looking for and the search engine will attempt to find it.
The most serious charge which can be brought against New England is not Puritanism but February. -- J W Krutch
New England Ruins :: Photographs
Teenage Angst Poetry: The Poetry of Adolescence. This has to be one of the best things I have read online in a long time. I'll share mine if you share yours! (2nd link to CBC Radio 3 Flash site – click through the opening page and then click on the second article. Well worth it.)
If you're going to brag that you could eat 100 peeps at a sitting, don't do it the day after Easter when they're on sale.
The Czar of Bizarre Johnny Meah grew up with the circus, clowning and making circus banners. His artwork is now collected as "Americana" and is on display on his site.
Ancient Greek mythology for aspiring young pagans.
warning: educational friday flash fun for the geeklings!pre-emptive comment: it's now friday in oz :)
warning: educational friday flash fun for the geeklings!pre-emptive comment: it's now friday in oz :)
Godsend Institute offers up this explanation of their cloning procedures. Since Dolly, several scientists have cloned other animals, including cows and mice. Now, at Godsend, we have pioneered a technique that allows a cell nucleus from a recently deceased child to be implanted within a human egg, allowing a mother to carry that child to term again.
How To Catch An Alligator is Ken Perlin's essay on his trip to the Amazon. The rest of his site is pretty amazing too. I suppose I'll have to put going to Brazil on my list of things that he's done that I envy him for.
Eureka! Brain scans reveal the neural processes correlated with moments of insight. [Via FuturePundit.]
9 beet stretch is the act of using digital tools to slow down Beethoven's 9th symphony to the point where the piece takes 24 hours to complete. Next week, a 9 beet stretch will be taking place in San Francisco, at 964 Natoma, from Friday April 23rd to Saturday April 24. Sleepover!
Quake to hit LA "by September 5," predicts a geophysicist at UCLA's Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics. Some skeptical, while others say it's not junk science.
The Counter Clinton Library A tax exempt reaction to the Clinton Library being built in Little Rock, Arkansas.
Genetic Savings and Clone is the first company to offer domestic animal cloning to the consumer. For just $50,000 you can have an exact replica of Fifi or Snowball. The company's founder claims this is a boon for loving pet owners. Others aren't so sure.
If I Ruled Design. Haven't you always wanted to knock out Milton Glasier? Now you can. Via Little Fluffy Industries.
Interested in QR codes? Make your own here.
This article, in Hypulp, describing how text and data can be coded into noiselike pixel patterns, was fascinating. It made me look for a way to generate these codes myself. Thanks gen for yesterday's link to Hypulp.
This article, in Hypulp, describing how text and data can be coded into noiselike pixel patterns, was fascinating. It made me look for a way to generate these codes myself. Thanks gen for yesterday's link to Hypulp.
FanPants To provide padding in the form of an oversized buttocks positioned in the seat of the pants. Talk about over-serving your target market... yeesh. [SFW - some flash - via Milk and Cookies]
Just found this one. The San Francisco Chronicle reports on a Berkeley website for supporting science teachers teaching evolution. The project was built with a grant from the National Science Foundation and has received an additional grant to expand the site to develop content for students and adults. More coverage from The Daily Bruin at UCLA and a brief clip from Science News.
Government of Canada vs. BlogsCanada The Government of Canada has served a cease and desist order to Canadian blog portal, BlogsCanada. Obviously the Treasury Department doesn't agree that the sincerest form of flattery is imitation.
They've been used to teach everything from math to social science, nuclear chemistry to English as a second language and even religion (although opinions vary on the value of that). The Simpsons: is there anything they can't do?
Number Spirals: Coincidences of order. "In mathematics you don't understand things. You just get used to them."
CNET's music.download.com, aka the new look mp3.com beta launches in a week or two. Artists are asked to submit music from now, however. (Previously on metafilter: exhibts A and B.)
"Which office do I go to to get my reputation back?" The US army has quashed convictions against a Muslim chaplain initially accused of spying at the US detention camp in Guantanamo Bay in Cuba. It means Captain James Yee - who spent 76 days in custody when the spying allegations were first made - now has a clean military record.
Author challenges Darwin's theory of "sexual selection." To Darwin, mutations that don't enhance survival, like peacocks' tails, must be aids to attracting mates to pass on genes. Homosexuality, therefore, is to Darwin and the Christian-right both an unnatural aberration. But with ever growing evidence of homsexual behavior in animals, from bonobos to penguins, isn't it time that Darwin's theory get replaced?
Jesus Christ: Choose your own savior.
Everyone claims their Jesus is the "real" one, the only authentic Christ unperverted by secular society or religious institutions... Nowadays, even nonbelievers assert a superior understanding of who the actual Jesus really was and what he stood for.
Everyone claims their Jesus is the "real" one, the only authentic Christ unperverted by secular society or religious institutions... Nowadays, even nonbelievers assert a superior understanding of who the actual Jesus really was and what he stood for.
This is precisely the sort of inane mumbojumbo that will -- perhaps literally -- get us all killed. ...The importance of words is a conceit of wordsmiths, certainly. But they are important -- especially when they bleed through into thought and action, which happens more often than you'd think.,
TPM is becoming almost too widely-read to be postworthy, but Josh really puts things into perspective with this post. For an example of what all this jingoistic gibberish can result in, see the post below it.
TPM is becoming almost too widely-read to be postworthy, but Josh really puts things into perspective with this post. For an example of what all this jingoistic gibberish can result in, see the post below it.
Absolutely, The Universe Could Be Funnel-Shaped At an extreme enough point, you would be able to see the back of your own head. It would be an interesting place to explore - but we are probably too far from the narrow end of the horn to examine it with telescopes. Frank Steiner's Quantum Chaos group
This is a message to our neighbours north of the Mediterranean, containing a reconciliation initiative as a response to their positive reactions. Osama bin Laden's latest message to the world. (more inside)
Documentography is a collective of young photographers dealing with documentary and photojournalism. They publish a quarterly magazine called Issue that has photos and stories by independent photographers. Great pictures.
I know this is probably a crappy post, and I saw this on a Google ad linked here. Does anyone see the irony in this Bush campaign product?
The sky is falling! [some links require reg] The years of hacking DIRECTV's signal and pirating its program offerings seem to be coming to an end.
A world wide panorama shoot. On Saturday, March 20, more than 170 photographers in 39 countries around the world celebrated the Equinox by creating VR panoramas. This site showcases the results of their efforts. (Quicktime needed)
Hall of Fame 2004 The best of classical music [via Nomen Luni].
Pumpkin Soup (the best you ever tasted). Tatty Ratty. Bear Under the Stairs. Helen Cooper writes and illustrates some beautiful children's books. This is a fascinating site about her books and her writing process. Take a look inside Pumpkin Soup and make sure to find it next time you're at the bookstore. Even if you don't have children... Then there was trouble. A horrible squabble. A row, a racket, a rumpus in the old white cabin.
April 14
George and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamtie. I watched the Presidential news conference but did'nt notice the tie effect, however a friend mentioned they had to put a piece of cardboard accross the TV to filter it out. More on the tie malfunction here the news conference video is available here .
Headline of the year. Intentional pun?
kill bill [note: flash, foreign, violent]
The GashlyCrumb Tinies "A is for Amy, who fell down the stairs", "B is for Basil, assaulted by Bears", "C is for Clara, who wasted away", D is for Desmond, thrown out of a sleigh", "E is for Earnest, who choked on a peach", "F is for Fanny, sucked dry by a leech" - But, as they say, a picture is worth a thousand words. Edward Gorey's GashlyCrumb Tinies, A-Z, in pictures - done in by bears, tacks, gin, awls, mires, fires, mice, ennui......enjoy!
Hypulp is a new effort by Paul Baron (recently profiled in Wired.com and TheFeature) and Paulus Dreibholz which "documents the influence of the internet on print design." Although only a few weeks old, discussions on the site include the use of web fonts in print, barcodes linking to online content, and other topics in that milieu.
Deviant Art is an incredibly rich resource of the profound, the visually impressive, amusing, and surreal.
A great old animation (5.4MB quicktime) set to a wonderful song Old Tin Can.
"Iraq will be a free, independent country, and America and the Middle East will be safer because of it." and part of this process is appointing an Ambassador. The leading candidate for this job? US ambassador to the UN and former US ambassador to Honduras, John Negroponte.
Cannon Films -- the notoriously schlocky independent studio that brought you such fare as Invasion USA, Masters of the Universe, and the Sylvester Stallone arm-wrestling movie Over the Top -- now have a fan-made blog devoted to their impossibly awful (yet addictive) movies. Your hosts Ink Syndicate give an informative and amusing history of Menahem Golan and Yoram Globus's peerless cinematic empire. Unknown Films provide an employee's-eye-view, interviewing Cannon advertising guy Jim Berteges.
Help U.S. Marines Equip TV Stations in Iraq US Marines seek to equip seven (7) television stations serving local communities within Al Anbar Province, Iraq. The Province includes the cities of Fallujah and Ramadi. These stations will offer information that is more accurate and balanced than existing alternatives. The goal is to improve understanding between Americans and Iraqis, build trust and reduce tensions.
Forget Fiction And Non-Fiction, Bud: Is The Book Liberal Or Conservative? The National Review's bestseller list (scroll down and click) is starkly divided into "Conservative Bestsellers" and "Liberal Bestsellers". Is this a quirky innovation and deliberate provocation or just plain stupid and sad? Does such a dichotomy in fact exist? How would the literature of the world fit into such a classification? (This isn't the end of the world as we know it, is it?)
Sengoku Daimyo: Projects related to medieval Japan.
Sharpeworld is back! From the scopitones to that creepy bald head and fascinating linky goodness, and now--Radio Sharpeworld too!
little trees is a brand new weekly comic from Drew Weing, who you may know from The Journal Comic and Pup (subscription only beyond the current sample).
Where Having Sex is a Crime: Criminalization and Decriminalization of Homosexual Acts. As Western countries ponder the legalization of gay marriage, it's well worth keeping in mind that queer men and women are living in the dark ages elsewhere. The International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission tries to keep track of progressive and regressive steps, and advocate for liberty. It's a tough job.
Art & Psychosis Some have suggested that there is a link between creativity and mental illness (MI), and others equivocate a little. One way or another, whether called Outsider, Transgressive or... (?) art is art and it seems the art from this community has greater potential (IMO) from an emotional standpoint then the majority that comes out of art school. One last link
Political Roadtrips - Here's a novel alternative to protesting Bush - visiting swing states to register voters there.
A .psd is worth a thousand words. As images are used more and more as propaganda, and Photoshop becomes ever more available to the masses, where are we headed? How can you continue to believe your eyes?
Miss Mary's Victorian Halloween, being a Compendium of Gothic Images, Tales & Whimsy from the Victorian Era.
Amazon's A9 Launches - Amazon.com's Entry into the Search Engine World launches today (in Beta). [via BoingBoing]
Tony Blair: Why we must never abandon this historic struggle in Iraq. Terry Jones: Tony really must try harder.
She's no Barbie To readers of Russian Fairy tales, the name Alyona conjures images of simple peasant girls who become princesses through modesty, hard work and intelligence. A modern day Alyona has surfaced in the cut-throat world of beauty pageants.
Lobby Now! Alan McLeod, Canadian Lawyer, writes "Make sure you are heard as Canada decides to revamp its Copyright Act." He goes on to encourage Canadians to contact the Heritage Minister and weigh in as the Copyright rules in Canada may be about to change.
Dial-A-Cheater "proved what I couldn't. After he answered the call I scheduled, I asked him who it was. He lied. I totally busted him out. He was cheating with my best friend!" Kill the illusion of joy with a cell phone (and $1.95 USD).
Areva! Cool pixel art ad set to the tune of :::gasp:::"Funky Town"
Lung cancer 'different in women' Rates of lung cancer in women have increased significantly in recent decades while those for men have remained stable. Female smokers have a greater chance of developing lung cancer, and a higher risk of developing adenocarcinoma, which is the most common form of the disease. But women also have better survival rates, the researchers said.
Have you ever wanted your very own wax museum? Who hasn't? Well, here's your chance:
The Country Music Wax Museum of the Stars is being auctioned on eBay.
The Country Music Wax Museum of the Stars is being auctioned on eBay.
"The real estate bubble's gonna pop!" You seem to hear that all the time... But dig deeper and you find that other people don't even think there's a bubble. Others think there's a bubble, but it's gonna keep growing. Then, just to make it interesting, you've got others who said the bubble was going to pop back in 2002. Why is first-time home-buying this friggin' difficult?!
Naive is a beautifully-presented site featuring some cool games and cartoons. Note: Flash. Via akihi.
April 13
Plymouth - Dakar Challenge 2005. 3000 mile race from Britain to Senegal, Africa. The Rules: Participant cars must cost $100UK pounds or less. Maximum budget for vehicle preparation: $15UK pounds. No outside assistance during race drivers are on their own. First to finish wins, cars donated to charity.
Gift hub - Connecting Funders, Active Citizens, and Advisors. Phil Cubeta, who is known to many as the weblog world's Happy Tutor (et al.), wants to stop just talking about philanthropy and actually do something. Now this a Corporate Guy that I actually respect. He's recently decided to 'go from satire to sermon, from noting problems to working for solutions,' and brought together some other smart and influential people to talk about philanthropy, activism, volunteerism, charity, social movements, civil society, and emerging democracy, and is one of the people organizing an Open Space for Giving Conference in Chicago. Can a webby philanthropic bridge be built between the chaotic, emergent ferment in the wired world and the world of corporate wealth? I don't know, but I wish him luck.
Reality's Apprentice Reality TV may seem a world away from real life, but what happens when Donald Trump's The Apprentice moves in upstairs? Worse, what happens when it seems to be a sham? Keith Hollihan reports with a fascinating account of his life's surreal intrusions.
Buying Up the Right to Pollute. "Power companies that release more SO2 than their permits allow must attempt to buy more allowances at the auctions, or purchase them at a premium from companies that have allowances to spare. Those that can't gather enough allowances or that go beyond certain emissions limits in a given year face strict fines from the EPA." (from a 4/7 Wired article) You may have heard of these "allowances" before, but the Acid Rain Retirement Fund, a non-profit, is doing something about them: *buying* them and simply letting them expire. Search NetworkForGood for "ARRF" to make a donation. [via our own CTP's Recursive Irony]
George Says Did the president fail to answer your questions tonight? Put the words right in his mouth.
Know a tune, but can't identify it? Melodyhound should help. Whistle the tune, record it, and their database can help match it. Can't whistle? No problem. Figure out the Parsons Code directly for the melody, and it will match that.
Take me out to the ball or blog game!! Slate has posted a good article on baseball blogs. Be you a Red Sox fan or a Cubs rube, you can follow your favorite boys of summer with in-depth Sabernomics articles or even track the next pre-injury Mark Prior through blogs. Some have been up for years, but they're increasing in popularity and some have even been picked up by major newspapers.
Joelogon's Foolproof Guide to Making Any Woman Your Platonic Friend. An oldie, but a goodie. Including the care and feeding of - very important stuff.
Thema: Passion Very good German site with depictions of the Passion of the Christ in the history of the art, from El Greco to Antonello da Messina, from Il Guercino to Botticelli. And there also, among many others, Rembrandt and Schiele and Rubens and Caravaggio Plenty of other good links here. As Bernard Berenson wrote, "A painter's first business is to rouse the tactile sense, for I must have the illusion... (more inside)
IM logging as illegal wiretap: We need to get beyond the technology itself and ask whether there are legitimate expectations of privacy that we seek to protect by either permitting or refusing to permit the creation of a permanent record of communications.
The robot should go in first. Between 50 and 100 Packbot [13MB wmv] unmanned ground vehicles (UGV) are currently being used for battlefield reconnaissance. One proved its worth last week when it uncovered a bomb and was destroyed in the process. Colin Angle, CEO of Packbot maker iRobot, doesn't rule out the eventual weaponizing of UGVs and quips "we're not using these robots to hand out flowers".
That frog-eating bastard should have that S.O.B. Rumsfeld shot! Respectful, informative campaigning continues on both sides. Wouldn't it be great if both propaganda machines sufficiently alienated the majority of the population so that it could make up its own mind?
Sometimes it takes the great Dustbuster of fate to clear the room of bullies and bad habits. Among a troop of savanna baboons in Kenya, a terrible outbreak of tuberculosis 20 years ago selectively killed off the biggest, nastiest and most despotic males... With that change in demographics came a cultural swing toward pacifism, a relaxing of the usually parlous baboon hierarchy, and a willingness to use affection and mutual grooming rather than threats, swipes and bites to foster a patriotic spirit. "And if baboons can do it, why not us? The bad news is that you might have to first knock out all the most aggressive males to get there." Wishful thinking from nerdy academics, or a harbinger of our future?
"We are now deep in the trackless swamps created by thoughtless, feckless UI design — full of glitz and GUI, signifying nothing." In The Luxury of Ignorance, Eric Raymond attempts to set up a network printer in Linux.
Pfix Pfizer: Pfizer, maker of several drugs including Lipitor used to lower cholesterol, has launched a lawsuit against Canadian web sites selling its drugs or knock-offs at a lower cost to Americans. They claim that it's a matter of safety for their users, and that costs are for the insurance companies to quibble. However many Minnesota seniors have fired back that it's a matter of sales, and are seeking to 'pfix pfizer' as they are unable to afford some of these life-saving medications. [more inside]
Eyeglasses Warehouse: Vintage Eyeglasses and Antique Spectacles.
The $700 Million Gyroscope. A spacecraft set to test Einstein's General Theory of Relativity is now on the launch pad, with the world's most accurate gyroscopes stowed away inside. The experiment will have cost $700 million when the data is in and finally analysed. What practical benefits will the average American reap from this?
Men aged 18-25, have you got your lighters ready? It's going to be draft time soon, according to the Nader campaign. The Selective Service denies it.
North Korean Nuclear Devices. "Abdul Qadeer Khan, the Pakistani scientist who sold nuclear technology around the world, has told his interrogators that during a trip to North Korea five years ago he was taken to a secret underground nuclear plant and shown what he described as three nuclear devices."
Ashcroft rejected counterterrorism funds on Sept. 10
"Yet the commission staff statement quotes a former FBI counterterrorism chief, Dale Watson, as saying he ``almost fell out of his chair'' when he saw a May 10 budget memo from Ashcroft listing seven priorities, including illegal drugs and gun violence, but not terrorism.
Additionally, on Sept. 10, Ashcroft rejected an appeal from Pickard for additional funding, the commission said."
"Yet the commission staff statement quotes a former FBI counterterrorism chief, Dale Watson, as saying he ``almost fell out of his chair'' when he saw a May 10 budget memo from Ashcroft listing seven priorities, including illegal drugs and gun violence, but not terrorism.
Additionally, on Sept. 10, Ashcroft rejected an appeal from Pickard for additional funding, the commission said."
The Jefferson Muzzles are awarded as a means to draw national attention to abridgments of free speech and press and, at the same time, foster an appreciation for those tenets of the First Amendment.
Where is Raed? Salam Pax's pal Raed Jarrar now has his own Blogspot site, Raed in the Middle, after some guest posts on Salam's blog. Foreboding political commentary (scroll down to "Three Smart Political Steps") on how AlSadr is making shrewd moves to unite Sunnis and Shi'as against American forces. In addition, Raed translates diary entries from his mother Faiza, who also Teaches you Arabic.
Creative, cheap, participatory, the most innovative city in the world......Curitiba !! There may be no single, organic and living font of solutions to many of the world's most pressing problems than Curitiba (previous link from Wikipedia, and a bit more of a wonkish summary here), a Brazilian city of 1.5 million that urban planners from around the globe make pilgrimages to, to learn.
On a budget a tiny fraction of those which American cities have at their disposal, how did Curitiba become the world's leading model for urban sustainability and quality of life ? - with possibly the world's most efficient and effective public transit system, a network of parks and greenery far beyond Olmsted's visionary parks, 70% trash recycling, innovative social welfare systems, trees everywhere, and "Lighthouses of Knowledge" with small libraries and free internet access as well, a low cost open university system.....and flowers! Curitiba's pedestrian-only (no cars) city center is filled with gardens.
On a budget a tiny fraction of those which American cities have at their disposal, how did Curitiba become the world's leading model for urban sustainability and quality of life ? - with possibly the world's most efficient and effective public transit system, a network of parks and greenery far beyond Olmsted's visionary parks, 70% trash recycling, innovative social welfare systems, trees everywhere, and "Lighthouses of Knowledge" with small libraries and free internet access as well, a low cost open university system.....and flowers! Curitiba's pedestrian-only (no cars) city center is filled with gardens.
Palin's Travels. The full texts of all five books in Michael Palin's wonderful travel/adventure series, Around the World in 80 Days, Pole to Pole, Full Circle, Hemingway Adventure, and Sahara are available online, along with loads of pictures, video (Quicktime req.) and audio clips.
Jamiel Terry, son of Randall Terry, famous anti-gay and anti-abortion spokesmen, comes out and speaks out in OUT Magazine . His father preemptively responds before OUT hits the stands, claiming his son has sold out the family for $5,000.
Low-Income Children At Risk "Low-income children are disproportionately exposed to a daunting array of adverse social and physical environmental conditions," according to Gary Evans of Cornell University. Evans reviewed almost 200 studies to document the environment of childhood poverty in the current issue of American Psychologist (Vol. 59:2, 77-92, 2004). Public policy also tends to consider just one "magic bullet" at a time, Evans says. "To make a difference, we need to take a broader perspective for intervention." What public policy changes would you suggest to protect and enrich the lives of children in low-income communities?
Searching Google for the word "Jew" brings up a clearing house of anti-jewish propaganda, Jew Watch.
Folk Songs For The 21st Century was recorded in the late '50s. Sheldon Allman wrote all the songs, and sings them in a strange, warped baritone voice. His tongue had to be firmly planted in his cheek when writing something like "Space Opera". Then again, maybe not... [via Buzz.]
April 12
So Yale students have a dating website for those who are "matched, single, or looking for a little somethin' on the side." Unfortunately, the Yale College Council, which launched the site in February 2004, is being accused of stealing the HTML code from a precursor site at Wesleyan, and the Yale Student Activities Commission may have ripped off Weslyan's dating questionnaires. Happily, the Herald article confirms that while the website might be in trouble, "the courts will never shut down the most reliable dating hotspot at Yale" -- the library.
Viral marketing done well: First, identify your market of choice. Second, offer an online petition about an issue that is important to them. Make sure that your privacy policy allows you to send the visitor email. Each target should be encouraged to spread the petition's address amongst their friends, selecting other similar marks better than you ever could. Better still, the suggestion to visit your site will come from a trusted source. Third, take your list and sell access to it. Is it still spam? If you do your job right your mark won't even know they've been hit until the email starts to roll in, and perhaps not even then. There's nothing to be ashamed about, right?
Penny Arcade remixes Penny Arcade remixes. A Japanese high-school English teacher assigns his students to fill in the captions of Penny Arcade comics. The results, predictably, are often really funny.
Sure, we've all seen bad web design, but sometimes one finds a site that's really worth a second look, and this is certainly one. It's not so much bad web design as a veritable county fair of bad web design, complete with a ring-toss (try to click that link!), a booth extolling the modern wonder of air conditioning, another exhibit about the wonderful world of the future, and, of course, misguided hero worship. But wait, there's more, including a visit from famous basketballer Michel Jordan. Really, one could spend hours and hours exploring the many nooks and crannies of The Retreat's website, and still not find all of the many, many gems that it contains. Don't forget to ask about the monogamous weddings!
Were protests always like this? Living in the bay area for a few years now, I've avoided taking to the streets to protest wars and such. Not because I'm pro-war or anything, I'm just a little wary of what these events are really all about.
Recent images posted to Live Journal (probably NSFW at any given moment) sounds like an uninteresting feed from a community: it's just a constant stream of images uploaded to LJ. But the truth is that it's fascinating to watch, to see the whole community summarized into a dozen images of the moment. [more inside]
Whizzkid develops Linux application for Windows [...]The significance of the development is that Linux and Windows are able to work in parallel on the same computer or server. To[sic] now, the computer world is divided into systems that operate either with Windows or with Linux. [...]
Air Marshal Forgets Gun in Airport Bathroom
Are we safer yet?
Are we safer yet?
Brazil Wants to Build a Wall Social and economic problems out of control? No problem. Brazil plans to literally build a 10 foot wall to separate the haves from the have nots.
Who is the real Slim Shady? Does he pass on a jacuzzi full of thong-laden women for a manicure, tanning and full spa treatment? yup.
"Crossing the Rubicon" is a phrase widely believed to refer to the moment when Julius Caesar and his army crossed the stream separating Gaul from Italy, a move which meant civil war and commonly used to mean "point of no return". Now Swiss archaeologists are challenging that theory with a phrase that should be "Double Crossing the Rubicon".
Once more, with hobbits... A Lord of the Rings / Buffy the Vampire Slayer adventure, heralded by the folks at the Z+Partners blog as "rip, mix culture" incarnate... offered here for your delectation.
"We are hunting Americans like pigs" -- A chat with Taliban leader Mullah Omar
This Thursday isn't just the dreaded tax day in America, on the upside, it's also National High Five Day. It's got a rich history and you only need to remember a couple key phrases: Yo, up high! and: Don't leave me hangin'! Remember to act like a fratboy this week and high-five everyone you see.
Mmmm, Pie. What do you get when you combine quirky pie recipes with homemade postcards? Why, the Pie-of-the-Month club, of course. Check out timely entries like Election Pie, retro Tang Pie, or Pink Lullaby Pie from a real live Wizard of Oz munchkin. Consult with a real pie expert to answer all your pie-related questions!
Bin Ladin Determined to Strike In US - The Memo From A Design Perspective A desginer looks at the original memo and re-designs it for usability.
Vitamin dosage is a much debated issue. Is there any real difference between the minimal and the optimal? There are the public standards, and then there are other perspectives. Given the potential impact on public health as new RDIs are adopted, what do you think we should take?
Where's the WE in itunes? Weedshare is a filesharing service/company that rewards users for sharing music files. Unfortunately, they're Windows only (and use DRM but with good reason), but still interesting...
Taphophiles, Rejoice! Northstar Galleries offers a collection of grave images from around the world. Of particular interest is an essay and gallery on "Sensuality in Memorial Art." But if potentially NSFW stone nudes are not your thing, you can search the Farber Gravestone Collection's archive of over thirteen thousand image database of pre-1800 American gravestones, more than enough for a melancholy afternoon.
A photo journal of a UNPA Nurse Practitioner's experiences in Operation Iraqi Freedom.
Nanochips The desire for boosting the number of transistors on a chip and for running it faster explains why the semiconductor industry, just as it crossed into the new millennium, shifted from manufacturing microchips to making nanochips. How it quietly passed this milestone, and how it continues to advance, is an amazing story of people overcoming some of the greatest engineering challenges of our time--challenges every bit as formidable as those encountered in building the first atomic bomb or sending a person to the moon.
MillionForChrist.com? Gays versus God? Looks like there's a race between people who support Christ and people who support same-sex marriages. They're both looking for a million signatures. Conincidence? Any bets on who's gonna win?
Some very moving Soviet war photography, notably several shots of the famously doctored (not to mention staged) but nonetheless dramatic hoisting of the Red Flag over a burned out Reichstag (a scene which, by the way, recently appeared in a videogame).
April 11
What would you do if you found your bitch cheating? (MPEG with Sound) A beautiful work of cinema featuring a dog and his unfaithful bitch. No, really. (Question: Is it just me or does the 'other dog' bear a striking resemblance to Tyson the Skateboarding Bulldog?)
History comes to the life, and to television. If people will not come to history, then let history come to them. [more inside]
Labels seek end to 99c music per song download
"...the major five labels think that 99 cents per song is too cheap, and are discussing a price hike that would increase the tariff to $1.25 up to $2.99 per song." How about free legal downloads for $6 a month. DRM free. The artists get paid.? Will the RIAA ever see the light?
"...the major five labels think that 99 cents per song is too cheap, and are discussing a price hike that would increase the tariff to $1.25 up to $2.99 per song." How about free legal downloads for $6 a month. DRM free. The artists get paid.? Will the RIAA ever see the light?
I am down with Plato and Socrates, And I like to get busy with all the ladies. Grunt, grunt/ sumthin,' sumthin,' sumthin,'/ Grunt/ Up in ma shed, up in ma shed...
From Bubbles' first freestyle rap, to Mr. Lahey's ever-doomed attempts to keep control of Sunnyvale Trailer Park, to Randy's shirtless gut, to eight year old Trinity's nicotine patch, to J-ROC's genuine delusion that he is black: the brilliance of Trailer Park Boys rolls on. Season Four begins tonight in Canada on Showcase; and on April 15th Season One debuts on BBC America. Here's hoping that success won't change the best TV show ever to come out of Canada. Previously discussed on Mefi last year , but I hope the new season merits a revist to Sunnyvale. Pass the pepperoni and the rum and coke.
From Bubbles' first freestyle rap, to Mr. Lahey's ever-doomed attempts to keep control of Sunnyvale Trailer Park, to Randy's shirtless gut, to eight year old Trinity's nicotine patch, to J-ROC's genuine delusion that he is black: the brilliance of Trailer Park Boys rolls on. Season Four begins tonight in Canada on Showcase; and on April 15th Season One debuts on BBC America. Here's hoping that success won't change the best TV show ever to come out of Canada. Previously discussed on Mefi last year , but I hope the new season merits a revist to Sunnyvale. Pass the pepperoni and the rum and coke.
Seeds of the Revolt: U.S. Targeted Fiery Cleric In Risky Move
'Damn the US and damn the resistance'
The delusions of war
New nationalism that unites Iraq
'Expect Snipers on All Minarets'
One Year After Saddam
'Damn the US and damn the resistance'
The delusions of war
New nationalism that unites Iraq
'Expect Snipers on All Minarets'
One Year After Saddam
CELT, the Corpus of Electronic Texts, "brings the wealth of Irish literary and historical culture to the Internet, for the use and benefit of everyone worldwide. It has a searchable online database consisting of contemporary and historical texts from many areas, including literature and the other arts." It has texts in Irish, Latin, Anglo-Norman French, and English, ranging from the annals of the fifth century to the Agreement reached in the Multi-Party Negotiations in Northern Ireland of 1998. "Great my glory/ I that bore Cuchulainn the valiant..."
A U.S. journalist's firsthand account from inside Fallujah. Rahul Mahajan, a U.S. citizen, author, and a contributor to papers such as USA Today and the Baltimore Sun, snuck inside Fallujah yesterday with a humanitarian convoy. He reports on a city under the gun of U.S. snipers, with intentional targeting of ambulances and the death of women and children. His conclusion? That Fallujah's fighters *ARE* supported and fully representative of the people there, and that "nothing could have been easier than gaining the good-will of the people of Fallujah had the Americans not been so brutal in their dealings. Now, a tipping-point has been reached. Fallujah cannot be "saved" from its mujaheddin unless it is destroyed." So, it's not Al-Jazeera reporting on this one -- will the mainstream media touch this story?!
A dictionary of Japanese pornography terms. After you've mastered the theory, you can read about it in greater detail, then test your knowledge. (First link SFW if no one's reading over your shoulder, others N.)
The Ledger: A Law & Order Blog.
Mike Disfarmer had a photo studio in the resort town of Heber Springs, Arkansas throughout the 30s and 40s, creating images with an amazing blunt, unvarnished beauty and strength. Nothing speaks more eloquently about Disfarmer's artistry than the photographs themselves. His genius was the ability to capture without judgment, the essence of a people and a time.
"Whether it is an impressionist masterpiece, or just wallpaper, if you take the colour juxtapositions and their proportions from nature, you won't go far wrong." Choosing colours for web pages.
The Great Mirror. "A collection of about five thousand photographs taken over the last 30 years by Bret Wallach, a geography professor at the University of Oklahoma. With few exceptions, the photos show cultural rather than physical landscapes and are intended to illuminate the people who have shaped these landscapes and are reflected in it." [Via wood s lot.]
360 photographs of Allied-occupied Japan after World War Two, taken by anthropologist John W. Bennett, arranged in portfolios with comments by Bennett and links to large images, such as hotel umbrellas drying in the sun. The exhibition includes selections from Bennett's journal and letters with his first impressions of Japan. Portfolios include views of Tokyo, children in the park, women of the night, traditional architecture, and Japanese resorts.
Everyday Apocalyptic Focusing on the epiphanic quality of apocalyptic insight, Dark draws on the wisdom of popular culture-including The Simpsons, Beck, and Coen brothers' films-to expose the "moral bankruptcy of our imaginations." I have no idea what any of this means.
Just in time for Easter, peeps in diarama-rama from the Twin Cities newspaper.
Remixing Bush's tasteless joke. Has some graphic images.
April 10
Definitely Not Your Mom's Cooking, But Comfort Food Of A Sort: that is, if you're an avant-garde seen-it-all, eaten-it-all gastronome whose jaded taste-buds crave a jolt of novelty, humour and sheer flamboyance. By far the most exciting, celebrated and downright controversial chef on God's good earth is called Ferran Adria. His restaurant, El Bulli has just re-opened, after the yearly six-month period experimentation of challenging new dishes in his taller/laboratory. [More inside.]
Loftcube. I saw this in Playboy and had to look it up. [Flash and music].
Bin Ladin Determined To Strike in US - The Presidential Daily Briefing
Kevin Drum: Aside from that, what really struck me was that the whole thing was so short — considerably shorter than your average op-ed column, in fact — and written at about a high school level. This is an intelligence briefing prepared at the request of the president of the United States and he was apparently satisfied with it? Eleven paragraphs of pabulum considerably less authoritative than an average article in Foreign Affairs ? Sheesh.
Kevin Drum: Aside from that, what really struck me was that the whole thing was so short — considerably shorter than your average op-ed column, in fact — and written at about a high school level. This is an intelligence briefing prepared at the request of the president of the United States and he was apparently satisfied with it? Eleven paragraphs of pabulum considerably less authoritative than an average article in Foreign Affairs ? Sheesh.
They've already had three? Fellow MeFites, I would like to present you the opportunity to attend the Fourth Rebuilding Iraq Expo, to be held April 26-29 in Arbil, Iraq. Sure wish I could make it.
Frustrated Republicans: President on vacation while Iraq burns got you down? Feeling loyal to the party, ideas, or repulsed by the Dems? Agonizing over voting Bush to stay true? Sign the petition, Maybe you won't have to. And Dems, if you can promise to be open minded in November you can sign as well. via Blogging of the President
Insecula. As the Wiki says:
Insecula: L'encyclopédie des arts et de l'architecture is a French language art website containing images and descriptions of thousands of works of art from major museums and collections in France and elsewhere, including the Louvre, the Musée d'Orsay, the Palace of Versailles, the Centre Pompidou, the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the MOMA.But it's not just museums and art. It's got Mayan ruins, Manhattan and Brooklyn, and of course lots of Paris streets. I can't believe plep hasn't posted this already...
N [flash, download only] is a Lode Runner clone that features a fun physics engine and sharp control. [via MoFi]
"One hundred seventy two people typed those magic words into Limewire, and got a hot steaming pile of monkey love."
"One hundred seventy two people typed those magic words into Limewire, and got a hot steaming pile of monkey love." A record of one's deliberate renaming of music files on P2P networks to see how many people would willingly search for, and download, the most horrible things ever.
The McCollough effect is a visual illusion somewhat similar to regular color aftereffects, but the working mechanism is different, and despite a wealth of theories, not entirely explained. Once the effect is established, it does not seem to go away and can last for days or even weeks. Proceed at your own risk.
The year to fear for Taiwan: 2006. The Taiwan correspondent for Jane's Defence Weekly speculates on how China might go about the conquest of Taiwan.
blue jam : all three series. ~17 hours of music mixed with disturbing comedy and downright weirdness.
How the left's fear of a right-wing Christian conspiracy gets George W. Bush -- and today's evangelical Christians -- all wrong. Alan Jacobs (more from him here and here) suggests that the idea that President Bush's evangelical Christianity has an impact on his politics is really a misunderstanding of Bush, fundamentalists, and evangelicals.
There's a lot of scammin', griftin', and chicanery going on in the world and Snopes has always been there, but they usually take some time to do their investigations. But for the quick hit, they've just launched a new daily scam page carrying just that day's latest scam news from around the country. It's really amazing how many major scams take place every day, and it helps to know how to spot a scam when you hear about it.
Pootie Tang Screen Test is an amusing four-minute video that includes a kick from Capoeira (images), a Brazilian Martial Art previously mentioned here. If you liked the screen test, you may enjoy the movie or the trailer.
DozenHoles.com will keep track of all the bets you make with friends, so you'll never have to remember why Johnny owes you a dozen donuts or why you owe Jimmy a box of tangerines.
Where Wealth Lives
"The top 1% of families, as measured by net worth, receive about 15% of income but own 30% of the nation's assets -- including stocks and bonds, homes, and closely held businesses. That's according to the Federal Reserve's Survey of Consumer Finances. The top 10% of families, as measured by net wealth, own 65% of assets, and the top 50% own a stunning 95% of assets..."
"The top 1% of families, as measured by net worth, receive about 15% of income but own 30% of the nation's assets -- including stocks and bonds, homes, and closely held businesses. That's according to the Federal Reserve's Survey of Consumer Finances. The top 10% of families, as measured by net wealth, own 65% of assets, and the top 50% own a stunning 95% of assets..."
The ubiquitous Nick Popaditch. A year ago, Staff Sgt. Nick Popaditch was in Baghdad's Al-Firdaws Square, celebrating with a cigar shortly before his tank toppled the statue of Saddam Hussein.
A year later in Falluja, cameras were there again, capturing the scene shortly after his tank was hit by an RPG near Fallujah. Staff Sgt. Popaditch lost his right eye as a result of his injuries. Meanwhile, Al-Firdaws Square was being closed to the Iraqi public, after posters of Muqtada Al-Sadr were plastered on the statue which replaced that of Saddam Hussein.
A year later in Falluja, cameras were there again, capturing the scene shortly after his tank was hit by an RPG near Fallujah. Staff Sgt. Popaditch lost his right eye as a result of his injuries. Meanwhile, Al-Firdaws Square was being closed to the Iraqi public, after posters of Muqtada Al-Sadr were plastered on the statue which replaced that of Saddam Hussein.
Bush Was Warned of Possible Attack in U.S., Official Says "President Bush was told more than a month before the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, that supporters of Osama bin Laden planned an attack within the United States with explosives and wanted to hijack airplanes, a government official said Friday. The warning came in a secret briefing that Mr. Bush received at his ranch in Crawford, Tex., on Aug. 6, 2001. A report by a joint Congressional committee last year alluded to a "closely held intelligence report" that month about the threat of an attack by Al Qaeda, and the official confirmed an account by The Associated Press on Friday saying that the report was in fact part of the president's briefing in Crawford." Then again, he had more important things to deal with that Summer.
April 9
Michelle Branch found by someone doing their taxes. No, it's not the pop singer. But have they ever found terrorist David Nelson? And will liberal radio host Michael Jackson ever get a job again?
Libyan dissident Fathi Eljahmi needs our help. Adam Daifallah relays the basics of Wall Street Journal columnist Claudia Rosett's piece about Eljahmi Wednesday. (I am linking to Adam's blog because the WSJ requires registration to read.) Ms. Rosett first mentioned Eljahmi last month. Now he and his family have disappeared.
Start 'em young with Playmobil's Security Check-in. With conveyor belt to screen luggage and a metal detector! (Frames: Item #3172)
FilteredNewsFilter: The only headline about North Korea in most of the media is that the U.S. Wants North Korea Working Group Talks to Resume Before the End of April. But, if you live in Australia or parts of Asia, you will have heard about N.K.'s rather shrill official statement claiming that the U.S. is "driving the military situation on the Korean peninsula to the brink of a nuclear war" with "moves to put the strategy of pre-emptive nuclear attack into practice." Fighting words. How come nobody in the 'real media' around here seems to have noticed it yet?
I will withdraw my snark if BOTH stories make the morning papers tomorrow, but I doubt it.
I will withdraw my snark if BOTH stories make the morning papers tomorrow, but I doubt it.
David Cerny: frilly pink tanks, babies climbing TV towers, and the president feeding slops to the director of the national gallery out of giant asses. Why, this could only be the NEA gone awry! Actually, it's Magic Prague, the land of Franz Kafka and Milan Kundera, and the artist, like the dissidents of past generations, would rather not do political art , political art. His latest sculpture ridicules the perverse situation in which the country finds itself post Havel: a place where right-wingers like President Klaus and national gallery director Milan Knížák— a past collaborator with secret police, and worse, completely idiotic and banal performance artist — prosper and rub shoulders at the expense of those with a conscience and good taste. Like David Cerny. This isn't the freshest post, but I've been waiting to join Mefi for a long time, and today is the first day I can post.
In these days of reflection and prayer, graphic designers would do well to seek the intercession of their patron saints.
Manabu Yamanaka Photographs. [view with caution]
Big Fat Whale Funny Web Comix
Happy Easter, everybody! Nothing like a natural abomination to ring in the season! Yes, ladies and gentlemen, those are real live baby chickens dyed in various pastel colors. How do they do this thing? They inject (non-toxic) dye right into the eggs. Who does this thing? These guys, a hatchery in Alaska (no information about the chicks on their web page). Amusing? Horrifying? Strangely delicious-looking? You make the call.
Kwaito: post-apartheid South African music. What does a community of musicians do when the politics they are singing against finally collapse? They strike out in a new direction. Kwaito is a danceable multilingual hip-house, sort of, which has become not one kwaito, but many, during the last ten years or more. A history. The kwaito story. A kwaito tour tale, with more kwaito news in the sidebar. Audio samples 1, 2, 3 (click on the album covers). Full MP3s: Kwaito by KGB. Fabulous Day (Kwaito Mix), by Redd Angel. A couple more full songs here. A music video by Bongo Maffin.
Drum Solo. With no drums
PiHKAL - Phenethylamines I Have Known And Loved: A Chemical Love Story, by Alexander and Ann Shulgin, is the online version of the book of the same name. It contains personal accounts by the Shulgins detailing the chemical procedures used in the synthesis, and lengthy qualitative reports regarding the subsequent ingestion, of 179 different types of Phenethylamines, the family of chemicals that includes 2C-B, Mescaline - the active ingredient in Peyote, and MDMA - better known as ecstasy. See also the sequel TiHKAL - Tryptamines I Have Known And Loved: The Chemistry Continues, again by the Shulgins, whose highlights include DMT and LSD.
Big Ass Fans is possibly the most irreverent industrial HVAC manufacturers' site around. Safe for work with the exception, to some, of the obvious. Via Bifurcated Rivets.
NASCAR Ballet See also: Jerry Springer, the Opera. It's like we can hardly even count on high culture and low culture being separate anymore. If only there had been some way to see this coming.
Jeff Skilling pulls an Uncle Junior? Sure sounds like guilty behavior to me.
Ever worn a very sparkly, floppy table?* Just one requires enough fabric to cover a tennis court from baseline to net, at least 20 different measurements and the finished product can end up costing more than 10 iPods. [bonus links inside]
Valiant Comics are Back! After a brief surge in popularity and value at the start of 1991, Valiant comics soon died during the great comic crash of the mid nineties. Now it seems that valiant comics are worth their weight in gold with comics worth only a few dollars (or less) a few years ago, now bringing in 200 dollars. Is this surge in price a sign of a new comic book crash or are collectors finally finding value in Turock and Man-O-War?
Done Deal: Script and Pitch Sales. Find out which scripts are being scooped up these days. Read the site and anxiosly await Krakatoa:
During the 1883 volcanic explosion off the coast of Java, social, political and cultural orders were also in major turmoil. But during all this turbulence, a romance is able to develop.It's like Pearl Harbor and Volcanon, but with a twist!
Hourly Cruft -- created triptychs from images found on the NYTimes home page. At 15 minutes after each hour, a new one is generated. From Robert Spahr, who also makes premise cruft, which takes images and headlines from CNN once every 8 hours. see here for more
And they're off! Apparently BBC3 plans to broadcast what it says is the first televised sperm race on April 15—on the educational show Lab Rats, naturally. The race will be filmed from inside two tiny glass tubes and relayed to a crowd watching at a pub. I wonder what the bookmakers have to say about the event?
Barbara Ann Tyson has a drinking problem. Ms. Tyson has been arrested some eightteen times this year, and dozens of times before. Most of the incidents are listed as "alcohol intoxication." In the age of public information being available online, is this a fascinating insight, or just watching a train wreck?
A symphony in Sound Recorder (Flash - sound)
Via B3ta
Via B3ta
Guru Vs. Blogger, Friday is Fight Night! A titanic battle of undefined criteria between high-paid (and over-hyped?) gurus and lowly bloggers. Who will win?
Wing sings the songs you love, in a way that will make you hate them. Listen to excerpts here. Music to suffer by, in the grand tradition of Leona Anderson. (via Primal Purge)
Yamadashi, the first part of the Onbashira Matsuri, a septennial shinto festival in the Nagano Prefecture, involves hauling a bunch of 200 year old fir trees out of the forest and then perilously riding them down the hillside (locals only, all you extreme sports nuts) in preparation for May's Satobiki. O-hanami this is not.
Sky Ear will be a one-night event in which a glowing "cloud" of mobile phones and helium balloons is released into the air so that people can dial into the cloud and listen to the sounds of the sky. The cloud will be made of one thousand large helium balloons each responding to the electromagnetic environment (created by distant storms, mobile phones, police and ambulance radios, television broadcasts, etc.) with coloured blue, red and yellow lights.
Maaawwidgge, dat Bwessed Ewent "I don't know what a guy has to do around here to get the marriage license. But I guess it's some consolation that I can get a meaningless one anytime I like, just so long as I bring along a woman I don't love and my $54. "
$14 Steady-cam The camera operator may walk (or even jog), move through tight hallways and doorways, and even climb up and down stairs without shaking the camera. Unfortunately, professional steadycams cost around $1500. Even the cheap 3rd party ones cost $600+. Whether you are an aspiring filmmaker, a videographer, the family documentarian, or just want more utility out of your video camera, you'll appreciate a steadycam. Includes Video of steadycam working. (What is a steadycam?)
Chicagoans show off their kanji character tattoos. We Chicagoan's know our hot dogs. Kanji characters, not so well. Japanese tattoos don't always mean what their wearers think they do. With the assistance of Mariko Sasaki, a researcher at the Consulate General of Japan in Chicago, we examined the tattoos of five Chicagoans. [via Chicago Tribune] Login: anonymous/anonymous
April 8
Those crazy christians, look what they'v done now. Beating down the Easter Bunny in front of children... THATS NOT RIGHT! I post this because I found it amusing. I am a proud follower of Jesus Christ... but please dont confuse me with these people.
If the current millennium has got you down, relax and think ahead to the year 3000.
"Most of us don't know what we'll be doing a year from now; why then should we care about what our descendents will be doing a thousand years from now? It's fun to speculate, sure; but envisioning the year 3000 may be more than an idle exercise or mere amusement." [via Reality Carinval]
"Most of us don't know what we'll be doing a year from now; why then should we care about what our descendents will be doing a thousand years from now? It's fun to speculate, sure; but envisioning the year 3000 may be more than an idle exercise or mere amusement." [via Reality Carinval]
Pancake Mountain presents Ian MacKaye performing "Vowel Movement" for the kiddies. As a friend said, this site has "pancakes and indie rock and bob mould as a corporate goon all in one package." [via sullivan]
The Guided By Voices Database: An act of love, considering that Bob Pollard (GBV's mastermind) has released 31 original Guided By Voices Albums and Ep's, 6 solo albums, and a good number side projects and collaborations (including Acid Ranch, The Airport 5, Circus Devils, Go Back Snowball, Lifeguards, Nightwalker etc), making a total of 871 released songs (lyrics to all of them included). The database also has gig information on every show GBV have played, most with set-lists. Amazing.
If you caught the Daily Show the other night, you might have seen the segment featuring a couple goofballs and "pete the porno puppet" trying to convert folks at an adult film convention. Their site, at xxxchurch.com, boasts "the #1 christian porn site" and like any porn site, they even get their share of hate mail. The guys behind it seem to have a good sense of humor, even though they're sure that porn is "not what God intended for us."
Travel photographs by Frantisek Staud.
Some said it could'nt be done, but the U.S. seems to have suceeded in uniting Iraq's different ethnic and religious groups. Now perhaps its time for the Vulcan's to begin to reign in their dreams of empire.
Who wants the slice with the bloody lung? How to make a delicious cake that looks like the exposed human thoratic cavity, complete with a ribcage of white chocolate and organs that each secrete a different fruit-flavored sauce. (MNBSFW due to how unbelievably real the thing looks.)
New Zealand critic blasts LOTR. Big budget movie special effects have overshadowed the timeless are of storytelling and character development. "..The Lord of the Rings movie trilogy is, as a work of cinematic art, ham-fisted, shallow, bombastic and laughably overrated.." [More Quotes inside]
At age 80, Oliver "Busta Jack" Jackson's cuttin' and scratchin' has more to do with gas and dry skin, than his turntable grooves. Stayin Alive was a big hit for the Bee Gees, but for Chicago's newest rap star, it's a mission. If you think it's because Busta Jack has a violent rivalry with gangsta's on the coast, well, you don't know Jack. Busta Jack is the world's oldest rap star, and the biggest challenge about stayin' alive... Meet Busta Jack.
Retro Gamer. £5.99 at all good newsagents in the UK. Classic Gamer. Free and downloadable here. I'm suddenly getting flashbacks -- should I buy Zzap! 64 or Commodore User? Choices, choices ... [latter link via ReBlog]
today's challenge: what do you do with those darn minority extremists when their numbers keep growing?
This giant Ukrainian Easter Egg (pysanka) was built in 1975 in Vegreville, Canada by (then) Univ. Utah Computer Science Professor Ronald Resch. Interesting egg factoids can be found here--including that it swivels like a weather vane. Vegreville has an annual festival. More images of egg here. The Vegreville Pysanka was the first physical structure completely designed with computer-aided geometric modeling software. There is a good description here of the complex geometry involved. It's based on a technique (PDF) he developed and patented for folding a flat material (i.e. sheet metal) into flexible surfaces. Ronald Resch has had an interesting career.
Kat Jungnickel is is blogging her experiences travelling in London on the 73 Bus.
The Mind Project. Delve into the research, including Iris and AI. Browse the curriculum. And, if you're a student or educator, or have Flash/programming skills, you can get involved. (Please note the site is always under development, and the interface is a little wanky - Flash intro.)
To capitalize or not to capitalize a deity? As far as I know Hebrew, Aramaic, Arabic and the modern descendants of Sanskrit use no capital letters, so for those languages the point is moot. I can't speak for too many of the other language families, but I don't know of any syllabaries or abugidas that use majuscules, so the question seems to be most relevant to the alphabetic languages that use capitals such as the Latin, Greek and Germanic families (including English). Some people even completely capitalize the name of their deity, apparently disdaining minuscules completely.
When PC case mods go too far. (Cue floppy drive jokes...)
This would be funny... if it weren't so very, very sad.
If you won C$30 million dollars in a lottery, would you tell your wife? Or would you keep it secret for an entire year as she fed her 4 kids from the food bank. Raymond Sobeski waited a year to collect the money because he "didn't want to do anything rash". Last week he went away for a week and promised to return today. Will she ever see him again?
Japanese Flash logic test
Get the family from one side of the river, to the other. [more inside]
Get the family from one side of the river, to the other. [more inside]
Indiana University has seen its fare share of problems when it comes to adult sites. The latest features a girl who has pictures of her on campus property. The problem is when the school newspaper covered the story (prev link) they linked her site on the front page of the paper. She couldn't purchase better advertising. Last link NSFW.
A few tips for the well-heeled gourmand. But I suspect the technologically oriented MetaFilter member will prefer these tips.
Fontifier will take a scan of your handwriting and turn it into a TrueType font.
...for $9.
...for $9.
How you remind me of someday. What you are hearing is Nickelback's "Someday" in your left speaker and "How you remind me in the right". All of those left shocked please raise their hands.
9/11 Panel: Bush White House Withheld Papers The commission investigating the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks announced yesterday that it has identified 69 documents from the Clinton era that the Bush White House withheld from investigators and which include references to al Qaeda, Osama bin Laden and other issues relevant to the panel's work.
Sabra. Shatila. Falluja? At least 280 people killed. 400 more wounded. Many more buried in the rubble. A city with 300,000 civilians and no food. No water. Nowhere to bury the dead. No place to run. No end in sight. Only one camera crew is currently in Falluja. These are the pictures that are being broadcast across the entire Arab world. So... which is worse? Is it justifiable? An act of liberation? A horrific mistake? Or is it a war crime?!
Why does Scalia hate America? Justice "Fat Tony" Scalia orders reporters to erase tapes of one of his speeches. Aren't public servents supposed to be public?
Questions Condoleezza Rice must answer Guardian's Mark Oliver considers the likely lines of inquiry the US national security adviser will face today from the commission investigating the September 11 attacks.
Eurabia? WTF? An interesting article by the ultra-prolific Niall Ferguson obliquely raises the question: wouldn't Europe (and the world) be happier if Islam still had a hold on the West? Al-Qaeda's longings for Andalusia and the Algarve apart, the truth is that Southern Spain (until 1498) and Portugal (until 1297) were very happy under Muslim rule. Isn't it sad that the three great monotheistic religions, plus the great atheist belief, can't live together anymore? [ NYT registration required. Via Arts and Letters Daily.]
The memespread project. How does a meme spread? What part does MetaFilter play in the process? [via waxy.org]
J&H Productions will give the label a percentage of J & H Productions or a percent of the gate, either one. Because J & H Productions is getting ready to do shows and J & H Productions would like to hook up with the label industry pertaining to shows.
April 7
Punkvoter is about organizing the many diverse and regional movements into one voice of political change. Punkvoter is our way to educate today's youth about what is really going on in Washington, DC and how we can collectively force change. This is our chance to be a strong voice against the serious flaws in the current political system. This is our way to talk about new laws and scenarios that could change our quality of life for years to come. Punkvoter is your organization. It will be run with the same energy and spirit of all punk efforts. With your help we will be a credible force to truly shape the future of our nation.
(Flash intro features tunes, main site is here, an impressive membership list is here.
There's a soundtrack to your demockracy.
(Flash intro features tunes, main site is here, an impressive membership list is here.
There's a soundtrack to your demockracy.
Citizens find Bush guilty of Afghan war crimes A citizens' tribunal Saturday in Tokyo found U.S. President George W. Bush guilty of war crimes for attacking civilians with indiscriminate weapons and other arms during the U.S.-led antiterrorism operations in Afghanistan in 2001.
Restaurant Industry Warns Members to Beware Strip-Search Hoax. "If anyone requests a manager or other employee to order someone to disrobe, ignore their request because it is a privacy invasion." Anyone want to supersize their sexual assault?
Dance Dance Revolution on one leg. That's a lot better than some of us can do on two. (Those of us over 15, anyway. Rotten kids.)
If you're bored with the kind of chess grandpappy taught you, know there are well over 1,000 other ways to do it. Play chess on a Moebius strip, with hexagons, or like Monopoly. Or play Chaturanga, chess's earliest ancestor. And if you don't have the time to, say, build your own 3-D Star Trek chessboard, there are also variations playable with a standard chess set.
Subservient chicken - modern advertising...
William Hung, my american idol After being kicked off the popular "talent" show, the snaggle-toothed Cal math major's debut cd is ranked #3 in Amazon music sales after just two days of being released, despite not being able to sing, dance, or even speak well. somewhere rob (or was it fab) from milli vanilli is doing the running man in his grave.
If you ever want your home to look like you're a super spy that lives in a 1960s supercomputer center, Lensvelt has the pefect thing for you: monolithic filing cabinets that look like mainframes. How cool would it be to have a living room that looked like this, or an office that was this clean? [via mocolo]
Nice Tits! The Royal Tit-Watching Society of Britain. (Shockingly safe for work)
the city of najaf is no longer under coalition control, ahead of an important pilgrimage. the secretary of state: "people who are considering engaging in the pilgrimage ought to very carefully calculate because we're not in a position to provide protection."
'Little Prince' author's plane found at last - "In France, the discovery is akin to solving the mystery of where Amelia Earhart's plane went down."
"But maybe it was the right policy after all."
on the 10th aniversary of the genocide in Rwanda, Jay Bryant suggests that perhaps Clinton's policy of non-intervention was the "right policy after all". This comes a few days after another fellow right wing columnist suggests from her suburban home in south carolina that we should "nuke the Sunni Triangle" (and any innoncent who happens to live there) - apparently her entire family agrees. Do they utterly lack sensitivity and should be ignored? or are these valid opinions worth publishing?
on the 10th aniversary of the genocide in Rwanda, Jay Bryant suggests that perhaps Clinton's policy of non-intervention was the "right policy after all". This comes a few days after another fellow right wing columnist suggests from her suburban home in south carolina that we should "nuke the Sunni Triangle" (and any innoncent who happens to live there) - apparently her entire family agrees. Do they utterly lack sensitivity and should be ignored? or are these valid opinions worth publishing?
Coelacanth quiz. Test your knowlege about this unpalatable but interesting ol' fish.
Zepto science Scientists have developed a device able to measure the weight of a single cell, and they intend to weigh a virus next.
The New York Press lists the 50 most loathsome New Yorkers. Time to get your hate on! Here's a sample to get you started:#18 Moby Musician IT WAS BAD enough when Moby started singing; now he's singing and talking at the same time. When not crooning school-girl poetry (see "We Are All Made of Stars") or desecrating classic punk songs between hissy fits on stage, the techno prophet cum vegan ethicist of the early 90s is schooling credulous fans on a wide range of contemporary issues. Between lessons in Nicaraguan history and tales of Rummy's early-80s holidays in Baghdad, Moby pontificates in prose that would make even DJ Spooky cringe ("We're so inherently locked into our temporal and corporeal selves that we're irrevocably locked into subjectivity") and Michael Stipe wince ("cos at the end of the day peace is better than war, right?"). We're thankful for "Go" and the car commercial songs on Play, but mister, please put your space helmet back on, get in your space ship and don't stop till you hit Pluto.
The Serco Transarctic Expedition: Ben Saunders is attempting the first ever solo ski crossing of the Arctic Ocean -- from Russia to Canada via the geographic North Pole without kites or dogs and without replenishing supplies. He's now about 160 nautical miles into the trek, and making daily posts about the experience.
Tyson the bulldog enjoys riding skateboards, not so much wearing flower hats.
Eyeball Jewelry This just caught my eye (Sorry!). It's jewelry that is implanted INTO your EYE! I think this is pretty cool and another milestone in body modding. Discuss how long until Georgia legislators ban this.
Rwandans turn toward Islam. A NY Times story (reg. req.) describes how Islam has become the fastest-growing religion in Rwanda, partly because people are disgusted with the priests and nuns who helped with the killing ten years ago, partly because Muslims saved many people at that time.
Muslim leaders credit the gains to their ability during the 1994 massacres to shield most Muslims, and many other Rwandans, from certain death. "The Muslims handled themselves well in '94, and I wanted to be like them," said Alex Rutiririza, explaining why he converted to Islam last year.Food for thought for those who think of Islam as a "religion of violence."
I saw a feature on ESPN last night about Britt Gaston and Cliff Courtney, two Georgia teenagers who are indelibly linked to history as the kids who ran alongside Hank Aaron after the famous 715th home run. Then I googled around a bit and discovered Jim Leavelle, the former Dallas cop who will forever be known as the guy in the hat watching Ruby take care of Oswald in the precinct basement. And then there's Mary Ann Vecchio, a 14-year-old runaway who was photographed wailing over a dead body at Kent State in 1970. And, of course, there's Afghanistan Girl. Can anyone think of other bystanders to historical events whose faces we all know but identities remain anonymous? Is there anyone who has not yet been rediscovered?
Peep Porn
Its possible that this is NSFW, but I doubt it
Its possible that this is NSFW, but I doubt it
Identifont is an amazing, free, font identification tool. Ever seen some nice text in print or on the web, wanted to use it yourself, but couldn't work out what font they used? By answering a series of simple questions (Does the 'Q' tail cross the circle? What shape is the 'g'?), all presented with handy example pictures, Identifont can quickly identify the name of the font you're looking for.
The Fast and the Frustrated. The city of Pleasanton, CA is about to install specially calibrated traffic lights which sense whether or not you are speeding. When speeding is detected, these traffic lights will change from green to yellow to red immediately, and will stay red for 10 to 30 seconds, all in an effort to stymie speeders.
(1) If you can talk about it, it ain't Tao.
If it has a name, it's just another thing.
Ron Hogan "perpetrates" his interpretation
of the Tao Te Ching, often coming nearer
its essence than stricter interpretations.
See also Jim Clatfelter's Headless Tao:
(11) The openness within a house
Provides location to reside
The open space that is my heart
Is where ten thousand things abide.
(Tread softly, for Headless Tao is on GeoCities.)
Pooh heartily approves.
If it has a name, it's just another thing.
Ron Hogan "perpetrates" his interpretation
of the Tao Te Ching, often coming nearer
its essence than stricter interpretations.
See also Jim Clatfelter's Headless Tao:
(11) The openness within a house
Provides location to reside
The open space that is my heart
Is where ten thousand things abide.
(Tread softly, for Headless Tao is on GeoCities.)
Pooh heartily approves.
John Ashcroft's Patriot Games. An interesting article from last month's Vanity Fair on Ashcroft and his revolution inside the Justice Department. Now the Justice Department wants to wage a war on porn, and "are spending millions of dollars to bring anti-obscenity cases to courthouses across the country for the first time in 10 years. Nothing is off limits, they warn, even soft-core cable programs such as HBO's long-running Real Sex or the adult movies widely offered in guestrooms of major hotel chains." [Via Boing Boing and Instapundit.]
The PETA sinks to a new low. This time drawing parallels between the gruesome Pickton murders and the the slaughter of pigs for meat. Many of the human remains of Pickton's victims are still being found at the Pickton pig farm. They were drugged and dragged across the room... Their struggles and cries went unanswered... They were slaughtered and their heads sawed off... Their body parts were refrigerated... Their bones were discarded.
April 6
The Kingdom of Loathing. Not since Progress Quest has the world of online RPGs seen such innovation. Look out Everquest!
Who Is That With Jeremy? Bill Clinton, Puff Daddy (or is that P. Diddy?), Kirsten Dunst, Spike Lee, the entire cast of Oz... Jeremy's dad has an obscene talent for getting his kid into famous arms for a snapshot.
What America Can Learn From Its Atheists -- by Leon Wieseltier. Taking the Supreme Court case being decided on the "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance, he wonders what happens to God and religion when it's pressed into service and has all meaning bleached away. For the argument that a reference to God is not a reference to God is a sign that American religion is forgetting its reasons. The need of so many American believers to have government endorse their belief is thoroughly abject. How strong, and how wise, is a faith that needs to see God's name wherever it looks?
Beatallica's sound is pretty simple: all Beatles cover songs, but done in the style of Metallica. Totally illegal, but available on many P2P networks for free download and via bittorrent. Blackened the USSR, indeed.
Bay Area Link Up is a social/business networking site for professionals in the Bay Area. Some use it for business networking and getting freelance work. Others use it for other reasons. They've recently expanded to other regions (and also added a monthly fee). I like this model better than Yahoo Groups or Usenet, simply because people create events that you can sign up for if they interest you. What online networking groups do you like to use?
Woman Performs Caesarean On Herself to Save Baby
Its thought to be the first case where both mother and child survived a self performed caesarean.
From the article, "...a mother's instinct to save her child can move a woman to perform extraordinary acts but said it would not have been necessary if adequate medical care had been available."
Contrast that story with the recent news: Chico Student Allegedly Kills Newborn and then leaves the body in a plastic bag in her dormroom.
An avoidable situation given California's Safe Haven Law that allows new mothers to safely surrender their newborns within three days of birth with no questions asked, no names taken and no repercusions, assuming the child isn't abused or neglected.
And she wouldn't be held on a million dollars bail awaiting trial for murder.
Its thought to be the first case where both mother and child survived a self performed caesarean.
From the article, "...a mother's instinct to save her child can move a woman to perform extraordinary acts but said it would not have been necessary if adequate medical care had been available."
Contrast that story with the recent news: Chico Student Allegedly Kills Newborn and then leaves the body in a plastic bag in her dormroom.
An avoidable situation given California's Safe Haven Law that allows new mothers to safely surrender their newborns within three days of birth with no questions asked, no names taken and no repercusions, assuming the child isn't abused or neglected.
And she wouldn't be held on a million dollars bail awaiting trial for murder.
That American forces use depleted uranium in our weapons isn't news, but these statistic are a little spooky. According to Bob Nichols at the Dissident Voice, we've unleased 4,000,000 pounds of DU in Iraq. That's the radioactive equivalent of 250,000 Nagasaki bombs (pdf) says Admiral Vishnu Bhagwat, former chief of Naval Staff in India. And since it's dust...it travels with the wind, which means Europe will see some fallout. It also turns out that most of the soldiers didn't know they were using DU, didn't know what DU was, and are now suffering reactions to it.
Frequent sexual intercourse and masturbation protects men against prostate cancer. From the article: "The good news is it is not related to an increased risk…"
Firebreathing has become trendy -- even Xena did it. Of course, its also very dangerous - don't try this at home.
"Let us rid ourselves of the fiction that low oil prices are somehow good for the United States." Words of wisdom from Dick Cheney.
Play the Sesame Street 35th Anniversary Trivia Game, hosted by Oscar the Grouch (who's as rude as he ever was).
The Up-In-Smoke Cigar Band Museum. "There are nearly 800 different vintage cigar bands currently displayed in the Museum, selected from my own collection. The cigar bands are displayed in exhibits contained in 12 different galleries arranged by general subject." Aaah, ephemera! My favorite galleries: "Men in Big Red Hats" and "Daddies, Baddies, Beauties, Babes, and Brothers."
Cass is dying of colon cancer, and he is telling us all about it in his beautiful, witty and absolutely inspiring blog.
Nader falls short of quorum in Oregon. I take a bit of perverse pride that my fellow Oregonians stayed away in droves. . .
Cigar Box Guitars. Welcome to the first museum dedicated to the humble cigar box guitar. We have gathered the facts & legends, pictures & players and stories that span over 150 years.
Worldisround lets people around the world share their travel photos and experiences with each other. (via idle type)
The secret source of Google's power
While competitors are targeting the individual applications Google has deployed, Google is building a massive, general purpose computing platform for web-scale programming.[via kottke.org]
The battle the US wants to provoke Make no mistake: this is not the "civil war" that Washington has been predicting will break out between Sunnis, Shias and Kurds. Rather, it is a war provoked by the US occupation authority and waged by its forces against the growing number of Shia who support Moqtada al-Sadr (by Naomi Klein in Baghdad).
April 5
Paul Kurtz on the Enlightenment. Unfortunately, there has been a massive retreat from Enlightenment ideals in recent years, a return to pre-modern mythologies. There has been a resurgence of fundamentalist religions worldwide—Hinduism, Sikhism, Islam, Roman Catholicism, and Orthodox Judaism. Added to this are occult-paranormal claims, which allegedly transcend the existing scientific paradigm. In the United States—the preeminent scientific-technological-military superpower in the world—significant numbers of Americans have embraced primitive forms of biblical religion. These focus on salvation, the Rapture, and the Second Coming of Jesus. Evangelical Protestant Christians have made alliances with conservative Roman Catholics and neo-conservative Jews, and they have captured political power—power they have used to oppose secular humanism and naturalism. via the council for secular humanism
For 36 years, Harold Gray has been on an extraordinary mission -- to recover what may be the most famous stolen coin collection in the United States. Since October 1967, when five hooded gunmen invaded the Coconut Grove estate of chemical empire heir Willis Harrington duPont, binding the family with silk neckties and stealing the valuable coin collection from duPont's safe, Gray has been on the case. ''We remain,'' he says today, ``in hot pursuit.''
In the Psychedelic Library you can find the likes of Aldous Huxley, The Acid Queen by Robert Hunter, LSD, My Problem Child from Albert Hoffman, The Private Sea: LSD and the Search for God by William Braden and Through The Lens Of Perception by Hal Zena Bennett is a fascinating account of a peyote experience in Mexico. The Psychedelic Library ultimately asks the question: can drugs, used in a positive and healthy way, truly guide us towards who we can become? No matter what you believe, it's an invaluable resource.
Will the promise of the other side of heaven tug at your heartstrings? About four-dozen of the watercolors of Daniel Merriam are on display at the Louis Aronow Gallery online.
Teenage lesbian or bisexual girls… are the worst hit by tobacco among all groups of young people, according to a new US study. "Antigay stigma and harassment, rejection from family and friends, and sometimes even physical violence can create a hostile environment for many young people coming to terms with their sexual orientation. This, combined with the tobacco industry's targeted marketing to lesbian and gay communities, is putting lesbian and bisexual girls in harm's way."
Confessions of a Welfare Queen. How rich bastards like John Stossel rip off taxpayers for millions of dollars. By John Stossel.
Toilets of the World :: a photoblog, sort of...
Clueless about History Britain is a nation of history dunces with many even believing Adolf Hitler never existed, according to a new survey. A quarter of those interviewed were not sure if the Battle of Trafalgar was a real historic event, while one in seven did not know the Battle of Hastings really took place. Sadly, it gets worse. Apparently the Battle of Endor actually happened in some people's minds.
Ten years gone. The unifinished story of Kurt Cobain. Hard to believe that it's been ten years since the unwelcome news was broadcast. As a Cobain contemporary/gen X'er/Seattle musican in the 90s, my own heart is still broken.
Has Anyone Ever
Written Drawn Anything For You? Now you can have your very own portrait of yourself with Stevie Nicks! Just as though you had really met her!
Where Has All the Acid Gone? (Anyone think our old friend will be making a return trip any time soon?)
Another Note On Peak Oil... That last question is at the center of a fierce debate. Adherents of the "peak oil" theory warn of a permanent oil shortage. In the next five or 10 years, they maintain, the world's capacity to produce oil will reach its geological limit and fall behind growing demand.
April 4
Eight U.S. Troops Killed in Shiite Uprising Occupation Forces Battle Cleric's Followers As Widespread Demonstrations Erupt in Iraq
A Young Radical's Anti-U.S. Wrath Is Unleashed For months, as American occupation authorities have focused on a moderate Shiite leader, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, a radical young Shiite cleric named Moktada al-Sadr has been spewing invective and threatening a widespread insurrection. On Sunday, he unleashed it. At his word, thousands of disciples, wearing green headbands and carrying automatic rifles, stormed into the streets of several cities and set off the most widespread mayhem of the occupation. Witnesses and occupation officials said the disciples occupied police stations, fired rocket-propelled grenades at American troops and overran government security in Kufa, the town in south central Iraq where Mr. Sadr lives. "The occupation is over!" many yelled. "We are now controlled by Sadr!"
A Young Radical's Anti-U.S. Wrath Is Unleashed For months, as American occupation authorities have focused on a moderate Shiite leader, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, a radical young Shiite cleric named Moktada al-Sadr has been spewing invective and threatening a widespread insurrection. On Sunday, he unleashed it. At his word, thousands of disciples, wearing green headbands and carrying automatic rifles, stormed into the streets of several cities and set off the most widespread mayhem of the occupation. Witnesses and occupation officials said the disciples occupied police stations, fired rocket-propelled grenades at American troops and overran government security in Kufa, the town in south central Iraq where Mr. Sadr lives. "The occupation is over!" many yelled. "We are now controlled by Sadr!"
Another Magnificent Obsession is born. The fiance of a friend just gave me her small collection of antique radios that they won't have room for in their new place. While looking for care instructions, I discovered a whole new subculture where art, science, design, and craftsmanship co-exist. They don't make 'em like this anymore, folks.
The music of the news: From Cool Hand Luke and Action News (ra) to today's Enforcer (MP3) and The Tower (WMA), TV stations and the music in their newscasts.
In California, a middle-class family with two earners each making $50,000 a year now owns, on average, an $830,000 home. "It is a dangerous situation indeed when neither home buyers nor the institutions that finance them are concerned with the ultimate price being paid for the housing asset."
"Home of the Underdogs is a non-profit site dedicated to the preservation and promotion of underrated PC games (and a few non-PC games) of all ages: good games that deserve a second chance after dismal sales or critical reviews that we feel are unwarranted."
Cape Town Skies: Photo gallery with more than 2000 images.
The Drama Triangle Here's an example. Dad comes home from work to find mom coming down hard on Junior with, "Clean up your room or else" threats. He immediately comes to the rescue,"Mom" he might say,"give the boy a break". Any one of several possibilities might occur next. Perhaps Mom, feeling victimized by dad, turns on him, automatically moving him into a victim position. They might do a few quick trips around the triangle with Junior on the sidelines. Or maybe Junior joins dad in a persecutory "Let's gang up on mom" approach, and they could play it from that angle. Or Junior could turn-coat on dad, rescuing mom, with; "Mind your own business, dad . . . I don't need your help!" So it goes, with endless variations perhaps, but nonetheless, round and round the triangle. For many families, it's the only way they know how to communicate.
The Bushiad and The Idyossey. "Narrative epic poems of 24 chapters each, The Bushiad and The Idyossey use satire and irony to cover events during nine months from December 2002 through September 2003, and were inspired by events as they occurred. Homer would recognize the tale." But where's Hercubush?
Asteroids marathon. Twenty-seven hours of game play and it's only good for fifth place. "In the history of recorded video game world records, no other record is as unique as that on the classic Atari game 'Asteroids' according to the Twin Galaxies Intergalactic Scoreboard. And the reason for that is simple. It is the oldest, unbeaten world record in our database, after more than 22 years of compiling and tracking world records on classic arcade, home console, pinball, hand-held and PC-based titles."
Urban Haute Couture "is about street art and street art only. Since a couple of years ago there's a boom in street art. To be clear we're not talking about graffiti. We're talking about street art that is spraypaint/marker template based, stickers, posters and combinations of those. This new breed of street art, except for using the urban landscape as a medium, has actually nothing to do with graffiti." Cities include Berlin, Amsterdam and the Romanian Stencil Archive.
The Floating Neutrinos have managed to cross the Atlantic in a raft made from recycled materials recovered from dumpsters and docks in New York city. Their next project is an Orphanage Raft, "for street orphans from third world countries such as Brazil, African countries, and India. The children will be those who are living in and surviving on the streets, with literally no one looking out for them or taking responsibility for them. We will get to know them and their situation thoroughly before they ever come to the raft. We are not looking to pick up runaways or anyone who has responsible adults in their picture...Once onboard, if they choose to stay, they will be given a floating, travelling home, and an education."
Online collection of children's literature circa 1850 and up. Primarily American and British, from thrilling stories of the ocean to a peep at the beasts. Every page (and even the spine) digitized in both JPEG and PDF format, and in some cases color-corrected. (Similar collections have been posted here previously)
Snark. In the newest issue of Bookforum, critic Sven Birkerts ruminates on what he considers to be the regrettable rise of the snarky book review, taking as his starting example Dale Peck's hatchet job on Rick Moody, written in 2002. "Psychologically [the literary] landscape [is one that is] subtly demoralized by the slash-and-burn of bottom-line economics; the modernist/humanist assumption of art and social criticism marching forward, leading the way, has not recovered from the wholesale flight of academia into theory; the publishing world remains tyrannized in acquisition, marketing, and sales by the mentality of the blockbuster; the confident authority of print journalism has been challenged by the proliferation of online alternatives. [...] All of this leads, and not all that circuitously, to the question of snark, the spirit of negativity, the personal animus pushing ahead of the intellectual or critical agenda. Snark is, I believe, prompted by the terrible vacuum feeling of not mattering, not connecting, not being heard; it is fueled by rage at the same."
LIFE IMITATES CABLE ACCESS Thy Spy is actually a cut above cable access, being a fairly well-executed mock documentary about an out of control Christian private eye which was shown at last year's Dallas Video Festival. The scary thing is that what seemed outrageous and over the top a year ago is now becoming business as usual in this country. Watch the movie (it's about 15 minutes) then check out these recent news items: here and here.
Chasing Venus Transits of Venus occur every 130 years or so when Venus can be observed passing across the face of the sun. Chasing Venus is an online exhibition by Smithsonian Institution Libraries that tells the story of how the transit has been observed since the 17th century, with early observations in England, illustrated accounts of expeditions by 18th century astronomers to various parts of the world, and early uses of photography to record observations in the 19th century. Includes links to animations of transits reconstructed from Victorian photographs, and details of a lecture series on Thursdays in April and May (first one April 8). The first transit since 1882 is this year.
Channel 4 in england are set to screen a graphic film of an abortion taking place. The programme examines the debate of abortion and gives views from both pro life and pro choice protagonists.
April 3
In response to Justice Konrad von Finckenstein ruling that file sharing was legal in Canada (previously discussed here), Federal Heritage Minister Helene Scherrer has stated that "As minister of Canadian Heritage, I will, as quickly as possible, make changes to our copyright law".
The problem is that Canadian copyright law has been going through a slow and thoughtful reformation process. Since the unveiling of A Framework for Copyright Reform in 2001, a lot of progress has been made in updating the laws to reflect the needs and concerns of content producers, and the public domain. Now, however, it seems that all of this work may be bulldozed by Helene Scherrer, who declared her intentions at the Juno Awards last night.
The problem is that Canadian copyright law has been going through a slow and thoughtful reformation process. Since the unveiling of A Framework for Copyright Reform in 2001, a lot of progress has been made in updating the laws to reflect the needs and concerns of content producers, and the public domain. Now, however, it seems that all of this work may be bulldozed by Helene Scherrer, who declared her intentions at the Juno Awards last night.
"Orphans and babies as young as three months old have been used as guinea pigs in potentially dangerous medical experiments sponsored by pharmaceutical companies, an Observer investigation has revealed.
"British drug giant GlaxoSmithKline is embroiled in the scandal. The firm sponsored experiments on the children from Incarnation Children's Centre, a New York care home that specialises in treating HIV sufferers and is run by Catholic charities." [link]
"British drug giant GlaxoSmithKline is embroiled in the scandal. The firm sponsored experiments on the children from Incarnation Children's Centre, a New York care home that specialises in treating HIV sufferers and is run by Catholic charities." [link]
The Fursuit & Costume Archive has a most impressive collection of videos of people in animal costumes. Are you furry-curious?
Typophile : Indulge your inner Font Nerd. (check out the "Found Type Gallery")
Its a vast left wing conspiracy! It seems that the RNC (Republican national committee) is seeing conspiracy everywhere. There are lots of stand alone groups that have been trying to get rid of this administration before Kerry showed up on the scene, and now that there is a target they want to hang everything on him. Its almost like flattery. Of course it reminds me of when SCO claimed IBM was orchestrating all the bad press about them.
Modern Mercenaries on the Iraqi Frontier In his own way, Stevie is a modern soldier-of-fortune, paid by a private security firm to lead a 44-man unit that is protecting American officials in charge of rebuilding the infrastructure of Iraq. He left his native Glasgow, Scotland, to join the British army at 16, served for 24 years in conflicts around the globe, about half that time as a member of the special forces. In the shadowy tradition of his trade, he asked that only his first name be used and declined to say much about the wars he has fought. "That is one topic I'd rather not talk about," he said in his rich brogue, speaking by phone from the Baghdad villa run by Kroll Inc., the company that employs him. Some bloggers have gotten in trouble of late for using the M-word, but now a wider conversation on Kroll, Blackwater, and friends seems to be emerging. Is the presence of mercenaries --both nationals of coalition countries and foreign nationals-- in Iraq part of Rumsfeld's broader transformation policy? Is their presence in Iraq even legal in the first place?
Flashmob Computing - attempting to create an instant supercomputer.
A 15 year old girl has been charged with several counts related to "child pornography" for sending out pictures of herself to several people she chatted with. As more and more teens use webcams for all sorts of things from keeping in touch with friends, getting strangers to buy them things from their wishlists and making some $$$ this has caused a little discussion. As she did not "force" herself, how does this intersect with recent attempts to criminalize "virtual" child porn as both situations have at their heart whether the primary issue is coercion/harm or the concepts images themselves. At the risk of "Newsfiltering", I am interested in opinions from a less histrionic group (thats you) than some others who are discussing it.
The Label Man: vintage crate labels.
Start saving for your childrens future therapy. What they learned this month is dead bodies being burnt and strung up on a bridge is ok to print on the front page of a newspaper, and watch on the news at dinner time; but you better not see any nipple, even for a half a second.
April 2
Shaolin Soccer Looks incredibly cool, but why isn't it playing in Seattle yet? And when is it coming here? I want my shaolin soccer!!!! ;-)
Suzuki buys a MX title and Michael Jordans prodigy, James Stewart, is going to do to Supercross, what Tiger did for golf.
Let's Make Enemies ...The CPA has also confirmed that after June 30, the $18.4 billion the US government is spending on reconstruction will be administered by the US Embassy in Iraq. The money will be spent over five years and will fundamentally redesign Iraq's most basic infrastructure, including its electricity, water, oil and communications sectors, as well as its courts and police. Iraq's future governments will have no say in the construction of these core sectors of Iraqi society. Retired Rear Adm. David Nash, who heads the Project Management Office, which administers the funds, describes the $18.4 billion as "a gift from the American people to the people of Iraq." He appears to have forgotten the part about gifts being something you actually give up. And in the same eventful week, US engineers began construction on fourteen "enduring bases" in Iraq, capable of housing the 110,000 soldiers who will be posted here for at least two more years. Even though the bases are being built with no mandate from an Iraqi government, Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt, deputy chief of operations in Iraq, called them "a blueprint for how we could operate in the Middle East." ...
SandwichGirl is (was?) a "dining attendant" at the McMurdo Station in Antarctica. She also keeps an intermittent journal, and takes pictures. Fun, wacky stuff.
Amid rumors of a ritual suicide, it seems Luther Blissett has gone back underground, but out of the shadows Wu Ming emerges! Best of all, Q is available among several free downloads under Omnia Sunt Communia.
A possible murder suspect's google-trail of dark and bloody tales?
A contributing writer for 'Deviant Minds' webzine (scroll down a few clicks to Donn Gash) may be linked to the gruesome murder of his father. His mother has already been charged.
A contributing writer for 'Deviant Minds' webzine (scroll down a few clicks to Donn Gash) may be linked to the gruesome murder of his father. His mother has already been charged.
Tragic Animal Love Stories - Simple drawings with sweet messages. via
Stick Figure Fight Club. For those wondering where the inspiration for yesterday's Homestar Runner cartoon came from, now you know. (Flash, sound)
Dictionary of the Scots Language. The two major historical dictionaries of the Scots language, the Dictionary of the Older Scottish Tongue (DOST) and the Scottish National Dictionary (SND), have been combined into one searchable online edition:
Thus, information on the earliest uses of Scots words can be presented alongside examples of the later development and, in some cases, current usage of the same words. In this way, we hope that the DSL will allow users to appreciate the continuity and historical development of the Scots language. By making the DSL freely available on the Internet, we also aim to widen access to the source dictionaries and to open up these rich lexicographic resources to anyone with an interest in Scots language and culture.
Downloaders Pay Back Wilco Just-launched Justafan.org allows fans who downloaded copies of the new Wilco album to donate to the band-selected charity Doctors Without Borders. In less than a day online, with nothing more than word-of-mouth publicity, donations exceeded $1,500.
Tigger arrested on molestation charges. Why couldn't it have been Eeyore? or Piglet?
Note to Self: What NOT to do when trying to fake your own kidnapping.....
U.S. job growth strongest in 4 years in March. Non-farm payrolls climbed 308,000 in March, the Labor Department said, the biggest gain since April 2000. However, the unemployment rate actually ticked upward from 5.6%, the two-year low seen in January and February, to 5.7% in March. Note in passing that this took place during the Bush administration!
After Life -- Streatham Cemetary
The Four Seasons by Jonathan Clark
Photos with Flash: roll your cursor over the picture or you may miss a surprise.
My fave: the wonderfully creepy 1st Autumn photo.
-via (the currently Survivor-obsessed) Magnolia Glen.
The Four Seasons by Jonathan Clark
Photos with Flash: roll your cursor over the picture or you may miss a surprise.
My fave: the wonderfully creepy 1st Autumn photo.
-via (the currently Survivor-obsessed) Magnolia Glen.
I feel safer already! A US requirement for foreign visitors to be fingerprinted and photographed is being expanded to include citizens from America's closest allies, starting September 30th.
Mars Rover Blog, move over: SpiritRover and OpportunityGrrl are on Livejournal, along with Pathfinder(ess), Voyager 1, Cassini, GOES, FUSE, Hubble, and the Planet Mars Himself. (Educational. Sort of. And very LJ. Very, very LJ.)
Eblots: Cut Rate Internet Therapy
Zo, vhat does dis remind you ov? (via Pop Culture Junk Mail)
Zo, vhat does dis remind you ov? (via Pop Culture Junk Mail)
Sports clichés. Related: political clichés.
The magazine Adbusters has published a list of "the 50 most influential neocons in the US," and, writes editor Kalle Lasn, "half of the them are Jewish." Lasn identifies the Jews on the list with a dot. At least I think they're dots; maybe they're very small yellow stars.
Simpson stars strike for more 'D'oh!' The voices of the Simpsons are on strike for $360,000 an episode. Seems almost reasonable for such a pop culture phenomenon, but the voiceover work equates to one work day per episode.
Portable Zip Codes "Every year millions of Americans are on the go: People who must relocate for work or other reasons. Those people may have been quite attached to their original homes or an adopted town or city of residence. For them this innovative measure will serve as an umbilical cord to the place they love best."
Virtuoso guitar performance of the Super Mario theme song. With sound effects too!
(3.5 mb Windows Media video)
(3.5 mb Windows Media video)
Who Would Have Thought? Sun and Microsoft just announced an historic 10 year collaboration agreement (an announcement that ended with Scott McNealy and Steve Ballmer actually shaking hands). What do you think? Ultimately beneficial ... or not?
The highest suicide rate in the world has been reported among young women in South India by a new study. The research is of major importance, according to the World Health Organization, as it brings to light Asia's suicide problem. "I was surprised to find the rates were so staggeringly high," says paediatrician Anuradha Bose. "I wonder if it's just another manifestation of the gender bias." Stress factors… affect Indian women in particular, such as issues of marriage and dowry. How can the WHO address this unacceptable situation for young women in South India and elsewhere? The article notes that studies are under way in other countries where young women are under great social pressures, and more suicide prone, including China, Sri Lanka and Vietnam (and there are many others where this should be researched).
April 1
I found an American "Grand Prior Chevalier" Knight Templar challenging Osama Bin Laden to a sword duel in the sand while I was trying to find the cool Mac / Neverwinter Nights project Open Knights. The whole thing seemed so much like an outtake from the wonderful Foucault's Pendulum that I had to share.
State of the Media Report 2004 by journalism.org, which seeks to improve news coverage in a more neutral fashion than those who cry bias from the left and right. The group offers advice for average citizens and others. The report focuses mainly on US media and identifies eight trends. The content analyses finds that newspapers have more lifestyle news than in the past, but less government and foreign affairs, even with wars abroad. More front page articles about issues, less on crime and disasters. Network news was heavy on foreign affairs, government, accidents, disaster, crime and health care. The cable networks had a lot of politics and Iraq stuff, but also a lot more celebrity/entertainment/lifestyle stuff than the big four. Local TV news treats crime as topic A. The magazine audience is aging, and total pages are declining, but some, like The Economist and the New Yorker, have found success in niches. Internet journalism is "still largely material from old media rather than something original." And it's still text-y. But it is clearly the future of journalism. But don't pronounce the dinosaurs dead yet. Radio once ruled, and in a way it still does: 94 percent still tune in to radio news at least once a week.
Ghosts of Rwanda
10 years later, FRONTLINE delivers one of the most powerful episodes in their excellent series of reports. Also covered in The Economist last week, and a couple years ago in The Atlantic in a sublime article: "Bystanders to Genocide". When you first heard about the tragedy did you wish you could have done something, if you had only known more?
10 years later, FRONTLINE delivers one of the most powerful episodes in their excellent series of reports. Also covered in The Economist last week, and a couple years ago in The Atlantic in a sublime article: "Bystanders to Genocide". When you first heard about the tragedy did you wish you could have done something, if you had only known more?
A slim majority of sampled economists favor drug decriminalization, according to this .pdf article in the newly-launched Econ Journal Watch.
Via Marginal Revolution.
Via Marginal Revolution.
Propeller Island City Lodge "Universal Art Objects & Hotel"
Takagism. This link was posted just a short while ago; so sorry for the sort of double post. However, the posted link was to the Crimson Room game, not the main site. It was Meta bombed so hard that I would bet that most people never got a chance to explore the main site. This guy is really creative. If you did get a chance to see it, I apologize for the double post.
From the Sign Of The Times Department: Gateway closes all of it's Country Stores, which once numbered over 300. 2,500 workers laid off.(Full disclosure: I worked at 3 different Country Store locations over the years, two of which closed down prior to this mass closing). It's hard to believe that it wasn't that long ago that they seemed like money factories. The boom is now not just dead, it's decaying and rotting. What a strange trip it was.
With Ahmed Chalabi poised to take control of post-occupation Iraq--one year after the start of the war--Congress' General Accounting Office is beginning to ask questions about the operations of his Iraqi National Congress. A piece of evidence submitted by Chalabi was a list of 108 news items which were placed in mainstream media by INC-coordinated (and Pentagon-funded) defectors. Who are other Mefites' favorite fraudsters?
East Coast Greenway is a community project to build a 2600 mile urban greenway from Canada to Key West. Bike, walk, rollerblade or Segway from Canada to Florida.. This "urban Appalachian trail" is twenty-percent trail complete now with %80 by 2010. Route Maps for each state.
Star Wars Trilogy DVD Commentaries Leaked . Five three-ish minute clips of Lucas-audio leakery! w00t! I can't wait til September!
Little Fluffy Industries: Posted on a Thursday for all your Friday Flash needs.
Regularly-updated listing of today's April Fools jokes on the web. Add 'em if you've got 'em.
Va. Man Claims $239 Million Jackpot Note in passing that this took place during the Bush administration! "A retired truck driver claimed a $239 million Mega Millions jackpot Thursday, calling the second-largest lottery payout in history "no big thing to me." His wife vowed to "shop till I drop.""
"The OSCE focuses only on establishment of democracy, the protection of human rights and the freedom of the press. I am now questioning these values." -Uzbek President Islam Karimov
Can we really wage an effective war on terrorism by aligning ourselves with villains? Does it strike anyone else as silly that we've justified our invasion of Iraq with the removal of Saddam while pairing with his Uzbek counterpart? Lack of political freedom and rampant poverty has tensions mounting in Uzbekistan(1 2 3 4).
Can we really wage an effective war on terrorism by aligning ourselves with villains? Does it strike anyone else as silly that we've justified our invasion of Iraq with the removal of Saddam while pairing with his Uzbek counterpart? Lack of political freedom and rampant poverty has tensions mounting in Uzbekistan(1 2 3 4).
Top 100 April Fools Hoaxes of all time. Also, April Fools on the Net - a history of newsgroup April Fools posts.
Missile Defense- the biggest security lapse on 9/11. Condoleeza Rice was to deliver a speech regarding the White House's position on national security on September 11th, 2001. The speech contained no mention of al-Qaeda and stated missile defense as the central focus of security, implicating Bill Clinton for "not doing enough about the real threat - long-range missiles." An interesting revelation coming from the campaign claiming their opponents are "wrong on defense."