Boing Boing: A Directory of Wonderful Things

Tuesday, February 28, 2006

HOWTO set up a DIY abortion clinic where abortions are illegal

Inspired by the grim news that abortions may soon be banned in South Dakota, one female blogger posts detailed instructions -- MAKE magazine style -- on DIY backalley abortions. Not a recommendation, and not reposted here with the belief that this would be safe or advisable for any woman.

In the 1960s and early 1970s, when abortions were illegal in many places and expensive to get, an organization called Jane stepped up to the plate in the Chicago area. Jane initially hired an abortion doctor, but later they did the abortions themselves. They lost only one patient in 13,000 -- a lower death rate than that of giving live birth. The biggest obstacle they had, though, was the fact that until years into the operation, they thought of abortion as something only a doctor could do, something only the most trained specialist could perform without endangering the life of the woman.
They were deceived -- much like you have probably been deceived. An abortion, especially for an early pregnancy, is a relatively easy procedure to perform. And while I know, women of South Dakota, that you never asked for this, now is the time to learn how it is done. There is no reason you should be beholden to doctors -- especially in a state where doctors have been refusing to perform them, forcing the state's only abortion clinic to fly doctors in from elsewhere.
No textbooks or guides existed at that time to help them, and the equipment was hard to find. This is no longer true. For under $2000, any person with the inclination to learn could create a fully functioning abortion setup allowing for both vacuum aspiration and dilation/curettage abortions.

Link to "For the women of South Dakota: an abortion manual." (Thanks, Siege and Happler, seen on MeFi)

Reader comment: Neurofuture says,

Here's a post that's compiled other approaches, costing less than $2K. Some nearly free. Bitch PhD features a DIY herbal abortion/miscarriage inducer requiring only parsley and vitamin C. It's generated quite a bit of attention from the academic and science community so she's updating her post to reflect some of the safety concerns around DIY abortion as well as more techniques.
It also includes a link to DIY emergency contraception, or the "morning after pill," using your regular birth control pills. Planned Parenthood provides this easy, medically safe info: Link. Information wants to be free. :)
Bitch PhD also links to feminists now organizing around this issue; personally I'd love to see an onslaught of women bloggers worldwide posting this kind of free, democratic and empowering info.

(Thanks, Andrew Gammell)

posted by Xeni Jardin at 11:57:40 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Moment of bondage couture Zen: gold Gucci handcuff clutch

Link (Thanks, Susannah Breslin!)

posted by Xeni Jardin at 11:51:49 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Jasmina Tesanovic on Mladic arrest: Less Than Human

Less than Human (The Cunt, The Gun, The State)

Jasmina Tesanovic

BELGRADE, 22 February 2006

I refuse to speak the name of the Bad Guy Who Became the Good Guy. When Milosevic was in power, for years on end, his words and face everywhere, his and his alone, while those of us, the political idiots, the victims, were so baffled and mute, I gave a vow to myself: the Word is power. I will never mention his name, privately or publicly.

This Bad Guy who became a good guy, because he pleads guilty in front of his God: he wants attention.

He gives long speeches, speeches full of himself and his new way out of prison: out of himself. He pleads for our sympathy, for compassion as though this lessens his guilt, and the victims' relatives feel disgusted. So does his boss, the number one indicted, who gave the order, who conveyed those orders from somebody else... He, who plays the game of the big Serbian hero from past centuries, and displays his grandeur saying literally:

I care for only three things in life: the Cunt, the Gun and the State.

God knows how many women he raped, whispered a relative sitting next to me...
More...

posted by Xeni Jardin at 11:46:31 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

"Suspect" jackets, in style of FBI/police raid jackets

Link, $35 plus shipping. (Thanks, Robb)

posted by Xeni Jardin at 11:36:18 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

New comic sf story: Paris Hilton gets a conscience transplant

Futurismic has posted its latest story, "The Jiminy Device," by Lisa Mantchev and it's one of the finest comic stories they've posted to date. It's the story of a kind of hyper-Paris-Hilton who is attended by an entourage of sycophantic primpers, whose antics results in her total dispossession and the implantation of a digital conscience device. It's a sweet, short, funny little story, with lots of laugh-out-loud techno-speculation:

Shock and disbelief clouded London's brow (despite the neurotoxin injections) as she stared at her lover. Marcel only shrugged. When one of his people scribbled a note and handed it to him, he read it cold.
"We're drifting apart. It's not you, it's me." He took the cigarette out of his mouth and glared at the hapless scriptwriter. She withered visibly behind her cheap haircut. "This is what I pay you for?" He shook his head and his stylist adjusted the tousled locks with a comb.
London sniffed, trying to muster some tears. Her special effects guy produced a squirt bottle of saline when she couldn't quite manage it on her own. Her personal trainer (Tony... or was it Toby?) glared at Marcel. "You can't leave me. I'm an heiress for god's sake. I'm leaving you."
Neil and Susanna, their respective PR generals, glowered at each other. Index fingers hovered over cell phones, ready to speed-dial the Associated Press.

Link (Thanks, Jeremy!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 11:33:49 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Choose Your Own Adventure covers photoshopping contest

This old Something Awful photoshopping contest challenged participants to remix the covers of Choose-Your-Own-Adventure books -- some of these are sheer genius, like this Schrodinger's Cat C-Y-O-A with TWO exciting endings! Link (via Neatorama)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 11:21:18 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Open forum for travelers locked out of airport electricity

WiFiNetNews has an open forum for travel-geeks to talk about which airports are dumb enough to lock travelers out of recharging their laptops on lay-overs, following on from yesterday's post about Montreal airport putting locks on its AC outlets. I've heard from a reader that London Stansted, which I use about 20 times a year, has started to lock down its electricity too. If it's true, I'm switching to Gatwick.

Frequent travellers need juice between flights, and airports that sell WiFi without providing the electricty to use it are like coffee-shops without toilets. They're missing out on the revenue they'd get from people who'd buy the WiFi if only they had the power to use it.

Link

posted by Cory Doctorow at 11:08:50 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Classic landscapes on female gluteus maximi

What could be more breathtaking than a collection of intricate, traditional landscape paintings?

Intricate, traditional landscapes painted on a female model's posterior.
Link to Flickr user Wallace's photo set, translated from the Chinese tags as "Human Body Art." (Thanks, Mark Mauer)

posted by Xeni Jardin at 10:58:03 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

HOWTO build a humane mousetrap out of a toilet paper tube

A great HOWTO explains an ingenious method for creating a homebrew humane mousetrap out of common household objects:

1. Get a toilet paper tube and crease two lines to form a flat sided tunnel.
2. Put a treat on one end of the tube: A cracker and dab of peanut butter works great.
3. Get a tall (at least 20 inches) bucket. A trash can works well.
4. Balance the tube precariously on the edge of a table or counter with the treat hanging directly over the tall sided receptacle...

Link (via Make Blog)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 10:54:27 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Bird flu warning in Vietnam: "Cook the crap out of all poultry"

These unappetizing, government-issued warning posters in Hanoi read, more or less -- "To minimize the risk of contracting bird flu, please boil the absolute living fuck out of all poultry before you eat it."

Stickyrice blog says, "These billboards have been erected outside markets in the capital in the past week or so. The WHO and the Ministry of Culture and Information are corroborating on this 'no-pink-bird-meat-decree.'"
Link (Thanks, Armand)

posted by Xeni Jardin at 10:42:26 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

HOWTO repurpose old phones as an intercom

Here's a HOWTO explaining the best ways to rewire the old phone lines and phones in your house or office to use them as an intercom. I haven't had a landline I used regularly since 1999, but every place I've lived has had tons of landline wiring, and old style phones are cheap like borscht. Once you've got this rigged, you can pick up that bat-phone on your desk, ring your loved one in the next room, and bark, "Schweetheart, get me rewrite!"

Talking over the phones is easy. You put DC current through the phone and it transmits and receives audio. So two phones and a current source (about 25mA) all in series will give you a talking circuit. A suitable current source can be as simple as a 9V battery and a series resistor whose value is adjusted (with both phones offhook) till about 25mA flows. You can then bypass the battery and the resistor with a capacitor to couple the audio straight across and get a loud and clear connection.
What is much harder is signaling the other end. To ring the bell you need to put 90V (RMS) 20Hz AC into the phone (nominally). Lower voltages will work (down to about 40V) but different frequencies won't. You can't ring the phone at 60Hz. I have a ringing circuit in a PBX I built but it consists of a 20Hz sinewave generator, a push-pull power booster and a big transformer. Much too elaborate for a simple 2-phone intercom circuit, and anyway the ringing voltage could painfully zap a kid.

Link (via Negatendo0

posted by Cory Doctorow at 10:40:58 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Nebula Awards finalists announced

The 2005 Nebula ballot is out!

Air - Geoff Ryman (St. Martin's Press, Sep04)
Camouflage - Joe Haldeman (Analog, Mar-May 04, also Ace book Aug 2004)
Going Postal - Terry Pratchett (HarperCollins, Oct04)
Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell - Susanna Clarke (Bloomsbury, Sep04)
Polaris - Jack McDevitt (Ace, Nov04)
Orphans of Chaos - John C. Wright (Tor, Nov05)

Link (via Futurismic)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 10:37:34 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Bouncing breast simulator from sports-bra company

Shock Absorber, a UK line of sports-bras, has a Flash-based boobies-physics simulator. Plug in a cup-size and a level of activity, and it produces a 3D animation of breasts of that size bouncing free, bouncing in a regular bra, and hardly moving at all in one of their sports-bras. Extra geeky bonus points for including a 3D wireframe view, so you can see the pure physics of the jiggle. Link (via Plasticbag)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 10:35:48 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Honey, let's plan a romantic getaway for two -- on an oil rig

Two oil companies have signed on to Mohamed Al Fayed's plans to open a hotel on an oil rig off the east coast of Scotland.

The Harrods owner wants to create a 50-bedroom country-house style hotel on a platform in the Cromarty Firth (...) by 2008. If approved, the attraction would also boast a visitor centre, a shop and a restaurant. Two unidentified oil companies have approved the use of their platforms.

Link (via Better Living Through Miles)

Reader comment: Vetnoir says,

I thought it might intrest you to know that there is already a place like this down here in SE Asia. Link.

Reader comment: Cholten99 says,

Sounds a lot like Christopher Brookmyre's book "One Fine Day in the Middle of the Night".

(Thanks, David Neill, and Dave!)

posted by Xeni Jardin at 10:26:40 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

HOWTO defeat Iranian censorship with Anonymizer and Voice of America

Michael sez:

The Anonymizer company has a contract with the Voice of America to provide anonymous internet access for users in a number of foreign countries, including Iran and China. Here's how an Anonymizer sysadmin describes the Iranian portion of the service: "It's based off of PrivateSurfing [...]. Added features for the Iran proxy is full time SSL, URL encryption, Farsi language support, and we switch the proxy website about once a month (every time the Iranian government blocks us). We perform checks on the service from within Iran to see if our site is actually blocked (yes, it works), and we maintain a database of all known e-mail addresses that we can detect as being located in Iran. Every time we switch the proxy site we send an e-mail informing them of the new free proxy location so the citizens of Iran can find it. The sites are also broadcast via radio and TV into Iran by the VOA. To be honest, we're usually about a day behind the blocks, due mostly to time zone differences."

Link (Thanks, Michael!)

Car Repair toolkit for chyxx0rs

Girls, don't you hate it when your tool bag doesn't match the hot pink mini and gogo boot set you happen to be wearing when you find yourself suddenly stranded on the highway? God I hate it when that happens. No more: this Barbie-colored bag contains everything from ice scrapers to jump leads. Link, and dig the general-purpose toolkit in the same color, Link. (Thanks, Violet Blue!)

Reader comment: Lynn Hatfield says,

I am my father's only child. When I went off to college in 1988, he gave me a toolbox. A tool box filled with hand-painted, hot pink screwdrivers, wrenches, ratchets, even the hammer had been pinkified. For the record, I have never been a pink loving girlie girl. (I am my father's daughter.) He knew this. His rationale? "If anyone ever wants to borrow a tool, you'll be damned sure they'll return it when they're done with it." He was absolutely right.
I still have that pink hammer today.

posted by Xeni Jardin at 10:19:53 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Telecom Digest moderator Pat Townson hospitalized

BoingBoing reader Jay James says, "To the USENET phone geeks this, is a fairly big deal." Snip from post by John Levine on comp.dcom.telecom:

Mike Sandman reports that Telecom Digest moderator Pat Townson had a heart attack early Saturday morning (around 6AM). They took him to the local hospital, and then transferred him to a hospital in Oklahoma that's supposed to have the best heart department around there. At the moment he's in a critical care room with no phone, with luck he'll be moved to a regular room with a phone in the next day or two. Readers who want to send him a get well card or note can send it to:
Pat Townson
Jane Phillips Medical Center
3500 E Frank Phillips Blvd
Bartlesville, OK 74006

posted by Xeni Jardin at 10:10:24 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Anagram transit maps for NY/NJ PATH, Sydney

Two more anagram transit maps trickled in yesterday. March 1's the cutoff for new anagram maps -- I'll blog all the ones I receive by midnight, Eastern time! Get anagramming!

NY/NJ Path:

Sydney:

(Thanks, TehDiplomat and Chris!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 10:09:02 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

CBS pulls an NBC on YouTube -- autistic b'ball player clip pulled

Anonymous BoingBoing reader says,

YouTube user "aretired" posted a clip from Thursday's CBS Evening News showcasing Jason McElwain, the autistic highschool basketball player who scored 6-3 pointers in the final four minutes of the game. The video clip shot up to #15 in alltime viewings on YouTube with 1.5 million hits in just three days -- then, it was suddenly and inexplicably pulled.
User "aretired" reposted the clip and was again pulled within a day, still no explanations.
CBS sent DMCA complaints for not just that McElwain clip, but all 11 of the user's other CBS-related clips that had up till now gone fairly unnoticed, by anyone. And, despite their huffing and puffing and pulling over a 2-minute feel-good piece of the year, you can still catch your fill of Oprah, Letterman, Degeneres, Dr. Phil and other CBS content at YouTube.

And, I'd add, at other popular user-submitted video-sharing sites. Here is a mirror to online video for the enormously popular CBS segment on Jason McElwain (wmv).

Reader comment: Gaynelle Grover says

As the parent of autistic identical twins who play on an NJB basketball team, I found this story incredibly moving. I wasn't alone. The link to the spot on YouTube made it's way around various autism online discussion groups--and undoubtedly disappointed many when it was pulled. However, you might let readers know it's available on Google Video: Link

Reader comment: Anonymous says:

hbo's real sports ran an almost identical story last year on a special ed student that got in a game and knocked down some 3s. watching the CBS piece was like watching a rerun. Link

posted by Xeni Jardin at 10:06:48 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Read outline for John Kricfalusi's new cartoon: The Heartaches

Ren and Stimpy creator John K has posted the pilot outline to his new cartoon, The Heartaches. It's called "Curly Fuzz Trauma."
Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 09:21:34 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Hunting enables men to show off

While it would seem that men in hunter-gatherer societies who are good hunters have an evolutionary advantage because their mates would stay with them longer and their kids would be better fed. It turns out though that the dangerous and exhausting act of hunting is also a good way for men to show-off. A study of the Hadza tribe of Tansania in the scientific journal Current Anthropology looks at this so-called "showoff hypothesis." From a press release:

"When asked where they would like to reside, [Hadza] women preferred the camp of good hunters, where more food would be shared with their families," explains Brian M. Wood (a graduate student in biological anthropology at Harvard University). "The choice was not so clear for [Hadza] men: living with bad hunters would showcase their own hunting prowess. Living with good hunters, however, would bring more food to their family, at the cost of lowered relative hunting status."

Ultimately though, most men in the study chose to live with the good hunters so they could best provide for their families. Link

posted by David Pescovitz at 03:57:54 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Tokyo Wonderfest photo gallery

Here are 84 photos from the Tokyo Wonderfest. My favorite photos are the ones of this figurine of a woman who is holding her own head and spinal column so she can kiss herself.

Josh says: "I recently went to Wonderfest here in Tokyo, a twice yearly (winter and summer) celebration of all things otaku. In other words, robots, cosplay and lots (and lots) of tiny figurines having tentacle sex. I went only equipped with my keitei (cellphone) so the picture quality isn't the best and I must warn you, most of the pix are definitely NSFW as I basically tried to document as much obsessive peversion as I could. Hope you enjoy them!"

(Obviously NSFW) Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 03:41:37 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Fight AOL/Yahoo's email tax!

EFF has coordinated a massive effort to push back against AOL/Yahoo's proposed email tax that will only guarantee delivery of email if the sender pays AOL/Yahoo for every message they deliver:

A pay-to-send system won't help the fight against spam - in fact, this plan assumes that spam will continue and that mass mailers will be willing to pay to have their emails bypass spam filters. And non-paying spammers will not reduce the amount of mail they throw at your filters simply because others pay to evade them.
Perversely, the new two-tiered system AOL proposes would actually reward AOL financially for failing to maintain its email service. The chief advantage of paying to send CertifiedEmail is that it can bypass AOL's spam filters. Non-paying customers are being asked to trust that after paid mail goes into effect, AOL will properly maintain its spam filters so only unwanted mail gets thrown away.
But the economic incentives point the other way: The moment AOL switches to a two-tiered Internet where giant emailers pay for preferential service, AOL will face a simple business choice: spend money to keep regular spam filters up-to-date, or make money by neglecting their spam filters and pushing more senders to pay for guaranteed delivery. Poor delivery of mail turns from being a problem that AOL has every incentive to fix to something that could actually make them money if the company ignores it.

Way more impressive than the letter is who signed it:

AFL-CIO, AIDS Foundation of Chicago, American Academy of HIV Medicine, Association of Cancer Online Resources, Chris Pirillo, Lockergnome, Common Cause, Communication Workers of America, Community HIV/AIDS Mobilization Project, Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility, Consumer Federation of America, Craig Newmark, Democracy For America, Democracy In Action, Democratic National Committee, Donor Digital, Drug Policy Alliance, Electronic Frontier Foundation, Free Press, Gun Owners of America, Human Rights Campaign, Humane Society of United States, Michael Geist, Moveon.org Civic Action, Oxfam America, Peacefire, RightMarch, RiseUp Networks, Tim O'Reilly, O'Reilly Media, United Farm Workers, Working Assets, American Rights At Work, Brothers In Action, Californians Against Waste, Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood, Center for Digital Democracy, Chicago Media Action Chin Music Press, Cleanpeace.org, Connecticut Parent Power, Defenders of Wildlife, Earthjustice, Earthworks, Englewood Ob/Gyn, Equality North Carolina, Free Schuylkill River Park, Life-Zone, M+R Strategic Services, Maryland League of Conservation Voters, Media Alliance, National Video Resources, North Carolina Harm Reduction Center Prometheus Radio, Roots of Promise, Sinapu, Working America

Link

posted by Cory Doctorow at 03:00:22 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Inexplicable, funny video: screaming tape-player sliding down a clothesline

This inexplicably funny video features a portable tape-player playing back panicked screams as it slides down a clothesline, hung from a carabiner, across a variety of settings. It's amazingly funny and freaking weird. Link (via JWZ)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 02:43:18 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Trove of rare Alabama civil rights movement photos unearthed

A newspaper in Birmingham, Alabama, has unearthed a collection of dozens of never-published, haunting photos from the civil rights movement. They've republished many on the Web and are hosting a gallery show of some as well:

Hundreds of photos from that era were lost, sold, stolen or stored in archives. Some of those pictures appear today for the first time in the newspaper, in an eight-page special section titled "Unseen. Unforgotten."
The section is the result of research by Alexander Cohn, a 30-year-old former photo intern at The News. In November 2004, Cohn went through an equipment closet at the newspaper in search of a lens and saw a cardboard box full of negatives marked, "Keep. Do Not Sell."

Link (Thanks, The Divine Goat!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 02:39:06 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Excellent parody of Sony "bouncing ball" commercial

progosk says: swedish gamer/machinima forum snoken has produced a wonderful revisitation of that lovely bravia ad (set to the same infectious josé gonzález cover of "heartbeats).
Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 02:37:05 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Free CC music on community WiFi network

Wireless Nomad, a cooperative WiFi network project in Toronto, has signed a deal with Fading Ways, a Creative Commons-licensed label, to distribute music free on its network:

Toronto's Fading Ways Music and Wireless Nomad Co-op are pleased to announce that the Fading Ways Share sampler series, licensed under Creative Commons, is available free on the Wireless Nomad wireless Internet network. 30 full-length songs are now available to download anywhere on the Wireless Nomad network, completely free, completely legal, and completely in support of our communities and artists.

Link (Thanks, Damien!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 02:27:32 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Collection of vintage BBS GIFs

Here's a giant Flickr gallery of GIFs from the golden age of BBSes, when every board had a file-repository of low-rez color images, just so that you could download them and experience the coolth of having a color! picture! on! your! screen! Link (Thanks, Mat!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 02:25:41 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Building "stores" light for later

Japanese construction company Shimizu and Sharp electronics plan to build a transparent office complex that's tricked out with thin solar panels and LEDs. The structure is planned for Matsudo, Chiba Prefecture, in southeast Japan. From New Scientist:

Sections of the office's walls look transparent, but actually contain incredibly thin solar panels and as many as 320 light-emitting diodes that release whitish-blue light at night. According to NikkeiNet Interactive (paid psubscription required), the walls can convert 7% of solar energy into electricity and illuminate the building for an average of 4.6 hours every night.

Link

posted by David Pescovitz at 01:02:07 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

New RU Sirius show: Timothy Archibald interview

This week on the RU Sirius Show, they have a fun conversation with photographer Timothy Archibald talking about his stunning new book of photos and interviews, Sex Machines , all about suburban men who build dildo-bots.

And Craigslist's Craig Newmark is on this week's NeoFiles. Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 11:53:33 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Triple Threat exhibition at Roq la Rue gallery in Seattle

I'm sorry I'm going to miss this show, featuring paintings by Ryan Heshka, Davey, and Brian Despain. It opens Friday, March 10th and runs through April 8.

(Click on thumbnails for enlargement) All three painters work in extremely different styles, yet present similar ideology in their subject matters undertones, mainly the strife between man and the natural world.
Ryan Heshka is rapidly becoming well known for his “Vintage Pulp” style paintings. Using the themes of technology vs nature, Ryan presents his work in a retro type format, drawing visual inspiration from 40’s –50’s science fiction magazines and old B monster movies. Layering luscious jewel tone colors alongside cut out text from various sources, Ryan’s work tackles environmental themes while remaining slyly humorous.
Davey (aka Dave Wong) paints fanciful, dramatic scenarios using animal characters inspired by film (King Kong, Planet Of the Apes, Ray Harryhausen films) and comic books (such as work by legend Jack Kirby). His works contains a dark tension and undercurrents of hidden aggression, mixed with a dreamlike vision of an untamed prehistoric world.
Brian Despain's paintings combine science fiction sensibilities with a nod to retro mechanics. Surreal creatures powered by early Industrial Revolution era technology are rendered in a precise, perfectionist manner, dipped in a rich, dusty color palette.

Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 11:38:06 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Guess what this object is and win $15

Here's the new guess-what-this-is quiz on Random Good stuff. If you think know what this is, post your guess here (don't email me about it, please).
Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 11:11:39 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Install Wikipedia on your iPod

Encyclopodia is a snapshot of Wikipedia as an 800MB ebook for your iPod. Link (Thanks, Ted!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 10:05:38 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Koster's amazing "What are the lessons of MMORPGs today?"

Raph Koster -- lead on Ultima Online, creator of Star Wars Galaxies, Chief Creative Officer of Sony Online Entertainment, and author of A Theory of Fun (a kind of Understanding Comics for games) -- has published an hilarious series of aphorisms under the title "What are the lessons of MMORPGs today?"

Lone heroes can't slay dragons. It takes an army.
People are only good at one thing.
That's why it takes six people (all doing different jobs) to kill most anything.
You never, ever, ever change jobs. If you want to, you probably need to die.
You can be the best in the world at your job.
But so can everyone else.
And you will all do it exactly the same way.
Intelligent beings who have civilizations and languages of their own are generally evil and should be slain.
Many, if not all, wild creatures are highly aggressive and will attack on sight.
Evil is not redeemable; good is not a choice. Your morals are innate.

Link (via Wonderland)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 09:47:34 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Podzinger: search the full text of podcasts

Podzinger is a service that aggregates hundreds of thousands of episodes of podcasts, converts the entire text of the casts to text, and then delivers a searachable index. You go to Podzinger, search for a search, and you get back all the podcasts that have mentioned that term -- along with embedded players that can play you back the whole podcast, or just those segments where the keywords are mentioned. In a nutshell, this lets you do Tehcnorati-style full-text searching of podcasts, treating them like textual blog-entries. It's way slick.

Podzinger will deliver you an RSS feed of any search result -- you can bake in a search for your favorite keywords and get an alert -- with timecode! -- every time the keywords show up in a cast.

This is all de-militarized technology from DARPA's EARS (Effective Affordable Reusable Speech-to-text) program, and it's been developed by the venerable BBN company, which was also part of the initial development of the Internet.

Podzinger only works in English right now, but they're rolling out "North American" Spanish and Mandarin shortly.

The only downside is that Podzinger doesn't run well on Firefox for the Mac, because of known bugs with the way that Quicktime and Firefox play together. Mac users have to switch back to Safari to use it. Still, it's a small price to pay for a killer free service. Link

Update: Dave sez, "Our product, Podscope, is like Podzinger, except that we also index video blogs and have a Firefox-friendly design."

posted by Cory Doctorow at 09:40:13 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Cat piano

Amazing inventor Athanasius Kircher designed this cat piano in in the 17th century. Kitties with differently-pitched voices were placed in the pens and then "triggered" to meow with a sharp poke in the ass. From Kircher's Musurgia Universalis (1650):

In order to raise the spirits of an Italian prince burdened by the cares of his position, a musician created for him a cat piano. The musician selected cats whose natural voices were at different pitches and arranged them in cages side by side, so that when a key on the piano was depressed, a mechanism drove a sharp spike into the appropriate cat’s tail. The result was a melody of meows that became more vigorous as the cats became more desperate. Who could not help but laugh at such music? Thus was the prince raised from his melancholy.

Link (via Neatorama)

posted by David Pescovitz at 09:25:53 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

London Copyfighters: Speak at Speaker's Corner on Mar 19!

If you're in London on Sunday March 19, there's a public event at my office that I'd like you to come to: we eat brunch, go to Speakers' Corner, and give impromptu speeches about copyright in between the Marxists, god-botherers and loonies.

Since January 2005, I've hosted a series of EFF-sponsored monthly-ish brunches at my office in London's Stanhope Centre. These "London Copyfighters' Drunken Brunch and Talking Shop" events have been semi-open: anyone who showed up was welcome, but I didn't advertise it much because I couldn't afford to feed an army.

But Stanhope Centre's lost its lease, I'm retired from EFF, and spring is upon us, so for the very last of these events hosted at Stanhope, I'm throwing it open to the wide world. If you're interested in issues of copyright, patent, trademark, free information, access -- that kinda thing -- you're invited to come to Stanhope on March 19th for an 11AM-1PM brunch and then to come and give a speech at Hyde Park's legendary Speaker's Corner, just over the road.

Giving a speech at Speakers' Corner is wild -- it's the ultimate soap-boxing experience, and everyone who's done it swears by it. You can check out pictures of previous declaimings, too.

Come April and through the spring and summer, the Open Rights Group will continue to run Copyfighters' Brunches as picnics in Hyde Park, and it's hunting for a nearby indoor home for the autumn and winter of 2006.

March's event is co-sponsored by EFF, Open Rights Group, the Foundation for Free Information Infrastructure and the Open Knowledge Forum Network.
More...

posted by Cory Doctorow at 09:17:23 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Smithsonian collecting Hip-Hop artifacts

The Smithsonian Institution has launched a national collecting initiative to gather objects related to hip-hop culture. According to a Smithsonian press release (PDF), the initiative, called "Hip-Hop Won't Stop: The Beat, The Rhymes, The Life," is seeking "objects from all aspects of hip-hop arts and culture, including vinyl records, handwritten lyrics, boom boxes, clothing and costumes, videos and interviews, Disc Jockey equipment and microphones, personal and business correspondence, and posters and photos." (Seen here, a mixer and cap that belonged to Grandmaster Flash.) The ceremonial launch begins today with hip-hop icons Russell Simmons, Ice T, Crazy Legs, and others expected in attendance. From the Associated Press:

"Hip-hop was born in New York but it's now a global phenomenon," said Valeska Hilbig, a National Museum spokeswoman. "It's here to stay, and it's part of American culture just like jazz is part of American history. It's part of the narrative we tell at the museum..."

Hip-hop impresario Russell Simmons, scheduled to attend Tuesday's announcement at the Hilton New York, wouldn't say what he planned to donate. But he called the Smithsonian's recognition a "great statement for hip-hop."

"It's not a signal to the end of hip-hop," Simmons, co-founder of the venerable Def Jam label, said of the Smithsonian's undertaking. "We know it will be a lasting fixture. And it should be. All over the world hip-hop is expression of young people's struggles, their frustrations and opinions."

Link

posted by David Pescovitz at 08:31:12 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Mobile Content Festival

BB pal Jon Lebkowsky and his colleagues at the Digital Convergence Initiative are sponsoring a Mobile Content Festival. You still have a few days to enter! Categories include Applications, Games, and Films. From the call-for-entries:

The DCI is looking to address the current influence of mobile devices on our culture. Mobile devices have had a tremendous effect on our society and we are interested in how that new audience might best be communicated to in this new medium. It is our belief that this new medium offers special consideration that have yet to be suitably identified; the least of which is viewing size. Other considerations for this new form are cost per download, as well ergonomic concerns, etc.

The Festival is looking for mobile content submissions that explore the mobile lifestyle.

Link

posted by David Pescovitz at 08:14:32 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

James P Kelly's "Burn" short sf novel podcast concludes

The entirety of Burn, a wonderful short science fiction novel, is now available as an audiobook podcast.

Back in November, I blogged about Hugo-award-winning author James Patrick Kelly's podcasting of his new short novel Burn, one chapter per week, for sixteen weeks.

Burn is the story of Prosper Gregory Leung, a native of a techno-primitive utopian planet called Walden, a planet that was purchased by a wealthy industrialist who turned it into a primitivist state modeled on Thoreau's book, chasing off the Pukpuks, the original settlers whose industrial civilization had denuded the planet's native flora and fauna. The Waldeners sign onto a covenant to eschew most technology -- including all the amazing, life-extending, faster-than-light magic of the universe outside of Walden -- except for genetically modified fast-growing forests that they use to replant the world, remaking it into a verdant and tranquil paradise.

But the Pukpuks aren't all content to be driven away. Some of them take to the hills, and attack Walden's forests and towns with firebombs that create the Burn, an ongoing, raging fire-fight that licks at the world's vegetation.

Leung is a firefighter, a kind of paramilitary role in this world, who has lost his best friend in a Pukpuk attack, and who is recovering in a high-tech hospital where he experiments with a souped up galactic phone that puts him in touch with the High Gregory, a kind of reincarnated Dalai Llama, but weirder and less tranquil, who surprises Leung by showing up with his entourage of prepubescent incarnations of divine powers to "make luck for him."

Like all Jim Kelly stories, Burn wrenches at your heart even as it makes you laugh out loud. I learned everything I know about reading aloud from attending Jim Kelly's readings at science fiction conventions (and he says he learned all he knows from reading to his kids, who are apparently a discriminating audience) and listening to him read Burn is a positive delight. One of my weekly highlights for the past four-or-so-months has been the latest Burn installment, and Jim's wonderful, warm readings of his book. I can't recommend it enough, and now that it's completed, it's the perfect thing to load onto a CD or MP3 player for a long trip or a week's worth of bike rides or workouts at the gym. Podcast feed link

posted by Cory Doctorow at 04:55:09 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Monday, February 27, 2006

Collection of quirky, "neo-Gothic" stories

City of Saints and Madmen, Jeff VanderMeer's latest short story collection, has been published. Jeff's collection is "set in the fantastical town of Ambergris, a complex landscape of stories, 'eyewitness' reports, 'faux histories,' and neo-Gothic imaginings" -- basically, the quirky, lush, funny stories that he's best known for. We were classmates at the Clarion Writers' Workshop back in 1992, and he's always been a sharp writer -- he won the World Fantasy Award for his novella The Transformation of Martin Lake back in 2000, and is a contender again for this fine volume.

In the first hour after death, the room is so still that every sound holds a terrible clarity, like the tap of a knife against glass. The soft pad of shoes as someone walks away and closes the door is profoundly solid—each short footstep weighted, distinct. The body lies against the floor, the sightless eyes staring down into the wood as if some answer has been buried in the grain. The back of the head is mottled by the shadows of the trees that sway outside the open window. The trickle of red from the scalp that winds its way down the cheek, to puddle next to the clenched hand, is as harmless now, leached of threat, as if it were colored water. The man’s features have become slack, his mouth parted slightly, his expression surprised. The wrinkles on his forehead form ridges of superfluous worry. His trumpet lies a few feet away… From outside the window, the coolness of the day brings the green-gold scent of lilacs and crawling vines. The rustle of leaves. The deepening of light. A hint of blue through the trees. After a time, a mouse, fur ragged and one eye milky white, sidles across the floor, sits on its haunches in front of the body, and sniffs the air. The mouse circles the man. It explores the hidden pockets of the man’s gray suit, trembles atop the shoes, nibbles at the laces, sticks its nose into a pant cuff.

Link (Thanks, Jeff!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 11:44:21 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Australia Copyright Agency to schools: pay Internet licenses or shut down the net!

Australian schools may have to pay a copyright fee every time a student is told to look at the web, if a plan from the national collecting society is successful. The Copyright Agency pays Australian authors for the photocopying that takes place on schools by randomly sampling the schools annually, collecting $31 million in fees and dispersing them to authors.

Now they say that they deserve to collect for the use of the Web. Despite the fact that there's an implied license to read Web pages that goes along with publishing them (who puts up a web-page without expecting it to be read?) and despite the fact that the vast majority of pages online weren't created by Australians, and despite the fact that the vast majority of pages created by Australians weren't created by professional authors, the agency proposes that it should be able to collect a tax on behalf of all those authors in the world in order to line the pockets of its few lucky members.

This is a way to transfer Australia's tax dollars from its education system to its copyright sector. Australia already has an arts council that gives money directly to artists -- if it wants to give them more money, it should get a bigger budget and do so, not trump up some kind of ridiculous Internet tax that could cost schools their Internet connections:

Negotiations between the Ministerial Council on Education Employment, Training and Youth Affairs, representing the schools, and the agency have broken down over plans to change the scheme to include a question in the survey on whether teachers direct students to use the internet.
"If it turned out we'd have to pay them, we'd turn the internet off in schools," the council's national copyright director Delia Browne said.
"We couldn't afford it; it would not be sustainable. How on earth are we going to deliver education in the 21st century? How are taxpayers going to afford this."

Canada's doomed Bill C-60 had a proposal for this, too. Luckily for Canada, they kicked out Sam Bulte, the Hollywood-bought lawmaker who had led the charge for C-60. Link (Thanks, Daz!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 11:33:11 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Montreal airport denies electricity to laptop users

Alec Saunders reports that Montreal airport has put covers over its electrical outlets, presumably to stop people from charging their laptops and phones while travelling. Which is, you know, really dumb: frequent travellers need juice between flights, and airports that sell WiFi without providing the electricty to use it are like coffee-shops without toilets. They're missing out on the revenue they'd get from people who'd buy the WiFi if only they had the power to use it.

I’m sitting in Montreal’s Trudeau airport, and noticing what appears to me to be a new trend. Airports have been capping off the power outlets. Where have they all gone? It used to be that you could find a power outlet on a wall or a pillar at the gate, but not anymore. In recent weeks, I’ve travelled through Seattle, San Jose, Chicago O’Hare, Toronto, and Montreal. The plentiful power that laptop users used to depend on is virtually non-existant. Here in Montreal, I am sitting in a phone booth, because it has a power outlet for laptop users.

I got into a huge fight at London's Luton airport a couple months ago when I was ordered to unplug my laptop because it presented a "fire hazard." All the devices plugged into the outlets in the airport had to be "certified." I asked about the laptop adapters for sale in the Dixon's electronics shop beside me and was informed that they were certified, and I could plug back in if I bought a new adapter from them (imagine that -- a £50 electricty tax in the form of a mandate to buy a new adapter!). I'd just spent £13 on WiFi, so I kept arguing, demanding that they give me a quote I could publish in a magazine column about their policy, and they relented -- finally -- when I pointed out that the people in the first-class lounge visible through the picture window had all plugged their laptops in. Link (via WiFiNetNews)

Update: Glenn sez, "My friend Nancy Gohring just wrote from Paris (where she's about to fly back to Dublin) that Parisian airports will add 2,000 free electrical outlets for people to use; this was promoted in the airport magazine."

Update 2: Slavin reports, "Had the very same experience at Stansted (London) a few weeks ago. Same circumstances, had just paid for a British adapter, and for wifi." Crap. I used to fly out of Stansted 20 times a year. I guess not any more.

posted by Cory Doctorow at 11:23:59 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Disney hiring "Intelligence Analyst" to review "open source media"

Disney is hiring an "Intelligence Analyst" who will monitor "open source media" to assess "threats that could harm, or make vulnerable, The Walt Disney Company (TWDC), its employees, guests, or assets:"

THE POSITION: The analyst thoroughly reviews information from open/public sources, official sources, and professional contacts, and conducts regular assessments of world events, regional/national security climates, and suspect individuals and groups. The analyst produces a range of written and verbal analyses for employees and management of the Company and provides tactical intelligence support to the Company's security and crisis management operators...
% of Total Duties and Responsibilities 45 [%] Monitors open source media, homeland security and law enforcement bulletins, and information from professional contacts, for international, national, and local news and intelligence that may affect the security and safety of TWDC. Maintains comprehensive files of intelligence on key issues and parts of the world; maintains record of threats received, assessments, and their disposition. Plays key information processing role in the Corporate-level Emergency Operations Center, when activated.

What a sweet gig! "These candy-ravers on LJ say they're going to throw an ecstasy party in Fantasyland tomorrow night -- throw on an extra security detail." Link (Thanks, Phil!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 11:16:10 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Pixar employees offer advice on Disney park redesigns

The Re-Imagineering is a blog that bills itself as "A forum for Pixar and Disney professionals passionate about the Disney Theme Parks to catalog past Imagineering missteps and offer up tenable practical solutions in hopes that a new wave of creative management at Imagineering can once again bring back the wonder and magic that's been missing from the parks for decades. The opinions expressed at Re-Imagineering are those of the individual contributors and do not necessarily represent the opinions of The Walt Disney Company." Absolutely brilliant. Check out entries like this one:

With the existing attractions, Park Operations has been known to disable actuators in animatronic figures and turn off special effects because they can't afford to maintain them. The auctioneer pirate isn't moving like a chicken because he was animated poorly, he's moving like that because an Operations person repositioned his arm so the figure won't wear down his costume. This lack of cooperation between WDI and park Operations undermines the work of the imagineers and leads to what we call, "bad show."
The goal of Park Operations exclusively needs to be maintenance of the best show possible. If meeting this goal conflicts with their budget then they need to be involved earlier in the design process to address maintenance issues and/or the cost of maintenance needs to be included in the design budget for all new attractions. Yes that would raise the cost of the attraction but it's not fair to hand Park Operations the keys to a 100 million ride and say, "keep her looking good as new." It's not that operations folk are unconcerned with quality (one would hope), they're just being practical. It's no fun to inherit a Lamborghini if you can't afford the insurance.

Link (Thanks, Terry!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 11:12:51 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

MPAA exec can't sell A-hole proposal to tech companies

Brad Hunt, the CTO of the MPAA, got an angry reception from a bunch of Hollywood tech-providers when he presented the MPAA's "A-hole" filtering plan.

For a couple years now, the MPAA has been promising to "plug the Analog Hole" by getting the government to pass a law crippling all recorders, so that they'll refuse to record anything with a secret watermark that says it's a copyrighted work (heaven help you if your son's first steps take place in the living room while the TV's playing -- your camcorder will be of no use).

Hunt gave the talk to a group of high-tech suppliers who provide entertainment technology for Hollywood and its viewers, and they greeted the A-hole proposal with the skepticism it deserves.

One questioner asked who would be responsible for the extensive consumer education needed. Hunt's answer -- that he hoped retailers would do it -- drew dubious groans.
The final question summed up the problem: "This is a room full of people whose living depends on this working. You're getting pushback to the point of hostility. If you can't sell this to us, how are you going to sell it to the target 16-45 demographic?"
Hunt said the marketplace would ultimately sort it out.

This Hunt's an interesting character. I once was at a meeting with him where we had no Internet access, so I went and got the conference center to turn on an Ethernet jack. Before I could get hooked up to it and turn on a WiFi service for the room, Hunt grabbed it and hogged it for the rest of the afternoon, refusing to turn on connection sharing so that a room full of TV, electronics, and film people could get online too. Taking advice from him on how public-interest policy should be set would be like putting Scrooge McDuck in charge of the local soup kitchen. Link

posted by Cory Doctorow at 10:57:25 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Anagram maps for Montreal (x2), Helsinki, Monterrey, San Diego, Mexico City

Montreal (I):

Montreal (II):

(see this alternate Montreal map)

(Thanks, Matti, Julien, Matthew, Edmz, Nick and Omegar!)

Update: David made this alternate Montreal map.

posted by Cory Doctorow at 10:37:58 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

As deadline passes, Iraqi official says Jill Carroll alive

Natasha Hynes, friend and former colleague of kidnapped American journalists Jill Carroll, says:

The Feb 26 deadline set by Jill's kidnappers passed by yesterday with nary a word about Jill. But I believe, at this stage, no news is good news. This morning, some reports from notable sources emerged indicating that Jill is still alive. These statements came from an Iraqi official and US Ambassador to Iraq Zalmay Khalilzad, with the Iraqi official claiming to know the kidnapper's name and address...

Link

Previous BoingBoing posts on Jill Carroll's abduction: Link

posted by Xeni Jardin at 08:29:55 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Shotgun shell chair

This is designer Alexander Reh's "Fully Loaded" chair. It's made from more than 450 12-gauge shotgun shells. "The bright brass tips create a massaging texture on the top of the chair, much to the contrary of their intended use," he writes. Along the same lines, here's a previous post about a shotgun shell vase.
Link (via MAKE: Blog)

posted by David Pescovitz at 07:33:27 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

A video of Coop's toy collection

Here's a video of Boing Boing favorite artist Coop and his awesome collection of Japanese toys!
Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 05:39:03 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Kirsten Ulve show in Chicago, March 3

(Click on thumbnail for enlargement) Former bOING bOING illustrator Kirsten Ulve has a show coming up at 219 N. Justine in Chicago from 5:30 to 8pm, called "Pictures You Will Like."
Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 05:12:38 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

ISPs in Iran, Tunisia also use SmartFilter (which blocks BoingBoing as "nudity")

Snip from a June, 2005 post on the Global Voices blog, about a report issued last year by The OpenNet Initiative and Berkman Center -- Internet Filtering in Iran (PDF). Snip from executive summary (PDF):

Iran is also one of a growing number of countries, particularly in the Middle East region, that rely upon commercial software developed by for-profit United States companies to carry out the core of its filtering regime. Iran has recently acknowledged, as our testing confirms, that it uses the commercial filtering package SmartFilter – made by the US-based company, Secure Computing – as the primary technical engine of its filtering system. This commercial software product is configured as part of the Iranian filtering system to block both internationally-hosted sites in English and sites in local languages.
SmartFilter, as with all commercial filtering software packages, is prone to over-blocking, errors, and a near-total lack of transparency. In effect, Iran outsources many of the decisions for what its citizens can access on the Internet to a United States company, which in turn profits from its complicity in such a regime.

In the comments thread on that post, former Secure Computing Public Relations Manager David Burt claims the copies of Smartfilter used by Iran's government-controlled ISPs were not licensed:

Secure Computing has sold no licenses to any entity in Iran, and any use of Secure’s software by an ISP in Iran has been without Secure Computing’s consent and is in violation of Secure Computing’s End User License Agreement. We have been made aware of ISPs in Iran making illegal and unauthorized attempts to use of our software.

But on Yishay Mor's blog, Mr. Burt appeared to confirm that Secure Computing sells its censorware products to a government-controlled ISP in Tunisia, and anywhere else that such a transaction would not be prohibited by US law:

We sell to ISPs where the law allows. It's really up the customer how they use our software.

Previously:
* BoingBoing banned in UAE, Qatar, elsewhere. Our response to net-censors: Get bent!
* Stick Michelangelo's "David" on your blog to protest censorware

Image: A "block page" from Iran's ISP DATAK, from Blockpage.com, received when attempting to access a pregnancy information website. "Headers indicate that the ISP is using Cisco's PIX firewall to filter in conjunction with Smartfilter. Pornography is blocked, as are political sites." Link

Reader comment: Mongo Nikol says,

Here's a letter from James S. Tyre, co-founder of the Censorware Project (and long-time EFF ally) sent in '99 to Senator John McClaine. It seems SmartFilter not only blocks nudity but it also filters out the Declaration of Independence, the US Constitution, the Bible, the Koran, and all the works of Shakespeare. Perhaps SmartFilter believes kids should be protected from these works, also?

Reader comment: Peggy says,

A 2002 survey by the Kaiser Family Foundation found that SmartFilter blocks a number of health-related sites. As you might expect, web sites with sex ed, birth control and sexually transmitted disease information were on the block list. It surprised me, though, that SmartFilter blocks the CDC site about diabetes. Of course it isn't just SmartFilter that blocks these sites - other internet filtering programs such as CyberPatrol and Websense are guilty of this as well. Link.

Reader comment: Moe's Diner says,

I used to work with an organization associated with a minority religion outside the mainstream big-5 (or big-7)--one of those hundreds of "other" philosophies that never was about social conformity or political success. So, I found out at the time that SmartFilter tends to lump the websites of *all* minority philosophies under the "cult" category. And, of course, most organizations opt-in to block "cults" (maybe it's part of the SmartFilter's defualt config?). Anyway, as you can imagine, the world is now a much safer place that people can't access unpopular philosophical ideas--you know, since, in general, all good ideas have always been popular and embraced by the mainstream.

Reader comment: Christopher Lotito says,

Campaign Against Smartfilter Directly! This page at the Secure Computing website allows you to check the blacklist status of your favorite URLs, then provide recommendations to change their categorization. The company promises to email you eventually and there is even a place to put comments. Since Secure Computing is located in San Jose in the United States... a place some may recall as a bastion of freedom and democracy, it seems appropriate that Secure Computing should enjoy a demonstration of that deomcratic proccess. I hope that all BoingBoing readers will take a couple minutes to cast their vote to have BoingBoing removed from the blacklist using this Secure Computing approved and even preferred method. Good Luck BoingBoing, I'll be keeping up on this issue and I hope you'll let me know if there are any other ways that I can help.

Reader comment: "Open Source Sex Ed" blogger, author, podcaster, and Fleshbot contributor Violet Blue says,

I personally really need the "Defeat Censorware" resource you're providing to get around stoopid filterware for my livelihood. I've often ended up in places hunting for wi-fi because I need to work, only to discover that I can't access my website or or Fleshbot.com at places like the local Sony Metreon shopping center -- not even the Movable Type blog-editing interfaces. I wonder how many other journalists and bloggers find themselves in the same fix?

Reader comment: Darin Dykes of ARRL.net says,

QRZ.com is an amateur radio site related to news, discussion, and buying and selling of ham radio related gear. While discussions can get quite animated, they don't merit the "Entertainment" block it received from SmartFilter. And qsl.net is a domain set up by ham radio operators for ham radio operators. It generally does not allow any content that you couldn't utilize via amateur radio. SmartFilter blocked the entire domain of thousands of ham radio operator sites and classed it as "Entertainment." How they got that I don't know. I work on a USAF base so BoingBoing is no longer accessible.

posted by Xeni Jardin at 05:07:01 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Tinselman uses fake tilt shift to make micro-Disneyland photos

Myst series co-creator Robyn Miller (aka Tinselman) made good use of the fake tilt shift method I posted earlier.

I've been hard at work on my scale model of early Disneyland and I'm now finally ready to reveal it. You will most definetely be impressed!... until you learn that my scale model is only a quick photoshop cheat. But it sure is fun!

Link

Reader comment:Graham Lampa says:

Some fellow flickr users and I who were jazzed by your original post on boing boing put together a flickr group for tilt-shift miniature fakes. We now have 43 photos in the pool and 20 posters, and it's cool to see what teeny-weeny, itsy-bitsy effects others are coaxing out of simple blurring in Photoshop!
Tilt-shift miniature fakes group.
Also, my personal collection of miniatures (mainly from my trips to China and later Italy this summer.

Reader comment: Steve Lombardi, Microsoft's Virtual Earth Program Manager says:

Hey! thanks for that post on the photoshop tutorial. Made me wish I could work photoshop real bad. But some of my work buddies can, and created some great images.
I had posted on my blog about this guy earlier this month, and began to think about how to take the immense library of oblique imagery we were capturing from planes and 'miniaturize' them in this way. What Barbieri is doing is really expensive for each shot he gets. The tutorial you posted, along with a random birds eye image makes a really nice poor-man's compromise. In the end, it makes me want to get good with Photoshop even more!

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 04:39:46 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

America's cleanest restroom contest

A company that makes restroom supplies sponsors an annual contest to find "America's Best Restroom." Here are this year's finalists, as reported by the Cincinnati Enquirer Post:

* All Seasons Bistro, in East Lansing, Mich., which was cited for its streak-free mirrors, old-world floor tiles and fresh paint job. "This is one of a few public restrooms I would allow myself, my wife and children to use and not worry about it," the nominator said.

* Borgata Hotel Casino & Spa, in Atlantic City, whose restrooms - with their stainless steel sinks, choice of hand towels or dryers and warm wood tones - "spare no expense."

* Hemenways, of Providence, R.I., a landmark waterfront restaurant whose restrooms are clean and have "simple elegance and charm."

* Quad City International Airport, in Moline, Ill., which has facilities that are "clean, simple, pleasant and exactly what you want in an airport washroom."

* Wendell's Restaurant, in Westerville, Ohio, whose sports-themed restrooms are "praised for being neat, clean and having lots of towels and even mouthwash."

Link (Thanks, Charles Pescovitz!)

posted by David Pescovitz at 04:31:53 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Stick Michelangelo's "David" on your blog to protest censorware

BoingBoing reader Kurt von Finck says,

Read with a mixture of dismay and pleasure today's BB article regarding blocking by SmartFilter. Dismay that a product with "Smart" in its moniker is so stupid, and pleasure that you've decided to stand up to it. Let me suggest an additional strategy.
What happens when the blogosphere uses so much tasteful nudity that the web is unusable for SmartFilter users? What happens when SmartFilter blocks so much content that the web is crippled for its users?

So, I have created the attached button (standard 120x90 size) that BB readers can put on their sites. It features the pubic region of Michelangelo's David sculpture, uses fairly neutral colors, and is taken from public domain stock photography. I release this work into the public domain, relinquish any claims over its use, and encourage BB readers to put it on their sites.
Maybe if enough of us do so, SmartFilter will just collapse under the weight of its own odious censoring.

Previously:
* BoingBoing banned in UAE, Qatar, elsewhere. Our response to net-censors: Get bent!
* Iran, Tunisia also use SmartFilter (which blocks BoingBoing as "nudity")

Reader comment: Kathryn says,

Along with the statue David, people could add the statue "Spirit of Justice," famous for Ashcroft's velvet draping: Link. Another famous topless babe is in Eugene Delacroix' Liberty painting: Link.

posted by Xeni Jardin at 04:21:00 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Black Death triggered Little Ice Age?

Scientists suggest that the Bubonic Plague may have triggered Europe's "Little Ice Age," a a bitter cold period between the 14th and 19th centuries. According to Utrecht University researchers, the Black Death wiped out so many people that millions of trees grew on the abandoned farmland. The huge new population of trees may have absorbed so much carbon dioxide from the atmosphere that the climate cooled. From the BBC News:

Dr Thomas van Hoof and his colleagues studied pollen grains and leaf remains collected from lake-bed sediments in the southeast Netherlands.

Monitoring the ups and downs in abundance of cereal pollen (like buckwheat) and tree pollen (like birch and oak) enabled them to estimate changes in land-use between AD 1000 and 1500.

The team found an increase in cereal pollen from 1200 onwards (reflecting agricultural expansion), followed by a sudden dive around 1347, linked to the agricultural crisis caused by the arrival of the Black Death, most probably a bacterial disease spread by rat fleas...

"Between AD 1200 to 1300, we see a decrease in stomata and a sharp rise in atmospheric carbon dioxide, due to deforestation we think," says Dr van Hoof, whose findings are published in the journal Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology.

But after AD 1350, the team found the pattern reversed, suggesting that atmospheric carbon dioxide fell, perhaps due to reforestation following the plague.

Link (Thanks, Vann Hall!)

posted by David Pescovitz at 04:09:45 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Gothic art at the Tate Britain

This 1782 painting by Henry Fuseli, titled The Nightmare, is a masterpiece of gothic art. It's on display at the Tate Britain right now as part of their exhibit "Gothic Nightmares: Fuseli, Blake and the Romantic Imagination." The exhibit sounds magnificent. I wish I could see these works in person but, alas, I'll have to settle for the catalog. From today's New York Times:

(The exhibit) is an exploration of the world of fantasy, mysticism, horror and sexual perversity that found expression in art and literature in Britain between 1770 and 1830 and which, fueled by novels, movies and even pop music, later became known as Gothic.

In literature, the iconic work was Mary Shelley's 1818 "Frankenstein." In art, the fad translated into paintings and drawings with strong narratives, muscular Michelangelo-inspired men and naked nymphs, as well as myriad fairies and demons...

The odd thing is that the man who came to personify the Gothic in English art was Fuseli, a Zurich-born self-taught artist who was in his mid-30's when he moved to London and who never spoke English fluently. Yet, more than any of his contemporaries, he turned to Shakespeare and Milton for material, attracted in both cases by the supernatural elements in their writing...

The 18th-century Swiss theologian Johann Casper Lavater wrote of Fuseli: "Specters, demons and madmen's phantoms, exterminating angels; murders and acts of violence — such are his favorite subjects; and yet, I repeat, no one loves with more tenderness."

Link

posted by David Pescovitz at 03:55:15 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Treetop Ewok prefab village to be planted on toxic soil

The Boase Concept builds prefab, treetop Ewok villages high in oak, alders, willows and poplars that are planted on toxic soil, and which gradually suck the gunk out of the land and purify it.

The buildings in the Boase development utilize solar-collecting facades, and the common areas lie under a "solar membrane" that both collects energy and invites natural lighting inside. Modular walls permit indoor-outdoor living and abundant natural ventilation. The walkability of the area fosters a healthy lifestyle for its residents, in close proximity to the surrounding city.

Aside: why do architectural firms' sites always suck? The site for this project is made out of unbookmarkable, unprintable, non-copy/pastable Flash, with an introductory animation, and all the substantive material in it is in PDF. Sheesh. These people are supposed to be concerned with the niceties of living -- how can they produce such unnavigable, anti-web materials? Link

posted by Cory Doctorow at 01:54:00 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Curated shopping: retail trend to thematic shops

Curated shopping is apparently a hot retail trend -- these are shops whose merchandise and decor are "curated" by someone with keen aesthetic sense. There needn't be anything linking the wares except for the sensibility they tickle:

Curated shopping--the concept of offering a selection of products as carefully edited as a museum collection--has become a retail buzzword in recent years (see "Shopping Etc.," March 2005). Colette, in Paris, and Moss, in New York, helped pioneer the concept, and both still set the standard for others. Now every major North American city seems to have at least one independently owned store with a decidedly unique approach to shopping. When it comes to furnishing interiors, these shop-owners-turned-lifestyle-curators assemble a contemporary mix of art, design, and craft that is exuberantly decorative and conceptual, even ironic. Unlike the pop-up retail trend--low-maintenance stores that appear temporarily in urban areas--boutiques that mix local and global designs are in it for the long haul, acting as incubators for lesser-known talents with bright futures.

Link (via Beyond the Beyond)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 01:45:45 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Photos from the Mad Hatter's Tea Party

Scott Beale took a bunch of pictures of the Mad Hatter's Tea Party last night in San Francisco. Looks like Phil Torrone (left) took a break from his usual non-stop blogging at Make to attend.
Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 01:10:51 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Fake tilt shift photography tutorial

A while back I wrote about cool style of photography, called tilt shift, that makes aerial photographs of real scenes look like miniature models. The effect is charming, but expensive, because you have to buy a tilt-shift lens.

Here's a nice little tutorial for faking the same effect using Photoshop. The results are very nice.
Link Scott Froschauer says:

While purchasing a "real" tilt-shift (as you were calling it, in my business we call it a "swing and tilt") is too expensive for most of us, there is a cheap alternative. For about $100 you can get a Lensbaby, which is a super analog lens. No focus marks, manual apeture (I mean real manual.) I've been shooting with one for over a year and it is easily my favorite single lens (particularly on the bang/buck ratio.)

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 01:05:49 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Awesome junk auction in Toronto March 2

My favorite little auction-house in Toronto (on which the auction house in my story Craphound is based) is having another sale on March 2 -- this is like meatspace eBay, with more serendipity and chain-smoking antiques dealers furiously outbidding one another. The auctioneer is amazing, like something out of a Tex Avery cartoon, motormouthing a mile a minute. Wish I could be there!

6:30 p.m. Thursday March 2
195 Park Lawn Road, Etobicoke
@ Byzantine Knights of Columbus Hall
A full sale of mostly smalls, great picks for dealer, decorator, collector alike. Always a great selection, 15 boxes unpacked unseen. Vintage lighting – hanging and table, china, 40s Zenith radio, mirrors, 19th c. painted violin case, large Capo Di Monte vase, Pray Dieu for home, smokers stand (2), 30s sardine can camera, lucite table, older toys and games, Victorian prints (religious and secular), Japanese sword, Militaria – helmets, bayonets, World War 1 canteen, oil paintings, antique clocks, dolls trunk, nude oil signed Corbet Gray, silver plate candlabra, ornate nouveau clock c. 1900, working mission clock, quilts, 1920s onyx table lamps, bridge lamp, large native splint basket, Arabia Finland jug, Shorter cat teapot, mod items, Edwardian record player in Mahog, cabinet, Police badges from around the world, linens, West German pottery, costume jewelry and watches, mantle clock, art and reference books, Parianware recumbent figure, masonic tea service O.E.S.
Directions – Take Park Lawn 300 m N of the Queensway. Park Lawn runs N – S at the Western edge of the Ontario Food Terminal,
For more info call 416-253-6313 or e-mail – thecountrypolitan@hotmail.com

posted by Cory Doctorow at 12:57:20 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

BoingBoing banned in UAE, Qatar, elsewhere. Our response to net-censors: Get bent!

Boing Boing to net-censors: Get bent!

We've decided not to rejig our editorial process to make it easier for a censorware company to block us for their customers. Instead, we're creating a clearinghouse of information on how to defeat censorware.

Last week, we reported that Boing Boing was blocked by entire countries including the United Arab Emirates, and by many library systems, schools, US government and military sites, and corporations.

Today, we've learned that Internet Qatar, the sole ISP in the State of Qatar, has also banned BoingBoing.

We've heard from librarians in Africa who want to watch the video of the American Register of Copyrights denouncing Congress, employees at the Australian Broadcasting Company, students, and workers around the world who can't gain access to our work.

At fault in most of these cases is a US-based censorware company called Secure Computing, which makes a web-rating product called SmartFilter. But SmartFilter isn't very smart. Secure Computing classifies any site with any nudity -- even Michaelangelo's David appearing on a single page out of thousands -- as a "nudity" site, which means that customers who block "nudity" can't get through.

Last week, Secure Computing updated their software to classify Boing Boing as a "nudity" site. Last month, we had two posts with nudity in them, out of 692 -- that's 0.29 percent of our posts, but SmartFilter blocks 100 percent of them. This month, there were four posts with nudity (including the Abu Ghraib photos), out of 618 -- 0.65 percent.

In fact, out of the 25,000+ Boing Boing posts classed as "nudity" by SmartFilter, more that 99.5 percent have no nudity at all. They're stories about Hurricane Katrina, kidnapped journalists in Iraq, book reviews, ukelele casemods, phonecam video of Bigfoot sightings (come to think of it, he doesn't wear clothes either), or pictures of astonishing Lego constructions.

Why is SmartFilter content to deliver a product with a 99.5 percent false-positive rate? Because it has promised its customers that it will stop their users from seeing nudity (fat chance -- it's a dead certainty that Smart Filter has failed to class innumerable sites containing nudity), and punishing 24,875 nudity-free posts to get at 125 that contain mild or "art" nudity is fine by them.

Secure Computing told us that their categorization system protects kindergartners from being exposed to porn. We argue that not only are products like SmartFilter incapable of blocking all potentially kid-inappropriate sites, but why treat entire countries, or entire corporate sites full of working adults, as kindergartners?

The question of keeping your child from viewing content you don't want them to see can be addressed more efficiently locally, with tech tools like the browser Bumpercar. As BoingBoing founder (and father of two) Mark Frauenfelder explains, "My daughter and I found a bunch of great kid-friendly sites and have added them to the 'white list.' As a parent, I have local control of the sites she visits instead of handing over control to a remote group of people that I don't trust to do my job of being a parent."

The fact is, there's no effective way to censor the Internet in broad strokes. Only dumb CIOs and totalitarian governments like the UAE believe that adding censorware to your network will prevent the naughty stuff from slopping in. Having a human being review a few pages on a site every couple months is a perfectly adequate classification system, in SmartFilter's lights -- which is convenient, since a genuinely thoroughgoing review would be ruinously expensive.

Secure Computing offered us a devil's bargain: if we'd change the URLs of images with "nudity" (which, they assured us, included photos of Michaelangelo's David) to something they could detect and block, they'd let the rest of the world see us again. That guy in the UAE who was worried he'd be imprisoned for trying to read BoingBoing would be OK again.

We considered their offer, and decided not to do it. What happens when the next censorware company comes along with another editorial process they want us to engage in to help them censor the site?

More importantly: why should we let a company that helps corrupt dictatorships oppress their citizen dictate morality to us?

So instead we've decided to help put Secure Computing out of business. We're doing this in three ways:

First, we're publishing a guide to evading the SmartFilter censorware. There are hundreds of ways to defeat these censorware apps, and we're going to catalog as many of them as possible.
Link to "BoingBoing's Guide To Evading Censorware."
Next, we're compiling a list of SmartFilter's dumb classifications. Send us your misclassified SmartFilter sites so we can add them to the list.
Finally, we're producing a guide to convincing your employer to ditch SmartFilter. It consists of parts one and two above: a list of bad SmartFilter classifications and a list of ways that SmartFilter can be shredded like wet kleenex. Why spend money on bad technology that doesn't work?

Signed, the BoingBoing team:
- Cory Doctorow
- Mark Frauenfelder
- Xeni Jardin
- David Pescovitz
- John Battelle

(Internet Qatar screengrab: thanks, Patrick McKinnion)

Previous BoingBoing posts:
* BoingBoing now censored in the UAE
* Argonne National Laboratory is blocking Boing Boing
* ISPs in Iran, Tunisia also use SmartFilter (which blocks BoingBoing as "nudity")
* Stick Michelangelo's "David" on your blog to protest censorware

posted by Xeni Jardin at 12:35:44 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Benjamin Franklin's 13-point plan for virtuous living

When Benjamin Franklin was 20 years old, he wrote up a 13-point "plan" for how he would live his life. He found that following the plan increased his happiness so much that he kept it up for the rest of his life.

He committed to giving strict attention to one virtue each week so after 13 weeks he moved through all 13. After 13 weeks he would start the process over again so in one year he would complete the course a total of 4 times.
He tracked his progress by using a little book of 13 charts. At the top of each chart was one of the virtues. The charts had a column for each day of the week and thirteen rows marked with the first letter of each of the 13 virtues. Every evening he would review the day and put a mark (dot) next to each virtue for each fault committed with respect to that virtue for that day.
1. Temperance: Eat not to dullness and drink not to elevation.
2. Silence: Speak not but what may benefit others or yourself. Avoid trifling conversation.
3. Order: Let all your things have their places. Let each part of your business have its time.
4. Resolution: Resolve to perform what you ought. Perform without fail what you resolve.
5. Frugality: Make no expense but to do good to others or yourself: i.e. Waste nothing.
6. Industry: Lose no time. Be always employed in something useful. Cut off all unnecessary actions.
7. Sincerity: Use no hurtful deceit. Think innocently and justly; and, if you speak, speak accordingly.
8. Justice: Wrong none, by doing injuries or omitting the benefits that are your duty.
9. Moderation: Avoid extremes. Forebear resenting injuries so much as you think they deserve.
10. Cleanliness: Tolerate no uncleanness in body, clothes or habitation.
11. Chastity: Rarely use venery but for health or offspring; Never to dullness, weakness, or the injury of your own or another's peace or reputation.
12. Tranquility: Be not disturbed at trifles, or at accidents common or unavoidable.
13. Humility: Imitate Jesus and Socrates.

Link (Merlin Mann linked to this last September)

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 12:31:31 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Family in Turkey chooses to walk on all fours

The Artyom Reader points to some articles and a video about a family in Turkey that walks on all fours and communicates using a "primitive language."

“The patients had a rather primitive language… they spoke to each other using their own language, using only a few hundred words” which the parents could partly understand, Tan wrote. “They were mentally retarded; they could not count from one to ten. They were not aware of time and space. For instance, they did not know where they live (which country, which village, which city). They were unaware of year, season, day, and time. Otherwise, they had quite strong legs and arms.” “The sitting posture was rather similar to an ape,” Tan added. “They could not hold their heads upright; the heads were flexed forward with their skulls. They could not raise their heads to look forward. This head posture with flexed skull was rather similar to the head posture of our closest relatives, like chimpanzees.”

Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 11:52:18 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

MAKE: Movies, submit yours!

As part of the Maker Faire this April in San Mateo, California, Make: is hosting the first film festival that celebrates makers and the DIY mindset. You have until March 24 to submit your clip, five minutes in length or less! Here are the details:

Grab those hacked CVS video cameras and $14 steadycams. It's time for MAKE: Movies! MAKE: is hosting the first festival for makers to show off their DIY short video clips. Don't think of it as a contest, because there isn't much to win if you make the cut... other than the admiration of your peers, a bag of MAKE: goodies, and the chance to see your work on the big (well, medium) screen at the upcoming Maker Faire in April. Our favorite footage will premiere at a special MAKE: Movies! party at the Maker Faire and shown throughout the event. Of course, you're invited to walk down the asphalt carpet and say a few words about your work. After the Faire, the selections will be available for free download on Makezine.com. So charge those batteries, fire up Final Cut, and... Action!

Here's what we want to see:

* Project demos: Your project is the star here, like the famed Shopper Chopper shopping cart and self-driving motorocycle.
* How-to's: From video explanations to Flash animated diagrams to claymation step-by-steps, these are your explanations, tips, and guides put into motion.
* Maker mini-documentaries: Give Nova a run for its timeslot with a short profile of the eccentric inventor next door or a brief biopic of a maker from history.
* Maker music videos: Think MTV meets cigar box guitars and circuit benders.

You can also nominate any videoclip that you think truly embodies the maker mindset.

Follow the link for the rules and submission guidelines. Link

posted by David Pescovitz at 10:32:09 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

FreeCulture NYU staging Creative Commons art-show

Fred sez, "On Wednesday, March 1st, Free Culture @ NYU will be holding an art show opening on the 7th floor of NYU's Kimmel Student Center at 7 pm. All of the art shown will be works licensed under Creative Commons in order to display the benefits of having creative works that give rights both to the artists and to the art-appreciating public. Free Culture @ NYU's Creative Commons Art show will be up for the month of March, but will also be simultaneously released online on our website. As far as we know, this may be the first all-Creative Commons-based art show ever." Link (Thanks, Fred!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 10:13:03 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Darren McGavin, the Night Stalker, RIP

Darren McGavin, star of the excellent 1970s television show Kolchak: The Night Stalker, died on Saturday. Over at Cryptomundo, Loren Coleman wrote an appreciation of McGavin, drawing out the fortean links in his career.
Link

posted by David Pescovitz at 09:03:33 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Sun supporting CC-licensed sustainable architecture

Sun has thrown its financial support behind Architecture for Humanity, a project that publishes Creative Commons-licensed designs for sustainable housing. It's a brilliant project and it's great to see Sun returning to its open roots, instead of sucking up to Hollywood by shipping crummy DRM:

As part of his wish, Sinclair requested a means to allow architects, funders, non-governmental organizations and communities to collaborate on generating and implementing innovative housing solutions globally. Sun answered by offering to provide an online platform that will facilitate collaboration and sharing of designs and will use advanced technology to simulate geographic/seismic, political/cultural and financial ramifications of designs. Sun and Sinclair will gather additional support from the technology, entertainment and design industries represented at the TED conference.
"The technology industry is unique in being able to effect social, political and economic progress on a global basis," said Jonathan Schwartz, president and chief operating officer at Sun, and president of the Sun Foundation. "We take that responsibility, and our partners in innovation around the world, very seriously - that's why we're proud to provide the computing power needed for Architecture for Humanity to help improve living conditions for so many people."

Link

posted by Cory Doctorow at 09:00:54 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Food sculptor Jim Victor

Jim Victor is a sculptor who makes things like people, animals, dinosaurs, boats, and motorcycles out of foodstuffs like chocolate, butter, and cheese. Seen here, "Milk, Moms. Morning," a butter sculpture for the 2005 New York State Fair.
Link (via Neatoramo)

posted by David Pescovitz at 08:51:27 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Sunday, February 26, 2006

Kenyan hotel where giraffes lean in through upper windows for food

A hotel in Kenya is situated in the middle of a giraffe preserve, and the tame giraffes lean their heads in through the windows of the second-storey breakfast room and get fed by the guests:

The Giraffe Manor, built in 1932 by Sir David Duncan, is situated on 120 acres of land just a few miles from the centre of Nairobi, Kenya's capital city. In 1974 Jock Leslie-Melville, grandson of a Scottish earl, and his wife Betty, who also founded the African Fund for Endangered Wildlife (AFEW), bought the Manor. They then moved five babies of the highly endangered Rothschild giraffe to their property where they have been successfully reared and they now have their own babies.

Link (via Neatorama)

Update: Matt sez, "I've been! I spent the first night of my Kenyan honeymoon in the Giraffe manor. A truly amazing experience. We were lucky enough to be hosted by the current owners of the house as opposed to the house sitters. Not only do the giraffes poke their heads in, you can stand on the front veranda and feed the giraffes, whilst the owners dog's chase warthogs around the grounds. "

posted by Cory Doctorow at 11:21:48 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Midnighters: YA horror trilogy mixes Lovecraft with adventure

The concluding volume of a new young-adult horror trilogy -- Midnighters -- from Scott Westerfeld has been published, concluding a wonderful, spooky romp that brings together the best of HP Lovecraft with Westerfeld's great talent for telling adventure tales that capture teen problems perfectly.

I've written about Scott's YA novels here before: So Yesterday (a YA Douglas-Coupland-esque book about a cool-hunter), Peeps (a vampire novel built on hard-science parasitology) and Uglies/Pretties (the first two books in a trilogy about a future where teens are forced into cosmetic surgery at 16) -- he's a consistently sharp writer whose well-turned books zip along at speed.

The Midnighters trilogy is about a small group of misfit teens in a conservative town who all share the ability to inhabit the secret hour between 12 midnight and 12:01 AM, a secret hour when time stands still for everyone but them, when the light turns blue, when they gain special powers -- the power to run tirelessly and leap buildings, even to fly.

This is pure wish-fulfillment for the kids, who are picked-on losers in their straight-laced school, harassed by the law and stuck in bad home situations. But it turns out that the secret hour is also inhabited by Cthuluesque Old Ones -- ancient monsters trapped forever in the darkness of the secret hour. And these ancient ones must escape.

The trilogy tells the story of the kids' defense of the town that rejects them, and of the ancient, wicked secrets there. If Lovecraft had a sense of plot and character, he could have written these.

Now the final volume, Blue Moon, has come into print, and it ties the story up nicely. If you're looking for three books to give to a kid in your life (or looking for a romp of your own), these would be a great choice.

Midighters 1: The Secret Hour, Midighters 2: Touching Darkness, Midnighters 3: Blue Noon

posted by Cory Doctorow at 11:08:15 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Art Frahm pinups recreated with goth/alternative models

A photographer has reconstructed and remixed the pinup pictures of Art Frahm using women in contemporary goth/alternative garb. Frahm was the famous 1950s painter who created bizarre pinups of women holding bags of groceries, stepping out of cars, or otherwise busy, with shocked expressions and their panties around their ankles, apparent victims of sudden elastic failure. There was nothing NSFW in these pictures, except the implication that somewhere under those modest 1950s dresses was an un-pantied set of nether-regions.

The remixes from "dklo" on Flickr feature faithful copies of the setups and facial expressions, but with women in huge gothy platform shoes, leather corsets, and fishnets. Link (Thanks, John!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 10:53:59 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Free Poe audiobook from Telltale Weekly -- today only!

Alex Wilson, proprietor of Telltale Weekly -- a DRM-free audiobook store that releases all its recordings under Creative Commons licenses after a certain period -- sez:

In celebration of Telltale Weekly's 2nd Anniversary, I'm giving away a bestselling recording of Edgar Allan Poe's "The Tell-Tale Heart" for one day only in DRM-Free MP3, Ogg Vorbis, and AAC formats.
The recording reverts back to 75 cents tomorrow, and--as part of Telltale's "Funding a Free Audiobook Library" program--will be free again with a Creative Commons License in October of 2009.

Link (Thanks, Alex!)

Update: Elias sez, "A few weeks ago I discovered Poe Podcast Project, a project where people from the theatre business and the like are reading several tales from E. A. Poe, usually putting good dramatization on them." Here's the feed URL.

posted by Cory Doctorow at 10:37:40 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Anagram transit maps for Miami (x2), Dublin, Ontario, Dallas, Glasgow, Portland, Ottawa, Houston

Another bumper-crop of anagram maps!

Miami (I):

Miami (II):

Dublin:

Government of Ontario (GO) rail:

(Thanks, Alesh, Mackers, Daniel, Owen, Andrew and Ethan !)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 10:23:50 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Cory's new podcast story, "Return to Pleasure Island"

I've begun podcasting another story, "Return to Pleasure Island," a dark and mean fantasy story that was originally published in Realms of Fantasy in 2000, and reprinted in my 2003 short story collection A Place So Foreign and Eight More. It's in four parts, and should be fully posted by the end of the week.

George twiddled his thumbs in his booth and watched how the brown, clayey knuckles danced overtop of one another. Not as supple as they had once been, his thumbs -- no longer the texture of wet clay on a potter's wheel; more like clay after it had been worked to exhausted crackling and brittleness. He reached into the swirling vortex of the cotton-candy machine with his strong right hand and caught the stainless-steel sweep-arm. The engines whined and he felt them strain against his strong right arm, like a live thing struggling to escape a trap. Still strong, he thought, still strong, and he released the sweep-arm to go back to spinning sugar into floss.
A pack of boys sauntered down the midway, laughing and calling, bouncing high on sugar and g-stresses. One of them peeled off from the group and ran to his booth, still laughing at some cruelty. He put his palms on George's counter and pushed against it, using them to lever his little body in a high-speed pogo. "Hey, mister," he said, "how about some three-color swirl, with sprinkles?"
George smiled and knocked the rack of paper cones with his strong right elbow, jostled it so one cone spun high in the air, and he caught it in his quick left hand. "Coming _riiiiiight_ up," he sang, and flipped the cone into the floss-machine. He spun a beehive of pink, then layered it with stripes of blue and green. He reached for the nipple that dispensed the sprinkles, but before he turned its spigot, he said, "Are you sure you don't want a dip, too? Fudge? Butterscotch? Strawberry?"
The boy bounced even higher, so that he was nearly vaulting the counter. "All three! All three!" he said.
George expertly spiraled the floss through the dips, then applied a thick crust of sprinkles. "Open your mouth, kid!" he shouted, with realistic glee.
The boy opened his mouth wide, so that the twinkling lights of the midway reflected off his back molars and the pool of saliva on his tongue. George's quick, clever left hand dipped a long-handled spoon into the hot fudge, then flipped the sticky gob on a high arc that terminated perfectly in the boy's open mouth. The boy swallowed and laughed gooely. George handed over the dripping confection in his strong right hand, and the boy plunged his face into it. When he whirled and ran to rejoin his friends, George saw that his ears were already getting longer, and his delighted laugh had sounded a little like a bray. A job well done, he thought, and watched the rain spatter the spongy rubber cobbles of the midway.

Podcast page, Subscribe to Podcast Feed

posted by Cory Doctorow at 09:40:32 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

RIP, Octavia Butler, "genius" science fiction writer

Octavia Butler, the brilliant science fiction writer, reportedly died on Saturday following a fall that was followed by fatal bleeding in her skull ~~gave her a fatal concussion~~. Butler was the incredible writer who was the first genre author to win the MacArthur Foundation's "Genius" grant. She was the first prominent African-American woman in the field, and her novels and short stories were an inspiration to a generation of writers of all backgrounds and both sexes (I was ready to give up writing after a five-year bout of writers' block in my mid-twenties when I read the introduction to her short story collection in which she recounted her own block and decided to keep trying). I recently reviewed her wonderful novel Fledgling here, a vampire book that, like all of Butler's work, was a disturbing, light-touch allegory about race and sex politics skinned with a fast-moving, heart-wrenching storyline.

Butler was only 58 when she died on Saturday. Her oeuvre is too modest, but will never be forgotten. She had many amazing books left in her. I only met her once, very briefly, and I was tongue-tied in her presence, but she was gracious and friendly. The field and the world has lost someone wonderful this weekend.

Several people have confirmed this now, though nothing authoritative has been published. I'll update this post if something firmer emerges. Link (Thanks, Bill, Jeff and Steve!)

Update: Here's the Seattle Post Intelligencer obit, and here's the Chicago Tribune -- thanks, Robn .

(Photo from NikolasCo/Flickr)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 12:39:49 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Bigfoot One's art

I'm not usually drawn to graffiti, but I dig the work of San Francisco artist Bigfoot One, natch. Along with the urban artworks he's been, er, exhibiting since the early 1990s, Bigfoot One paints on wood panels and recently created an exquisite vinyl action figure for STRANGEco. Link to Bigfoot One's site, Link to a 2005 interview from the San Francisco Bay Guardian (Thanks, Sean Ness!)

posted by David Pescovitz at 11:36:58 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Loren Coleman in the Boston Globe

My cryptozoologist pal Loren Coleman of Cryptomundo is the subject of a long profile in today's Boston Globe. The reporter visited Loren in his wunderkammer home, also known as the International Cryptozoology Museum. From the article:

To believers, doubters, even skeptics, Bigfoot makes a big impression. The replica 8 1/2 - foot hairy hominoid -- crafted from the fur of musk oxen and buffalo, a hulking presence on the porch of a brown-and-yellow home in Portland, Maine -- scares the bejesus out of the UPS man. Still, it's right at home here on the doorstep of a man who has spent a lifetime investigating mysterious animal sightings. "I don't particularly feel like a strange person," Loren Coleman says. "It's the subject I study that's strange."

He is a leading figure in the world of cryptozoology, a field whose legitimacy is disputed. Coleman has trekked to 49 states, as well as Canada, Mexico, and Scotland, gathering physical evidence and eyewitness accounts of Bigfoot, the Abominable Snowman, the Loch Ness Monster, Mothman, thunderbirds, and other legendary beasts not verified by conventional science but storied enough to make us wonder: What if?

"Eighty percent of all the accounts that come to me are misidentifications, are mundane animals - a few fakes, a few hoaxes," Coleman acknowledges. "But it's that 20 percent of the core unknowns that keep me going."

Link (free reg. required or BugMeNot: me@privacy.net / boston)

posted by David Pescovitz at 08:14:17 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Don Knotts dead at 81

Don Knotts -- AKA The Incredible Mr Limpet, Deputy Barney Fife, and Ralph Furley -- has died at 81 from pumonary and repsitory complications. Good night, Barn, and sleep well. Link

posted by Cory Doctorow at 02:16:25 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Boing Boing themesong from Kraftwerk clip

John ~~remixed~~ clipped a Kraftwerk song into a Boing Boing "themesong" (it's more ringtone- or arpeggio-length) -- "Boing. . .um-chakka Boing Boing . . . um-chakka." It'd make a good sting if we ever had a talk-show or something. 73K MP3 Link (Thanks, John!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 02:11:49 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Anagram maps: Calgary, Vancouver (x2), Philadelphia, Buffalo, Rochester, Hong Kong (x2), Seattle, Minneapolis, Detroit

Lovely, lovely anagram transit maps!

Calgary:

Vancouver (I):

Vancouver (II):

(See also this map of Vancouver)

Philadelphia:

Buffalo:

Rochester (defunct/planned):

Hong Kong (I):

Hong Kong (II):

Seattle (proposed):

Minneapolis:

(see also this alternate Minneapolis map)

Detroit:

(Thanks, Mike, Rock, Pyrop, Enno, Alex, Allen, Nootropic, Ian, Nathan and Watty!)

Update: Lindsay made an alternate Vancouver map

Update 2: Here's an alternate Minneapolis map from Ben

posted by Cory Doctorow at 02:03:42 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

SETI@home-like project to crack unbroken Nazi Enigma ciphers

Four of the messages encrypted with the Nazi Enigma machine were never decrypted; a distributed computing project (like SETI@Home) is harnessing the power of the Internet's many computers to break them. One has already fallen!

The M4 Project is an effort to break 3 original Enigma messages with the help of distributed computing. The signals were intercepted in the North Atlantic in 1942 and are believed to be unbroken. Ralph Erskine has presented the intercepts in a letter to the journal Cryptologia. The signals were presumably enciphered with the four rotor Enigma M4 - hence the name of the project.
This project has officially started as of January 9th, 2006. You can help out by donating idle time of your computer to the project. If you want to participate, please follow the client install instructions for your operating system...

Link (via /.)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 01:37:30 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

No-pants photoshopping contest

On tomorrow's Worth1000 photoshopping competition -- removing the pants from photos of the famous. Tony Blair is extremely well-suited to silk panties, garters and thigh-highs. Link

posted by Cory Doctorow at 01:23:44 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Saturday, February 25, 2006

Florida cops threaten people who ask for complaint forms

A CBS undercover reporting team went into 38 police stations in Miami-Dade and Broward Counties in Florida, asking for a set of forms they could use to complain about inappropriate police behavior. In all but three of the stations, the police refused to give them forms. Some of the cops threatened them (on hidden camera, no less) -- one of them even touched his gun.

officer: Where do you live? Where do you live? You have to tell me where you live, what your name is, or anything like that.
tester: For a complaint? I mean, like, if I have --
officer: Are you on medications?
tester: Why would you ask me something like that?
officer: Because you're not answering any of my questions.
tester: Am I on medications?
officer: I asked you. It's a free country. I can ask you that.
tester: Okay, you're right.
officer: So you're not going to tell me who you are, you're not going to tell me what the problem is.You're not going to identify yourself.
tester: All I asked you was, like, how do I contact --
officer: You said you have a complaint. You say my officers are acting in an inappropriate manner.
officer: So leave now. Leave now. Leave now.

Link (via Why, That's Delightful!)

Update: Alex sez, "The Lauderhill cop who was shown intimidating an individual looking to file a police complaint on hidden camera took the news station to court to stop the story from airing."

Update 2: Lee sez, "The Police Complaint Center exists to help citizens file complaints against officers and departments -- an important service, as police officers are supposed to be serving the public."

posted by Cory Doctorow at 12:45:53 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Toronto Transit Commission censors humorous subway map remix

The Toronto Transit Commission has followed the stupidity of Transport for London by sending a spurious trademark threat to a blogger who made an hilarious anagram remix of the stations on its classic map.

I grew up riding the TTC, and the map is burned into my subconscious. It's part of every Torontonian's experience of the city, a part of the cultural fabric. Culture gets remixed -- that's what happens with it. Trademark is supposed to protect rightsholders from competitors who use their marks to confuse the public in the course of commerce. No one who saw RobotJohnny's genius map would have confused it for a second with a real TTC map and sent him a subway token. The TTC's legal bullying here is completely needless -- they face no risk and no loss from letting their riders make turn the map into their own personal remix.

Torontonians go to bat for the TTC all the time, shouting at the province and the feds to beef up funding. We've put up with the disruption of the Sheppard Subway, we've lived through the years when they couldn't even get the platform clocks to work. Where the hell do they get off wasting legal fees threatening bloggers for producing noncommercial humourous, harmless remixes? Link (Thanks, RobotJohnny!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 11:58:58 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Anagram transit maps: Berlin, Copenhagen, Baltimore (x2)

Berlin:

Copenhagen:

Baltimore (I):

Baltimore (II):

(Thanks, Benny, Henrik, Mike, Shiny, Mishhkin and Daen!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 11:48:54 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Cory's I, Robot podcast concludes

I've just posted the final installment of the podcasting of my story, "I, Robot" (a nominee for this year's British Science Fiction Award and Locus Award), which was originally published in the Infinite Matrix online magazine. Next up, Return to Pleasure Island, originally published in my short story collection A Place So Foreign and Eight More.

Link, Subscribe to Podcast

Update: ~~The MP3 was corrupted. There's a new one that's been uploaded and I'm just waiting for some post-processing before I link to it again -- sorry!~~ OK, it's fixed!

posted by Cory Doctorow at 10:52:41 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

BoingBoing now censored in the UAE (and elsewhere)

An anonymous BoingBoing reader in the United Arab Emirates says,

And its finally happened... I knew the day was not far.... :(
The sole ISP in this country, which happens to be owned by the government has blocked boingboing.net Apparently boingboing is disseminating information that is " inconsistent with the religious, cultural, political and moral values of the United Arab Emirates. " See attached/hotlinked screenshot.
Please email me so if you post this on boingboing, so I can VPN to the office back home and read about this on boingboing... Till then I guess am stuck with fark.com which am sure is next. :(
PS - Please remove all personally identifiable information from the screenshot, cause I don't want to end up in jail. Yes they do put people in jail for attempting/bypassing their proxy.

Link to full-size screenshot.

They're pretty good at controlling internet ports. As a reminder, they appear destined to control America's physical ports as well.

Earlier this week, many dozens of readers emailed to inform us that BoingBoing had suddenly become no longer viewable at their place of employment -- government sites and corporate sites around the world. We understand that this is due to the fact that the makers of the SmartFilter software, which is used by governments and private sector customers, just added BoingBoing to a category occupied mostly by porn sites. We have contacted Secure Computing, the makers of Smartfilter and are attempting to help them correct their error. We will post an update on BoingBoing soon.

posted by Xeni Jardin at 07:57:16 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

SF editor: watermarks hurt artists and reward megacorps

Kathryn Cramer, science fiction editor, writer and investigative blogger, has written a post on how mandatory watermarking proposals like the VEIL initiative will bone individual artists, continuing a trend that started with unfair electronic rights grabs by big publishers in the eighties:

My experience in the early-mid 90s teaches me that part of the purpose of setting the production standards of early CD-ROMs absurdly high was to promote corporate authorship over individual authorship with the idea that digital products could be authored like film and TV, not like books, thus empowering the executive level and disempowering the actual creators, or rather reconfiguring relations such that executives become part of the creative "team."
Now computers are being sold that allow individuals, and small groups of individuals, to produce works to very high production standards on very low budgets. This also threatens the rise of corporate authorship. So watermark-style DRM may do very little to prevent the "piracy" about which the big media corporations are up in arms, it may be the killer app of corporate authorship.

Link

posted by Cory Doctorow at 07:50:43 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Dangly jewelry for your headphones

These Japanese heaphone danglers let you wear dangly ear jewelry without getting it tangled up in your walkman's headphones. Link (via Popgadget)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 07:47:01 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

WELL founder to run Google's philanthropic arm

Larry Brilliant, co-founder of The WELL and polymath epidemiologist, has been put in charge of Google.org, the billion-dollar charitable arm of Google. Link

posted by Cory Doctorow at 07:33:44 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Episode six of awesome sysadmin sitcom The IT Crowd is downloadable

Episode six of Graham Linehan's wonderful, screamingly funny sysadmin sitcom, The IT Crowd, is online for DRM-based Windows streaming from the Channel 4 UK site.

Me, I'm grabbing the DRM-free version from the Mininova torrent linked below (it's coming in fast, too with 30 peers in the mesh) and I can't wait. For the past six weeks, the new IT Crowd episode has been the highlight of my week -- I've always loved nerdy comedy (Real Genius! Sneakers!) and The IT Crowd gets so much right about being a sysadmin (I job I held down in a previous life), and is wicked funny into the bargain (no surprise, since Graham Linehan was previously responsible for Father Ted, ~~an Irish~~ a sitcom about degenerate Irish priests that has made me laugh so hard I thought I was going to be sick).

It says here that my copy will arrive in 25 minutes. Come on, progress-bar, move!

The arrival of Jen's "lady time of the month" has unexpected consequences for the office. Jen's in a bad mood, Moss feels weird, Roy bursts into tears, and even Richmond's been feeling gloomy. The only cure is to have a big girly night out with scented candles and Dirty Dancing saves the day, before cutting a rug at the office party...

Link, Alternate Link (Thanks, Ian, Fabian, Compn, CJ, and Adrian!)

Update: Watched it, loved it, howled with laughter and pounded the table and wept. Christ, this show is the best thing ever.

Update 2: Episode 6 is up on YouTube -- thanks, Tian!

posted by Cory Doctorow at 01:15:24 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

University buildings photo-remixed into mecha monsters

Cris Rose, a graphic designer, remixed photos of the buildings on London's Brunel University into awesome, science-fictional mecha-monsters. This is beautiful work. Link (via Wonderland)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 01:12:49 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Homebrew IT Crowd ringtone

Steve's cut a great little ringtone from episode five of The IT Crowd, the incredibly funny sysadmin sitcom from Graham Linehan, creator of Father Ted.

It features Moss saying "Hello?" after some dramatic music and then cuts into a few recognizable bars of the show's themesong. This is my new ringtone -- so long, Louis Jordan's "Stone Cold Dead in the Market," hello "The IT Crowd!" Link (Thanks, Steve!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 12:59:57 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

HOWTO stream The IT Crowd from outside the UK

Episode 6 of Channel 4 and Graham "Father Ted" Linehan's amazing, hilarious sysadmin sitcom went live yesterday, and as with the previous episodes, the show is available for download from C4's website.

Unfortunately, as with previous shows, Channel 4 has once again locked the show up with DRM, presented it only as streaming Windows files, and has used crude IP filtering to restrict playback to the UK only.

You can always circumvent this by just downloading the torrent that inevitably goes live within minutes of the show going up on the site -- no geographic restrictions and no DRM, thank you very much.

But if you'd prefer to stream it from Channel 4 with DRM (and if your computer will actually play it back) (mine won't!), and you're outside of the UK, Tian has written up a tremendous HOWTO explaining the best way to get the show online:

1. In Firefox, under Tools, select Options...
2. Under General, click on Connection Settings...
3. Type in "83.100.217.53" in HTTP Proxy field, "80" in Port field, and check Use this proxy server for all protocols.
4. Click OK to return to browser screen and enjoy the show.

Link (Thanks, Tian!)

Update: Messi sez, "please advise people to remove the HTTP proxy entry when they finished downloading the episode from C4. This unknown proxy may collect passwords and other stuff. Thanks!"

posted by Cory Doctorow at 12:54:57 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Handmade magnetic wooly Katamari

Laine, a crafty crafter, has made a Katamari (the ball that picks up random oddments in the wonderfully weird games Katamari Damacy and We Love Katamari out of wool and stuffing, with a powerful magnet inside that allows it to actually pick up (ferrous) oddments in the real world! Link (Thanks, Pat!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 12:48:24 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Pot-hanger in the shape of Chinese word for "luck"

This pot-hanger is in the shape of the Chinese word for "luck," rendered in red steel. Link (via Cribcandy)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 12:44:23 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Princeton prof explains watermarks' failures

Princeton's Ed Felten has written a terrific article explaining the ins and outs of watermarking for audiovisual material, providing an excellent guide for anyone who wants to understand how the new proposals to mandate watermark detectors are doomed.

Congress is considering a bill to "plug the analog hole," that is, to prevent the use of recording equipment for capturing digital programs while they're been played back (one outcome of this is that you couldn't video your child's first step if he was taking it in the living-room with the TV playing in the shot).

The proposal is to use a "watermark" called VEIL, based on secret technology, and to require all people who build recorders to include VEIL detectors that can shut off the recorder if it appears that it's recording a watermarked program.

Felten is one of the world's leading experts on why watermarking fails, having led the effort to defeat the most ambitious, expensive watermarking system to date, the Secure Digital Music Initiative. In this article, "How Watermarks Fail," he talks about the ways that attackers can circumvent watermarks, in plain language that even I can understand:

[W]atermarks tend to be defeated if an adversary can get his hands on a watermarked file, and the same file without the watermark. By comparing the two, the adversary can determine where the watermark lives, which is usually sufficient to remove the watermark from other files. Alex used this method in deciphering the MediaMax watermark (as described in our Sony CD DRM paper), and my colleagues and I used it also in analyzing the SDMI watermarks back in 2000.
Almost as powerful as a Rosetta Stone attack is a comparison attack, where the adversary does not have an unwatermarked file, but does have the same file with several different watermarks in it. Any place where two of the files differ is a place where watermark information lives. Given several marked files, an attacker can locate all or most of the places the watermark is hidden, which is again the first step in removing the watermark.

Link (via Hack the Planet)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 12:42:09 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Anagram transit maps for Cleveland, St Louis (x2), BART, and Singapore

Some great new anagram transit maps came in overnight:

Singapore LTA:

(See this alternate Singapore map as well)

(Thanks, Billy, Rob, Fred, Peter, and Jesse!)

Update: Michael's produced an alternate map of the Singapore system

posted by Cory Doctorow at 12:13:55 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Friday, February 24, 2006

Best TV news clip ever

I was browsing Panopticist, and I found this short video from a local news program. I won't spoil the surprise for you. If it was a prank -- hats off to the prankster!
Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 07:46:30 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Company installs hidden passageways in your house

Fred Yarm says: "A company that makes and sells the parts, motors, and security systems for secret doorways a la Batman - including book levers in the bookshelf to reveal a secret room, reclining chairs that open up to enter a tube slide to another floor, etc. Cool animations of their work." Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 07:26:01 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Found yearbook from 1970

Swapatorium found a 1970 yearbook and posted a bunch of the pages. It's a lot of fun to look at these photos!

This is the best yearbook I have ever seen. A man who knows that we like photos and letters gave us a box of ephemera from an art/architecture student from the late 1960s-70s. Included was this Rice yearbook from 1970. I have scanned a few of the pages so you can get an idea what it contains. Apparently they set up a photobooth in their school in 1969 and asked students to pose. Those photobooths were then used as the yearbook images.

Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 05:26:18 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Rushkoff on the futility of artificial workplace fun

Great entry by Douglas Rushkoff on a common workplace blunder: introducing "fun" that isn't part of the job.

Thanks to Kevin at Consumatron.com for sending me this link to a fabulously ridiculous story about a company - Gem Plumbing and Heating - hiring "Fun University" to help them make their boring workplace more fun.
No, it has nothing to do with the work at hand, but completely extraneous bouts of silliness, as in: "About 100 cans of silly string were placed around the building, and when employees got their hands on them, this building just exploded. It was an absolute blast."
As I try to explain in the "follow the fun" chapter of Get Back in the Box, efforts like this are really stupid, and actually defeat the whole point. By making the "fun" at work extraneous - external and unrelated - to the boring and dull work that people are actually doing, it only exacerbates the problem. It's like giving kids dessert as a "reward" for finishing the main part of the meal. Why do they need a reward? Because the main meal tastes terrible!
The reward just reinforces the notion that the work itself is not fun.

Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 05:12:01 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Ridiculous product - toothbrush with replaceable bristle attachment

Uploaded Images Two-Headed-Toothbrush-722015

You can do your part to prevent landfills from overflowing by using this special toothbrush. When the bristles wear out, simply throw away the top part and put a new one onto the permanent green (get it?) plastic handle.
Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 04:43:38 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Goatse Friday Rorschach Roundup

From time to time, a cranky BoingBoing reader will email something like, "Hey Xeni, if you love goatse so much, why don't you stop posting funny crap about it all the time and just marry it?"

But more often, readers instead email links to goatse-related flotsam and dotcom jetsam.

Here's a roundup of some of the recent sightings; all of these are more funny/weird than explicit/NSFW.
* Charles of dcist.com saw goatse on the opera stage:

This is a review I wrote of a performance by the Kirov Opera at the Kennedy Center here in Washington. I think that the Internet omnipresence of that dreaded goatse.cx image has done things to my brain. I may or may not be seeing it in the set backdrop pictured in the image at the top of the review. I made a point about this in my review, but you can tell me if I'm just seeing things that aren't there. What it looks like to me, in the backdrop of the Grail altar in this production of "Parsifal," is something quite like the dreaded goatse image. There is no reason for that sphincter-like hole to be there either. This staging was used first in 1997, however, so the similarity is unintentional, if it is indeed there.

* BB reader roldick found a goatse inspirational quote.

Got this on my (ambivalent adjective) web clips on gmail today. Maybe I'm just dirty but i immediately flashed goatse. Quote of the Day - Oliver Wendell Holmes - "One's mind, once stretched by a new idea, never regains its original dimensions."

* Hal found a four-handed (Mercy!) goatseoid image on a book about web accessibility:

Link to book cover. Despite the unfortunate reference, it's hard to imagine what the heck they were thinking.

* Jesse found goatse on a Prague train:

Took this shot on the Prague subway system. I don't speak/read Czech, but since you have to push a button on the inside door to exit the tram, this sign might be trying to indicate that. Link to jpeg.

* And Sam says there's nothing sweeter than...

Yes, that's right, Goatse candy - with a creme center. Link

Here's a worksafe explanation of the original goatse: Link.

posted by Xeni Jardin at 04:36:32 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Ben Sakoguchi's orange crate label paintings

Ben Sakoguchi has painted hundreds of acrylic-on-canvas works inspired by the colorful labels found on crates of California oranges from the 1880s to the 1950s. From his site:

In the 1970's—after cardboard cartons had replaced wooden crates—beautifully printed labels that had long been stored in packing houses were being sold as collectors' items at the flea markets Sakoguchi frequented. He was attracted by the familiar orange crate label format, and started using it in a series of small paintings.

Just as the actual labels had depicted a wide variety of subjects—Sakoguchi's paintings sampled events, issues and attitudes of modern culture. He produced several hundred orange crate label paintings (1974 - 1981) before moving on to other projects.

In 1994, Sakoguchi revisited the orange crate label format, and has continued the series.

Link (Thanks, Vann Hall!)

posted by David Pescovitz at 04:34:08 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Petri gardens

Landscape architecture blog Pruned is featuring some beautiful "gardens" grown in petri dishes. More can be found at Social Fiction and a Yale University fractal geometry page called Bacterial Growth in Stressed Environments.
Link (via Easternblot.net)

posted by David Pescovitz at 03:42:07 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

100+ National Archives films now on Google Video

Google today announced the addition of 103 historic films from the US National Archives in Google Video. Included:

* Footage of the Apollo 11 mission, and the first person to step on the moon: Link.
* From 1894, "Carmencita - Spanish Dance" -- one of the oldest films at the archives: Link (screengrab at left).
* A representative selection of U.S. government newsreels, documenting World War II, 1941-45: Link.
* NASA documentaries on spaceflight: Link.
* Films from the 1930s, that document the history and establishment of a nationwide system of national and state parks. /
* Early footage of Native American life, the Boulder Dam, water and wind erosion in America, Civilian Conservation Corps workers, and the establishment of the Tennessee Valley Authority.
* From 1970, a motion picture documenting recreational programs for inner city youth: Link

Link to launch announcement.

posted by Xeni Jardin at 03:41:42 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Trailer Mashup: Toy Story Requiem

Toy Story plus Requiem For A Dream equals this: Link. Woody, Jesse, Buzz and Bo Peep go down a dark and scary path. Unfortunately, it's only available in WMV.

Reader comment: Josh sez

Here are direct links to the torrent. Pirate Bay (Link) Torrent File (Link)

Reader comment: John sez

You mentioned that "Toy Story Requiem" was only available in wmv format... well, there's quicktime versions available here: one, two, three.

posted by Xeni Jardin at 03:18:43 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Photos from the Computer History Museum

Boing Boing pal Scott Beale says:

Here are some photos I shot in the Visible Storage area of the amazing Computer History Museum in Mountain View California, which has a huge collection of computers going back to the dawn of the computer age. It included computers like UNIVAC, Digital Equipment PDP and Cray Supercomputers, components from SAGE and computers from Control Data, Philco, Fairchild, IBM, Altair and many more.

Link

posted by Xeni Jardin at 03:14:08 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Yahoo music exec: labels should try selling music without DRM

Snip from News.com post by John Borland:

Yahoo Music chief Dave Goldberg raised eyebrows Thursday at the Music 2.0 conference in Los Angeles with a proposal rarely heard from executives at large digital music services: Record labels should try selling music online without copy protection.

Link (Thanks Lisa)

posted by Xeni Jardin at 02:45:44 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Abe Vigoda alive, birthday today, ergo Firefox tool still needed

BoingBoing reader dwlfennell says,

Yes, Abe Vigoda is still alive (as of this posting). In fact, he's celebrating his 85th birthday today - more than 20 years after people magazine mistakenly reported his death. Well, there's no need to endlessly question his mortality any longer. Just download the "Abe Vigoda status" extension for Firefox to keep tabs on whether or not he's still alive.

Link to the Abe Vigoda Status Firefox Extension. Reader comment: Mongo says,

Keeping in the spirit of the occassion: Link

posted by Xeni Jardin at 02:43:28 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Radio Katwe: internet censorship in sub-saharan Africa

Reporters Without Borders reports that the communications division of Uganda's government has imposed "mandatory filtering" against a Ugandan news radio station's website. The case is the first known incident of government censorship of the internet in Uganda, and occurred days before presidential and parliamentary elections on February 23rd.

The Radio Katwe news website (Link) accepts contributions from Internet-users and posts content that is extremely critical of the government. Just before it was censored, it had attacked the accumulation of wealth by the family of President Yoweri Museveni.
(...) All the country's Internet Service Providers (ISPs), MTN, UTL, Africaonline, Spacenet and Busnet have made the site inaccessible. UCC officials justified the decision, saying that Radio Katwe "was spreading rumours" and damaging the country's "security and harmony".
Local ISPs filtered the site by blocking its IP address (the identity number of its server that hosts it on the Internet). According to a test carried out by Nart Villeneuve, head of research at Toronto University (Link), they at the same time blocked nearly 700 other sites hosted by the same server, which is based in the USA. States.
On its home page, Radio Katwe advises the use of tools such as guardster.com or proxify.com to get round the censorship imposed by the authorities.

Reader comment: John G. says,

While I agree that the censorship in the case of Radio Katwe is a bad idea, there have been other occasions in Africa (specifically Rwanda) where censorship or jamming of "hate radio" might have caused the tragic events there to play out differently. Radio, like any medium, is simply a tool that is imbued with positive or negative influence by its creator, More here on radio's role in the Rwanda Genocide: Link

posted by Xeni Jardin at 02:39:27 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

If you love that goat so much, why don't you marry it?

A guy in Sudan was caught having sex with a goat. Authorities made him pay a dowry for her and claim the critter as his wife. Link; alas, no pix. (Thanks, Marty)

posted by Xeni Jardin at 02:31:39 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Elaborate, high-tech underground pot-growing site uncovered

Just amazing, the extremes some botanists go to in their horticultural enthusiasm. Sometimes when I read stuff like this, I pretend that tulips or orchids are illegal, and I imagine sneaky little elderly ladies constructing elaborate stealth-growing facilities -- all to feed their insatiable flower joneses. I'm not a marijuana smoker or an orchid-obsessive, but I think outlawing either plant makes about as much sense. Snip:

This was underneath a house in a cave. The entrance was through a secret hydraulic door in the garage that led to a concrete ramp that went about 50 yards into the ground. Inside the cave was living quarters and a secret escape hatch that led you through a tunnel that exited via another hydraulic door that opened up a rock on the outside. It was very elaborate. The set up allowed them to harvest every 60 days which resulted in multi-million dollar sales. One of the guys busted was living in a house on the water in FL and had a nice yacht. One of the agents here in Nashville worked on this for 5 years before the warrant was finally served in December.

Link (Thanks, Toby)

posted by Xeni Jardin at 02:26:00 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Gun designed to look like a cellphone

The CellGunphone is a pistol disguised as a crappy old cellphone. Press the keys, 5, 6, 7, 8 in succession, and it will pepper your assailant pretty good with four .22 caliber rounds. Link, includes video of the device in action.
(Thanks, O'Clock)

Reader comment: Kyle Wayman sez,

Maybe I'm crazy, but I think this may be a hoax. The only sites I find (albeit with just a quick google) referencing this all just link to the cellular.co.za site you linked to. Watching the video, I don't understand how all four rounds are supposed to shoot out of the antenna without the top half of the phone sliding over to line each one up - it's not as if it's a revolver. Granted, I'm not a gunsmith, but maybe another reader is? Can someone verify how this would work, or debunk it?

Reader comment: Ben sez,

I remember seeing this elsewhere a few years ago... I want to say I saw it on Bruce Schneier's blog but I'm not certain. Regarding the shooting out the antenna thing, I'm fairly sure the article is just poorly written. If you watch the video closely you can see slight muzzle blasts along the top end of the phone, which appear to be moving towards the camera. From the images of the gun and the description of how it fires (pressing the different keys oriented behind where the bullets are), I'm almost certain that it's feasible that it's real and the article just slipped up.

Reader comment: Guav sez,

It's not a hoax, and the bullets do not all fire from the antenna. There are four separate barrels, one for each bullet (these also correspond to the trigger buttons). If you watch the video carefully, you can see that the bullets exit from the four different chambers.

Reader comment: Brian Shumate sez,

The recent posting on BB about the Cell Phone Guns certainly reflects reality, and was a big "be afraid" blurb back in the immediate post-9/11 days. In fact, the truth behind these weapons is backed up by Snopes as well. As to the firing mechanism: All four rounds are not discharged through the 'antenna' as the previous commenter seems to have suggested. There are four *separate* barrels, muzzles, firing pins, and triggers involved in this really rather crude, and primitive firearm, and the bullets simply penetrate the thin plastic top of the phone when exiting the muzzle of each barrel. This weapon is designed for very close proximity firing, and is not accurate at any distance beyond a couple meters.

Reader comment: JonesR sez,

I haven't looked at the video, but I wouldn't naturally assume that the antenna is the barrel. I'm no gun nut, but stealthy 22's can barely have a barrel at all, they are usually meant for close range self defense. In either case, one could be loading a small magazine such as 9mms have in their grip, via those holes. The weird bit is, if you are needing to stealthily shoot someone in self defense, how likely is it that the attacker is going to allow you to go for even your cell phone?

Reader comment: Nial McGaughey sez,

the device looks like a simple "pepperbox" type derringer. 4 chambers 4 firing pins, 4 barrells. anyone looking at the top of the phone could tell something is amiss, there will be 4 big holes in the top of the phone, and the antenna will be hollow. not to mention the thing looks like ronco made it for sale to the after 3AM TV watching set.

Reader comment: Henry sez,

If you watch the video closely, the puffs of smoke from 2nd through 4th shots don't come from the area of the antenna. Rather, they seem to originate from further down the phone body, in line with the other bullets, indicating there are four barrels along the top. Having handeled quite a few guns of various makes and models in my life, I see nothing to indicate this would not work.

posted by Xeni Jardin at 02:13:44 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Fantastic Masonic tattoos

Masonic Ink is a gallery of new Masonic tattoos. I don't have any tattoos, but Bro. Brian Morse's (shown here) is tempting!
Link (thanks, Gary!)

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 02:10:54 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Stolen: solar-powered sculptures shown at Burning Man

Gary Eberly says,

BoingBoing readers, be on the lookout for stolen hi-tech art!
Sunbrothers, my buddies in Richmond, Ca. (outside of San Francisco) make some of the coolest hi-tech solar-powered art you've even seen.
If you go to Burning Man like I do, you may have been fortunate enough to see some of their art up-close and personal.

More...

posted by Xeni Jardin at 02:03:40 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Microwaved penis in Pittsburgh turns out to be sex toy Whizzinator

The severed penis a gas station clerk spotted in a microwave turned out to be a pee-filled ~~sex toy~~ gadget for drug test evasion.

A couple entered the GetGo station in the 200 block of Fifth Avenue about 5:10 p.m., and the man asked a female store clerk to heat in the microwave an object wrapped in a paper towel.
Police Chief Joseph Pero said the clerk complied but noticed a strange odor. When she handed the object back to the man, it became unwrapped and she saw what resembled a penis. The couple left the store separately, and the clerk called 911.
Chief Pero said the woman who was in the store contacted police this morning and said the object was a sex toy filled with urine. Chief Pero said she explained it needed to be heated to body temperature for use in an employment drug screen she needed to take.

Link to Pittsburgh Post-Gazette story. (thanks, Patrick Hillman)

Reader comment: The lovely and knowledgeable Violet Blue corrects press coverage of the incident, and schools Boing Boing:

What's happened here is that they've confused the Whizzinator (or maybe Urinator) with a sex toy (ew), and one quick look at the site lets you know that these are not sex toys, but gadgets specifically maufactured for pasisng drug tests -- they even come in a variety of "flesh" tones (that is, if you're Barbie).
Link. There's also the Ejaculator, but it's not made to hold enough liquid for a urine test: Link.

posted by Xeni Jardin at 01:54:27 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Aztec gods as Lego minifigs

Boing Boing reader Andrew Becraft has recreated much of the Aztec pantheon in Legos. Shown here, Xipe Totec, also known as "the flayed one" -- god of suffering and sacrifice, of spring crops and goldsmiths.
Link, blog post also includes links to Norse and Greek deities in minifig form.

posted by Xeni Jardin at 01:50:02 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Space Invaders wall decals

Cool wall graphics company Blik sells a line of big space invader decals in assorted colors. The starter pack includes eight 13" diameter aliens and the missile base for $45.
Link (via Daddy Types)

posted by David Pescovitz at 01:20:44 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Malcolm Gladwell blog

Excellent writer Malcolm Gladwell, of Tipping Point, Blink, and New Yorker fame, has started blogging. Link

posted by David Pescovitz at 01:11:42 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Digitally-generated porn tapestries

Martin Bricelj describes his Pornogobelin project as an "attempt at reviving an all but forgotten bourgeois pheonomenon of centuries past. By combining traditional techniques (needlepoint) and traditional motifs (erotica) the author approcahes in a fresh and playful way the aesthetics of the digital format, which is these days largely utilized for dissemination of pornography on the web.”

Spotted in this post on Fleshbot, where you'll find more background on the project. (some links in this post contain needlepoint nudity).

posted by Xeni Jardin at 01:08:41 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Ye Olde Unicorn Chaser

Boing Boing reader Phill Kennedy says,

Xeni, where are you when you are needed??? Boing Boing had the guy drinking kids' urine, then they had the shrunken head thing. Where is that Unicorn chaser when we need it most?? Is there some kind of "Xeni" "bat signal" we can turn on in emergencies??

Link to THE UNICORN TAPESTRIES. In the ancient tapestry shown above, one of these bold and magical unicorn creatures is getting an anal probe with a spear. That's gotta hurt. Oh and why not mack on some cuppycakes while you're browsing?

posted by Xeni Jardin at 12:59:32 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Update to Japanese TV show about cat that likes human milk

Mark says: "Concerning your post about the Japanese nipple-sucking cat, my Japanese wife tells me it's a spoof, a comedy sketch about a cat that gets hired by women all over Japan to suck their nipples. Apparently, it's a very busy cat, and the cat's manager is constantly rushing the women clients because the cat is already late for its next appointment up in Hokkaido. The manager has to literally pull the cat from the woman's nipple. It's all a joke, of course."

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 11:34:38 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Mathematics of fetch

At Science News, Ivars Peterson explores the mathematics of dogs playing fetch. Specifically, dogs attempt to identify the optimal path toward the ball or stick they're fetching. That canine approach isn't unlike using calculus to model and solve the problem. Peterson's story starts with an introduction to Hope College mathematician Tim Pennings and his dog Elvis. From the article:

When Elvis and Pennings go to the beach, they always play fetch. Standing at the water's edge, Pennings throws a tennis ball out into the waves, and Elvis eagerly retrieves it. When Pennings throws the ball at an angle to the shoreline, Elvis has several options. He can run along the beach until he is directly opposite the ball, then swim out to get it. Or he can plunge into the water right away and swim all the way to the ball. What happens most the time, however, is that Elvis runs part of the way along the beach, then swims out to the ball.

Depending on the dog's running and swimming speeds, the strategy that Elvis follows appears to minimize the time that it takes to get to the ball. Indeed, Pennings found by experiment that Elvis performs in a way that closely matches a calculus-based mathematical model of the situation.

Link

UPDATE: I'm aware that others, including Richard Feynman, have explored similar, er, waters. (For example, a lifeguard racing to save someone who is drowning.)

UPDATE: For more on animals and math, check out Keith Devlin's book The Math Instinct. Link

posted by David Pescovitz at 11:20:15 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Websites displaying homes, photos of sex offenders: creepy

I stumbled on this website by way of blogging.la yesterday: Family Watchdog is a site that promises to display the names, home addresses, mugshots and other data for convicted sex offenders near any given geographical location in the US. The site also offers a notification service -- get alerts when a convicted sex offender moves near your home.

I entered my home address, and was thoroughly creeped out to see lots of little red, yellow, and green squares nearby. Each sqare represents the home address of a convicted sex offender, and each color indicates conviction type (rape, sex acts against minors under 14, sexual battery, kidnapping with intent to rape).

The creepiest thing of all, though, is seeing their faces: there are mugshots in each convict's pop-up window. Websites like this bring up all kinds of complex privacy arguments, and the consequences of potential errors. Wrong names, addresses or photos could happen, no system is perfect -- not to mention possible wrongful convictions. Some argue that sites like this encourage vigilanteism and create risks for wrongfully accused or databased people; others argue they promote a false sense of security awareness (what about the rapist next door who isn't in this website's database?)

But right now I'm just stuck on the immediate, visceral, ick factor. You plug in "Starbucks" to Google Maps, you get little red dots on a map that show you where to buy a frappucino. Enter a search here, and instead you'll see these men (and women)'s faces and criminal records.

Link

Reader comment: Jonathan Martin says,

It's interesting to note that (at least in my state) there's a higher concentration of "dots" in lower income areas. That says one of the following:
- sex criminals are more likely poorer
- poorer people are more likely to be sex criminals
- that richer people get away away with it (i.e.: hire better lawyers)
- that richer victims are less likely to report crimes, poorer more likely
- the higher concentration could be caused my denser population in those areas
- or none of the above
I'm certainly not suggesting a correlation between income and crime, just an observation.

Reader comment: Brandon Robinson says,

Thanks a ton. Me and my mom were checking offenders around our house, and we ran across a picture of a guy who asked out my mom to go on a date just a few hours before. He was convicted for rape. You possibly saved my mom for posting it, so I thank you.

Reader comment: Kyle Straker says,

I'd just like to point out that certain states do not share/store the addresses of sex offenders. This would include Nevada, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and Vermont. Boy do I love my home state, Pennsylvania.

Reader comment: Vince says,

Don't get too creeped out. In many states, including Florida, the law is so broad as to get you listed as a sex offender for urinating in public. Do it in an area where you even might be in view of children and you'll get the "offense against children" mark.
Drunken college kids doing a drive-by mooning? If convicted of indecent exposure, they get the same. You'll notice most (if not all?) sex offense criminal records don't bother to state the crime committed.

Reader comment: Joe says,

Here is a news story about a woman who puts a sex offender sign on the wrong house. It is illegal to harass these convicted sex offenders. The privacy issues are very complicated. Megan's Law is tricky because we all know how corrupt our legal system is with racist police and judges. It is supposedly a common frame-up for police to plant child porn on drug dealers' computers so they can send them away for longer. Link to story.

Reader comment: Brenda Carter says,

Although Family Watchdog (a great service!) does not currently include offenders from Pennsylvania, the state does provide public access to the registered sex offenders database at the Megan's Law website. While it doesn't provide a nifty interactive map, it is searchable by county, city, ZIP code, name and alias, and also includes creepy mugshots.

Reader comment: Bruce Hallman says,

Be aware that if you read the fine print of the source data for sex offender database, (in Californina at least), you find that the make no assurances that the data is correct. Sex offenders move, and the database of their registered address commonly is out of date with their actual address. This was the case for the address of the house next door to my own house for several months last year. Also, there have been reports, when the parent is the molestor of their own child, [and still resides with the child], that the address listed is actually the address where the child victim lives. In such cases, publicly listing the address is clearly wrong.

Reader comment: Father and Washington state resident Glenn Fleishman says,

Vis a vis Family Watchdog, Spokane apparently outdoes most of the rest of the US (including nearby cities) for child molesters and serial killers. No idea why.

Reader comment: chialynn says,

I ran the only convicted sex offender I know through this site -- and his name's not listed. So I ran his address -- and no, he's not there. Lives equidistant between two schools, he's got a history of sex acts with minors, but he's not on the list. I have other problems with this site (many, many problems, which I'm trying to write up in something like a coherent format now), but this is the main one. It reads as though it's all you need to keep your family safe -- but obviously it's not.

posted by Xeni Jardin at 10:49:10 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Field-testing body armor by shooting it

The backyard ballistics people at Box O' Truth took some of the material that goes into body armor, laid it over blocks of clay, and shot it with a bunch of different weapons, writing up the results in humorous science-fair style:

We decided to try a round of 9mm Ball because that is most commonly used in the Sandbox.
Notice how it flattened out the ball.

Link (Thanks, no name!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 09:47:36 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Handmade shrunken heads for sale

Sadly, these shrunken heads aren't real. But they are handmade and they're only $11.50, from Seattle's Ye Olde Curiosity Shop. From their online catalog:

One of the most famous parts of our museum is our collection (of) real shrunken heads. No, we can't sell them, but we do have a close fascimile. These goatskin shrunken heads are handmade in Ecuador only for us.They are made of boiled goatskin that has been formed by hand and shaved to simulate the human hair left on a real shrunken head.These have been very popular for re-sale on the internet - now you can buy them direct from the source.

Link (via Kircher Society)

posted by David Pescovitz at 09:42:56 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

MI6 compensates LSD human lab rats

In the 1950s, UK intelligence body MI6 ran an experiment where volunteers, under the impression that they were participating in a research effort to find a cure for colds, were given a liquid to drink. Turns out that the liquid was laced with LSD and some of the participants freaked out. Five decades later, MI6 has paid three men for their troubles. According to the BBC News, the settlement for each is thought to be less than £10,000. From the BBC News:

A spokesman for the Foreign Office, which oversees MI6, said: "The settlement offers were made to the government on behalf of the three claimants which, on legal advice, and in the particular circumstances of these cases, the government thinks it appropriate to accept..."

The research was carried out after British and American governments thought the Soviet Union had developed a "truth drug" which could compel spies and servicemen to yield up important secrets.

MI6 scientists decided to test LSD, the closest thing they thought they had to a truth drug, on volunteers to see how they reacted.

Link

posted by David Pescovitz at 09:34:38 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Van Gogh's Starry Night hand-frosted onto a cake

This artistic Livejournaller hand-frosted a cake with Van Gogh's Starry Night and did a completely ass-kicking job. Link (Thanks, Okami Snow!)

Update: Here's Van Gogh's Almond Blossom as a cake, masterfully rendered by Abbie!

posted by Cory Doctorow at 08:40:13 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Anagram remix of LA's Red Line

Here's LA's Red Line as an hilarious remix anagram transit map (other lines to follow). As the suggester notes, "Would be funnier I guess if more people in LA actually rode public transit." Link

Update: Here's an alternate LA map with the Orange line,

Update 2: Here's another one -- thanks, Gregg!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 08:12:32 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Stockholm transit map remixed

Stockholm joins the ever-growing list of cities whose transit map station-names has been remixed with their anagrams. Link

posted by Cory Doctorow at 07:46:17 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Man arrested for drinking urine

A 54-year-old man in Ohio has been arrested after he was caught harvesting urine from a movie theater urinal in order to drink it.

"Listening to his describe it, it's like listening to a crack or cocaine addict. He's addicted to children's urine," said a police officer.

Police said Patton goes to family restaurants and movie theaters and waits for boys in a bathroom stall. Investigators said he shuts off the water to the child-level urinal and puts a cup in the bottom.
Patton allegedly told police that he leaves the stall after the child leaves.
"He goes back and retrieves the cup and drinks the urine," Fithen said.
Police said Patton told them it makes him sick, but that it's almost spiritual to him. He allegedly added, "I like it because it makes me closer to them -- like I'm drinking their youth."

Link (via Random Good Stuff)

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 07:18:47 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

DC Metro map anagram mix

Here's the DC Metro system map with anagrammed station-names! Link (Thanks, Gene!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 07:15:02 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Palm Beach County voting machines generated 100K anomalies in 2004

Black Box Voting has released its stats from its investigation of the electronic voting machines used in 2004 in Palm Beach County, Florida: they found over 100,000 anomalies in the logs:

The internal logs of at least 40 Sequoia touch-screen voting machines reveal that votes were time and date-stamped as cast two weeks before the election, sometimes in the middle of the night...
Dozens of voting machines were turned off during the middle of the election while the polls were open. Machine # 6359 in precinct 1036 was powered down 128 times during the election.

Link (via /.)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 07:11:45 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Cutting board marked with measurement guides

Popgadget reports on an ingenious flexible cutting board from Japan that comes marked with measurement guides that help you share out a pie evenly, or make precise measurements of ingredients as you chop them. Printed on the board is the motto "Please divide equally and eat happily!" Link

posted by Cory Doctorow at 07:08:25 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Kit with seeds from 10 carnivorous plants

On the Make Blog, Phillip Torrone posted about a carnivorous plant kit that Edmund Scientific is selling. It has seeds for the Cobra Plant, Venus Fly Trap, Pitcher Plant, Trumpet Plant and more.
Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 07:04:17 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Vowel-free online dscssn

Members of the Barbelith online community are conducting a discussion without using vowels. Teresa Nielsen Hayden removes the vowels from trolling posts on the Making Light message boards, a process she calls disemvowelling. This is a voluntary version of that:

Cn y pst wtht vwls?
´s ´s chtng t´ ´s´ ´pstrph´s?
Knd of lks lk Cthlh´ spkng, dsn´t t?
N snw hr, snny ´´tsd´. Hw´s th wthr, whr y r?
My brn lrdy strtd hrtng, frm wrtng lk ths.
Hv y fnd th hddn vwl yt?

Link (Thanks, Dave!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 04:18:41 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Anagram U-Bahn map for Vienna

Here's the Vienna U-Bahn map anagram remix, auf Deutsch. Link (Thanks, Mandaya!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 04:15:08 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Thursday, February 23, 2006

Remix Einstein picture by speccing your own blackboard writing

The Dynamic Einstein picture lets you specify your own text for the Mighty Hip Einie to be writing on his personal chalk board. I always knew that that Einstein was a closet Subgenius! Link (via Lawgeek)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 11:58:26 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Anagram transit maps for Manhattan, Oslo, Boston and Atlanta!

Lots of terrific anagram transit maps!

Altanta anagram map:

Olso anagram map:

Boston Orange Line Anagram Map:

(See this alternate, more complete version) (See also this alternate Boston map) (See also this Boston map)

New York "1" Line Anagram station-names:

27
97
68
69
130
101
611
521
371
451
751
861
811
911
Damn Tyck Trees.

(Thanks, Cody, Martin, AnalogKid and Precision Blogger!)

Update: Dlin sez, "I made this anagram map of Boston's transit system, the T, last night. This one includes all lines of the T except the silver line, which isn't a 'real' rail line anyway."

Update 2: Michael sez, "Here's a complete Boston MBTA subway (and some commuter rail) map with all stop names anagrammed. How can you not love a system where one line ends in Bootleg Clones and the airport is now Proletarian Annotation Girl?"

Update 3: Michele sez, "I finally finished my Boston MBTA anagram map -- all lines are anagrammed, including the Silver Line and Commuter Rail (even the destinations at the end of the lines, and the map Legend)."

posted by Cory Doctorow at 11:48:50 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Pesco on Irene McGee's NoOne's Listening radio show

Tomorrow night (Friday), I'll be a guest on Irene McGee's terrestrial radio show No One's Listening. This is the version of her show that airs on 106.9 Free FM San Francisco from 11pm-midnight (PST). (Background here.) You can listen to a stream of the station online here, but annoyingly only via Windows Media, plus you have to fill out a silly free reg form. Still, if you're in the area or want to check out the stream, please tune in. You're also invited to join in the madness via phone or email during the live broadcast. You can call in at +1.888.500.1069 or email to noone@nooneslistening.org. Apparently, the show will also be archived as a podcast on the NoOne's Listening site a few days later. Thanks!
Link to 106.9 Free FM, Link to NoOne's Listening

UPDATE: Yay! Xeni will be joining us via phone tonight too!

posted by David Pescovitz at 08:59:16 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

US online retailer selling Perplex City cards

Earlier this month I wrote about an amazing alternate reality game called Perplex City. I just learned that Insound.com is selling the puzzle cards in the US for $5 per pack of 6 cards. Each card is a work of art.

It's The Matrix meets Alice in Wonderland meets The Da Vinci Code in one of the most unusual concepts we've ever seen at Insound. If it wasn't insanely compelling, we wouldn't divert our attention from music to sell it. Is it a game? Is it a story? Is it a series of interlinked puzzles spanning mysterious websites, cryptic phone calls, stray emails, hidden messages and live events in random cities around the world? We're not entirely sure to be honest...some call it an Alternate Reality Game. Others describe it as interactive fiction. Videogame geeks call it a real life MMO.
Created by a range of leading designers and illustrators, the Perplex City puzzle cards range in difficulty from the fun and easy to the captivatingly complex. There are beautifully crafted riddles, origami challenges, pop culture trivia, logical mindbenders, 3D mazes, Egyptian hieroglyphs and much, much more. These cards are the entryway into the world of Perplex City and contain information and clues essential to unraveling the mystery and finding the missing Cube.

Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 05:03:22 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

The art of Catalina Estrada

Catalina Estrada is an artist from Barcelona with a radiantly exuberant color palette and a knack for fanciful flourishes. She also has a show coming up at Roq La Rue in Seattle this April.
Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 04:11:54 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

The Glaucoma Hymn

The Association of International Glaucoma Studies has a downloadable song on its website called the "Glaucoma Hymn." I think there should be a song for every disease.

Glaucoma Hymn
Glaucoma, Glaucoma, Glaucoma
Constricting vision slowly
Halted by progress of science
Vision of a world united
Beyond all science knowing

Link (thanks, Jenn!)

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 04:04:10 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Xeni on NPR: Google Case Puts Focus on Web Thumbnail Photos

For today's edition of the NPR News program "Day to Day," I filed a report on the recent ruling by a federal judge that Google violated the copyright of adult entertainment site perfect10.com by posting thumbnails of the site's photos. The ruling could have significant implications for Google and other search engines that index copies of photos and other files online, so people can find them.

Link to archived audio for "Google Case Puts Focus on Web Thumbnail Photos," and Link to PDF of court ruling.

Previously on Boing Boing:
Judge rules against Google in court case over porn thumbnails

posted by Xeni Jardin at 03:53:03 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Xeni on ABC World News Tonight: billionth iTunes download

I'll be a guest on ABC World News Tonight Thursday evening for a segment on the significance of a milestone for Apple's iTunes Music Store: the one billionth song was purchased and downloaded today. Will the success of iTMS and Apple's iPod foster a more competitive digital music marketplace, with more choice for music fans? Or should consumers brace themselves for a future in which music and movies are locked up in proprietary, non-interoperable systems that limit our freedom to enjoy tunes we've legally obtained? Link to ABC World News homepage, here's a related news synopsis on the ABC.com site. Here's a press release from Apple about the billionth download (a Coldplay song, btw).
Image: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images.

Reader comment: Jason Schultz says,

Worth noting also that it's taken Apple about three years to sell a billion songs, which is a drop in the bucket compared to CD sales and especially compared to P2P traffic, even today. So while this is nice for Apple, it's still not showing signs of replacing the existing music distribution mechanisms.

Reader comment: Jonathan Tilney says,

Read this item and the comment by Jason that this was after three years. While it is correct, it should be remembered that it took iTunes 27 months to record its first 500 million sales and only 7 months to do the second 500 million. Its growth is looking like becoming exponential.

Reader comment: Chad Arsenault says,

It's also worth noting that iTunes is providing the consumer with much better service than CD distributors, by allowing a la carte delivery of the product. When we hear a song we like, we no longer drive to our local music stores and pay upwards of $12 to purchase a CD full of other songs we may or may not enjoy. Instead, we hop online and pay a dollar for the specific product we want to purchase.
It may take a little time, and there will certainly always be those who hold out against purely digitized media (we all have friends who listen to nothing if its not cut into vinyl); but eventually, as long as online content distributors continue to provide the consumer with exactly what they want at a fair price, CD sales will decline to the point where they are no longer the primary distribution mechanism. The record companies may whine and snivel, but it's not like we don't expect that from them anyway.

posted by Xeni Jardin at 03:44:25 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Richard Dawkins hosts UK TV show about religious faith

Panopticist reviews a UK TV special he bittorrented called The Root of All Evil?, hosted and narrated by devout atheist Richard Dawkins.

From the vantage point of the United States, the program is remarkable: You simply would never encounter such a brazen denunciation of religious faith on this country's airwaves, because the outcry from the religious right would be deafening. Dawkins's narration drips with contempt; as he goes about his rounds, it's as if he can hardly restrain himself from shouting, "I'm surrounded by IDIOTS!" The smoke coming out of his ears leaves a trail behind him wherever he goes.
In the seven-and-a-half minute clip linked through the image below, Dawkins visits Colorado Springs to attend a sermon by an influential but proudly ignorant pastor. In a conversation with Dawkins after the sermon, the pastor likens the event to a rock concert. Dawkins suggests that it was more akin to a Nuremberg rally —- a comparison that the pastor appears to be too uneducated and ignorant to be offended by.

Link

Reader comment: Richardsays:

I actually saw this program in the UK, and the particular part you mention in that clip is superb to see.
The Pastor doesn't really get upset onscreen, afterwards he apparently came up to the crew in the car park and told them to get off his land because he had called his worshippers animals. That's a reference to Dawkins saying that we're descended from apes!
There are some amazingly good scenes, and very strong arguments. From my little write up of it there are a few links to some essays he's written which are even more powerful. The essay about religion and human guided missiles is very tough going. You've got to admire him.

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 03:38:33 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Acetylene filled balloon blows up inside car

On Notes from the Technology Underground, Bill Gurstelle reports that a 46-year-old Wyoming Colorado man did something foolish with a big balloon and some welding gas.

All the windows were blown out, the vehicle doors were bent towards the outside and the roof was pushed about a foot higher than normal. [The occupants said] that they were taking a balloon to a Super Bowl party -- a balloon filled with acetylene, a very explosive gas used in welding -- so they could blow up the balloon while celebrating. However, on the drive, the balloon rolled across the back seat, possibly causing static electricity, and igniting the gas, causing it to explode.The couple said a passer-by gave them a ride home. Deputies called in an ambulance, who took the couple to Swedish Medical Center for possible shrapnel wounds and broken eardrums. Norman Frey, 46, faces a charge of possession, use, or removal of explosives or incendiary devices. He faces two to six years in prison.

Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 03:28:26 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

7 new MPAA lawsuits: Isohunt, Torrentspy -- and newsgroups

Snip from a press release issued today by the Motion Picture Association of America regarding seven lawsuits filed today against filesharing service providers -- and newsgroups believed to be hubs for fileswapping activity:

Today’s lawsuits mark the first time the MPAA is taking action against sites that enable users of Newsgroups to easily find and download illegal content. Newsgroups are electronic bulletin boards which in recent years have become a major source of pirated content as users are able to attach movie, music and games files to their messages. The following is a list of the sites being sued by the MPAA and its member companies.
Isohunt.com, BTHub.com and TorrentBox.com: These related Torrent sites facilitate downloads of over 140,000 content items, including popular movies and television shows such as Wedding Crashers, Lost and Desperate Housewives.
TorrentSpy.com is the world’s most-visited site for obtaining infringing content using Torrent software. The site offers over 160,000 content items including 27,182 movies, 21,130 TV shows and over 45,000 music items.
NiteShadow.com has over 24,000 registered members and offers over 1,000 science-fiction TV and movie content including Battlestar Galactica, Quantum Leap, Sliders, Stargate, Babylon 5 and multiple Star Trek series.
eDonkey: Ed2k-It.com is a leading eDonkey site, with over 46,000 registered site members. eDonkey sites provide easy one-click access to specific content items on their peer-to-peer network.
Newsgroups: NZB-Zone.com, BinNews.com and DVDRs.net are membership-based websites that enable users of Newsgroups to initiate easy downloads of infringing content. NZB-Zone offers over 3.3 million files, including Star Wars Episode III, Wedding Crashers, Chronicles of Narnia, 40 Year-Old Virgin and King Kong; BinNews.com offers files for over 3,000 movies; and DVDRs.net has over 37,000 members.

Link

Reader comment: Gary says,

Just thought I would say that NZB-Zone.com, BinNews.com and DVDRs.net do not contain any files other than 'maps' or nzbs to files already posted on usenet. This is even less direct than torrents as you have to pay a private provider for usenet access to begin with.

posted by Xeni Jardin at 03:19:47 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Lovingly scanned and OCR'd copy of The Scientific American Boy

Project Gutenberg is offering a complete 345-page scan of The Scientific American Boy, published in 1907. The book tells the fictional story of a group of adventurous and infinitely resourceful lads who embark on a campaign to explore "Willow Clump Island," a fantastic juvenile Eden that provides the boys with ample opportunities to test their boat-, tent-, surveying instrument-, bridge-, hut-, cabin-, ladder-, tree house-, heliograph-, water wheel-, windmill-, megaphone-, and combination lock-building skills.

It's also the good fortune of the gang that one of the boys nearly drowns in a swimming accident, because it gives their chaperone, the kindly "Uncle Ed" ("one of those rare men who take a great interest in boys and their affairs") a chance to demonstrate the art of artificial respiration on the unconscious boy.

My favorite part of the book is when the gang forms a secret society with a club pin in the shape of a beetle.

The only other charm our secret club afforded was the wearing of a mysterious club pin. It was a silver beetle, with the letter G engraved on the head and the letter B on the body, while down the center of the back was the letter I (see Fig. 187). In public we called ourselves the G. I. B.'s, but it was only the initiated members who knew that these letters were to be read backward, and, with the beetle on which they were engraved, signified the "Big Bugs." Of course, we had some secret signs and signals, a secret hand grasp, a peculiar whistle as a warning to run [used, perhaps, whenever Uncle Ed began to take too great an interest in the boys? -- M] another meaning "lie still," and a third signifying "all is well."

Link

Reader comment: Jared Buck says:

Just a comment about the Scientific American Boy book you linked to in
yesterday's Boing Boing -

Project Gutenberg does books in many diffeent genres, and among those are old issues of magazines such as Scientific American. I have done a number of books for PG's Distributed Proofreaders, and if your readers would be interested in seeing what issues of the magazine we have done, I would ask them to look here. Search under "Scientific American" in the title field. We already have issues from the early 1890s and I myself am trying to work on an issue on SA that will eventually become a PG etext.

Glad you could give PG a little shout-out!

Jared Buck
Project Gutenberg Volunteer

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 03:02:36 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Vintage photos of kids dressed as cowboys

Umpqua sends us a link to a Flickr group of "old photos of children either dressed up as cowboys or indians and/or on ponies. Lots of cute children and very tired looking ponies." God, these are incredible! Link (Thanks, Umpqua!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 02:39:02 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

UK anti-piracy officer assures Firefox she'll catch the pirates who copy it

A Trading Standards officer in a town in the UK contacted the Mozilla foundation to assure it that she'd caught the icky pirates who were copying Firefox without permission. When the Mozzers explained free software and copyleft, the officer lost it -- "I can't believe that your company would allow people to make money from something that you allow people to have free access to. Is this really the case? If Mozilla permit the sale of copied versions of its software, it makes it virtually impossible for us, from a practical point of view, to enforce UK anti-piracy legislation, as it is difficult for us to give general advice to businesses over what is/is not permitted."

I felt somewhat unnerved at being held responsible for the disintegration of the UK anti-piracy system. Who would have thought giving away software could cause such difficulties?
However, given that the free software movement is unlikely collectively to decide to go proprietary in order to make her life easier, I had another go, using examples like Linux and the OpenOffice office suite to show that it's not just Firefox which is throwing a spanner in the works.
She then asked me to identify myself, so that she could confirm that I was authorised to speak for the Mozilla Foundation on this matter. I wondered if she was imagining nefarious copyright-infringing street traders taking a few moments off from shouting about the price of bananas to pop into an internet cafe, crack a router and intercept her e-mail.

Link

posted by Cory Doctorow at 02:29:31 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Laughing Squid on Hi-Fructose Vol 3

Laughing Squid provides a sneak peak at the cover of the next issue of the wonderful art magazine, Hi-Fructose.

The amazing Los Angeles artist Mark Ryden will be featured in (and on the cover of) volume 3 of Hi-Fructose magazine (coming out this summer). This issue will also feature Chris Ware, Jim Woodring and a bunch of other great stuff, plus it is shipping with a special Viewmaster Photo Reel featuring photos from Brian McCarty.

Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 02:10:40 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Anagram remix of the Chicago transit map

Following on from the Transport for London censoring a fan-remix of the Tube map labeled with anagrams of the station names, Pete's mixed his own version of the Chicago Regional Transit Authority map. Link (Thanks, Pete!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 02:01:54 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Vintage motel postcards

Chris has begun to post his favorite vintage motel-room postcards to Flickr. It's a great collection! He waxes rhapsodic about "the lamps, the bedspreads, the nightstands, the old TVs (or radios, if predating TV ubiquity), the drapes, the alternately dazzling and unfortunate approaches to interior decor." Link (Thanks, Chris!)

Update: Matt sez, "James Lileks is doing a very similar thing on his page. He's got loads of cards, and is posting them by state, updating once a week."

Update 2: Yorkie sez, "The Great Postcard Hunt has been collecting and cataloging interesting vintage postcard scenes from around the world, then recreating them with equivalent modern day views. It's effectively a combination of treasure hunt and photo safari, except all the hard preparation work has already been done."

Update 3: Humuhumu sez, "Here's an amazing collection of vintage Hawaiian hotel room postcards."

posted by Cory Doctorow at 01:46:30 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Sports Utility Watch -- gigantic, feature-laden, heroically ugly

This "Sports Utility Watch" is 1.5" x 2", and includes a compass and a thermometer. Plus it's gigantic and completely gearhead chic. I want one. Link (via Gizmodo)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 10:50:03 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

TV with hacked-in "science lab" two-stage power-switch

This Flickr user has owned his 14" TV since he was 16; when the power-switch broke, he decided to wring a few more years out of it by attaching a couple of "science lab" switches to it:

I fixed it. My way. The original switch was a two-part affair, the main switch turning on the high-voltage guts with a second smaller switch turning on the tuner. These are not normal switches that you can go to Maplin and pick up, so I did the next best thing - picked up generic, science-lab looking switches and mounted them on the side. To complete the look, I've added labels printed on my Dymo: "POWER" and "LAUNCH".

Link (via Make Blog)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 08:07:47 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Anagram map of the Amsterdam Metro

Here's a remixed Amsterdam subway map with all the station names changed for humorous anagrams -- it's in the tradition of the anagram remixed London Underground and Toronto Transit Commission maps. Lenin sez, "I can assure you that the anagrams are good and often very funny." Link (Thanks, Lenin!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 07:57:58 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Diane Duane vows to finish trilogy as a reader-supported web-book

Diane Duane, author of the wildly successful Young Wizards fantasy novels, has decided to complete her "Feline Wizards" trilogy as a web-based, reader-supported serial. She'll publish the ten chapters or "The Big Meow" one chapter at a time, releasing a new chapter every time her donations pot crosses her minimum-to-publish threshold. At the end of the experiment, the supporters will get bound copies of the book from lulu.com. Diane's vowed to finish the book in time for the World Science Fiction Convention in LA this August 23.

The first two volumes of the Feline Wizards trilogy drew a sizable audience, but not enough to convince Diane's publisher to pay her to write book three. Over the years, an anxious audience has demanded a conclusion to the series, so back in December, Diane posted an open question to her blog: would her readers support her if she finished the trilogy without a publisher?

The answer's been a resounding yes -- one reader's even gone so far as to offer a $1,000 matching grant to Diane toward the completion of the book.

I'll be blogging this experiment as it unfolds -- check back here for notice when the first chapter goes live.

A lot of the people who mailed me knew about, and mentioned, Lawrence Watt-Evans' celebrated approach to his own version of this problem, in which he "serially" self-published his Ethshar novel The Spriggan Mirror, posting a chapter every time the PayPal donations from interested readers reached a certain point. (And afterwards, his book found a publisher, too.)
That particular business model had been on my mind for a good while. Certainly it has an honorable and ancient cultural precedent in the storyteller who unrolls his or her mat in the marketplace and tells just enough story to get your interest...then shakes the bowl in front of him/her, and waits for enough coins to jingle in it to warrant a continuation. But at the end of the day, when you start a project like this, the question is always going to be: is there going to be enough interest to see it finished? Yes, I want to tell this story -- there are characters in The Big Meow who I've been wanting to write for a long time. And at the same time, what goes on in my household is still a business, about which I have to be fairly hardheaded if it's not to flounder in the face of present market conditions

Link (Thanks, Diane!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 07:39:22 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Anagram map of Toronto subways

After seeing yesterday's post about Transport for London's nastygramming of the Tube map that substituted all the station names for anagrams, Robot Johnny produced an inspired version that remixes the Toronto Transit Commission's subway map with anagrammed station-names. Link

posted by Cory Doctorow at 05:35:48 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Vintage Disneyland photos collected at yard-sales

The "Stuff from the Park" blog collects vintage photos of Disneyland discovered at yard-sales and flea-markets, including some amazing rare shots of the Park's construction phase (also noteworthy are some photos of county fairs and other amusements).

I will start off with this image of a ballon seller posing in front of King Arthurs carousel in Fantasyland. Image is an original slide with the date of 7-55 written on the back. Great posed shot with the wild balloons that are pre-Mickey Mouse design. I love the sunglasses and the circle skirt. This balloon seller was definitely prior to Disney actually hiring and training employees. He looks like one very scary clown!

Link (via The Disney Blog)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 05:13:01 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

More clues to identity of author of EFF-sliming article in The Reg

More information has come to light about the identity of the writer for The Register who wrote a column in which Electronic Frontier Foundation was falsely accused of losing several cases (most of the "cases" mentioned as EFF's losses were either EFF wins, not cases, or not EFF's cases). The piece was published under the by-line "Bonhomie Snoutintroff." Like many people, I assumed that the piece had been written by Andrew Orlowski, a reporter at The Register with a track-record of leveling accusations at EFF.

However, I was wrong. On February 3, I ran a retraction after an insider at The Register tipped me off that "Bonhomie" was a pseudonym for another long-time Register contributor.

Now the FFWD blog has made a compelling case that Bonhomie Snoutintroff is the pen-name of Thomas C Greene, a long-standing Register contributor who used several near-identical passages in a 2001 article in The Reg.

I wrote to Greene to ask him if he was Snoutintroff. Here's part of our exchange:

CD: Did you write the Bonhomie column about EFF? If not, did the writer who did so use your lines with or without your permission?
TG: I don't like to be cagey, but if i am bonhomie, then i should prefer to leave it unconfirmed so that the nom de guerre isn't a total giveaway, whereas if a contributor to the Reg had, say, flattered me by imitating a phrase of mine here and there, then i would handle that directly, and not embarrass the fellow in public.
So it's a bit of a no-win item, as you can see.
I find it puzzling that there is such interest in learning the author's identity, since the piece is obviously not straight news. Bonhomie's byline should make that abundantly clear.
Now, if it were straight news, and it became controversial, we would certainly handle it in a more formal and forthcoming manner. But questioning the EFF item strikes me as very much like questioning this one: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/04/01/bush_twins_volunteer/ .
I would add that many writers and journos use pseudonyms occasionally, and enjoy it for what it is: a chance to write in a voice not one's own. It can be useful creatively sometimes, or it can simply be a welcome break from the routine. Sometimes, journos contribute to competing publications, and often prefer to do so pseudonymously. At the Reg we've had several pseudonymous submissions from known tech journos who would prefer not to advertise where they work. I've published articles elsewhere myself, sometimes under my name, and sometimes under a nom de guerre.
There's really nothing sinister to it; it's a common practice, actually.

If Greene and Snoutintroff are indeed one and the same, it's a pretty ironic circumstance. Greene is the author of "Computer Security for the Home and Small Office," which contains chapters on the correct use of crypto to defend your network. The irony is that the strong crypto that Greene's book recommends was only legalized when EFF won the Bernstein case, which menas that Greene owes part of his living to the victories of an organization that the Snoutintroff article characterizes as a perennial loser (the other irony is that the article predicts that EFF will lose its class-action suit against Sony for distributing malicious software on its music CDs, a case that EFF went on to win). Link (Thanks, Jason!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 04:20:06 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Flickr set documents locations in Neal Stephenson trilogy

Neil sez, "Great chunks of Neal Stephenson's 'The System of the World' trilogy (review) use the Tower of London as a pivotal location, but I never got a clear enough mental picture of the place. So I photo-documented the Tower, with Flickr notes text extracts to provide a visual guide for the interested reader. The Baroque Cycle takes in a lot of the specific geography of London, and I'd love to see a collective gazetteer emerge, perhaps using 'baroquecyclelondon' as a tag?" Link (Thanks, Neil!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 03:36:26 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Vote Gavin Baker for U Florida Student Senate!

Gavin sez, "I'm running for Student Senate at the University of Florida. I've developed a personal platform of free culture issues -- which might make the first candidate anywhere to run on a free culture platform. Besides advocating for a student voice in university tech policy, I'll fight the anti-filesharing software deployed in campus housing, advocate for open access to university research and journals, promote free/open source software and open file formats -- you get the drift."

* Investigate ICARUS, the Department of Housing’s anti-filesharing software, and invite students into a public debate for the first time
* Work with the university to establish guidelines for the use of specialized proprietary software in classes, so students won’t be stung by expensive class software that they can’t re-sell

Gavin's the president of Florida FreeCulture and a director of FreeCulture.org, and if I got a vote, it would be for him, in a heartbeat. Link

posted by Cory Doctorow at 03:31:16 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Wednesday, February 22, 2006

How the US is boning the developing world at WIPO

EFF and other public interest groups are back at the United Nations this week, at the World Intellectual Property Organization's meeting of the "Provisional Committee on Proposals Related to a Development Agenda." This is the meeting where the nuts-and-bolts of how WIPO will turn itself into an actual humanitarian agency, instead of what it has done traditionally: help rich countries and their multinationals screw the developing world.

The public interest groups continue to subversively write down what's going on and publish it, something that WIPO's Secretariat once described as "abusing WIPO's hospitality" -- normally, the Secretariat would release a report six months after the fact, once everyone quoted in it had the chance to revise the report of what they'd said. EFF and others publish their account of the WIPO deliberations daily -- twice a day, when it's going hot and heavy -- and it gets slashdotted, read by delegates' bosses in their capitols, and distributed. It has a genuinely disruptive effect on the orderly dividing-and-conquering of the world that's underway there.

Technologically, it's dead simple: the public interest groups make an ad-hoc WiFi network, open up the group-editing program SubEthaEdit, and collectively write down as much of what's being said as they can keep up with, along with explanatory text.

EFF's just posted its Day 2 notes from the meeting, and they're fascinating. Check out all these developing nations coming to accord on how to protect their interests, and then the US and its states like Mexico (which follows the US's lead all the time at WIPO) just poo-pooing the whole thing as too complicated to even consider. Shameless -- and on display for everyone to see. Hilariously, the US continues to argue that the best way to protect developing countries is to put up a website explaining how great more copyright and patent laws are.

Chile had actually put forward three suggestions, but it was the proposal for WIPO to undertake a study of the value of "a rich and accessible public domain" that drew comments from a slew of Member States, the Committee Chair and public interest non-governmental organizations. And rightly so. As Chile's proposal notes, the public domain is essential for ensuring access to knowledge, and provides the foundation for technological innovation.
Intellectual property rights are supposed to promote the same goals, but you'd never know it from the comments of some participants who seemed to fundamentally misunderstand the essential relationship between IP and the public domain. Apparently under the mistaken impression that the public domain is the opposite of intellectual property, these participants claimed that the proposal was outside WIPO's mandate.

Link

posted by Cory Doctorow at 11:41:22 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Using corn-rows to teach fractals

Teachers in predominantly black schools in the US have developed a program to teach fractals by using corn-row hair-styles as examples of the form:

Each braid is represented as multiple copies of a “Y” shaped plait. In each iteration, the plait is copied, and a transformation is applied. The series of transformed copies creates the braid. In the above example, we can see the original style at top right, and a series of braid simulations, each composed of plait copies that are successively scaled down, rotated, and translated (reflection is only applied to whole braids, as in the case where one side of the head is a mirror image of the other). One of the interesting research outcomes was that our students discovered which parameters need to remain the same and which would be changed in order to produce the entire series of braids (that is, how to iterate the iterations).

Link (via Collision Detection)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 11:29:05 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Quantum computer solves problem without running program

A quantum computer at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign has solved a problem without running the actual problem -- one of the weird-ass outcomes of building and running a quantum computer. Reportedly, this particular effect can't scale up much beyond a very simple problem, but the people responsible indicate that there are similar effects that might be usable at larger scales:

Utilizing two coupled optical interferometers, nested within a third, Kwiat's team succeeded in counterfactually searching a four-element database using Grover's quantum search algorithm. "By placing our photon in a quantum superposition of running and not running the search algorithm, we obtained information about the answer even when the photon did not run the search algorithm," said graduate student Onur Hosten, lead author of the Nature paper. "We also showed theoretically how to obtain the answer without ever running the algorithm, by using a 'chained Zeno' effect."
Through clever use of beam splitters and both constructive and destructive interference, the researchers can put each photon in a superposition of taking two paths. Although a photon can occupy multiple places simultaneously, it can only make an actual appearance at one location. Its presence defines its path, and that can, in a very strange way, negate the need for the search algorithm to run.
"In a sense, it is the possibility that the algorithm could run which prevents the algorithm from running," Kwiat said. "That is at the heart of quantum interrogation schemes, and to my mind, quantum mechanics doesn't get any more mysterious than this."

Link (via Futurismic)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 11:23:05 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Web 2.0 in space? "Borg" PC posse designs NASA antennas

NASA spokesperson John Bluck explains,

For the first time, objects 'evolved by computers' will be launched into space in March 2006, if all goes to plan. The objects are antennas mounted on three small NASA satellites.
Earlier, 80 personal computers, running artificial intelligence software, quickly 'evolved' the design of the small space antennas at NASA Ames Research Center in California's Silicon Valley.

Here's a snip from a NASA article about the project:

Like a friendly, non-biological form of the Borg Collective of science fiction fame, 80 personal computers, using artificial intelligence (AI), have combined their silicon brains to quickly design a tiny, advanced space antenna.
If all goes well, three of these computer-designed space antennas will begin their trip into space in March 2006, when an L-1011 aircraft will take off from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. The airplane will drop a Pegasus XL rocket into the sky high above the Pacific Ocean. The rocket will ignite and carry three small Space Technology (ST5) satellites into orbit.
Each satellite will be equipped with a strange-looking, computer-designed space antenna. Although they resemble bent paperclips, the antennas are highly efficient, according to scientists.

Link

posted by Xeni Jardin at 10:13:32 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Schizophrenia, Aging and Art: Louis Wain

A Cornell University student's research project titled "Schizophrenia, Aging and Art" profiles Louis Wain, an early 20th century artist who began to suffer from schizophrenia late in life. While a commercial artist, he drew lots of comics of cats that appeared in newspapers and children's books. From the project's Web site:

During the onset of his disease at 57, Wain continued to paint, draw and sketch cats, but the focus changed from fanciful situations, to focus on the cats themselves.

Characteristic changes in the art began to occur, changes common to schizophrenic artists. Jagged lines of bright color began emanating from his feline subjects. The outlines of the cats became sever and spiky, and their outlines persisted well throughout the sketches, as if they were throwing off energy.

Soon the cats became abstracted, seeming now to be made up of hundreds of small repetitive shapes, coming together in a clashing jangles of color that transform the cat into something resembling an Eastern diety.

The abstraction continued, the cats now being seen as made up by small repeating patterns, almost fractal in nature. Until finally they ceased to resemble cats at all, and became the ultimate abstraction, an indistinct form made up by near symmetrical repeating patterns.

Link (via Neatorama)

UPDATE: Fortean researcher Mark Pilkington of the excellent Strange Attractor Journal writes:

The dramatically satisfying idea that these beautiful pieces reflect Wain's ongoing descent into schizophrenia is most likely untrue. In his biography of Wain, The Man Who Drew Cats (as far as I know this is the only biography of the artist), Rodney Dale shows that Dr Walter Maclay, a collector of art by mental patients, found the images and arranged them, arbitrarily (some are unsigned and all are undated), into an order that suggested the progression of Wain's madness...

Says Dale: "Assembling what little factual knowledge we have on Dr Maclay's eight paintings, there is clearly no justification for regarding them as more than samples of Louis Wain's art at different times. Wain experimented with patterns and cats, and even quite late in life was still producing conventional cat pictures..."

The kaleidoscopic cats, and other fine examples of art by sufferers from schizophrenia, depression and other mental illnesses, are on display at the Bethlehem hospital archive and gallery in Beckenhem, Kent (just south of London) which is well worth a visit. You can also pick up fantastic Louis Wain mugs, as well as postcards! They have a site here.

posted by David Pescovitz at 09:55:30 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Rare Ferrari busted in half

Yesterday, someone crashed a $1 million Ferrari crashed into a utility pole on the Pacific Coast Highway in Malibu, California. Bel-air resident Stefan Eriksson claims that he was just a passenger in the car and that the driver, who he knew only as "Dietrich," ran away from the scene. Apparently, investigators haven't yet determined who owns the car either.

"We're investigating as to who was actually driving," said Sgt. Philip Brooks of the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department today. "His (Eriksson's) story has inconsistencies that need to be cleared up...

Officials are trying to determine whether (Eriksson) is the noted Swedish game designer whose firm, perhaps not surprisingly, was involved with car-racing themed video games....

Eriksson "had a .09 blood-alcohol level, but if he's a passenger, that's OK," Brooks said. "But he had a bloody lip, and only the air bag on the driver's side had blood on it. The passenger-side air bag did not. My Scooby-Doo detectives are looking closely into that.

"Maybe the 'driver' had a friend who picked him up. Maybe he thumbed a ride," the sergeant added. "Maybe he was a ghost."

Link (Thanks, Paul Saffo!)

UPDATE: Thanks to all the readers who point to the latest Ferrari crash news articles that include info about Eriksson's history with game company Gizmondo. Link

posted by David Pescovitz at 09:30:29 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Japanese TV show about cat that loves human milk

I'm not really sure what is going on here, but if I had to guess I'd say it was a segment from a Japanese TV show where the producers took a cat around to different women asking them if they'd allow the cat to suckle their breasts. That's entertainment! (NSFW?)
Link (thanks, Jim!)

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 09:26:35 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Thumbtack Press is selling prints of Mark's work

Thumbtack Press, a very cool new company that sells archival copy prints (framed or unframed) has started selling prints of my art. I hope you take a gander!

Every print from Thumbtack Press is a gallery quality print on heavy bright white stock. We use only archival inks utilizing a professional 8-color process. The final print is trimmed to size and protected in an acid-free polyurethane cover before shipment in a board-backed, water resistant envelope.

(Shown here: "Pet or Pest?")
Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 09:14:54 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Outsider architect photo gallery of Thunder Mountain

Tinselman posted about a bizarre survivalist compound in Imlay, Nevada dubbed Thunder Mountain.

Frank Van Zant's vision was sparked when he heard the prophecy of a medicine woman: "In the final days there shall rise up a place called Thunder Mountain." She also told him that only those who lived at Thunder Mountain would survive the coming apocalypse. Van Zant wasted no time; he changed his name to Chief Rolling Thunder Mountain, moved his family to the desert in Imlay, Nevada, and began to build his monument.
At age 69 Van Zant committed suicide because he had finally completed his masterpiece.

Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 03:54:37 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Motorized ice-cream cone for the lazy-tongued

These $10 motorized ice-cream cones are just the thing for those of us with very, very lazy tongues. As the bumpf sez, "No more licking around the edges of a drippy cone." Whew. The nightmare is over. Link (via Popgadget)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 02:02:23 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Clever kids' easel/chair is made out of a roll of paper

This genius chair/easel provides a huge roll of paper for a kid to sit on while s/he draws, and comes with a five-year supply of paper.

The Chair is made with drawing paper, as the paper is being "drawn upon", the size of the front cylinder increases and thus follows the child's growth!- age 2-7 Years. Clean paper is transferred from the back cylinder to the front simply by rolling the front cylinder backwards. The amount of paper is approx. 500 meters, which means that the paper can be changed twice a week for 5 years.

Link (via Gizmodo)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 02:01:43 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Japan to ban resale of used electronics

As of April 2006, it will be illegal to sell used electronics that are 5 years old or older in Japan. Akihabara News says that this is part of a pattern of restriction of the sale of used goods that prevails in Japan, where manufacturers have been able to convince the government to sweeten their profit-lines by banning re-sale of goods:

The first ones to talk to the government about this were the car manufacturers, and they convinced the government to enforce a rule that used cars have to go to the technical inspection after 3 years, and this is a costly matter since a check costs between 1500 and 3500 EUR. Once you're in the system, you have to get your car checked every 2 years, and once your car is 10 years old, you need to go there every year. This is a reson why the Japanese change cars quite fast, usually before the car is 3 years old. Important aspect is that you have no control whatsoever on the cost of possible repairs, because after the technical check, the car is driven to the garage and they do the repairs that the technical check asked them to do, you just get the bill with your car. A very nice rip-off... and this system is being envied by a lot of other domains, like the electronics domain at this moment. So from April 1st 2006, ALL electronic products sold in Japan before 2001 will be prohibited from the 2nd hand market! This means that for example a PC like the Vaio U1 (PCG-U1) will be soon not vailable on the Japanese market anymore, since it was sold in April 2002... and you still have about a month to get a Vaio C1! It also seems that a 5 yeas old product (made after 2001) will Face the same problem in the futur.

Link (via Gizmodo)

Update: Lots of you have written in to point out this site, which purports to debunk this article. However, if you read it, you'll see that in the guise of "protecting consumers," this Japanese law will limit the resale of used goods to giant retailers that presently make all their money from new goods, while shutting out user-to-user sales of electronics, pawn shops, market stalls, charity shops, etc. In other words: the sale of used goods will be at the discretion of the companies that stand to lose the most from the sale of used goods.

posted by Cory Doctorow at 02:00:07 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Podcast interview with Bird Flu book author John Farndon

Here's a podcast interview with the author of a new book calld Everything You Need To Know: BIRD FLU published by our friends at Disinformation.
Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 11:25:20 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Fun fake ad from Michael Cho

I like this fake old magazine ad that Michael Cho drew.

It actually began as a doodle that got out of control. I took the copy and layout pretty much verbatim from an old black and white ad, but just substituted my own images and and made some minor changes to the text. Then I rendered the whole thing out in 2 colours. Blame me if you want for all the crappy lettering and crooked lines, but remember: I did this without a ruler!

Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 11:07:27 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Argonne National Laboratory is blocking Boing Boing (or maybe not, see update)

An employee at Argonne National Laboratory says: "I'm at a big US federal site, 3500 employees, never blocked you before. There is an option where I can request that a domain be reconsidered if there's cause. I'll keep my eyes open."

If you are stuck behind a Boing Boing-proof firewall, you might be able to access Boing Boing using this link: http://www.google.com/translate?langpair=en|en&u=www.boingboing.net

This clever little trick from Google Hacks allows you to access restricted web sites using Google language tools service as a proxy.

Reader comment: Adjam says:

I used that 'Google proxy' method to bypass our sysadmin's paranoid web restrictions all the time two years ago!
He would block it though, so instead of using google.co.uk /translate?langpair=en|en&u=www.somthing.com i would use google.co.jp or google.co.fr. And he was so incompetent that every now and then he'd just reset all the web restrictions without realizing it and I could use .co.uk again.

Reader comment: Charles says:

I'm not sure who said boingboing is blocked from Argonne, but I know I check your site daily and it's not blocked. It's a big lab - maybe someone's department has a local firewall setup. It's definitely not labwide.

Reader comment: Scott says:

I think my app Bitty should be able to get through to blocked content, for example here's boingboing.
I just released a new version. Here's boingboing in Bitty as a Google personalized home page module:
1) Go to: http://www.google.com/ig/
2) Click "Add Content" in the top-left corner
3) Look for "Create a Section" at the bottom of the new left-hand sidebar, and copy/paste this URL
4) Click OK at the prompt

Reader comment: Brian says:

Don't know if this is just a coincidence but.. BoingBoing was blocked at Prudential starting today. Noticed this morning when I went for my daily fix!

Reader comment:A reader says:

Regarding the bypass of firewalls you suggested to be able to read Boingboing if it is blocked…
I thought you should know this method is very popular here in China to bypass government filters. Google Translate doesn’t work, but lesser-known translators (like, say, http://www.worldlingo.com) work perfectly. It doesn’t work for Google Translate and Babelfish, though… I think the Chinese government is wise to this and banned these sites.

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 10:47:55 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Petition to take Cory Maye off death row

Vince Daliessio says: "Laura Denyes from whatisliberalism.com is circulating a petition for pardon for Cory Maye, who is on death row in Mississippi for shooting an intruder in his home in self-defense. The intruder turned out to be an undercover police officer searching for drugs. The officer did not knock or announce his presence, he did not identify himself as a policeman, and he did not have a warrant to search Mr. Maye's apartment. Mr. Maye made a split-second decision to defend himself and his daughter, and shot the intruder. As soon as another officer yelled 'Police!' Mr. Maye dropped his weapon and surrendered. The officer died, unfortunately. Do not let the Drug War claim another innocent life by allowing the state of Mississippi to execute Cory Maye.

"Whatever your opinion of personal firearms ownership, Cory was completely within his rights to defend himself and his young daughter against an intruder who failed to declare his identity, and who did not have a warrant. Please consider signing the petition to the governor of Mississippi for a pardon for Mr. Maye."

Both the liberal and conservative press are up in arms about this. Here's a Fox News column with more details.

That Cory Maye is even in prison is an appalling failure of Mississippi's criminal justice system. Police had no reason to be in his home that night, much less to break down his door. His case is just the latest in a series of tragic consequences resulting from the overuse of paramilitary tactics when police serve drug warrants.
But it's the details of Cory Maye's case that make it particularly compelling:
Cory Maye had no prior criminal record. He had no history of violence. Police found one gram of ashen marijuana in Maye's apartment (that's about a sixth of a teabag's worth). There was no "large stash," and Cory Maye was no drug dealer. In fact, Maye's name appeared nowhere on the search warrant, only his address and the phrase "persons unknown."

Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 10:40:59 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Why kids are on MySpace

danah boyd has published an excellent paper on the hows and whys of the explosive growth of teen users of MySpace, the most popular social networking site ever. boyd, a high-tech social scientist who has an excellent track-record for winkling out the important truths behind social uses of tech. Her clear-eyed work on MySpace talks about the youth-liberation aspects of the service as well as the response, situating in history.

Adults with authority control the home, the school, and most activity spaces. Teens are told where to be, what to do and how to do it. Because teens feel a lack of control at home, many don't see it as their private space.
To them, private space is youth space and it is primarily found in the interstices of controlled space. These are the places where youth gather to hang out amongst friends and make public or controlled spaces their own. Bedrooms with closed doors, for example.
Adult public spaces are typically controlled spaces for teens. Their public space is where peers gather en masse; this is where presentation of self really matters. It may be viewable to adults, but it is really peers that matter.
Teens have increasingly less access to public space. Classic 1950s hang out locations like the roller rink and burger joint are disappearing while malls and 7/11s are banning teens unaccompanied by parents. Hanging out around the neighborhood or in the woods has been deemed unsafe for fear of predators, drug dealers and abductors. Teens who go home after school while their parents are still working are expected to stay home and teens are mostly allowed to only gather at friends' homes when their parents are present.

Link

posted by Cory Doctorow at 10:36:01 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Judge rules against Google in court case over porn thumbnails

A Los Angeles federal court has ruled that Google's image search violates a porn site's copyright -- because the search tool makes it possible to view thumbnails of the porn site's photos, which are intended to be locked behind a paywall.

U.S. District Judge A. Howard Matz found Google directly infringed on copyrights held by Perfect 10, a Beverly Hills publisher. He said the free availability of the photos on Google could harm Perfect 10's efforts to sell thumbnail, or small, versions of its photos as downloads to cell phones.
``The court reaches this conclusion despite the enormous public benefit that search engines such as Google provide,'' Matz wrote in a 47-page order filed Friday. If upheld, the judge's ruling could affect Yahoo and other Internet companies whose image searches display thumbnails of copyrighted pictures. The judge ordered Google and Perfect 10 to submit by March 8 wording for a preliminary injunction barring the use of the thumbnail images.
Perfect 10 publishes the adult magazine ``Perfect 10'' and operates a subscription Web site that claims to feature ``the world's most beautiful natural women.'' Google's image search displays thumbnail images when people submit a query on a particular subject. The tiny pictures are stored on Google's servers but when a person clicks on the image, he is taken to the original source of the full-sized image. Google's creation and display of the Perfect 10 thumbnail images ``likely do not fall within the fair use exemption,'' Matz wrote, citing a legal standard that allows for limited use of copyrighted works, such as for criticism, comment, news reporting or teaching.

Link to SJ Merc article, Link to AP item.

posted by Xeni Jardin at 10:12:22 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Hoverboard made from leaf blower engine

Step by step guide to making a motorized hoverboard for $300.
Link (Via Make blog)

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 09:28:06 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Antique mole trap collection

Rick Cicciarelli (aka Mousetrapboy) collects antique animal traps, including mole traps, and has pictures of some of them on his site.

Mole traps are another area of the hobby that have interested me off and on in the past few years. Unlike the mouse and rat traps, the mole traps are not nearly as popular of a collectible and thus the prices have remained fairly reasonable.

Link (via Incoming Signals)

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 09:03:12 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Transport for London censors anagram Tube map

The hilarious remixed London Tube map that substituted anagrams of the station names has been censored off the Internet by lawyers working for Transport for London. The page now reads, "Content removed at the request of Healeys Solicitors acting on behalf of Transport for London and Transport Trading Ltd."

I blogged the map last week -- it was one of the funniest and most creative re-uses of the familiar map I'd ever seen. The London Tube Map is part of the culture of London, a genius work of information design that is as familiar to a Londoner as the familiar pub designs and the black cabs. Like all culture, it's subject to being remixed by playful citizens and artists.

No one made money from the anagram map (in fact, serving a big PDF to lots of people can cost a lot of money). Instead, we Londoners shared the map on a noncommercial basis the same way you would any clever joke or song or poster about the world around you. It's shameful for Transport for London to have abused UK trademark law to engage in rank censorship. It should celebrate the creativity of its riders, not punish it. Link (Thanks, Jamie!)

Update: Thomas sez, "A bunch of remixed Tube maps have been collected in one place. This includes a jpegified version of the anagram map."

Update 2: Greywulf is hosting another mirror of the map.

posted by Cory Doctorow at 07:15:44 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Sequel to Scalzi's Old Man's War: The Ghost Brigades

John Scalzi's "The Ghost Brigades," the sequel to Old Man's War, is in print and on shelves today.

I described Scalzi's Old Man's War as "The Forever War with better sex, Starship Troopers without the lectures." It's the tale of a war fought in space by soldiers who are picked from Earth's elderly population and rehabilitated into superhuman fighting machines using secret technology, never to return to earth.

The Ghost Brigades continues in the same vein, with the story of the Special Forces of the space military, genetically engineered superhumans who fight to defend a planet they've never visited and never will. Scalzi's special gift for action scenes that vibrate and human interaction that can bring a belly laugh or tears is sharp and clear here.

John's an all-round good guy, a beloved AOL moderator and a bestselling humorist whose Uncle John's Bathroom Reader sell by the truckload. He's one of the strongest new voices in science fiction and it's a treat to have a new book from him in hand. Link

posted by Cory Doctorow at 05:52:49 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Good Sams try to find the owners of a lost camera

Someone has found a digital camera in London and has put up a website with enough information to identify the owner if s/he turns up. It's a marked contrast to the thieves who found Judith's camera at a national park in Hawaii and refuse to return it because their son likes it so much.

The Camera has 2 Memory chips, with over 300 pictures dating back to January 2005. Most of the pictures are family pics showing a young child playing, and some more recent ones include a new baby. There are a few movies on the chips, with Spanish being the spoken language. But, we are not sure if its Spanish from Spain or Latin America. 2 of the location shots on the camera can be found HERE and HERE

Link

posted by Cory Doctorow at 01:40:25 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Canadian Uni bans WiFi because its safety can't be proved

The president of Canada's Lakehead University, Fred Gilbert, has banned the use of WiFi on campus because he's worried that inconclusive studies have failed to show that chronic exposure to radio waves won't cause long term harm:

"All I'm saying is while the jury's out on this one, I'm not going to put in place what is potential chronic exposure for our students," he said. "Admittedly that's highest around the locations of the antenna sites and the wireless hotspots, but those are the places people tend to gravitate to because they get the best reception."

Um, how about mobile phones, 2.4GHz walkie-talkies and microwaves, dude? Link (Thanks, Richard!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 12:29:26 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Investigative blogger picking at secret "A-Hole" technology

Kathryn Cramer, an investigative blogger, has begun to publish the results of her research into VEIL. VEIL is a technology that the entertainment industry has proposed to turn into a legal requirement for all devices capable of turning an analog signal into a digital one: cameras, recorders and mics of all kinds, in other words. This is to "plug the analog hole."

No one will say how VEIL works, though. As Ed Felten discovered: if you contact the VEIL people and ask for an explanation of how their magic watermarking tech works, they'll charge you $10,000, make you sign a non-disclosure, and then refuse to tell you how the encoding works anyway (they will explain decoding though).

Any technology whose workings are a secret isn't fit to be considered for a legal mandate (I don't think legal mandates on technology are a good idea, period, of course). Kathryn's turned her extraordinary talent to picking apart the company that makes VEIL and its founders, and I can't wait to see what she turns up:

This secrecy screams SCAM to me, and regular readers of this space know that I have been finding certain kinds of secrecy and scams entertaining of late. So I'm taking a look. Koplar Communications International, home of VEIL technology, seems to be a real company with a real address and real execs and all that (unlike certain companies I've lately looked into). But the response Freedom to Tinker got to their inquiry is just wrong wrong wrong. And in my experience, when you find something like that and start picking at the threads, things get interesting pretty quickly.

Link

posted by Cory Doctorow at 12:26:07 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Anti-DRM protests planned for Philly

Free Culture Swarthmore is planning street-demonstrations against DRM in Philly!

The protest will take place Saturday, February 25th at noon at the Tower Records Store on South Street. It will continue into early afternoon. Free Culture wants to inform consumers of their fair use rights and warn them about the DRM threat.
"We need to get the word out about fair use rights," said co-founder Luke Smith. "No one wants to buy a broken record; if you're not allowed to put it on your iPod, what exactly are you paying for? We want record companies to replace crippled CDs and pay for the damage they cause to their customers machines. We also want to drive the message home: you can't do this anymore, because we're watching you."

Link (Thanks, Miles!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 12:20:58 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Anachronistic tech photoshopping contest

Lots to love in today's Worth 1000 photoshopping contest, whose theme is to create anachronistic high-tech products, like this transistor iPod. Link

posted by Cory Doctorow at 12:19:11 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Notional folk-songs about changing lightbulbs

The "How many folksingers does it take to change a light bulb?" page lists snippets of notional folk-songs notionally performed by well-known folkies on the subject of light-bulb changing:

Mike Tems:
Broken-hearted I'll wander
Broken-hearted I'll remain
Since my bonny lightbulb man
In the wars he was slain...
Nigel Gatherer:
First when I cam tae the toon
They ca'd me young and bonnie
But noo they've changed the bulb
Ca' me the lightbulb's honey.

Link (via Making Light)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 12:10:30 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Tuesday, February 21, 2006

1982 Atlantic article on the De Beers diamond cartel

Fascinating story of how the De Beers cartel pumped up the value of a relatively common gemstone, the diamond, by conducting a global psychological manipulation campaign.

In its 1947 strategy plan, the advertising agency strongly emphasized a psychological approach. "We are dealing with a problem in mass psychology. We seek to ... strengthen the tradition of the diamond engagement ring -- to make it a psychological necessity capable of competing successfully at the retail level with utility goods and services...." It defined as its target audience "some 70 million people 15 years and over whose opinion we hope to influence in support of our objectives." N. W. Ayer outlined a subtle program that included arranging for lecturers to visit high schools across the country. "All of these lectures revolve around the diamond engagement ring, and are reaching thousands of girls in their assemblies, classes and informal meetings in our leading educational institutions," the agency explained in a memorandum to De Beers. The agency had organized, in 1946, a weekly service called "Hollywood Personalities," which provided 125 leading newspapers with descriptions of the diamonds worn by movie stars. And it continued its efforts to encourage news coverage of celebrities displaying diamond rings as symbols of romantic involvement. In 1947, the agency commissioned a series of portraits of "engaged socialites." The idea was to create prestigious "role models" for the poorer middle-class wage-earners. The advertising agency explained, in its 1948 strategy paper, "We spread the word of diamonds worn by stars of screen and stage, by wives and daughters of political leaders, by any woman who can make the grocer's wife and the mechanic's sweetheart say 'I wish I had what she has.'"

Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 08:58:33 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Touchscreens to order fast food

Abir Majumdar says: "I went to one of those Taco Bell/KFC hybrids in Morrisville, NC and all the ordering was done through the gigantic touchscreens. No humans take orders there. You go to the machines and you're presented by an animated Colonel and talking taco. Then you put in an order as if you were at amazon. You can pay with cash and credit card."
Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 08:45:19 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Boing Boing interviews Paul Krassner

When Carla and I started the print zine bOING bOING in 1988, one of our primary inspirations was a countercultural newsletter called The Realist. Founded in 1958, The Realist published nonfiction and satirical pieces side by side, leaving it up to the reader to decide which was which.

The publisher and editor of The Realist, Paul Krassner, specialized in goring sacred cows. The most infamous piece he ran in his newsletter was a two page drawing by Wally Wood called "The Disneyland Memorial Orgy," which commemorated the death of Walt Disney by depicting all the popular Disney Characters having sex outside the gates of the Magic Kingdom. You can see a color reproduction of the poster, which Paul is selling, on his website.

When Life magazine profiled Krassner in the 1960s, describing him as a "social rebel," the FBI sent the magazine a poison pen letter that said. "To classify Krassner as a social rebel is far too cute. He's a nut, a raving, unconfined nut." True to Krassner's pranksterish form, he used that description in the title of one of his books, Confessions of a Raving, Unconfined Nut : Misadventures in Counter-Culture.

I don't know of anyone who has had as many weird experiences as Paul. Besides being the co-founder of the Youth International Party, also known as the Yippies, along with Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin, Paul is famous for gaving Groucho Marx his first acid trip, writing for Mad, being publisher of Larry Flynt's Hustler in the late 1970s, and editing Lenny Bruce's autobiography.

Today, at age 73, he's as busy as ever, writing columns for several publications and regularly blogging on the Huffington Post. I spoke with Paul on February 20, 2006. Link
More...

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 08:14:45 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Accidental FSM couture?

I'm fairly confident that this outfit from designer Jeremy Scott's fall 2006 collection is not an homage to the Flying Spaghetti Monster's meatballs and noodly appendages. Still, stranger things have fannied down the runway before. Link to photoset in the online magazine ZOOZOOM. (thanks Susannah Breslin!)

posted by Xeni Jardin at 03:19:28 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Cheney, Whittington, and peppered quailtards -- in Lego

Link (Thanks, minifig)

posted by Xeni Jardin at 03:11:01 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Democracy: a new platform for making and seeing TV on the net

A new suite of free and open tools let you watch TV, make TV, and recommend TV in a way that's easier, cheaper and more accessible than ever before. Democracy is a new Internet TV viewer that combines RSS (so you can pull a "channel" of programming), BitTorrent (so you can download TV from indie producers without gonking their site by sucking down all their bandwidth) and VLC, a multi-format player (so you can watch video no matter how it's encoded). Combine that with Broadcast Machine, a simple tool for publishing channels of video, and Videobomb, a social video service a little like Digg or delicious, and you've got a tremendously exciting development in democratic access to media.

Democracy has been available in beta for the Mac for months, but as of today, Windows users can play along too (the Linux player is just a little ways behind).

The experience of Democracy is great. Fire it up, pick some channels, and leave it running. Flip to it whenever you want to watch your video -- it's as easy as turning on a TV, but you can recommend the videos you like to your friends, make channels of them and save them.

What's more, you can hack the player, the publisher, all of it -- it's all free, open source software that's ready for your code contributions.

Democracy strikes the same balance that great free software tools like Firefox achieve: an elegant, simple tool for everyone to use; a powerful, active developer community that anyone can hack in. Link (Disclosure: I am proud to serve as a volunteer on the Board of Directors for the Participatory Culture Foundation, the nonprofit that created Democracy)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 02:05:05 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Brokeback Mountain scenes recreated in Lego

Link (Thanks, Kenneth)

posted by Xeni Jardin at 01:35:41 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Mladic Arrest: When Bad Guys become Good Guys

From writer and filmmaker Jasmina Tesanovic (politicalidiot at yahoo.com), who has been traveling in the same mountains where the accused war criminal ~~was just captured~~ may or may not have been arrested. Nobody seems to know exactly what's going on, wildly conflicting reports are circulating. Jasmina writes from Belgrade:

When Bad Guys become Good Guys

Today the " Good" Guy of the Scorpion Srebrenica trial finally spoke out: I shot the six Muslim men, I am guilty before God and you will decide, from the special court for war crimes, if I am guilty for you too. I obeyed the orders... Others, the "Bad" guys at the same trial, are in denial.

At this hour, B92 and some other media are unofficially reporting that General Ratko Mladic in charge of Srebrenica action is being arrested, but the Serbian official government is in denial. Only a few hours ago, the special adviser of president of president Kostunica said he knew nothing, except that it is imminent.

More...

posted by Xeni Jardin at 12:08:38 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Cafe Scientifique

The New York Times profiles Café Scientifique, regularly-scheduled science-themed hang-outs held in bars, coffee shops, and campuses in several US cities and abroad. The aim is to turn the lay public on to the mind-bending wonders of science. Great idea! From the article:

"A lot of people come to see real live scientists — some of whom are extremely famous and prominent — and see how their brains work," said Dr. John Cohen, a professor of immunology at the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center and the founder of the Denver Café Scientifique. "People don't often get a chance to do that. Some come to ask questions, others are content to listen."

The Denver Café Scientifique was established in 2003 and is the largest in the country to date, drawing about 150 people (cafescicolorado.org). The topics vary from sleep to interstellar communication to Higgs bosons to nanotechnology, and they attract people of all ages and all occupations.

"Who would have thought you'd have standing room only at a geek event?" Dr. Cohen asked. He said he first read about science cafes in 1999 when they were catching on in England. "It just sounded like so much fun," he said. "I saw it as a reminder of the peripatetic philosophers who wandered the Agora in Athens." He imagined them, he continued, "stopping every so often to refresh themselves with a mug of wine from the local sellers."

Link

posted by David Pescovitz at 12:07:33 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Supreme Court rules that sacred DMTea is OK

Last April, I posted that the Federal Government were attempting to block members of a church in New Mexico from drinking hallucinogenic tea as part of a ritual. The sacred tea, hoasca, contains the powerful hallucinogen dimethyltrptamine (DMT). Today, the Supreme Court unanimously ruled that the government has no business messing with the church's method for communicating with god. They then sent the case back to a federal appeals court. From the Associated Press:

(Chief Justice John) Roberts said that the Bush administration had not met its burden under a federal religious freedom law to show that it could ban "the sect's sincere religious practice."

The chief justice had also been skeptical of the government's position in the case last fall, suggesting that the administration was demanding too much, a "zero tolerance approach."

Link (Thanks, Meri Brin!)

posted by David Pescovitz at 11:58:08 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

A Scanner Darkly trailer

Here is the new trailer for A Scanner Darkly, Richard Linklater's adaptation of the surreal SF novel by Philip K. Dick. Coming July 7. Seen here, Bob Arctor removes the scramble suit that hides his identity by constantly flickering through visual characteristics of other people. Very trippy. Link to Quicktime file (Thanks, Dave Gill!)

UPDATE: BB reader Shawn Geddes writes, "If you check out the scenes in the trailer where a woman is monitoring Keanu's character, you'll notice scrolling text on her monitor. The scrolling text in these views comes from the screenplay for "Blade Runner."

posted by David Pescovitz at 11:30:38 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Shoes designed for illegal Mex/US border crossings

An Argentine artist has designed a line of sneakers called "Brincos" (from Spanish Brincar, to jump) for immigrants who are sneaking accross the Mexican border:

"The shoe includes a compass, a flashlight because people cross at night, and inside is included also some Tylenol painkillers because many people get injured during crossing," Werthein says...
An Aztec eagle is embroidered on the heel. On the toe is the American eagle found on the US quarter, to represent the American dream the migrants are chasing.
A map - printed on the shoe's removable insole - shows the most popular illegal routes from Tijuana into San Diego.

Link (via Gizmodo)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 11:08:43 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

City made of biscuits on display in London

A Chinese artist has built a huge city in miniature out of biscuits at Selfridges department store in London:

An estimated 72,000 biscuits, including digestives, chocolate digestives, rich tea, hobnobs, caramels and fruit shortcake, will be used during the week-long project.
Mr Dong has also built biscuit cities in Beijing, Chongqing, Shanghai and Paris.

Link (Thanks, Alex!)

Update: James took a great set of photos of biscuit city before it was eaten.

posted by Cory Doctorow at 10:51:14 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Mechanical computer kit from 1960s available again

A toy company has reintroduced the Digicomp, a mechanical computer kit from the 1960s. This looks like an amazing educational toy. As Retrothing notes:

The Digicomp is a plastic mechanical computer from the 1960s. It offered three bits of tabletop computing, back in an age where corded telephones were considered high-tech. The machine arrived in kit form; your first task was to assemble the jumble of tubes, rods, and elastic bands into something that resembles a Jetson's parking garage. Once complete, it's a fantastic hands-on way to teach Boolean algebra and binary numbers.

Link (via Make Blog)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 10:16:08 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

"Google censoring Iraq videos in US" rumor debunked

In recent days, gazillions of BoingBoing readers (I lost count after one bazillion) sent in emails like this:

Google isn't just censoring in China. If you are in the United States, you can't see certain videos on Google Video. I stumbled across this Iraq footage (Link, alternate link, and another) on video.google.com, described as: "Detonation of Improvised Explosive Device used against Coalition forces. We found this one before they could use it against us." Too bad Google won't let me watch it. For whatever reason, the site reports that "This video is not playable in your country." If I were to upload the same file to YouTube or Revver I can see it, and the video doesn't contain sexual content or copyrighted stuff from a news organization or anything. Why is Google censoring these videos?

Google is not censoring these videos. A spokesperson at Google tells Boing Boing:

Video uploaders, using Google Video's 'Advanced Options' feature, can choose to blacklist countries. In this case the uploader blacklisted the US and only the US. When uploading the video the content owner set a preference not to show this content to users in the US.

Further investigation by BB confirmed that this was the case -- the person who uploaded this video, not Google, chose to block US viewers.

Reader comment: Jeff says,

Xeni's comments that "bazillions" of Boing Boing readers have submitted links regarding Google's censorship of Iraq videos reminded me of a Bush joke I heard recently (although the joke itself is probably not recent). Link

posted by Xeni Jardin at 10:03:52 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

US copyright head: world "totally rejects" webcasting restrictions

The head of the US Copyright Office says that a controversial treaty that would bring harm to webcasters -- especially podcasters -- has been rejected by the rest of the world, leaving only the US to champion it. This is the opposite of the US negotiator's position, which is a lot like the old Internet saw, "The lurkers support me in email" -- that is, that lots of countries have privately supported the restrictions on webcasters, but haven't found the right time to express that support at the United Nations.

At stake is the "webcasting provision" of the "Broadcasters' Treaty" underway at WIPO, the UN agency that handles copyrights, patents and the like. The Webcasting provision would make it illegal to retransmit Creative Commons licensed works (as well as public domain works, uncopyrightable works like those made by the US government, etc) without permission of the person who hosts them. In other words, it will no longer be enough to know that the author of the work wants you to share it -- you'll also need permission from the company that hosts and distributes the files.

The treaty wil eliminate fair use for all Internet audio/video casts, by creating a different set of rules for what's fair and what isn't when it comes to casters than when it comes to copyright holders. You'll have to negotiate two separate, contradictory "fair use" systems whenever it comes time to making a podcast.

At the UN, the US consistently argues that this is a popular idea. They've been put up to advancing it by an org called DIMA that's a front for Microsoft and Yahoo, who like the idea of being Internet audio/video gatekeepers.

I've delivered a letter to the UN signed by 20 tech companies that oppose the inclusion of webcasting in the Broadcast Treaty. The copies of the letter were stolen from the literature table and put in the trashcans in the toilets. Repeatedly.

I questioned Mary-Beth Peters, the US Register of Copyrights, about the Webcasting treaty during the Q&A after her panel at a conference at UNC last November. To everyone's surprise, she admitted that the US's position that this is a fundamentally popular idea was a lie:

[7:20]...I think the most controversial piece is the scope of the right that's being created. The position that the US took is well, if you're going to give that type of a right to a broadcaster -- theft of a signal -- then you should look at all people who are similarily situated, including webcasters. Now, that has been totally rejected by the rest of the world."

MP4 Link, AVI Link, MPG Link

Credit: The University of North Carolina and UNC-TV for the video capture and TJ Ward for digizing it.

posted by Cory Doctorow at 10:03:41 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Own your own Hobbit skull model

Bone Clones has just completed a high-quality resin reproduction of the skull of Homo floresiensis, the amazing "little people" whose bones were discovered in Indonesia in 2004. (Link to previous posts about Homo floresiensis, BB's mascot.) The skull replicas will sell for $289 each. Loren Coleman at Cryptomundo has the ordering details. From his post:

This price is much more reasonable that the copies made from silicon, which have cost $2000 each. (image seen here -ed.) Bone Clones skulls are custom formulated, high grade, polyurethane resin, which simulates the subtle delicacy of natural bone, yet are extremely durable and resist breakage and chipping...

If you are interested in purchasing a Hobbit (Homo floresiensis) replica skull, they are not even in the Bone Clones catalogue yet. But you can obtain them right now by mentioning Cryptomundo, and using “Part Number BH-033″ to order them.

Link

posted by David Pescovitz at 09:42:30 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Woman denied custody of son for participating in SubGenius holiday

As a card-carrying minister of the Church of the SubGenius since 1984, I am outraged that a judge has taken a mother's child from her because she participated in a sacred SubGenius ritual event.

…On February 3, 2006, Judge Punch heard testimony in the case. Jeff entered into evidence 16 exhibits taken from the Internet, 12 of which are photographs of the SubGenius event, X-Day. Kohl has never attended X-Day and is not in any of the pictures. Rachel is depicted in many of these photos, often wearing skimpy costumes or completely nude, while participating in X-Day and Detroit Devival events.
The judge, allegedly a very strict Catholic, became outraged at the photos of the X-Day parody of Mel Gibson’s movie The Passion of the Christ — especially the photo where Jesus [Steve Bevilacqua] is wearing clown makeup and carrying a crucifix with a pool-noodle dollar sign on it while being beaten by a crowd of SubGenii, including a topless woman with a “dildo”.
…Judge Punch lost his temper completely, and began to shout abuse at Rachel, calling her a “pervert,” “mentally ill,” “lying,” and a participant in “sex orgies.” The judge ordered that Rachel is to have absolutely no contact with her son, not even in writing, because he felt the pictures of X-Day performance art were evidence enough to suspect “severe mental illness”…

Link (thanks, weev!)

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 09:41:36 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Copyright office head denounces "big mistake" of extending copyright

The head of the US copyright office has accused Congress of making a mistake by extending the length of copyright in America, calling the term "too long," and saying that Congress made a "big mistake."

The remarkable admission came at the tail end of an event held at the UNC Law School on November 2, 2005, when Mary-Beth Peters, the Register of Copyrights, and a panel of copyright scholars, lawyers and bureaucrats convened to deliberate copyright in public.

Peters can be heard making the statement one minutes and eight seconds into the video linked below:

[1:08] We've certainly lengthened the term [of copyright] perhaps -- I won't even say perhaps -- too long a term. I think it is too long. I think that was probably a big mistake, but one that Congress can make."

AVI Link, MP4 Link, MPG Link

Credit: The University of North Carolina and UNC-TV for the video capture and TJ Ward for digizing it.

posted by Cory Doctorow at 09:02:02 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Video explains the world's most important 6-sec drum loop

This fascinating, brilliant 20-minute video narrates the history of the "Amen Break," a six-second drum sample from the b-side of a chart-topping single from 1969. This sample was used extensively in early hiphop and sample-based music, and became the basis for drum-and-bass and jungle music -- a six-second clip that spawned several entire subcultures. Nate Harrison's 2004 video is a meditation on the ownership of culture, the nature of art and creativity, and the history of a remarkable music clip. Link (Thanks, Chris!)

Update: Hirmes sends us a link to a mirror.

posted by Cory Doctorow at 08:41:14 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Artists paint Detroit's derelict buildings Tiggeriffic Orange

An underground artist clade in Detroit is painting the city's many derelict buildings "Tiggeriffic Orange," in order to liven the landscape. They call the project "Detroit. Demolition. Disneyland."

The artistic move is simple, cover the front in Tiggeriffic Orange - a color from the Mickey Mouse series, easily purchased from Home Depot. Every board, every door, every window, is caked in Tiggeriffic Orange. We paint the facades of abandoned houses whose most striking feature are their derelict appearance.

Link (via We Make Money Not Art)

Update: Gooch sez, "Tyree Guyton just spoke at UM Feb. 9th about his work with the long running Heidelburg Project, were he paints and decorates abandoned houses and areas in Detroit and has been since 1986."

posted by Cory Doctorow at 07:58:24 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

"Guantánamo" movie actors interrogated at UK airport

Snip from BBC News item:

The actors who star in movie The Road to Guantánamo were questioned by police at Luton airport under anti-terrorism legislation, it has emerged. The men, who play British inmates at the detention camp, were returning from the Berlin Film Festival where the movie won a Silver Bear award. One of the actors, Rizwan Ahmed, said a police officer asked him if he intended to make any more "political" films.

Link to BBC story, Link to Guardian UK story, Link to IMDB listing, Link to screening details from Berlin filmfest website.

Image (Reuters): Guantánamo actors (from left) Waqar Siddiqui, Rizwan Ahmed and Arfman Usman with Michael Winterbottom and detainee Rhuhel Ahmed. (Thanks, Christopher and Alastair)

Reader comment: Christopher says,

I though it would be a good idea if your readers were made aware of the website addresses to forms with which to email the leaders of the UK political parties, many of whom regularly partake in the same activy during their "party political broadcasts". These are: number10.gov.uk, conservatives.com, libdems.org.uk. I would suggest that as many people as possible emailed the leaders to inform them of their "crimes" and possible arrest if they wish to continue to star in them. I have already emailed Tony Blair (Labour leader), David Cameron (Conservative leader) and the Liberal Democrats (I don't think they have a leader, yet) about the matter.

Reader comment: anonymous says, I think it's appropriate to also credit craig murray, the former ambassador to Uzbekistan who broke the story on Feb. 18th and does a very good job with the ongoing coverage.

posted by Xeni Jardin at 07:38:35 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

iRony: SNL cast uses Macs, can't watch "Lazy Sunday" from NBC.com

BB reader Rob says,

As a follow up to the item you posted about NBC nastygramming YouTube: this link is to an NYT review of an episode of A&E's Biography where they followed SNL behind the scenes for a whole week. I thought this might be interesting to you because I saw this episode and I remember distictly (about 95% sure) that they show Jimmy Fallon writing out one of his sketches on an iMac. Therefore, NBC's decision to nastygram YouTube would prevent even their own staff from easily accessing their clips. Unfortunately, I can't seem to find that clip of the show or a mention of their use of Macs anywhere. Maybe one of your other readers might have taped it or bought the DVD from A&E (link)?

Previously on Boing Boing:
NBC nastygrams YouTube over "Lazy Sunday"

Reader comment: Cris in Dallas says,

A week or so ago Steve Martin hosted the show...one of the running gags was a competition between Martin and actor Alec Baldwin over who would hold the record for hosting SNL the most times...in the middle of the show Steve Martin went to Lorne Michaels to demand more money, when he walked in on Michaels, he was busy playing "Snood" on a 15" Aluminum Powerbook. Besides we know that the Lonley Island guys use macs exlusively to produce all their own work, as well as SNL's digital shorts.

Reader comment: Damien Barrett says,

A few years back, I used to work the company that provided Macintosh technical support to the SNL staff. They were indeed using quite a few Macs at the time. I doubt that this has changed in the years since. Nick Burns could probably make the YouTube videos play on their Macs. MOOOOVE!

posted by Xeni Jardin at 07:26:30 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Video game scenes recreated in legos

Skinny Coder, a Flickr user, creates genius recreations of video-game scenes using legos. Shown here -- the wonderful "Katamari Blockacy." Link (via Wonderland)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 05:47:04 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

What if London Underground stations were sponsored?

Paul sez, "This link shows what the Tube Map might look like if TfL decided to allow companies to sponsor stations in return for slight station name-changes, e.g. Alliance & Leicester Square, Knorrthfields, Osterley Learning Centre... you get the idea." 476K PDF Link (Thanks, Paul!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 05:43:48 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

DRM arms-dealer threatens Mac software site

VersionTracker, an excellent repository for Mac software, has been threatened with legal action by Macrovision (a company that sells malicious anti-copying software that blocks owners of movies and software from making backup copies of them). At issue is a link to MacTheRipper, a program that helps you make backups of your DVDs.

"We have been contacted by Macrovision, who claims this violates their property and are threatening to sue us if we don't remove the links to it. We are checking with our legal advisors to find out what our options are. -VersionTracker Editors"

Link, Link to MacTheRipper site (Thanks, Jon!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 05:33:49 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Monday, February 20, 2006

Paul Saffo interview

On Sunday, the San Francisco Chronicle ran a lengthy interview with my Institute for the Future colleague Paul Saffo. From the interview:

Q: You call yourself a forecaster. Some people call you a futurist. Is there a difference?
A: People who call themselves futurists don't have a sense of history of the term. It dates back to the early 1900s. Tied into fascism, these guys would have parties and go hang out and stroke the streamlined lines of new cars. I think of futurists as people who have a particular attitude about the future. They're advocates for a certain kind of outcome. As a forecaster I am something very different. I am a professional bystander. I have opinions about the future, of course. But my whole posture is to be detached and to identify what I think will happen and not allow my judgments of what should happen to get involved.

Link

posted by David Pescovitz at 09:04:06 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Photo: Miss Computer 1973 -- who is she?

Lorelei says,

I found this photo in 2003 at Urban Ore, an awesome salvage, recycling, and reuse resource in Berkeley, CA. I was looking through their section of old photographs and found a couple of 8"x10" B&W prints of women in a data center. The only identifying info I could find on them was the typewritten "MISS COMPUTER 1973" label. Sadly, i have no idea where this picture was taken.

Here's photo 1, and here's photo 2.

Reader comment: Dave says,

I could be wrong, but I think the woman in the photograph titled Miss Computer 1973 is Rear Admiral Grace Murray Hopper. She was a pioneer in computer science who invented the assembler and helped develop COBOL (more info at this link). I met her in the 1970s at the University of Rhode Island and the lady in the photo sure looks a lot like her. She was brilliant and her lecture helped inspire my budding interest in computer science.

Update: The woman in this photo is not Grace Hopper.

Reader comment: Jay says,

My guess is it is not MISS Computer as in a beautiful woman, but M.I.S.S. Computer as in a form of Materials Inventory Support System. The photo is of the computer system and the woman just happens to be standing there.

posted by Xeni Jardin at 05:51:50 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Metblogs relaunches with spiffy new UI

The 42-city Metroblogging network emerged from its changing room in a fetching new frock today. Link to details about the redesign (which looks/works real nice, guys), and here's the network.

posted by Xeni Jardin at 05:23:14 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Kids' band - the Marimba Ponies

This 8 MB video of young kids playing xylophones and percussion instruments will knock your socks off.

Here are The Marimba Ponies, who operate internationally without the crutch of conductor or sheet music, bouncing and prancing rhythmically in order to foster international goodwill, doing Sabre Dance. The Marimba Ponies are aged four through twelve, at which point they are forcibly retired from the marimba business and offered gainful employment dodging lizards with the J-Pop girl group Morning Musume.

Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 05:08:32 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Gizmos Trump Gowns at Nerd Oscars; Xeni's reports for NPR, WN

You may know that the organization behind the Academy Awards is the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences -- but we don't often hear much about the "sciences" part.

On one night each year, that all changes when AMPAS hands out its Technical and Scientific Awards for devices, formulas and discoveries that change the way movies are made. This year's edition took place inside the Beverly Hilton's International ballroom, where the Oscars will unfold in two weeks -- but this fête was way geekier than the one happening on March 5.

I filed a radio report for NPR here (streaming audio in Win and Real), and a writeup for Wired News here.

Complete list of 2006 winners, including lifetime achievement honorees, here.

Image (courtesy AMPAS): host Rachel McAdams (Wedding Crashers, Red Eye, etc) was the only hot starlet in the house -- pretty much everyone else was a nerd. She's surrounded by Technical and Scientific Academy Award winners in this photo.

Oh, and this didn't make it into either report, but the pre-ceremonies entertainment consisted of a ventriloquist from Branson who did jokes about poop and chihuahuas (in an awful Speedy Gonzales accent). Then he stuck black wigs on two Academy bigwigs, and did Motown ventriloquist karaoke. Everyone at my table but the eight-year-old girl was cringing. You know profit margins in Hollywood aren't what they used to be when...

Update: Scott Kirsner has a terrific report in Salon, and here's his cinematech blog post with more.

posted by Xeni Jardin at 04:34:26 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Mysterious "lawer" threatens to sue over Bad Samaritan story

A person claiming to be a Canadian barrister has threatened to sue Boing Boing over a post about a Canadian family that refuses to return an expensive digital camera they found while on holiday in Hawaii.

This weekend, I blogged the story of Judith, who lost her camera while on holiday on Hawaii, and of the unnamed Canadian family that found it, but refuses to return it because doing so would upset their son, who has grown attached to it.

Shortly after that post, I got an email from someone who claimed his name was "Don Deveny," purportedly a Canadian Barrister of a sort called "Queen's Counsel." "Deveny" implied that the post was illegal and that I was liable for making it.

However, I don't believe that "Deveny" is a lawyer. For one thing, he can't spell "lawyer." For another, he doesn't know the difference between "libel" and "slander." He can't even spell "counsel."

I have contacted all of the law societies in Canada that license barristers to practice. None of them have any record of "Deveny," nor does the Canadian Law List. No one under that name is listed in any Canadian phone directory as a practicing attorney.

This is illegal. Falsely presenting oneself as a lawyer is a violation of provincial laws like Ontario's Law Society Act. As Lisa Hall, Acting Manager, Communications and Public Affairs for the Law Society of Upper Canada explained to me, "We could prosecute him on the basis of the Act. If he's trying to practice law, that's quite something. On conviction he'd be liable to a fine of not more than $10,000."

What's more, "Deveny" has even offered to represent other people that Boing Boing has written about, adding a new offence. Click the "More..." link below for a complete record of our correspondence, including the headers on his emails.
More...

posted by Cory Doctorow at 04:20:35 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Mac-on-Intel site self-censors to avoid Apple's wrath

The OSX86 project, where owners of copies of Apple's OS X discuss how to install their property on non-Apple computers, has instituted a policy of censoring links to entire sites if there's a chance that some part of that site might contain material that might cause Apple to threaten to sue them.

Las week I reported on how Apple had invoked the loathsome Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) to censor legitimate technical investigation into the means by which its customers can increase the utility of its products.

The proprietors of the site have reinstated their message-boards, but in order to minimize further legal liability from the corporate giant, they've opted to prohibit any links to a site run by a user called Maxxuss, who has written patches that enable new uses of Apple's products.

Maxxuss doesn't stand accused of distributing copies of Apple's materials, nor of telling people how to get copies of their products. By all accounts, he was written his own, original software that owners of Mac OS X can use to extend the usefulness of their property (of course, people who've downloaded Apple's software without paying for it can also take advantage of this, but it's a principle in law and civil society that we shouldn't punish the innocent to get at the guilty).

The proprietors of the site note that Maxxuss is a valuable contributor to the technical discourse on the functioning of Apple's products, that his site has much that is of "news value," but to avoid the risks associated with Apple's legal threats, they've opted to institute the indiscriminate ban on links to his site.

Our first-class moderating staff has helped ensure that direct links to any patches are not allowed. We have in the past linked to the homepage of Maxxuss - but not to the offending 10.4.4 patches - in the interest of news, but we've removed those links just in case.

Link, Link to Maxxus's site (via Macslash)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 01:59:48 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Three kinds of Malaysian Bigfoot?

Loren Coleman reports that the Bigfoot-type creatures reportedly spotted by locals in the Endau-Rompin National Park, Malaysia, seem to represent several kinds of hairy hominids. (The news media here and abroad have been all over this story. Link, Link, and Link.) At Cryptomundo, Loren puts the various reports in context and lays out the three "sizes" of giants that are thought by some to be running around in the Malaysian forest. (Ilustration of a "Typical True Giant" by Harry Trumbore.)
Link

posted by David Pescovitz at 01:38:20 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Glowing, hand-carved tiki idols

These glowing, multicolored, hand-carved tiki idols run on three AA batteries; Toby sez the designer "might make a USB powered version if there are enough people interested." Link (Thanks, Toby!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 01:32:11 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Fun with liquid nitrogen

Here's a massive list "1001 things to do with liquid nitrogen." Two examples:

Freeze a can of shaving cream and then peel the can away from the cream. Put the canless cream into someone's car. Let the oven-like heat from the car's sitting in the sun defrost the shaving cream. 2 cans will fill an entire car. (Coulter C. Henry, Jr.)...

Try taking a ping-pong ball and poking a small hole in it. The hole has to be tangent to the sphere of the ball. When poking the hole use a pin and the pin should be almost flat agianst the ball. Basiclly you want a hole in the side of the ball that will cause the ball to spin. Submerge this ball into the liquid nitrogen and let it fill up. Place the ball on a table and watch it spin. As the nitrogen goes back to a gas it will rush out the hole and presto!! It's pretty cool. If it does not spin try placing your hand on it to warm it to get it started.

Link

UPDATE: Thanks to all the readers who point out that the shaving cream prank doesn't seem to work. Link

posted by David Pescovitz at 01:19:02 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Animation celebrates its 100th birthday

The wonderful ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive Project Blog is honoring James Stewart Blackton, the father of animation, on the 100th birthday of the artform.

James Stewart Blackton was a "Lightning Sketch Artist" in Vaudeville billed as "The Komikal Kartoonist". Inspired by Thomas Edison's recent invention of moving pictures, Blackton teamed with Albert E. Smith to form the first movie studio, Biograph Films.
Smith and Blackton created what were then called "Trick Films"... the camera was stopped for a moment while the scene was changed, making things magically appear and disappear; images dissolved from one to another; and shots were double exposed to create ghostly images. In 1900, Blackton experimented with putting his lightning sketch act on film in a movie called "The Enchanted Drawing", but it was in March of 1906 when he made his most important breakthrough. In a trick film titled "Humorous Phases of Funny Faces" Blackton created what is regarded as the first American animated film.

Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 01:07:50 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Watchmaker's blog

Ron DeCorte is a master watch maker who creates his own timepieces, restores complex mechanisms, and has a deep interest in automatons. The articles he writes are fascinating and his photos of dissected complications are stunning. From his study of a Vacheron Constantin minute repeater wristwatch movement:

Unlike a lot of other watch complications, the repeater is a bit mysterious, having most of its mechanism hidden under the dial. And so I thought it would be interesting to present an article on the subject of repeaters, particularly the minute repeater...

Striking watches, repeaters, were developed prior to electricity when checking the time during the night wasn’t as easy as turning on a light bulb or looking at the illuminated electric clock. And during some of those long Sunday church services many a man was known to reach into his pocket, cradle his repeater in his hand, and count the hours and minutes until he was free to go fishing, drinking with his buddies at the pub, or visit his mistress!

(Seen here, a) Vacheron Constantin minute repeater wristwatch movement, topless. The minute repeater strikes the hours, quarter hours, and minutes, on two gongs, each with a different pitch. Yes, there are exceptions to this two-gong rule, but they are very rare.

Link (via MetaFilter)

posted by David Pescovitz at 01:03:52 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Kirsten Anderson lecture on Pop Surrealism

Roq La Rue Gallery owner Kirsten Anderson is going to talk about her book Pop Surrealism: The Rise of Underground Art on Friday, February 24 at 7pm at the Seattle Academy of Fine Art 1501 Tenth Ave E (N. Capitol Hill), in Seattle.
Link to an interview with Kirsten by Eric Grimes

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 01:03:46 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Biowarfare for Dummies

Paul Boutin wrote this feature on DIY biochemwomd for a national publication some months back -- but some editorial reshuffling happened, and the story never ran. Paul shared a copy with me a few weeks ago. I thought it was terrific, and asked if we might share it with BoingBoing readers. Paul kindly obliged, and here it is:

BIOWAR FOR DUMMIES:
How hard is it to build your own weapon of mass destruction? We take a crash course in supervirus engineering to find out.
Anthrax. Smallpox. Ebola. For thriller writers and policy crusaders, biological warfare was a standard what-if scenario long before anyone mailed anthrax to government and media offices in 2001. Pentagon war games like Dark Winter, held just before 9/11, and this year’s Atlantic Storm suggested that terrorists could unleash germs with the killing power of a nuclear weapon.
Scientists, though, have always been skeptical. Only massive, state-sponsored programs—not terrorist cells or lone kooks—pose a plausible threat, they say. As the head of the Federation of American Scientists working group on bioweapons put it in a 2002 Los Angeles Times op-ed: “A significant bioterror attack today would require the support of a national program to succeed.”
Or not. A few months ago, Roger Brent, a geneticist who runs a California biotech firm, sent me an unpublished paper in which he wrote that genetically engineered bioweapons developed by small teams are a bigger threat than suitcase nukes.
Brent is one of a growing number of researchers who believe that a bioterrorist wouldn’t need a team of virologists and state funding. He says advances in DNA-hacking technology have reached the point where an evil lab assistant with the right resources could do the job.

Link to full text, with photos. Image above: "The ABI 394 synthesizer. Think of it as an inkjet printer for DNA."

posted by Xeni Jardin at 12:45:54 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Window curtains that look like cascading blonde hair

These surreal curtains from a Dutch designer are printed with a photorealistic mane of blonde hair. If you've ever leaned back in your Barkalounger and thought to yourself, "What my living room really needs are more luxurious locks of beautiful blonde hair," welp -- here ya go.
Link (Thanks, Jill B.)

posted by Xeni Jardin at 11:51:31 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Got extra books? Donate 'em to New Orleans public library.

NYFA reports that The New Orleans Public Library is seeking book donations to rebuild its collection, which was decimated after Katrina. Link (Thanks, Sara Bader)

Reader comment: Liz Mackenzie-Barrett says,

Before everyone starts sending them books, I found the following on their website: “Many caring people have contacted us to offer donations of books for our damaged libraries. While we much appreciate any offers of assistance, the best way to help NOPL at this early stage of our rebuilding process is to donate funds” -- Link

Reader comment: Jordan Pietzsch says,

There is a non-profit group that does work related to this. The organization's name is First Book and they setup the "Book Relief" program as an immediate response to Hurricane Katrina. The program is still in place and they are still accepting contributions (in fact, they only accept contributions, not actual books). They distribute 1 book for every 50 cents they receive - and the money goes directly to shipping and warehouse costs, so they aren't making any money off of this. So far they have sent thousands of books to families affected by the Gulf Coast hurricanes, with more distributions in the works. These books go directly to the children, not a library - and the kids get to keep the books forever, no strings attached. (Full Disclosure: I work with First Book and have been involved in the Book Relief program.) If you are interested, you can find out more about First Book and Book Relief at these sites: www.firstbook.org, and www.bookrelief.org

Reader comment: NOLA resident Shannon Ellery Hubbell says,

Thanks for calling attention to the New Orleans public libraries! I just wanted to point you in the direction of the website for the Cita Dennis Hubbell branch (hubbelllibrary.org... yes, three L's in the middle)...

Reader comment: BenBuckley says,

Ms. Hubbell called your readers' attention to one of NoLa's public libraries. I'd like, if I might, to call BoingBoing readers' attention to NoLa's first re-opened lending library, the all-volunteer, collectively run Iron Rail Bookstore and Library. Long before any of the public libraries had even started to clean up, The Iron Rail had re-opened its doors and was lending books to residents and relief workers alike.

Reader comment: KC says,

Here is the blog of a public librarian in NOLA who was one of the few to be able to still staff a library: Link

posted by Xeni Jardin at 11:47:25 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Dell seeks damages from dude named Dell over "dellwebsites.com"

Paul Dell says:

Dell Inc. are suing me for using my own name. My friends are helping me out over a summons I recieved from Lovells, the law firm representing Dell. I can't afford the legal fees, let alone the headache -- and I find the whole scenario disturbing. My friends are doing a great job, and I have recieved words of encouragement from all over the world.

Link to Mr. Dell's account.

Reader comment: Grant says,

The story about the guy named Dell (in Spain) being sued by Dell France is very fishy. A court in France does not have jurisdation over domain names. That is controlled by the Internet Corporation For Assigned Names and Numbers and domain name disputes are handled by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) Arbitration and Mediation Center. You can read the FAQs here.

Reader comment: Nigel Pond says,

While your reader Grant is correct that a French court does not have jurisdation over the registration of domain names, French courts do have jurisdiction over alleged infringements of trademarks registered in France and any other alleged violation of French law by the owner of a domain name. So it is perfectly possible that Dell (US) could be suing French for the claims alleged.

posted by Xeni Jardin at 11:44:47 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Hi Fructose Vol. 2

The second issue of Hi Fructose magazine is out and it's outstanding. (The Hi Fructose store is sold out, but here's where you can get a copy.) This volume of the art/pop/culture magazine is overflowing with fun and vinylicious features like an interview with Tim Biskup, Gina Garan on the Cult of Blythe, a Las Vegas travelogue and centerfold by Brian McCarty, cover illustration by Feric, and pages of beautifully-designed pop surrealist and toysploitation imagery. Link

posted by David Pescovitz at 11:31:27 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Boing Boing has 1337 readers

Ultra-observant Boing Boing reader Alex says,

I don't know if you've noticed or if someone has reported this already but the feedburner counter on the left of boingboing currently reads 1337 K readers. lol

posted by Xeni Jardin at 10:57:43 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

$1000 reward offered to nab camera-happy Houston police chief

Matt Asher is offering a $1000 reward to the "first person who can provide definitive videotaped evidence of Houston police chief Harold Hurtt committing a crime, any crime."

This is in response to a Seattle Post Intelligencer article reporting that Hurtt wants to install surveillance video cameras "in apartment complexes, downtown streets, shopping malls and even private homes."

"I know a lot of people are concerned about Big Brother, but my response to that is, if you are not doing anything wrong, why should you worry about it?" he was quoted as saying. Link

Reader comment: Bear says: "I think it should be fairly easy to nab Mr. Hurtt committing a crime, as I believe it is still a city statute in Houston that one must make a 360-degree survey of any car one intends to start to verify that no children are under the vehicle or threatened by it. If you post this, hopefully someone can come up with verification and other bizarre laws in this city that it should be easy to observe him breaking.:

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 10:55:59 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Inside look at producing a musical

My friend Suzy Conn has written a great insider article on the process of creating, mounting and succeeding with an indie musical. Suzy wrote and shepherded her musical Plane Crazy and has had amazing success with it, but it's been an astonishing amount of work to go from idea to execution:

Long story short, as I head into a two-week Toronto workshop of a revised PLANE CRAZY I am still juggling all three -- book, music and lyrics. I am very lucky to be able to "test" the changes that I made coming out of NYMF so quickly. And I am particularly lucky to be doing it in a school setting where I can focus on the work itself through a fairly luxurious rehearsal process, and not be freaked about the "performance" deadline.
The Sheridan College musical theater program is the premier musical theatre school in Canada and is devoted to the development of new musicals. Part of this is very practical because the students benefit through exposure to the process of workshopping a new work -- working with a writer, getting new pages constantly, and originating a role.
Working with this cast and the wonderful director Marc Richard I am continuing to evolve the piece as we rehearse because I feel free to experiment. For example, I came into the rehearsal process with two new songs, and I've just added a third new song! As I work with Marc, I'm discovering new things in my own work! Very cool.

Link

posted by Cory Doctorow at 09:44:27 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Fake cat-paw toys with claws

Bandai is releasing an inexplicable fake cat-paw toy, with claws. Furries, start your engines:

Bandai is releasing the "Neko Nyanbou" in Japan sometime in April. So what is it? Well, these are fake cat paws with claws that can be controlled by a small switch hidden in the "handle". Why on earth would you use these? To scratch your back, to scare a colleague or just as an extension of your arm...

Link (Thanks, Alice!)

Update: Ben sez, "This product called 'nekonyanbo' (literally 'cat meow stick') was a fad toy originally released in the 1980's, apparently following the literally phenomenal popularity of the 'What's Michael?' cat manga by Makoto Kobayashi."

posted by Cory Doctorow at 09:38:01 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

$1 garage sale score: treasures in an old Skippy jar

Mister Jalopy bought this glass peanut butter jar filled with little treasures at a garage sale for $1, and photographed each item individually, using his great close-up photography set-up. A dirty rubber band never looked so good.

This jar houses the collected treasures of Mr. Frankie Bartoli of Chicago, Illinois and was sold to me by his family for $1. I bought it because the Smithsonian had not stopped at the garage sale prior to my arrival. But, like the Smithsonian would have, I took a photo of every single item inside.

Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 09:36:59 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Little magazines that come stuck to pop bottles

A marketing student's project to produce little magazines that are shipped under the removable label of a pop bottle is going into commercial production. The idea is to bypass traditional distribution systems and economics, and piggyback on the far-more-sophisticated soft drink distribution infrastructure. Link (via Popgadget)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 04:57:09 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Calculate present value of money from 1257-present day

This currency converter produces present-worth values for money through history, using a wealth of different systems. It applies to the UK and US, and depending on the method used, you can get price and value comparisons all the way back to 1257.

In 2004, $1.00 from 1900 is worth:
$22.37 using the Consumer Price Index
$19.02 using the GDP deflator
$108.01 using the unskilled wage
$149.07 using the GDP per capita
$575.24 using the relative share of GDP

Link (via McDaid)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 04:45:34 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Sunday, February 19, 2006

William Wray paintings at charity sale in LA

Former Ren and Stimpy artist William Wray is now making incredible landscape paintings of southern California. Today, he told me that he is donating some paintings to a charity sale at Cheebos restaurant in LA.

Art selected by the GET: ART Committee will be made accessible to the beginning collector (and all others!) via a unique format: all artwork will be grouped into four affordable price points: $100, $250, $500 and $1000, and will be sold “cash & carry.” Over 200 pieces will be for sale Photography, painting, sculpture and mixed-media will be represented. GET: ART opens Friday, February 24th from 7:07-10:02 pm with hors d’oeuvres from CHEEBO Catering and a no-host bar, in the main galleries of Bonhams & Butterfields at 7601 Sunset Boulevard. The sale continues on Saturday, February 25th from 10:00am-5:00pm. PARKING IS FREE in the Bonhams & Butterfields parking lot.

Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 09:31:27 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Virtual sea cruise from 1900 Paris Expo

Tinselman has an interesting post about an early 19th Century sea cruise simulator called the Mareorama.

The Guide to the Paris Expo (1900) explained how it all worked: "Immense canvases unroll slowly, steadily, and noiselessly before their eyes, and the rise and fall of the boat, together with the shifting scenes, complete the illusion that one is really on board a steamer, cruising in front of some well-known seaport cities of the Mediterranean."

Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 09:23:26 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Bird in hand photos

The Bird Hand Book is a collection of photographs that Victor Schrager took of more than 100 species of birds held in the hands by ornithologists. Many of the photos can be viewed in an online gallery at the Musarium. From an interview with Schrager on the site:

You must feel a strong connection with birds to begin such a massive project – what do they represent for you?
Actually, my interest at the beginning was in the birds' names – the poetic and allusive qualities that their names present. I felt there might be an interesting irony between the vagueness of generalized bird forms and the specificity of the names. The fascinating detail and structure of the birds, in combination with the variable element of the hands quickly caused the project to take a different direction. When I began, I had no great expertise or particular interest in birds, and certainly not in the traditional practice of bird watching with binoculars, but observing birds from so close and intimate a vantage point (I say that I photographed the birds at the same distance that one reads a book) is a wonderful way to learn about them...

How do you perceive the relationship between bird and handler?
It is similar to the relation between a sculpture and pedestal.

Link (via Proceedings of the Athanasius Kircher Society)

posted by David Pescovitz at 08:42:37 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Is Kanye West a Vanessa Beecroft fan?

At left, Mr. West's femmetourage. At right, Ms. Beecroft's, which predates it. Link (Thanks, Sean!)

posted by Xeni Jardin at 08:12:59 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Pour Him Over Ice Cream For A Nice Parfait

Snip from Alasdair Watson's hilarious, obsessive, chocolate-geeky writeup of a tasting event he attended at one of London's finer chocolate shops:

If [Gerard] Coleman is to be believed, then I suspect the single most important thing I've learned is that the chocolate business is full of lying bastards out to exploit the public and flog inferior crap. This is not how he put it, and it's not how he comes across (more of that in a minute), but over the course of the anecdotes about other chocolate makers, it's very hard not to see a picture emerging. Coleman has apparently heard other people in the chocolate business say things like "you don't have to like what you make", something I (and he) find incomprehensible. As far as I'm concerned, if a person can't stand behind their work, then they are a hideous shitehawk, and should be scourged with rusty barbed wire.
Here are a few things I know now that I didn't know before: There are three kinds of chocolate beans: Criollo, Forastero and Trinitatio. Criollo is the original kind, the sort that the Spanish nicked off the Aztecs. This is the stuff that produces the all round best-flavoured chocolate. So, of course, most chocolate is made with the inferior Forastero, which is cheaper, and easier to grow in bulk. Trinitario has a variety of strengths, being a hybrid of the two. (Only 5-10% of the world's cacao is good quality Criollo, or higher grade Trinitario, mostly single estate specialists.) But let's talk about what we're sold as "chocolate" in this country. (...)

Link (via Warren Ellis -- happy belated birthday, Warren!)

posted by Xeni Jardin at 08:01:21 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

More commemorative lamps of doom: Three Mile Island

Following up on the understated elegance of the 9/11 lamp , I present to you another lighting fixture of unspeakable tragedy: the 1979 Three Mile Island commemorative lamp. Spotted on eBay, with a base shaped like a nuclear reactor cooling tower. Link (Thanks tangent)

posted by Xeni Jardin at 07:32:52 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Giant knitted bottle cozy is ad for Japanese drink company

To promote a new fizzy drink product, Japanese beverage maker Suntory canned (heh) TV ads in favor of a giant hand-knitted bottle cozy for the window of a new Tokyo shopping mall. Link (Thanks, Gaijin Biker)

posted by Xeni Jardin at 07:24:14 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

I'm selling my 17-inch G4 1.5 Ghz PowerBook with a cracked screen on eBay

I bought this brand new 17-inch G4 1.5 Hhz PowerBook in December 2004. In the summer of 2005, I dropped it in a parking lot, cracking the screen, and dinging the corners. A couple of weeks later, the hard drive stopped working and I replaced it with a brand new 5400 rpm, 80 GB hard drive from Western Digital.

I'm selling it on eBay.

Aside from the cracked screen, I can find nothing else wrong with the computer. The DVD Read/Write SuperDrive works fine, as does the illuminated keyboard and ambient-light sensitive display backlight.

See more photos here.

Here is a system profile, taken today (2/19/2005).
Link to eBay auction

Reader comment: J Garland says: "When you get a new laptop to replace this one I STRONGLY recommend getting a Personal Articles Policy from State Farm on it. I have one on my powerbook. It cost $30 a year and it covers theft, fire, and accidental damage (such as dropping it and cracking the screen). I haven't had to file a claim yet but it sure beats buying a new laptop."

Reader comment: Andy says: "To add to the readers post, State Farm also provides rental insurance which would cover all your precious hardware. You can get a $10,000 policy that will cover all your belongings, gadgets and all, for under a hundred dollars a year.

"You would be surprised at the scope of the insurance. When I got mine, I was given a sheet with examples of -real world- claims that are covered. A couple examples on the sheet: If your horse were to escape your property, and it broke your neighbors fence, the fence would be covered. If you were to travel to Europe, and soiled your hotel's bed sheets, THAT would be covered."

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 01:36:34 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Kitsch-macabre 9/11 re-enactment lamp

Boing Boing reader Paul says,

I bought a lamp yesterday in a late night grocery store in berlin that re-enacts the events of 9/11. The lamp contains two rotating films inside it. The inner (opaque) film depicts the pre 9/11 skyline of new york city while the transparent outer one has a number of helicopters, boats, paragliders and one passenger jet imprinted on it. The films rotate at different speeds and every two minutes or so the passenger jet seems to fly into the twin towers.

Link to blog post with photos and short QuickTime movie.

posted by Xeni Jardin at 12:46:58 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Ugly teens more likely to be criminals

A recent study suggests that unattractive individuals commit more crime than people who are average or good looking. Researchers from the University of Colorado and Georgia State University determined this based on a survey of 15,000 teenagers interviewed in 1994 and again in 1997 and 2002. From the Washington Post:

Cute guys were uniformly less likely than averages would indicate to have committed seven crimes including burglary and selling drugs, while the unhandsome were consistently more likely to have broken the law.

Very attractive high school girls were less likely to commit six of the seven crimes, while those rated unattractive were more likely to have done six of seven, controlling for personal and family characteristics known to be associated with criminal behavior...

Other studies have shown that unattractive men and women are less likely to be hired, and that they earn less money, than the better-looking. Such inferior circumstances may steer some to crime, (the researchers) suggest. They also report that more attractive students have better grades and more polished social skills, which means they graduate with a greater chance of staying out of trouble.

Link

posted by David Pescovitz at 10:27:20 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Marine animals as sensors

UC Santa Cruz researchers are using marine animals outfitted with sensors to collect oceanographic data. For example, sensors on California sea lions collect the animals' location, speed, and dive data along with ocean temperature and salinity information. The data is then transmitted to the researchers via satellite. The scientists are also tagging northern elephant seals, Antarctic fur seals, tuna, salmon sharks, albatross, and other animals. Along with providing insight into animal behavior, the project is also helping scientists understand the role of oceans in the global climate system. From a UC Santa Cruz press release:

"We're using these animals as ocean sensors to tell us about oceanographic conditions, and we're also learning how they use the ocean--where they go and what they do," said Daniel Costa, professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of California, Santa Cruz...

Costa began using electronic data recorders to study the diving behavior of elephant seals in 1983. Since then, the miniaturization of electronic components and sensors, plus advances in satellite technology, have led to dramatic improvements in the tags. Recent innovations...have greatly improved the ability to pinpoint an animal's geographic location, and researchers are adding new capabilities to the tags, such as measuring the chlorophyll content of the water (an indicator of algal blooms or "primary productivity").

"We can now use animals to show us things like the thermal properties and cooling rates of the ocean and the structure of the water column, and they can often get valuable data that would be hard to collect by other means," Costa said.

Link

posted by David Pescovitz at 10:16:36 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

J Edgar Hoover loved Lucy

Cross-dressing FBI chief J. Edgar Hoover apparently wrote a drooling fan letter to Lucille Ball in 1955 to tell her how much he enjoyed the previous Monday's episode of "I Love Lucy," noting "In all the years I have travelled on trains, I have often wondered why someone did not pull the emergency brake, but I have never been aboard a train where it was done. The humor in you program last Monday, I think, exceeded any of your previous programs and they have been really good in themselves." Link (Thanks, gruverja!)

Update: Richard sez, "Two years before writing the fan letter, Hoover had opened what became a 50-page spy file on Lucille Ball when a House Committee on Un-American Activities probe revealed she had once registered to vote as a communist. G-Men also put the screws to Ball's husband Desi Arnaz in disapproval of his making a TV show about the FBI busting Ma Barker (allegedly in order to further a rival Warner Bros. hagiography, which Hoover was helping)."

posted by Cory Doctorow at 05:04:24 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Round things made square photoshopping contest

On the Worth1000 photoshopping contest today: round things made square. This square pregancy bump is really well done (love the square navel!); but there's lots more great work there, real technical virtuosity and wit. Link

posted by Cory Doctorow at 04:51:16 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Saturday, February 18, 2006

Bad Samaritan family won't return found expensive camera

A woman lost her camera on holidays; the family who found it decided not to return it because their child liked it so much. Now, that's parenting.

"Well," she said, "we have a bit of a situation. You see, my nine year old son found your camera, and we wanted to show him to do the right thing, so we called, but now he's been using it for a week and he really loves it and we can't bear to take it from him."
I listened, not sure where she was going with this.
"And he was recently diagnosed with diabetes, and he's now convinced he has bad luck, and finding the camera was good luck, and so we can't tell him that he has to give it up. Also we had to spend a lot of money to get a charger and a memory card..."
I was incredulous. "This is an expensive camera, you know."
"Oh, we know, we looked it up."

I agree with the commenter on this post: she should post this family's name and hold them up for shame and ridicule. This is theft. Link (via Anil)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 06:03:11 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Converting an NES to an alarm-clock

This inspired NES to alarm clock conversion was inspired by a trip to a thrift store; the maker notes, "The finished product's time, alarm time and other parameters have to be set by manually shorting Player 1 controller input contacts with wire jumpers. Not what I intended, but one day I will get around to rewiring that paddle." Link (via Digg)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 05:55:20 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Miller hunts down people who use throwaway emails on their contests

Regina sez, "I filled out a web form for a contest from Miller using a throwaway junk email address and then, months after I dumped the throwaway account, I got this to my main account! Not sure I like the idea of companies tracking me down like this."

Thank you for being a loyal consumer of Miller Brewing Company. As one of our VIP consumers, you have likely received email communications from us in the past. Recently, however, we have not been able to deliver email messages to the address you originally supplied. We have performed an electronic change of address to update our records so that we can continue to send you special offers, promotions, and announcements via email.

Link

Update: Brian McWilliams, author of the great book Spam Kings, has done more investigation into this pernicious spamming technique, "Turns out this spooky little spam was the work of Equifax, the big credit reporting agency that shut down its Boca Raton-based spam operation, Naviant, in 2003, due to the impending passage of CAN-SPAM."

posted by Cory Doctorow at 05:25:53 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Students learn more from teachers who hand-wave

Math teachers who wave their hands while talking in a way that illustrates a point differently from their words impart more information to their students. The UChicago researchers determined that students whose teachers hand-wave learn more, and that when the hand-gestures illustrated a point to one side of the main point, they did even better.

As part of the experiment students had to complete the equation “7+6+5=?+5”. Teachers told the youngsters that they had to make one side of the equation match the other side.
The gestures simply duplicating these directions involved the instructors pointing to the left-hand and then the right-hand sides of the equation. When using complementary gestures, however, the teachers pointed to each of the numbers on the left and then signalled the subtraction of the five on the right side by scooping their hand away from the number.

Link

posted by Cory Doctorow at 05:11:49 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

HOWTO resist warrantless searches at Best Buy

A Best Buy customer relates the stirring 1999 tale of his refusal to let security guards at the store engage in their indiscriminate warrantless searches of his bags after he's paid for his purchases. He simply walks out, and whenever anyone tries to stop him, he just says, "Am I being detained for shoplifting?" and keeps walking. They even sent out people with pickup trucks to block him into his parking-spot!

Merchants basically have two rights covering people entering and exiting their stores. They can refuse to let you enter the premises and/or to sell you anything, and they can place you under citizens arrest for attempting to leave the premises with any property that you haven't paid for. But the second you hand over the appropriate amount of cash, they lose all rights to the items. They can't legally impair you from leaving the store with your property.
Apparently the employees of my local Best Buy aren't very familiar with annoying pedantic individuals who will choose principals over convenience when walking out with a shopping cart full of expensive home entertainment gear. I manage to get about 5 steps out the door before the door guard catches up to me and grabs my cart, with the "sir" in his "I need to see your receipt, sir" somehow not very complimentary. This is apparently a stalling tactic, as shortly a few more blue-shirted employees make a move to block me from making any more progress toward my car.
I ask, still calm, if I am being detained for shoplifting. This suggestion apparently shocks my captor into regaining some of his senses, and he lets go of my cart. I explain that unless he wishes to do so, he has no right to stop me.

Link (via Digg)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 05:04:54 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Friday, February 17, 2006

Tiki fireplace

This gorgeous, homemade tiki fireplace complete with smoking nostrils is lavishly documented in this build log. Link (via Neatorama)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 10:24:49 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

RIAA using kids' private info to attack their mother

The recording industry has escalated its attacks on a soccer mom whose PC may have been used to share music files by attacking her children. Westchester County's Patti Santangelo bought a PC for her kids that the RIAA claims was used to share copyrighted music, but Patti never used her PC for this, and there's no evidence that the files ever resided on her computer. Since she's innocent, Patti's refused to pay the labels' shakedown demand of $3500, making her the first RIAA victim to stand up for her rights.

Now the RIAA have begun to introduce private information about Patti's minor children into the case, apparently obtained by illicit means:

"As just one example, it was deeply unsettling for us to learn just how much personal, non-public information the RIAA had collected on Patti's children.
"All parents should be concerned and I think people have to know the implications.
"It's one thing to sue children directly. They get a lawyer, rules are established, the court might offer certain protections, etc, but when it's done through a back door - suing a parent to get information about a child - the child has no protections, especially when the plaintiff doesn't even have the decency to not publish personal information about the child.
"This, then, is going to become the new feeding ground for those who seek to exploit children, whether through improper contact or identity theft.
"This new class of child - scared and facing the federal legal system, with few protections and their personal contact and identification information, as well as their posted feelings, fears, desires and thoughts - is now exposed to the world for all to see.
"And exploit."

Link (via Digg)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 10:21:05 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Internet Freedom Conference open for discount reg

David sez, "F2C:Freedom to Connect, the Internet Freedom Conference, is coming back to AFI Silver, in Silver Spring (close-in suburb of Washington DC) on April 3 and 4, 2006.

"This year I'm doing it with Jeff Pulver, Inc., with partnership of the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School, Tropos Networks, O'Reilly Media, Voxeo, Free Press, Public Knowledge and many other companies and organizations concerned about Internet Freedom.

"I'd like offer a special deal to friends of past F2Cs that does not appear on the official F2C website. It is about 50% off the standard early bird pricing, $295 vs. regular early bird at $595. Please use code FODC when you register before February 28." Link (Thanks, David!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 10:14:34 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

New episode of The IT Crowd, awesome sysadmin sitcom

Episode 5 of Graham "Father Ted" Linehan's convulsively funny nerd comedy series "The IT Crowd" is available for download from the Channel Four site. C4 has wised up and taken the DRM off its downloadable preview of the episode, but it's still weird, streaming stuff that won't play on my machine -- there's a direct download too, thanks to John. This episode is every bit as funny as the previous four -- it's the nerd-love episode. Geeks and dating, as funny as it gets. Link, Direct Download Link, Coral CDN mirror (Thanks, John!)

Update: Here's the video on YouTube -- thanks, Sergio!

Update 2 Here's the torrent -- thanks, Mike!

posted by Cory Doctorow at 10:06:31 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Apple censors OSX-on-Intel message boards with DMCA

Apple has invoked the DMCA, which allows anyone to censor web-pages by claiming they infringe on copyright, to shut down message boards on a hobbyist site where Mac OS X owners were discussing how they could install their software on non-Apple hardware.

"We're sorry to report that despite our best efforts, the OSx86 Project has been served with a DMCA violation notice. The forum will be unavailable while we evaluate its contents to remove any violations present. We thank you for your patience in this matter," the posting read.
Win2osx.net, another Web site that hosts discussions related to getting Mac OS X onto chips with the x86 instruction set, was also down Friday. Earlier this week, Win2osx.net's discussion forums contained a posting from a hacker known as "Maxxuss," who made a patch available on his own Web site that would allow programming-savvy PC users to put a recent version of the Mac operating system on their x86 systems.

Link (Thanks, CZ!)

posted by Cory Doctorow at 09:56:47 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

web zen: photo zen

Web Zen Home, Store (Thanks Frank!)

posted by Xeni Jardin at 06:53:45 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Two pro-community-wireless bills introduced in US Senate

US Senators have taken up the community wireless rallying cry. Sascha Meinrath, who was very active in tech community efforts to re-connect New Orleans post-Katrina, tells Boing Boing,

Major reform is afoot! Two bills were introduced on Friday that would radically improve unlicensed wireless access. Both bills would greatly improve the general public’s access to the public airwaves. The first bill, “The Wireless Innovation Act of 2006,” is a major bi-partisan effort to line up Senators to support Community Wireless.
The second, “The American Broadband for Communities Act,” is lead by Republican Senator Stevens and does much the same. While many will argue that the two bills don’t go far enough, they are a giant leap (not a baby step) forward towards reforming spectrum policies to make more efficient use of computer technology. I don’t know if the drafts are public yet, but will post the texts once I get confirmation.
Both bills would open up TV broadcast bands (as proposed by FCC proceedings 04-186) within the next 180 days. These bills are particularly important because of FCC proceedings 05-312 (read the wireless communities' concerns about the 05-312 proceedings here). The 04-186 proceedings are something that I and many other people have been actively working towards for quite some time. You can read our official comments on the 04-186 proceedings here. Obviously, it is fantastic news to see US Senators taking up the same position as we've been forwarding and I'm hopeful that we'll finally see some reforms to make more efficient use of the public airwaves.

Link

posted by Xeni Jardin at 06:48:48 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

Fascinating Ask Metafilter question: How to deal with adult bus bullies

On February 7, "cior" asked the hive mind at Ask MetaFilter to help her with a problem she faced everyday on her bus ride to work. Abridged excerpt:

Each morning at 6:54am I catch an hour-long bus from my house to my office. On this bus are two women (40-50's) who seemingly work all night in some sort of nursing capacity.
One of them, the one who sits across the aisle from me likes to open her window. Mind you, this morning it was 25F outside. From where she sits, she gets a light dusting of fresh air. From where I sit, it's an artic blast that a) farks up the newspaper I'm reading, b) throws my hair into my face and c) freezes my nose off.
Last week, as they did the little dinger thing that signals for a stop I got up and went across the aisle to close the window after they were out of their seats and towards the front of the bus. This act was met with a very loud and demeaning call-out peppered with phrases like:
* Who does she think she is?
* Look at Little Miss Thing
* Uhn-uh, she's closing the window again.
It's truly endless, and so far I haven't acknowledged any of it.

Tons of people have given her suggestions so far, and there are a lot of fascinating answers. I think a lot of us (people who read MetaFilter and Boing Boing and the like) had their share of bullying as kids and so now it's payback time. It's interesting how many answers involve wearing an iPod to drown out their voices. My two favorites: "Superglue the window shut after they've gotten off the bus," and "The next time they say anything while you are closing the window, simply smile sincerely, wave, and (if they can hear you) say 'See you tomorrow! Have a good one!' sincerely"
Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 05:06:50 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

County Homeland Security Officers Try To Police Porn, Fail

Mo "Here's a story in today's Washington Post about two Montgomery County Homeland Security officers who try to police porn at a public library. After one patron is targeted and asked to step outside, the librarian resists. The police are called and the only ones ushered outsid