Cartography and data analysis nut Brandon M-Anderson put together this impressive zoomable map of the United States with one dot for each of the 308,450,225 people recorded by the 2010 census: oddities revealed include people living in "abandoned" areas or parks. A Redditor stitched the tiles into a huge image.

One second this eagle is gliding around above a park, majestic, then moments later it swoops down and tries to grab a toddler. It's just so sudden and unexpected: the bird looks small when it's far away, but oh god nope that's one of those Hobbit-carrying guys and little red monkey hat is off to Mordor.

It may not be real, but damn it's a good fake. There's more info here.

Video Link: Golden eagle snatches kid

More than a year ago, my friend Phill showed me an iPhone app he was working on: a revamp of Tamagotchi, an adorable little pet you take care of on your phone. My digital pets normally starve alone in a huge pile of their electronic feces, but Hatch was different. It was detailed and rich, with beautifully done art by David Lanham. I've loved playing with it throughout its development, even when it used to burp in your pocket at inappropriate times.

I've been pestering Phill for months to release it so other people could play it too, and today they're finally announcing that you can adopt one of these squishy little guys in preparation for the app release.  Get one of these cuties early!

Hatch: Adopt a Fugu

A while back, my friend Rich Vreeland, AKA Disasterpeace, made a Flash game called January where you catch snowflakes on your tongue and each plays a soft, pining note. Rich has been busy lately making music for other video games, but he just pushed out a big update to January. The new version trims down on the storyline in favor of a more capable music generator. It has auto-pilot functionality, a selection of keys to choose from, a pentatonic mode, and the ability to save your generated compositions as MIDI files.

Check out the new version of January and the original version.

Busy people like you and I don't have the time nor the inclination to navigate the sea of earbuds out there, so I turned to Wirecutter to find out what they recommended as the best earbuds. They've got a fine recommendation in the $100 category, and now that I've got a pair of them I can verify that they're great. Here's the executive summary as to why:

• Excellent sound, with a little extra bass.
• Flat cable shows you where twists are so they really never get tangled.
• Controls and microphone work with the iPhone and are unambiguous and easy to click.

One important note not on Wirecutter: get these memory foam tips with them. I tried the rubber inserts and molding my own earplugs (from two materials even!) but they always slip out or don't seal properly in my ear. With these foam tips you'll get a nice seal in your ear to project the sound, and they're practically earplugs on their own so you can't hear anything but the music even when it's quiet.

Velodyne vPulse in-ear headphones and Comply memory foam tips

More thorough review at Wirecutter

Mrs. McGettrick's Fuggler Emporium on Etsy specializes in adorable teddy bears... with creepy artificial human teeth. Some of them have little plastic weapons, but all of them share a disturbing "I have seen the void" gaze.

 The products' descriptions are great as well:

It's been said that I need a hobby. Here it is. The moral of this story? Be careful what you wish for. My house is filled with these creatures now, and my husband has a sadness about it all. He rocks back and forth, eyes seeing some distant, unknown horror, fingers coiled loosely around our old, trusty shotgun, uttering cryptic warnings to all who come near.

SMALL PRINT: Mrs McGettrick's Fugglers are not suitable for small/medium/oral fixated children, as there is a risk that small parts could come loose and present a choking hazard. Colours may vary from the photographs, due to monitor settings, flash, and my inability to use a camera. Mrs McGettrick's Fugglers are made in a house containing a cat. A cat who pulls out her own fur in an attempt at shocking nudity, and who walks like Nosferatu. If you have cat allergies, I might suggest you avoid buying from this shop. Mrs McGettrick's Fugglers are not suitable for people who don't appreciate cuddly toys with uncannily realistic teeth jutting out from their mouths. Mrs McGettrick's Fugglers are not suitable for people who have ever harboured a suspicion that toys can come alive at night.

Mrs McGettrick's Fuggler Emporium via reddit

This lovely mechanical contraption is designed to mechanically recreate bird song. The video uploader says this was made about 120 years ago in Paris, probably by Blaise Bontems who was known for this type of automaton. It's a fascinating, delicate device!

The Finest Bird Song of 1890

I'm fascinated by these videos of animals having birthdays, started by this especially surreal video Xeni sent me of a skunk named Peaches celebrating her first birthday. Do the animals understand that it's their birthday? How, precisely, does one celebrate an animal's birthday? Sometimes it's a big party for the owners, but sometimes it's just throwing a cupcake to a pig in a driveway. There seem to be a lot of different animals having different kinds of birthday celebrations memorialized on YouTube, and I've collected a few in this playlist.

It's actually my birthday today, and in lieu of the usual wall posts I've asked my Facebook friends to send me videos of animals having birthdays. If you find any good ones, add them to the comments below!

Animals having birthdays playlist on YouTube

I desperately want to believe that this horse mask Mentos commercial is actually from a 1992 episode of the Swedish Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, as the description says, if only because this is just the kind of baloney that pushes crates of sugar pills. I'd also like to believe that this was made by Mentos's marketing department in a brilliant comeback to the top of the tubed candy industry. However, I think this is actually just some really brilliant independent filmmakers hitting me right in the nostalgia.

Best viewed in 240p.

Mentos Horse Mask Basketball Commercial Thanks Dannel!

Get your own horse mask, because seriously you guys.

Dan Wrexham throws down the gauntlet: "If you've seen a better picture than this picture of a dog dressed as two dogs carrying a present, I don't believe you." I can't think of anything better.

UPDATE: François Arias let us know in the comments that he took this photo! He even sent in a better angle of this excellent dog:

Dog dressed as two dogs holding a present on Twitter via @willak via @Mike_FTW

how to eat a corn in 10 seconds via reddit's "Learn Useless Talents" section

KaomojiApp adds a menu item to your Mac with a huge collection of Unicode emoticons that you can easily select and insert in any text area. The free version has a few basic samples in each emotion category, and you can unlock hundreds more for just $3.

Yay! ☆.。.:*・°☆.。.:*・°☆.。.:*・°☆.。.:*・°☆

KaomojiApp.com

Apple was recently ordered by a UK court to publicly display a notice that Samsung did not copy the iPad with their Galaxy tablet to undo the damage they've done by making that accusation. And like a scolded child, they're scuffling their feet and mumbling "sorry" to the ground.

It's no surprise that their apology is at the bottom of the page, or that you need to scroll to see it. What's sneaky about it is that the large image of the iPad on their homepage resizes automatically to force that text to always appear below the fold when you load the page. Apple's webmasters have written in code to figure out how tall your browser window is, then make the site's design just big enough to push the apology out of your view and make you scroll to see it.

apple.co.uk [via Reddit] Thanks, Majd!