Labor Day lazy short linkage roundup

Xeni Jardin


  • Above: a nice collection of nerdy wedding cakes. Link, rounded up by ace scienceblogger Shelley Batts (that's not her in the photo, just so you know — it's Carol Orsini of GameDaily).

  • If you receive an invitation from a social networking site called Quechup, run screaming.
    Shava Nerad is among many who pointed us to their horrible spamming practices, and says, "The blogs are calling it 'the Q problem' and a 'trust virus.' Bad juju, in general, not to mention they are one of those sites that sends you your selected username and password in the clear."
    By the time you read this, there will probably be some news articles out about how evil they are. Until then, watch out.
  • A chemical found in microwave popcorn, diacetyl, is killing food industry workers — and may also pose a threat to consumers. The stuff is used to create a buttery taste in many popular brands. Link.
  • A fascinating profile piece in this weekend's New York Times Magazine about Def Jam founder Rick Rubin's new job: save Columbia Records. But the bigger job he's taken on: save the entire music industry from its own slow, suicidal idiocy. Link. Here's a YouTube video Rubin totally flips out over in the course of that story — an until-recently-unknown Welsh cellphone salesman named Paul Potts singing Nessun Dorma, from Puccini's Turandot: Video Link.

  • At left, several fat Flickr sets of pulp fiction cover scans: Link. My favorite are the cheezy pervy ones.
  • The Islamic religious council of Central Java has issued a fatwa on nuclear power, and declared plans for a nearby nuke plant "haraam," or "forbidden." Link.
  • Add this to the list of stuff promised, then denied to Katrina survivors: No WiFi for NoLa. "A free Internet wireless system in New Orleans likely will not be expanded to devastated areas of the city, following EarthLink Inc.'s decision to quit investing in such services." Link.

  • Artist Dan Funderburgh has created some neat Gangsta bling wallpaper, now available from a New Orleans-based shop that also offers fruit flavored scratch-'n'-sniff wallpapers. If the gangsta paper were scratch-'n'-sniff, would it smell like blood and gunpowder, new car, dolla dolla bills, or Chanel #5?

  • This news is a few days old, but you Burners and vacationers may have missed it: Torrentspy now blocks users with USA IP addresses: Link.
  • This one, too. Privacy rights in India suffer a new blow as police in Mumbai expand the use of keyloggers in public cybercafes, citing national security threats after recent bomb blasts in Hyderabad: Link.
  • MySpace launches a networking portal of sorts around fashion: Link.
  • 50 years in a woman's life documented in photos, found by a stranger at a flea market: Link.

    • (Thanks, William Smith, Susannah Breslin, Kyle Marler, Aaron Rowe, Mike, Patrix, Andrew Tonkin)