Over on O'Reilly Radar, Jim Stogdill has a fabulous piece on the economic theory of rents as they apply to technology businesses, open source, cloud computing, spectrum auctions, and other… Read the rest of the article: Rent-seeking in the 21st century: where eBay, free software, Foxconn and the MPAA come from

JT has had enough with fear-driven election ads, so here's "a little 30 second blipvert lifting heavily from Texas Chainsaw Massacre and the RGA's own 'Remember November' campaign." Vote Hope… Read the rest of the article: Anti-fear election spot

Eileen Gunn sez: Last summer the immortal Michael Swanwick offered to write a story a day for the 42 days of the Clarion West Writer's Workshop . If you donated… Read the rest of the article: Steampunk short stories in the style of classic steampunk tales

Writing in about the campaign to get the Machine of Death anthology to #1 on Amazon on its launch day, editor David "Wondermark" Malki writes, "It worked! Machine of Death… Read the rest of the article: Machine of Death Amazon campaign infuriates Glenn Beck

Here's an adorable Plants Versus Zombies "Hypnoshroom" terrarium, from Etsy seller AnUnclesMonkey. Hypnoshroom sprout Plants vs Zombies – Made to Order – please contact me to discuss timeframe for delivery… Read the rest of the article: Hypnoshroom craft

Quantum Mechanix has released a nerdtastic Hallowe'en video: John De Lancie (Star Trek's Q) reading Poe's The Raven. I still prefer Lord Buckley's 1950s hipster argot version, but this is… Read the rest of the article: Poe's "Raven," performed by Star Trek's Q

Julia found a 1931 Practical Standard Funk and Wagnall dictionary at a used book store and exacto knives to carve it into a remarkable piece of 3D art. Vintage dictionary… Read the rest of the article: Carved dictionary

From Fast Company's ongoing "Explaining Everything With Flowcharts" series, a flowchart showing how a time-traveller could explain the Internet to a Dickensian street-urchin. Very funny stuff and excellent use of… Read the rest of the article: HOWTO explain the Internet to a Dickensian street urchin

Dyster sez, "I recently bought an extremely rare old folio of lithographs, drawn by Hans J. Jedlitschka, sometime, it is guessed, between 1895 and 1910. I've put up a flickr… Read the rest of the article: What should Dyster do with this late 19th century folio of lithos?

David Topping from Torontoist sez, "Torontoist has an interview with HI-LITE, an urban explorer who favours cranesâ€"and whose shots of Toronto from dozens of storeys off the ground are totally… Read the rest of the article: Photos from Toronto's crane-climbing urban explorer

I'm coming to San Francisco next month to present the 19th Annual Electronic Frontier Foundation Pioneer Awards (this year's winners are Stephen Aftergood, James Boyle, Pamela Jones and Groklaw, and… Read the rest of the article: EFF Pioneer Awards in San Francisco, Nov 8

Mammoth Arizona used book seller Bookmans made this sweet advert featuring a warehouse sized store in which thousands of used books do a domino run across counters, shelves, floors, etc.… Read the rest of the article: Used book domino run

Back in September, I blogged Quilty1987's mesmerizing YouTube tutorial on making weird, erratically shaped gears that really mesh and spin. At the time, I pondered what these would look like… Read the rest of the article: Ambitious and improbable gears: video

Tens of thousands of South Koreans have had their websites censored or been kicked off the Internet by their ISPs on the strength of a single, unsubstantiated accusation of copyright… Read the rest of the article: South Korea's US-led copyright policy leads to 65,000 acts of extrajudicial censorship/disconnection/threats by govt bureaucrats

Martin Broughton, the chairman of British Airways, has called on Britain's aviation industry to stop "kowtowing" to the USA's ridiculous and inconsistent aviation "security" procedures. Broughton points out that carriers… Read the rest of the article: British Airways chairman: "stop kowtowing to US aviation security demands"

Ben Tripp sez, "Rise Again, my zombie apocalypse novel (reviewed here by Cory) is in bookstores today! In honor of the occasion, I wish to direct readers to my downloadable… Read the rest of the article: Print-and-stick zombie wounds

Chuck Forsman created this wonderful retelling of Raiders of the Lost Ark in the form of an old Popeye newspaper strip; he's selling prints for $20. Raiders.Popeye.72 Buy print ($20)… Read the rest of the article: Raiders of the Lost Ark as a Popeye comic

Boingboingdave sez, "Outside the Conway-Rand Paul debate in KY, Paul supporters held down a woman from MoveOn while another stomped on her neck and head. The woman was attempting to… Read the rest of the article: Rand Paul supporters pin down and curb-stomp MoveOn activist – video

Lavie Tidhar writes, "The World SF Blog is launching a new weekly fiction feature, beginning with Aliette de Bodard's "Melanie", with more stories lined up from South Africa, Israel, Brazil,… Read the rest of the article: Science fiction from around the world, every week

Here's a fascinating report from the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences on a novel kind of robotic gripper that uses balloons and coffee grounds to attain strong, sensitive… Read the rest of the article: Robotic hand attains sensitivity and strength with coffee grounds and balloons