The new T-Mobile/HTC G2 Android phones have great specs, but they also have a "security feature" that wipes out any OS you install and replaces it with T-Mobile's crippled version of Android, with tethering disabled (T-Mobile also lards their default installation with un-deletable crapware). — Read the rest

You know those outraged, desperate first-person reports of travellers being inappropriately groped by the TSA at American airports? The TSA's official blogger, Blogger Bob, says they don't exist: "there is no fondling, squeezing, groping, or any sort of sexual assault taking place at airports. — Read the rest

Alan sez, "I love this video, done by Sean Wainsteim for You Say Party's'Lonely Lunch.' It looks like a standard science fiction mini-story, but set in the crowded streets and alleys of an early-21st century Indian city such as Mumbai." — Read the rest

Eric often sends me links that crack me up, so my first response on Friday when I saw he forwarded me a parody response by Mick Jagger to Keith Richards's recent autobiography was to prepare for a good laugh. The alleged response, called "Please allow me to correct a few things," is, in fact, written by ace rock critic Bill Wyman, who has the novelty of sharing a name with the Stones' two-decades-gone original bass player. — Read the rest

File this one under More Krazy Koncept Products: Newspapers, which are made from wood, are themselves used to make "wood" in this project from a Dutch design house, Vij5. Or, to give it its accurate name, "NewspaperWood." (PDF)

When a NewspaperWood log is cut, the layers of paper appear like lines of a wood grain or the rings of a tree and therefore resembles the aesthetic of real wood.

I was pleased to learn that Trader Joe's has recalled products containing that vile culinary interloper, cilantro. I hope this causes lots of people to fear this noxious, puke-inducing abomination. Maybe it will lead to a worldwide ban.

After hearing the good news, I went over to IHateCilantro.com — Read the rest

From Pink Tentacle: "Various Japanese plants (and fungi) spring to life in Omni/ScienceNet's 'Action Plant' series of time-lapse videos shot in Kōchi prefecture." — Read the rest

In the video above, three excerpts from Paul Zaloom's new toy theater puppet show, "The Adventures of White-Man."

Paul Zaloom is a comedic puppeteer, political satirist, filmmaker, and performance artist who lives and works in Los Angeles and tours his work all over the world.

Left: Photographer D.K. Langford claims this Texas vehicle inspection sticker rips off his photograph. Right: The photograph on which Langford's lawsuit against the Department of Public Safety and the Texas Department of Criminal Justice is based. (Source)

Since "to griggs" has been proposed as a verb in (dis)honor of Judith Griggs of Cooks Source, Texas photographer David K. — Read the rest

A group of animal rights activists seeking to draw awareness to the cruelty of battery hen farming operations have hidden a webcam in a factory farm in Israel. The result: a live webstream that shows these animals confined in conditions that would widely be regarded as inhumane, and gross. — Read the rest

Via the Submitterator, Boing Boing reader insert says, "Despite pending lawsuits, in 2005, the CIA destroyed videotapes of its 'harsh interrogation techniques' (translated from Newspeak, that means torture). When anybody else does this, it's obstruction of justice. But when CIA agents do it, it is 'heroic' and 'patriotic.' — Read the rest

"Junior the Jumping Cat," a photo contributed to the Boing Boing Flickr pool by BB reader John Kieltyka, of Seattle. He has more wonderful shots of doggies captured mid-flight, too: "Monkey," and "Tilly." So great!

Jenny "Shifted Librarian" Levine sez, "Tens of thousands of people will be gaming together at their local libraries on Saturday, Nov. 13, to celebrate the American Library Association's 3rd annual National Gaming Day @ your library. Libraries will offer a variety of activities, including modern board games, traditional games (such as chess and checkers) and two national video game tournaments that will pit players at dozens of libraries against each other for bragging rights to the ultimate Rock Band and Super Smash Bros. — Read the rest

This December, 1929 continuing education ad from Modern Mechanix tells men that their neighbors are secretly shaking their heads in pity for their wives because of their paltry paychecks — a mere two months after the Black Friday crash of 1929. — Read the rest

At Mistake Reports, people can anonymously describe a decision they made that didn't go as planned.

Robbins Barstow, the wonderful father of the home movie revival, has died at home at the age of 91. Barstow's magnificent vintage home movies circulated on the Internet after he began to transfer and upload them: whimsical shorts of Barstow's family vacations in the 1950s and 1960s, as well as movies from Barstow's childhood that recreated popular adventure serials with a lot of verve and humor. — Read the rest

MapCrunch is addictive. Select the countries you'd like to include, then click go. You'll see Google Street View photos that are nothing like the photos in tourist brochures. (Via Gurney Journey)

The Los Angeles Times today reports that The Spaceship Company, or TSC—the joint venture owned by Burt Rutan's Mojave-based Scaled Composites and Richard Branson's space tourism company Virgin Galactic—are building a production facility at the Mojave Air and Space Port where the world's first fleet of commercial spaceships will be built. — Read the rest

For 10 weeks, a Kansas State University human nutrition professor ate nothing but sugary snack cakes, candy bars, cookies, sweetened breakfast cereal, and chips. He lost 27 pounds. (He also "took a multivitamin pill and drank a protein shake daily. And he ate vegetables, typically a can of green beans or three to four celery stalks.") — Read the rest

The $25 Pick Punch looks like a fun gadget. It's out of stock right now, however.