Smartphone video footage of police brutality being exercised against black Americans and other ethnic minorities living their lives within the nation’s borders have become depressingly commonplace. While difficult to watch and, most likely for the videographer, difficult to stand by and film, such footage can be an important tool in bringing cops who abuse the power of their office to justice. The news, social media and water cooler talk here in North America often overflows with reports of abuses of power by law enforcement officials. It’s easy to forget that the very same brand of injustice and violence are served up in other parts of the world – a lot.

According to The New York Times, in Australia, a country that’s been marred by institutional racism since its inception, “...aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples are incarcerated at 13 times the rate of non-Indigenous Australians. They make up 27 percent of Australia’s prisoners, compared with 3 percent of the overall population.” Given the disproportionate representation of Indigenous Australians in the clink, it’s safe to say that there’s some greasy shit going on Down Under, of a similar sort to the greasy shit we see going on up here in places like New York City and Ferguson, Missouri.

To help Australia aboriginals and Torres Strait Islander peoples to mitigate this prejudicial treatment at the hands of those meant to serve and protect them, human rights activists are teaching them how to respond to the threat of police violence and to record their interactions with law enforcement, just like we do up here:

From The New York Times:

The Copwatch workshops, activists said, are intended to teach people their legal rights and how to safely record interactions with police officers.

Hotel safes with keypad combinations have become a staple in a certain level of hotel room, but if the administrative override code was not changed from the factory settings, it's incredibly easy to open one. Read the rest

Tierra Whack created an album where each song's video can be published as an Instagram post. Watch Whack World in its entirety here. Read the rest

Alice Potts engages in what she calls "human body design," creating bioplastics by soaking materials in body fluids to embed them with crystals. Read the rest

Little Pyongyang made the festival rounds and his been picked up by The Guardian. It tells the story of how one soldier made his way to Europe's largest community of North Korean nationals after escaping the brutal regime.

Joong-wha Choi, a former soldier in North Korea, lives today with his wife and children in a sleepy London suburb, home to Europe's biggest North Korean population. Despite enjoying the new found comforts of his British life, and being emancipated from the pressures of the North Korean state, he has a desire to return to the land that betrayed him, and feels like his true home. Joong-wha reflects on both why he left North Korea and the state of his day to day life over the course of several months, in a portrait of loss, longing, and the complexities of healing from trauma.

Here's a nice Q&A with the filmmakers

• Little Pyongyang (YouTube / The Guardian) Read the rest

Kensuke Koike demonstrates a cool visual trick involving an evenly-punched hard copy of an image turned into a regognizable avatar. Read the rest

Artist and designer Rus Khasanov (previously) has created a bright and highly-detailed montage of colors colliding. What really sets this apart is the beautiful music by Dmitry Evgrafov. Read the rest

Eight American kids are killed or injured daily by unsecured guns in their homes. The Ad Council, creators of Smokey Bear and other iconic PSAs, launched the End Family Fire campaign to raise awareness. Read the rest

The Raigad Movie captures the stunning light and windswepts cliffs of a 17th century fort, shot entirely on a phone by Sanket Khuntale. . Read the rest

Slinky Josh bills himself as North America's first professional slinky manipulator, and if the passers-by are any indication, he's very good at his chosen profession. Read the rest

This whimsical series of images by Filtre Studio imagines Queen Elizabeth straightening paintings and vacuuming up after her dogs. What's most interesting is that the entire room was created digitally. Read the rest

After hitting the mute button (YouTube should have a terrible music reporting option), check out this delightful Malaysian selfie museum with lots of trompe-l'œil paintings and optical illusions. Read the rest

Colored sand, a Chladni plate, and a little Bach make for a very soothing demonstration of cymatics. Read the rest

PolyGlu is used by aid workers to force impurities in water to settle at the bottom of a container, making the water safer for drinking in areas where water is scarce or polluted. Read the rest

Philosopher Jacob Böhme had a small but enthusiastic following who created stunning fan art of his ideas. The William Law editions of his writing have beautifully designed plates that open up thirteen successive layers of illustrations nested inside one another. Read the rest

The timeless joy of dropping junk from high places to see what happens has been refined into an art form by three Australian gentlemen, and their giant metal dart series is the best giant-dart-based entertainment in human history. Read the rest

This broadclub cuttlefish like to prowl the Indonesian reefs for crabs, which it then hypnotizes with its remarkable skin before grabbing and eating. Read the rest