Links posted in April 2008
April 30, 2008
How does the Daily Show get those fantastic point-counterpoint clips where they get a political figure or talking head saying 2 contradictory things back to back? Well, it takes a lot of TiVo and one full time staffer.
April 29, 2008
Would you eat something that was still squirming? I like to consider myself an omnivore of the non-hypocritical variety -- that is, I fully acknowledge that when I eat flesh, it's exactly that. I can look at an animal and simultaneously think "aw, cute" and "yummy." [more inside]
April 28, 2008
Marc Andreessen has a great break-down of Microsoft's potential hostile takeover of Yahoo! at his blog. The takeaway message is that the tech industry appears to have matured enough that we'll be seeing more of the same types of things that used to be left strictly to older businesses.
Foreign Policy is having a vote for the world's top intellecutals. Choose from their list of 100, which includes quantum gravity researcher (who has been willing to avoid embracing string theory full force) Lee Smolin, but includes Larry Summers (boo) and a good deal of other recognizable names (Paul Krugman, Fareed Zakaria).
April 26, 2008
If you put no stamp on a letter, how often will it be delivered anyway? What if you put yourself down as the sender and the recipient? And drew a little square in the top right corner and wrote "No Stamp"? But put a stamp inside, and a polite note? Would it still show up if you sent it from another state? country? continent? Would they arrive adorned with stickers apologizing for the delivery delay incurred by your stinginess? A controlled scientific experiment in 15 photographs.
April 24, 2008
Cool software that allows you to visualize gravity. One of Julio's coworkers wrote this great piece of software. Check it out!
April 21, 2008
Eff Emm You has a writeup on a really cool electronic music gadget named Tenori-On. It encompasses lots and lots of sounds in a neat little touchscreen package that looks like a Lite Brite. The Youtube videos on the page really sold me on its potential.
April 18, 2008
The Infocom Disk - Andy Baio of Waxy just found the Golden Ticket of geek journalism.
From an anonymous source close to the company, I've found myself in possession of the "Infocom Drive" — a complete backup of Infocom's shared network drive from 1989. This is one of the most amazing archives I've ever seen, a treasure chest documenting the rise and fall of the legendary interactive fiction game company. ... For obvious reasons, I can't share the whole Infocom Drive. But I have to share some of the best parts. It's just too good.
So let's start with the most notorious — Milliways: The Restaurant at the End of the Universe, the unreleased sequel to Infocom's The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.
In an effort to increase the quantity of insipid drivel in my life, I have begun listening to Radio Disney, AM 1110. As surely as the sun rises in the east, I tell you this, boys and girls; Radio Disney is seriously pummeling my brain with fifty thousand watts of Pure Awesome.
I present the following as conclusive evidence of Pure Awesome:
[more inside]
April 17, 2008
April 15, 2008
Trapped - This week in the magazine, Nick Paumgarten writes about the lives of elevators, and tells the story of Nicholas White, who was trapped in an elevator in New York City’s McGraw-Hill building for forty-one hours. Here is a condensed look at White’s ordeal, as captured by the building’s security cameras.
April 14, 2008
The subject of odd punctuations came up the other day. I present for your orthographic diversification:
- Interrobang, ‽ ‽
- Octothorpe is the same thing as the hash (#, #), isn't the same thing as a sharp (♯, ♯), but does have a hilarious backstory.
- The ineffable Grawlixes include the Jarn, Phosphene, Squean, Nittle and Quimp -- they're how cartoon characters swear in print (seen earlier here). They don't, inexcusably, have unicode code points, but the superheroic MarkerMan typeface will do in a pinch.
Hot Chicks With Douchebags is what Tyler Durden would do if Tyler Durder weren't doing What Would Tyler Durden Do. [more inside]
April 13, 2008
John Archibald Wheeler died today. A huge percentage of the best researchers in relativity research (and Richard Feynman) can trace their Ph.D. lineage back to Wheeler. His research was massively influential in reconnecting general relativity with astrophysics. He was, by all accounts, gentle, straightforward and noncondescending in his teaching and dealings with ordinary people, which, as we know, can be quite rare in physicists.
RIP - W of MTW [more inside]
The hot new thing in cellphones is to go big. Really big.
April 12, 2008
Bush admits to approving torture. Here's your motherfucking smoking gun, guys. Case closed. 'Bad apples' theory debunked. The President approved the violation of the Geneva convention:
"Well, we started to connect the dots in order to protect the American people." Bush told ABC News White House correspondent Martha Raddatz. "And yes, I'm aware our national security team met on this issue. And I approved."
[snip]
The so-called Principals who participated in the meetings also approved the use of "combined" interrogation techniques -- using different techniques during interrogations instead of using one method at a time -- on terrorist suspects who proved difficult to break, sources said.
What the hell is it going to take to get some oversight on this shit? I really can't believe that Bush has just come out and admitted to this. Read the whole thing. My favorite part:
Ashcroft was troubled by the discussions. He agreed with the general policy decision to allow aggressive tactics and had repeatedly advised that they were legal. But he argued that senior White House advisers should not be involved in the grim details of interrogations, sources said.
According to a top official, Ashcroft asked aloud after one meeting: "Why are we talking about this in the White House? History will not judge this kindly."
Ashcroft is slowly turning into the voice of moderation and sanity in the first Bush administration. And nothing terrifies me about this country more than that.
Texas Polygamy Raid Poses Risk - Remind me again how the Gays are the ones threatening the "institution of marriage"?
April 09, 2008
WFMU has a blog entry describing a completely amazing pool at the top of Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe. The thing that is so amazing about it is that the current is so slow you can hang out over the edge of the falls and look down (more pics).
Bush at 61% in recent poll -- In a Pew Research Center poll of professional historians, Bush earned an approval rating of 61%, inasmuch as 61% approved of certifying him the "worst president ever". Another 35% withheld their full approval, choosing only to place him in the bottom ten, aside Buchanan (shattered the union, financial panics), Pierce (Bleeding Kansas) and Harding (Teapot Dome corruption, sex scandals).
“No individual president can compare to the second Bush,” wrote one. “Glib, contemptuous, ignorant, incurious, a dupe of anyone who humors his deluded belief in his heroic self, he has bankrupted the country with his disastrous war and his tax breaks for the rich, trampled on the Bill of Rights, appointed foxes in every henhouse, compounded the terrorist threat, turned a blind eye to torture and corruption and a looming ecological disaster, and squandered the rest of the world’s goodwill. In short, no other president’s faults have had so deleterious an effect on not only the country but the world at large.”
Requiem for a deli - let me wax nostalgic for a place the rest of you may not know about: the famous Rascal House Deli in Miami Beach just closed. This was a Jewish Deli from the old old school (the one they tore down to build the old school). I remember there used to be lines around the block to get in -- different queues for 2, 3, 4, 5+ in your party. When you sat down they laid out rolls and a bucket of pickled stuff (such a nosh!) while you waited for your reuben or lox platter to come out. Azoy gait es.
April 07, 2008
...And that happened. Part of a baseball game, as called by John Mayer (1min long) -- this is for everyone who doesn't like baseball but does want a new catchphrase.
April 05, 2008
You can now pry the gun from his cold, dead hands. Charleton Heston is the latest late celebrity.
April 02, 2008
It is a trite and tired thing to simply link to an Onion article but this week's editorial is many sigmas funnier than most Onion articles:
Stop Making Movies About My Books - by Dr. Seuss in Seussical rhyming meter. This must have been a ball to write.
Nicholas Kristof's Challenge to Bill O’Reilly - "do some real reporting. I’m planning another trip to the Darfur area later this spring, and I’d love to take him along to cover something that would really merit his trademark outrage: genocide."
April 01, 2008
Youtube top vids for April - (linked from its front page) have some really good selections, especially the first one ("Star Wars Rube Goldberg Machine") and the one with the baby. I don't think I'm ever gonna give up checking these out at the start of each month.
Science Fair Whatif - it's been a while since a Photoshop Phriday has been worth pointing to, but this one's pretty good. remember though: somethingawful.com => "mostly NSFW"