Friday, March 26, 2010

The Latest from Boing Boing

Boing Boing

The Latest from Boing Boing

Link to Boing Boing

Reciting Pi while balancing books and spinning a Rubik's Cube

Posted: 26 Mar 2010 03:42 AM PDT

The aptly named YouTube user Booksonmyhead made a video in which she balances 15 books on her head while reciting Pi to 100 digits and manipulating a Rubik's Cube. This young person has a real future ahead of her -- imagine how effective she'd be in running a local government!

balancing 15 books on my head, reciting pi to the 100th digit, and solving a rubik's cube. (Thanks, Fipi Lele!)

Previously:


Dog eats police car

Posted: 26 Mar 2010 02:33 AM PDT

From Chatanoogan.com's YouTube feed: "A Chattanooga Police officer, while running radar at 1410 Workman Road on Sunday night, had his patrol car attacked by a ferocious bulldog. Officer Clayton Holmes said he had stopped to work on a report when he felt his car shaking. He got out to investigate and what he found was a bulldog chewing on his patrol car. The dog chewed two tires and the entire front bumper off of the car."

Winston the Bulldog vs Patrol Car (Thanks, Mary!)

Previously:


How the American phone companies used to feel about privacy

Posted: 26 Mar 2010 12:38 AM PDT

Back in 2008, Matt Blaze put the push for immunity for telcos that participated in GW Bush's illegal wiretapping program in context: "As someone who began his professional career in the Bell System (and who stayed around through several of its successors), the push for telco immunity represents an especially bitter disillusionment for me. Say what you will about the old Phone Company, but respect for customer privacy was once a deeply rooted point of pride in the corporate ethos. There was no faster way to be fired (or worse) than to snoop into call records or facilitate illegal wiretaps, well intentioned or not. And it was genuinely part of the culture; we believed in it, even those of us ordinarily disposed toward a skeptical view of the official company line. Now it all seems like just another bit of cynical, focus-group-tested PR."

Warrantless wiretaps, redux (Thanks, David!)

Previously:


Chants Mongols Et Bouriates

Posted: 25 Mar 2010 11:06 PM PDT

The liner notes say it was recorded in: "Mongolia and Buriatia in 1967, 1968, and 1970 in the course of field work organized in the frame work of the Protocole d'Echanges Culturels between France and Mongolia, and as part of an exchange program with the Academy of Sciences in the USSR."

"In Mongolian tradition, neither music nor singing can strictly-speaking be described as specialist activities. In the past, everyone was expected to be capable of singing and playing the fiddle at festivals..."

Imitation Of The Flute (with the nose)

From the liner notes again: "The player flutes with his nose. Some air really does pass through the nose. The player's lips are slightly parted but do not move: only the corners of the mouth tremble sightly and the cheeks are tensed. This tension brings him out in a sweat. The melody comes from the movements of the tongue. Anyone who possesses this technique is able to reproduce any melody"

Both of these tracks just blow me away with how much the singers sound like birds:

Song To The Glory Of A Horse

Nostalgic Love Song

For you die-hard record sifters, the info is Vogue Records LDM 30138 (recorded in 1973). Here's a full track-listing. You might be able to download it somewhere if you peek around the internet. ;-) I call for a re-issue!

This post is part of a series about music that disorients the senses. I've found that some of the most amazing and jarring auditory illusions are not the usual scientifically distilled or synthesized ones, they're often found in folk music and made by people's voices. Of course, in a way, it makes perfect sense - the vocal chords are some of the most complex and advanced musical instruments in existence. They are ubiquitously available, and we've been experimenting with them for longer than any other sound-making implement.

Disney's Human Element

Posted: 25 Mar 2010 11:16 PM PDT


Scott Smith, a talented photographer and frequent visitor to Walt Disney World, has a blog called "Disney's Human Element" featuring candid snaps of people doing their thing at WDW. He's got a fantastic eye and really manages to capture the essence of a visit to the parks. I love this shot of a little boy marching along behind the brass band, totally caught up in the music and the spirit of play.

Disney's Human Element

Zombie Evil Eye ring

Posted: 25 Mar 2010 10:51 PM PDT


Creepy horror maker Undead Ed has a new Zombie Evil Eye ring up for sale and admiring. I've seen plenty of rings made from glass eyes, but this one's definitely the creepiest. In a good way.

Rot Ring Green Zombie evil eye (via Super Punch)

Previously:


Scott Pilgrim trailer

Posted: 25 Mar 2010 10:47 PM PDT

w00t! The first Scott Pilgrim movie trailer is online! I loved Bryan Lee O'Malley's comic (and can't wait for the final installments!), about a slacker who has to fight his new girlfriend's seven evil ex-boyfriends. All the action is set in Toronto, my hometown, and they shot there too. The movie looks pretty faithful to the original material -- really looking forward to this.

Scott Pilgrim vs The World (via Warren Ellis)

Previously:


Telcoms expert on Verizon's fiber maintenance procedures

Posted: 26 Mar 2010 12:18 AM PDT

David Isenberg (a well-known telcoms wonk -- former Distinguished Member of Technical Staff at AT&T Labs, author of the classic "Stupid Network" paper, member of the FCC's National Broadband team) lost his Verizon fiber network access a week ago in a storm. Since then, he's been blogging the wasteful, inefficient and bizarre ways that Verizon maintains its network, with the sharp eye of a telcoms specialist. It's great reading. Verizon has a soft spot in my heart for being one of the few phone companies in America that refused to participate in illegal mass wiretapping under GW Bush (Whoops, that was Qwest! Verizon built a circuit straight into Quantico), but as far as I can tell, every phone company runs its infrastructure like this.
Brian put a little red laser light on the end of my fiber that points back into the network and went about 750 m down the road to the splitter box. At the splitter box he literally tried to see the light at the other end of the fiber.

Only about 10-15% of the ports in the splitter box were occupied -- this is not a sustainable take rate under anybody's business model. FIOS has been in our neighborhood since 2005. You'd think they'd have signed up a few more FIOS customers.

Brian the technician explained the different ways that technicians map drops to splitters. There's standard company practice, then there's a variation on that (offset by one), then there's the possibility that a repair or a mistake screws up the whole system. He tried all the logical alternatives and did not see the light. Then he proposed to unplug every fiber to rule out the (very real) possibility that my service had been mapped onto a random port. This, of course, would interrupt every FIOS phone call and Internet stream. I egged him on, saying that the whole neighborhood has been getting service glitches since the Big Storm. We unplugged every fiber momentarily, but we never saw the light.

Verizon doesn't know what Verizon knows

(Image: 2008_04_biketrail_infrastructure_063 infrastructure, a Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike image from dsearls' photostream)

Previously:


Profit-sharing arrangements among Somali pirates

Posted: 25 Mar 2010 10:31 PM PDT

The UN Dispatch went digging through the Security Council to Somalia report on Somali pirates, and discovered a fascinating and corporate arrangement for dividing the spoils:
To be eligible for employment as a pirate, a volunteer should already possess a firearm for use in the operation. For this 'contribution', he receives a 'class A' share of any profit. Pirates who provide a skiff or a heavier firearm, like an RPG or a general purpose machine gun, may be entitled to an additional A-share. The first pirate to board a vessel may also be entitled to an extra A-share.

At least 12 other volunteers are recruited as militiamen to provide protection on land of a ship is hijacked, In addition, each member of the pirate team may bring a partner or relative to be part of this land-based force. Militiamen must possess their own weapon, and receive a 'class B' share -- usually a fixed amount equivalent to approximately US$15,000...

When ransom is received, fixed costs are the first to be paid out. These are typically:

• Reimbursement of supplier(s)

• Financier(s) and/or investor(s): 30% of the ransom

• Local elders: 5 to 10 %of the ransom (anchoring rights)

• Class B shares (approx. $15,000 each): militiamen, interpreters etc.

The remaining sum -- the profit -- is divided between class-A shareholders

The Somali Pirates' Business Model (via Kottke)

(Image: Somali Pirates, Wikimedia Commons/US Navy, Public Domain)

Previously:


11 year old girl kicking ass on the bass

Posted: 25 Mar 2010 10:24 PM PDT

Here's 11-year-old bass guitar prodigy Mohini Dey hammering, slapping and walking a wide and impressive set of groovy sounds from a curious, headless instrument. Sometimes she's accompanied by a seemingly younger child on a guitar. Scroll forward to around 8 minutes for the hot slapping craziness. Tina Weymouth, look out!

11 YEAR OLD MOHINI DEY ON BASS (Thanks, Fipi Lele!)

Previously:


UCLA students re-create the World's Columbian Exposition of 1893

Posted: 25 Mar 2010 10:19 PM PDT


The UCLA Urban Simulation Team is undertaking a series of historical re-creations, including the World's Columbian Exposition of 1893. The renders are a little, you know, cartoony, but the fly-through really does give you a sense of the Exposition as it must have been in its glory days. I think the graphics remind me most of Quake or Quake II, which makes me want to run around firing unlikely guns at huge Cthulhoid horrors.

Real-time visual simulation technology has the potential to radically alter our understanding of historic urban environments. Unlike fixed computer animations, real-time technology allows interactive exploration of the modeled site, thereby creating unprecedented opportunities for experiential interpretation and innovative pedagogy. The World's Columbian Exposition of 1893 is a perfect test case for the educational applications of interactive computer models. The exposition was a milestone for American architecture and urban planning. As Director of Works, Daniel Burnham coordinated a team of the most notable architects in the country, each designing one of the fair's major buildings. As a group, these architects created a classical city that would have lasting repercussions on American design ideals and spark the American Renaissance and City Beautiful movements. Our understanding of this important complex has heretofore been based solely on static images and written descriptions. This is no longer the case. Real-time visual simulation technology allows us to reclaim the lost experience of navigating through the White City. Just as in 1893, the completed model will allow users to stroll along the virtual Court of Honor, tour the Wooded Island, and marvel at the fair's classical structures from a gondola.
The World's Columbian Exposition of 1893 (Thanks, Sprockety!)

Hollerin'!

Posted: 25 Mar 2010 04:36 PM PDT

hollerin.jpg

Click on the picture to hear a clip.

Hollerin' is not for the weak of spirit. It's a long-distance communications device, alarm system, karaoke alternative, and slightly questionable method of telling your girlfriend that you're coming over so she should brush her hair. It's also one of the oldest and most exhilarating-sounding methods of communication that I've heard. This compilation of music on Rounder Records documents a contest held in Spivey's Corner, North Carolina between the years of 1969-1975. If you have a history of Hollerin' in your family, please tell me about it! Read some history and listen to excerpts here. It was Leonard Emmanuel, 1971 Hollerin' champion, who said it best: "There was just as much a need of hollerin' as there was of eatin' at that day and time."

Special thanks to Joshua Burkett of the beloved Mystery Train Records in Amherst, MA for sending me this album a few years ago.

This post is part of a series about music that disorients the senses. I've found that some of the most amazing and jarring auditory illusions are not the usual scientifically distilled or synthesized ones, they're often found in folk music and made by people's voices. Of course, in a way, it makes perfect sense - the vocal chords are some of the most complex and advanced musical instruments in existence. They are ubiquitously available, and we've been experimenting with them for longer than any other sound-making implement.

French dude "fingerhacks" Obama's Twitter account

Posted: 25 Mar 2010 02:41 PM PDT

An unemployed 25-year-old man in France said to have hacked into Twitter accounts belonging to President Barack Obama and various celebrities could be headed to the hoosegow. French police conducted a sting lasting several months, with help from the FBI. How'd he do it? "[B]y simply working out the answers to password reminder questions on targets' e-mail accounts, according to investigators."

Ten Alternate Names for the New Sarah Palin Reality Show, from Boing Boing readers

Posted: 25 Mar 2010 02:33 PM PDT

palin.jpg

I asked people who follow me on Twitter to come up with more interesting titles for the forthcoming Sarah Palin television show on TLC than the rather bland "Sarah Palin's Alaska." Following are ten the submissions which caused me to spew the largest spews of coffee on my monitor due to involuntary LOL.

• MYTHMAKERS (@DavidHains )

• NATURE'S DEATH PANELS (@dunagan23)

• PALINTOLOGY (@iheartmuseums )

• WHALIN' WITH PALIN (@hmobius)

• THE BEWILDERNESS (@james_atomic)

• TRAILIN' PALIN (@invisiblea)

• WIFE ON EARTH (@fcw)

• NORTHERN OVEREXPOSURE (@JIMWICh)

• THE BEVERLY SNOWBILLIES (@drhypercube)

and..

• Untitled nature show narrated by David Attenborough, in which the entire family is eaten alive by pack of starving cheetahs. (@dr_ultimately)

Read more about the deal at the New York Times. And The Awl has what I believe to be the one must-read post about the whole affair: "Sarah Palin's 'Planet Earth' and the End Times."

[Image: "Representing the Pro-Death Party. Hi!," a Photoshop creation published on Flickr under a Creative Commons license by Irene Roxanne]

Brin: Google's reroute to HK was suggested by Chinese government

Posted: 25 Mar 2010 02:19 PM PDT

Google's Sergey Brin says in this Wall Street Journal article that the Google.cn reroute to Google.com.hk was actually suggested by the Chinese government. (via Kristie LuStout)

A new species, or something else?

Posted: 25 Mar 2010 02:18 PM PDT

Maybe it's a new species. Maybe it's the love child of a new species and a Neanderthal or human. Maybe it's just an example of Neanderthal diversity and we're all too closed-minded to notice. — Carl Zimmer on varying interpretations of the not-quite-human, not-quite-Neanderthal DNA found in Siberia.

How to make hot water freeze faster than cold

Posted: 25 Mar 2010 02:19 PM PDT

Aristotle, Francis Bacon and Rene Descartes all thought hot water would freeze faster than cold water. The idea sounds ridiculous, but don't write it off just yet. New research shows that hot water really can freeze faster—sometimes, under very specific conditions. This is a great example of how what we see isn't always the full story.

Documentary of Austin musician Kimberly Freeman on YouTube

Posted: 25 Mar 2010 08:28 PM PDT


davidjr says: "I just filmed and released for free on YouTube my entire feature length documentary [One-Eyed Doll]. Didn't think the festival circuit would garner that many views, didn't want it to be in limbo, didn't think people would buy a DVD about a band they never heard of. I wanted to show my talents & the bands."

Punk rock meets poetics in an intimate view of Austin, Texas underground rock star, Kimberly Freeman, a beauty with an irresistible voice, magnetism and moves, who delivers a range of soulful original songs that reflect on her personal story and have a transforming influence on her fans.

Filmmaker davidjr.com, aka David Bruce Bates, Jr., creates a portrait of Kimberly Freeman and her One-Eyed Doll band with one camera in this on-the-scene 'gonzo' style tour through back roads, basement rock houses and clubs from Austin to Harlem. One-Eyed Doll is the 2010 & 2009 Austin Music Awards winner for Best Punk Band.

The trailer is above. Here's the full (1.5 hour) documentary

How Thomas Edison set W. H. Vanderbilt's house on fire

Posted: 25 Mar 2010 02:23 PM PDT

redlight .jpg

This anecdote, taken from Edison's autobiographical notes, may well be one of the most awkward moments in the history of public relations.

So, William Henry Vanderbilt was an early investor in Thomas Edison's electric lighting endeavors, and it wasn't terribly surprising that Vanderbilt wanted to be one of the first kids on the block, so to speak, to get the new lights installed at his own house. This was prior to 1882—and the opening of the first centralized power plant—so the lights were run by an on-site generator installed in the basement. Sadly, the first demonstration of Vanderbilts' lighting system went a bit awry.

About 8 o'clock in the evening we lit it up and it was very good. Mr. Vanderbilt, his wife and some of his daughters cam in and were there a few minutes when a fire occurred. The large picture gallery was lined with silk cloth interwoven with fine metallic tinsel. In some manner, two wires had got crossed with the tinsel, which became red-hot and the whole wall was soon afire ... [the fire is put out] ... Mrs. Vanderbilt became hysterical and wanted to know where it came from. We told her we had the plant in the cellar, and when she learned we had a boiler there, she said she would not occupy the house; she would not live over a boiler. We had to take the whole installation out.

Lessons learned: Better insulation on your electrical wiring = good. Tinsel in your wallpaper = bad. Mrs. Vanderbilt = totally freaked out by the wrong thing.

Image courtesy Flickr user cocreatr, via CC

Quote from "The Papers of Thomas A. Edison, Volume 6". Edited by Paul B. Israel, Louis Carlat, David Hochfelder, Theresa M. Collins and Brian C. Shipley. Published by Johns Hopkins University Press, 2007.

Kombucha in New York Times

Posted: 25 Mar 2010 01:21 PM PDT

As a kombucha homebrewer, I was pleasantly surprised to learn that MAKE columnist Tim Anderson brews his own kombucha as well. From the New York Times:
201003251314 Kombucha's popularity has also attracted home brewers. Tim Anderson, founder of a 3D printer technology company, moved from Boston to Berkeley, Calif., with his "mother" -- passed on to him from a friend who got it, as the story goes, from gypsies in Russia.

Mr. Anderson, an advocate for all things do-it-yourself, made step-by-step kombucha brewing instructions complete with videos for Instructables.com (one of over 200 tutorials he has made on everything from tire sandals to wheelchair shopping carts). Nearly 60,000 people have viewed the kombucha guide to-date, according to the site's page-view statistics.

"I'm surprised people would pay to get this stuff," Mr. Anderson said. "The kind you can buy tastes vinegary and dry, whereas the one you can make yourself is so incredibly delicious."


I agree with Tim. Homebrew kombucha tastes much better than store bought!

A Strange Brew May Be a Good Thing (Via Seth Roberts)

Previously:


Amazing Sierra Club internship opportunity

Posted: 25 Mar 2010 01:23 PM PDT

BB pal Orli Cotel of Sierra Club tells me, "We are offering this ridiculous opportunity that just might be the best internship on earth, where you get paid to travel all over the country as the Sierra Club's youth outdoors ambassador, host a videoblog about helping to get young people outside, and get a bonus $2000 worth of free gear from The North Face." Deadline to apply is March 31. Hey Orli, does a 40-year-old still count as "youth"? Here's the gig:
Internoutdooooo • Travel around the country hiking, rafting, and enjoying the outdoors with the Sierra Club's youth programs

• Create an awesome video blog that documents the experience

• Your home base office will be in beautiful San Francisco at the Sierra Club's headquarters

• Earn a $2,500 stipend for the 8-week internship, plus all expenses paid for travel

• The intern will be outfitted with $2,000 worth of gear from The North Face and Planet Explore

"Want the Best Internship on Earth?"

Toys that inspired sci/tech breakthroughs

Posted: 25 Mar 2010 12:42 PM PDT

Shrinkyyyyy Media Gallery 8D048A7E-9D6F-Fed2-49Af280Bc15930C2 5
Scientific American presents four toys that inspired innovations in science and technology. For example, University of Pittsburgh physicist Jeremy Levy had an Etch A Sketch in mind when developing a new way to fabricate nanoscale transistors. And UC Irvine biomedical engineer Michelle Khine used Shrinky Dink technology to make microfluidic systems for "labs on a chip." (Images above.) From Scientific American:
Khine knew that when Shrinky Dinks condense, any ink lines on the plastic become raised--and that's precisely what she sought in a microfluidics mold. She bought Shrinky Dink plastic designed for computer printer use, printed a pattern, and baked it for several minutes in her toaster oven. The results exceeded her expectations. Instead of just making molds, Khine ultimately developed a technique to make microfluidics chips directly from Shrinky Dink plastic. "It actually worked really well," Khine says, well enough to found a company based on that basic premise. To create products such as stem cell research devices and solar cells, Shrink Nanotechnologies has developed a new material that trumps the toy's abilities. Says Khine: "Shrinky Dinks shrink by 60 percent, but our new polymer shrinks 95 percent. And the properties shrink more consistently."
"Thinking Outside of the Toy Box: 4 Children's Gizmos That Inspired Scientific Breakthroughs" (Thanks, JR Minkel!)

The other side of Chuck Jones

Posted: 25 Mar 2010 01:02 PM PDT

6a010536b5599f970c01310fddde3c970c-500wi.jpg

The great animator Chuck Jones once said that the difference between getting a laugh and not getting a laugh in a cartoon could be one frame out the 24 that flashed past in every second. Jones knew everything there was to know about motion. There's a great moment in a Roadrunner cartoon called Gee Whiz-z-z-z-z-z-z (1956), in which Wile E. Coyote allows himself a brief look of triumph as he finally gets his Acme brand bat wings to work. It always seemed to me that what made the moment work was the absolutely perfect two-beat pause between the look and the inevitable crash into the mountainside. Not one beat; not three; two. That was Jones understanding motion. As it turns out, he had a pretty good grasp of stillness too. Here's a fantastic watercolor from the late 1950s, via Chuck Redux.

Mark Evans: etched leather art

Posted: 25 Mar 2010 12:40 PM PDT

Markevansssssss
Mark Evans etches images into leather using scalpels, huge hunting knives, and other blades. Along with nature scenes like the beautiful piece above, he's also carved portraits of celebrities, from Muhammad Ali to Naomi Campbell. Mark Evans - Etched Leather Artwork (Thanks, Tom Osborne!)

Weekly World News announces Bat Boy manga

Posted: 25 Mar 2010 11:14 AM PDT

Bat-Boy-Japanese
Weekly World News' most famous living mutant, Bat Boy, is pursued in NYC's Times Square by Japanese Idol Yuko Arashi.

Most people know that Buddha said:

Believe nothing,

No matter where you read it,

Or who has said it,

Not even if I have said it,

Unless it agrees with your own reason

And your own common sense.
This is good advice, but I when it comes to the Weekly World News, I make an exception. With a flawless record for rock-solid reporting, "The World's Only Reliable News" beats direct competitors, such as Pravda.ru and The Weekly Standard.

That's why I took this press release about the creation of the first Bat Boy manga and a Japanese language version of the Weekly World News website with the seriousness it deserves:

Takushi Chikakane said, "I am very proud to be bringing Bat Boy, Angry Ed and the other members of the WWN family to the millions of fans in the Japanese market. WWN's smart, yet quirky story telling is tailor made for our market. Upon launch we will instantly be one of the most recognizable character libraries in the market. Bat Boy will also become the focal point for an annual award ceremony. The Bat Boy Award will go to famous Japanese media celebrities each year. Very soon, we expect it will be bigger than the Oscar."

Yuko Arashi, stated, "Bat Boy is very cute. I have a doll of him in my room. If I capture him, my fame in Japan will rival that of our biggest Sumo wrestler."

Japanese join hunt to capture Bat Boy

White House seeking advice on spurring student-led innovation around broadband

Posted: 25 Mar 2010 12:44 PM PDT

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CC-licensed photo from Louis Abate's Flickr stream

Try for a second to forget commercial broadband companies pushing crappy apps and think about what you might actually want to do with gigabit Internet and 4G wireless. What are some killer apps that would really drive demand for everyday access to those speeds? My old UC Berkeley colleague/friend Tom Kalil, now the Deputy Director for Policy in the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, and US CTO Aneesh Chopra, are asking that question on behalf of the US government. They'd like to launch an initiative to spur student-led innovation around next-generation broadband networks, but they'd like helping developing the idea. From the Office of Science and Technology Policy:
Now is the time to launch an initiative that would cultivate, with student involvement, such a wave of innovation (for broadband networks). Although it's impossible to predict what the next generation of applications will be, universities, companies, and students could work together under such an initiative, which would serve as a sort of "Petri dish" where new ideas could incubate and grow. This initiative could be led by the private sector, encourage multi-campus and even global collaboration, build on investments already made in high-speed research networks such as Internet2 and National LambdaRail, and take advantage of a growing number of grants from the Department of Commerce's Broadband Technology Opportunities Program (BTOP).

The initiative could have a number of elements, including:

• Campus-based incubators for the development of broadband applications, with access to high-speed networks, cutting-edge peripherals, software development kits, and cloud computing services.

• Relevant courses that encourage multidisciplinary teams of students to design and develop broadband applications.

• Competitions that recognize compelling applications developed by students. Some existing competitions that could serve as models include Google's Android Developer Challenge, Microsoft's Imagine Cup, and the FCC-Knight Foundation's "Apps for Inclusion" competition.

"The Role of Student-Led Innovation in "Killer Apps" for Broadband Networks"

Drew Friedman's "Alice In Wackoland" art

Posted: 25 Mar 2010 10:24 AM PDT

Drewfriedman Images 3718813878 The inimitable Drew Friedman created the cover art for this week's issue of The Nation, featuring Glenn Beck as the Mad Hatter, Sarah Palin as The Queen of Hearts, and Rush Limbaugh as The Cheshire Cat. Drew says, "Beck was a bit tricky (to draw) as he's basically a nondescript, bland looking, pudgy-faced guy, a former "comic" who still looks like every other guy who performs at 'Chuckles' or 'Wacky's' Comedy Clubs across the country."
Alice in Wakcoland

Great Fables Crossover: Fables goes even more meta, stays just as rollicking

Posted: 25 Mar 2010 08:47 AM PDT

I just finished Fables Vol. 13: The Great Fables Crossover, the latest collection in Bill Willingham's superb Fables series. This is an incredibly complicated, long-running story in which all the fables of every time and land have been chased from their dimensions by a dark power, and have gone into hiding in NYC, where a final battle is brewing.

The last Fables volume, War and Pieces, had enough finality in it that I erroneously believed it to be the end of the series -- for one thing, I couldn't imagine what else could come to top it. I was bemused to discover that the series was only half-done, and that the real action was only getting started.

Crossover marks a transition to a different kind of second act for the storyline, I think. As the title suggests, the story is a crossover between the main Fables serial and one of the spinoffs, Jack of Fables (which depicts the many adventures of the roguish Jack of Beanstalk fame).

In Crossover, the Literals (literal embodiments of philosophical and literary ideals, such as the Pathetic Fallacy and a trio of beautiful, ass-kicking embodiments of librarianship) suck the Fables into a new kind of fight -- a fight against the Writer, himself a Literal, bent on rewriting reality and making a better one, in order to rein in the characters and situations who've run away from him.

As with previous volumes, it's whacking great fun, as well as being an education in the ways of storytelling and a philosophical rumination on the nature of belief, reality, and the power of stories. Willingham's humor and scenarios grow more meta with each installment, but somehow, it never degenerates into a mere exercise -- Fables is always, first and foremost, a wonderful story.

Fables Vol. 13: The Great Fables Crossover

List of all Fables collections

Free download of Fables 1

Previously:


Child-abuse survivors oppose EU censorwall

Posted: 25 Mar 2010 08:44 AM PDT

A recently leaked European Council proposal seeks to create a "Great Firewall of Europe," instituted to block sites that depict the abuse of children. As with other censorwalls, it's unlikely that this will performed as intended, since paedophiles will circumvent it with proxies, or by using P2P or email or private websites to trade illegal material. But the creation of a continent-wide network censorship scheme is likely to cause new problems, inviting authorities to shoehorn ever-greater slices of the net into the "illegal" category -- this has already happened in Australia and other countries that have built Chinese-style censorship regimes.

One of the most nuanced and important challenges to the EC proposal has come from MOGiS e.V, a German organization of child-abuse survivors. They've issued a statement condemning the proposal on several grounds: first, that censorship is unlikely to attain its stated goals and will create new harms, and second (and most importantly), that the EC should be turning its attention to making it easier for EU member-states and other nations to actually shut down sites that host images depicting the abuse of children.

Christian Bahls, a spokesperson for the group, says, "Blocking just hides the problem and actually lowers the police's incentive to become active. Also, going after the servers means a small chance of catching the people that put it there in the first place. Images of child abuse are outlawed all over the world. There is a global consensus that this imagery is illegal and should not be distributed (see the 193 Interpol members or the 117 signatories to the 'Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography')."

MOGiS e.V. was formed in Germany in 2009 in order to fight censorship proposals there, and now they are extending their work across the EU, along with other anti-censorship groups, to call for meaningful solutions to the abuse of children and to fight against unworkable, dangerous knee-jerk censorship proposals. Their slogan is "Remove, don't block! -- Act, and don't look away!"

Leaked EC censorship proposal (PDF)

MOGiS statement on EC proposal

(Thanks, Christian!)

Previously:


Hot Tub Time Machine

Posted: 25 Mar 2010 09:29 AM PDT

hot-tub-time-machine-th.jpg John Cusack, who will soon be joining us here at Boing Boing as a guestblogger, has a new movie out tomorrow, Friday March 26: Hot Tub Time Machine.

Ebert likes it, and that's about all I need to know. Those of you, both men and women, who are old enough to have enjoyed "electroclash" back when it was called "new wave" and came out on vinyl will likely find much to enjoy. It's sort Hangover meets H.G. Wells meets 80s nostalgia, meets a dude in a bear suit and sex jokes.

Cusack, as Ebert writes in his review, pretty much rules in everything—even goofy escapist fare such as this. As the Village Voice headline aptly explains, "The Delorean's a jacuzzi and the 80s are back." Snip from a Chicago Sun-Times interview:

Q. With a name like "Hot Tub Time Machine," you have a lot to live up to.
Cusack: I sort of thought it was the other way around. If you have a title like "Hot Tub Time Machine," that's a stupid title. Maybe people are going to think the people who made it have lost their mind completely. When they go in and see it, they're going to be so pleasantly surprised ... [Laughs] It's pretty hard for people to say "Hot Tub Time Machine" does not live up to the artistic expectations we had.

Q: Why did you decide to produce this movie?
Cusack: Grace [Loh, his production partner] and I thought this would be ... very smart, post-modern and very dumb. Post-modern in the way that you have a movie within a movie. You have actors who were in these '80s movies going back to movies that, it's almost like Crispin [Glover] and I and Chevy [Chase] kind of being trapped into a version of film youth. We thought that mixture could be a pretty fun ride for a comedy if you get it right.

Boing Boing readers and internet continuity extremists will note that the comedy contains a few elements of historical fudging with regard to when the internet and email were invented, and by whom. And that is why FSM invented comment threads, my children.

Hot Tub Time Machine.

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