The Latest from Boing Boing |  |
- Most accurate analogy ever for The Great Internet Commenting Dilemma
- Spacesuits of yesteryear, from Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum Collection
- Best thing to come out of Antennagate? Apple's "antenna testing chamber" porn.
- More on how Gizmodo got its gear back in the "iPhone Warrant" kerfuffle
- Game of Life in HTML 5
- CreatueCast: Fried Egg Jellyfish
- Boing Boing Game Dev Challenge: The Winners!
- Wired forecast the iPad's existence in 1999
- Maple Mountain Sunburst: Isabella Rossellini reads prose by Aldous Huxley's wife (music video)
- Man claims stolen house was bought from God
- Voice actor Billy West on how to create Popeye's two-octave grumble
- Dent May sings Oh Paris! on his magnificent ukulele
- Gizmodo editor Jason Chen to finally get his stuff back: San Mateo D.A. withdraws iPhone warrant
- Cognitive Dissonance Theory for Juggalos
- The Windmill Farmer: animated short by Joaquin Baldwin
- Antennagate: the Apple press conference
- 4chan "backtraced," reported to "cyberpolice" by mustachioed mad dad
- HFBD2ME
- Winds howl over the deserted moonscape behind Rupert Murdoch's UK newspaper paywalls
- Rube Goldberg rat-run sends a neutral balloon through dozens of Dyson bladeless fans
- Vatican: ordaining women is as bad as raping children from the pulpit
- Buzzword Blank Verse: the Search Engine video podcast returns!
| Most accurate analogy ever for The Great Internet Commenting Dilemma Posted: 16 Jul 2010 08:09 PM PDT Weingarten, preach it: "I basically like 'comments,' though they can seem a little jarring: spit-flecked rants that are appended to a product that at least tries for a measure of objectivity and dignity. It's as though when you order a sirloin steak, it comes with a side of maggots." (via Joel Johnson) |
| Spacesuits of yesteryear, from Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum Collection Posted: 16 Jul 2010 03:16 PM PDT  Over at Gizmodo there's a wonderful image gallery from the book Spacesuits: The Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum Collection, by author Amanda Young and photographer Mark Avino. Incidentally, this particular image reminds me of a frame from Maurice Sendak's In the Night Kitchen. "Milk in the batter, milk in the batter! We bake cakes like nothing's the matter!" Smithsonian's Spacesuits: Number One On The Runway (Gizmodo) |
| Best thing to come out of Antennagate? Apple's "antenna testing chamber" porn. Posted: 16 Jul 2010 07:32 PM PDT  Reporters who attended the "Antennagate" presser today in Cupertino were invited to tour the company's "$100 million antenna designing and test facilities." They're blinding us with science! Bonus: When I right-clicked to save this jpeg from the Apple website, I noticed that the original file name included the words "Stargate Chamber." The hell with your free bumpers, Mr. Jobs, I want one of these suckers! Related: Farhad Manjoo of Slate didn't go to the press conference, but he published a decidedly sour, not-impressed take on the day's Apple news. Wilson Rothman, formerly of Gizmodo and now of MSNBC, has a contrasting recap piece here. (HT: Glenn Fleishman) |
| More on how Gizmodo got its gear back in the "iPhone Warrant" kerfuffle Posted: 16 Jul 2010 03:39 PM PDT Following up on news from earlier today: Ryan Singel of Wired News tweets, "Gizmodo outs its iPhone 4G source in return for getting editor's computers back from cops. That's fearless journalism." From the Wired News piece: "Asked if Gizmodo will provide police with the names of its sources, [San Mateo County Chief Deputy District Attorney Stephen] Wagstaff replied only that they have agreed with [Gizmodo's] defense attorney [Thomas] Nolan that anything beyond the computer documents -- such as what went on around the story, or what his client's motives might have been -- would be answered by Nolan, not Chen or Gizmodo." Oddly, though, other outlets reported that it was Wired News, not Gizmodo, that outed Gizmodo's source. |
| Posted: 16 Jul 2010 02:39 PM PDT  Joseph Mansfield created an HTML 5 implementation of John Conway's Game of Life, the classic cellular automaton first devised in 1970. Conway's Game of Life in HTML 5 (via Technoccult)
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| CreatueCast: Fried Egg Jellyfish Posted: 16 Jul 2010 02:04 PM PDT On the latest episode of CreatureCast, from Casey Dunn's evolutionary biology lab at Brown University, we meet the Fried Egg Jellyfish and learn about "some of the dramas that play out on jellyfish stages." Sophia Tintori interviewed Trisha Towanda, and animated and edited the video. The music is by Amil Byleckie. From the episode description: In the vast ocean, without walls and far from the floor, jellyfish can become drifting islands of activity. Creatures from far and wide will congregate on them to act out the ups and downs of life and death. Jellyfish have symbiotic relationships with living things of all sizes, from fish and shrimp that feed off them or off the pieces of food left between their tentacles, to single-celled photosynthesizing organisms that take shelter inside the cytoplasm of the jellyfish's cells.CreatureCast- Jellyfish Theater
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| Boing Boing Game Dev Challenge: The Winners! Posted: 16 Jul 2010 06:37 PM PDT  We are thrilled to announce the winners of the first ever Boing Boing "Games Inspired by Music" Competition, sponsored by Safari Books Online. The polls closed at midnight with Zachary Johnson's Infiltration and Zachary Lewis's Space Junk nearly neck and neck. Space Junk took the grand prize with 249 votes, followed by Infiltration with 233 votes. Coming in third was Sean Monahan's Beat Boost! All three of these are instant old-school classics!
Mr. Lewis receives the grand prize of a year of access to Safari Books Online, a $515 value, and a fat prize pack from GAMA-GO, including a limited-edition art print, GAMA-GO book, Gama-Goon Statue, Sing-A-Long Tongs, and other goodies. Mr. Johnson and Mr. Monahan score three month subscriptions to Safari Books Online, valued at $128 each, and a grip of GAMA-GO goods like a Yeti Qee Keychain, Pocket Journal, and Hip-Hopsicles!
Thank you to everyone who took the time to create an entry! We're blown away by the effort and raw mutant creativity that went into these! And much appreciation to the chiptunes composers who inspired us with the bleeps and bloops. And thanks to all who played and voted! Finally, much appreciation to our partner Safari Books Online. We've wanted to hold a competition like this for a long time and we're grateful to them for helping us make it happen. For the foreseeable future, they're offering Boing Boing readers a special 15 day trial of Safari Books Online plus 15% discount for 12 months (new subscribers only) on a subscription. Check it out! And if this is all new to you, please visit the Boing Boing Arcade, featuring all the finalists in our contest. Shall we play a game? |
| Wired forecast the iPad's existence in 1999 Posted: 16 Jul 2010 01:10 PM PDT  It appears that Wired Magazine predicted that Apple would create "a wireless handheld dubbed the iPad" in its April, 1999 issue. via @betsymason |
| Maple Mountain Sunburst: Isabella Rossellini reads prose by Aldous Huxley's wife (music video) Posted: 16 Jul 2010 12:30 PM PDT
Andy McNeill of The Maple Mountain Sunburst Triolian Orchestra shares the fantastic video above with Boing Boing, for the band's song "LookListenFeel." You can also watch it at 30,000 feet: on-board Virgin America planes on our in-flight Boing Boing Video entertainment channel. Andy explains. Last August I drove to Isabella Rossellini's apartment in Manhattan from the little town of Elora Ontario where I live, armed with a laptop and a mic. There we recorded her narration for two tracks for my album The Maple Mountain Sunburst Triolian Orchestra. She was as gracious and wonderful as one would imagine.The video was created entirely in illustrator and After Effects CS4. YouTube link, or Vimeo link. You can buy this song, or the entire album, here. |
| Man claims stolen house was bought from God Posted: 16 Jul 2010 12:48 PM PDT Brent Wilson of Lake County, Montana was convicted of illegally taking possession of a foreclosed house and moving in. Apparently, Wilson had filed paperwork with the county claiming that he had actually bought the home... from Yahweh. From FindLaw: Many of the journal entries was also addressed to Yahweh, whom Wilson seemed to regard as a sort of sleeping partner in his real estate endeavors."Man Steals House, Claimed He Purchased it From Yahweh" |
| Voice actor Billy West on how to create Popeye's two-octave grumble Posted: 16 Jul 2010 12:45 PM PDT Voice actor Billy West was on NPR's Fresh Air yesterday. I always love hearing actors do roles on radio, especially someone like West who is known for such original roles as Fry, Professor Farnsworth, and Dr. Zoidberg on Futurama. But what really wow-ed me was his description of how he learned to emulate the unforgettably unique voice of Popeye, as originally done by Jack Mercer: It's worth listening to the whole segment (it's 28 minutes long), but the Popeye bit starts at about 17:05. Billy West: The Many (Cartoon) Voices In His Head [Fresh Air] |
| Dent May sings Oh Paris! on his magnificent ukulele Posted: 16 Jul 2010 12:03 PM PDT My friends over at Creative Commons are listening to this lovely song — Oh Paris! performed by Dent May & His Magnificent Ukulele — in their office today. I'm putting it on my playlist for this weekend's road trip to Yosemite. (Thanks, Lisa Green!) |
| Gizmodo editor Jason Chen to finally get his stuff back: San Mateo D.A. withdraws iPhone warrant Posted: 16 Jul 2010 11:59 AM PDT EFF reports that the San Mateo county district attorney will withdraw the Gizmodo iPhone 4 warrant. Jason Chen gets his stuff back. But the ordeal may not be over: "The police could (for example) attempt to subpoena the same material without running afoul of section 1524(g) and still proceed with their case." A case, huh? Did someone say something about a free case? I'll be here all week. |
| Cognitive Dissonance Theory for Juggalos Posted: 16 Jul 2010 08:22 PM PDT 
A prankster who goes by the pseudonym of "Laszlo Thoth," one of the "scientist haters" who participated in an educational prank on a horde of Juggalos in San Francisco recently, shares this Guide to Cognitive Dissonance Theory for Insane Clown Posse fans. "It's actually a pretty good layperson's introduction to cognitive dissonance theory," he says, "with examples that most people (including juggalos) can relate to." Update: The person who submitted this to me to post on Boing Boing doesn't have much more of a sense of humor than the Insane Clown Posse band members who confronted and threatened the Noisebridge folks at the ICP show. "Laszlo Thoth" has removed the linked-to content from Google Docs because he was offended at my re-use of the term "scientist haters" below, a reference to the ridiculous put-down the pranksters received in person from ICP. He requested that I omit the phrase, and submitted a rewrite of my blog post he'd rather see me publish, and I declined. For funny people making fun of a funny song from a funny band, I'm dismayed at the total lack of humor. Apologies for the dead link.
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| The Windmill Farmer: animated short by Joaquin Baldwin Posted: 16 Jul 2010 11:35 AM PDT Animator and filmmaker Joaquin Baldwin, whose work I've featured before on Boing Boing Video, has a lovely new short up: the tale of a farmer in danger of losing his crop of windmills when he struggles against the cyclical forces of nature. Joaquin created this at the UCLA Animation Workshop, with music by Nick Fevola. He explains, This film was inspired while driving back from a trip to Palm Springs, when my partner said that it must take them forever to plant and grow so many windmills. I wrote down the title The Windmill Farmer for an idea to explore later, and about a year later I started developing it into a character and story. This film took 4 months to complete from the first boards until the final mix.The Windmill Farmer (YouTube) Watch more films by Joaquin Baldwin here.
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| Antennagate: the Apple press conference Posted: 16 Jul 2010 10:44 AM PDT Antennagate: the neologism Steve Jobs just used to describe media frenzy over allegations of design flaws in Apple's iPhone 4. Some live coverage from the press conference in Cupertino: Gdgt, Wired, Gizmodo's meta-coverage, Engadget, and Markoff's tweets. Update: as predicted, free cases. |
| 4chan "backtraced," reported to "cyberpolice" by mustachioed mad dad Posted: 16 Jul 2010 07:47 PM PDT Update: video edited and re-uploaded to include *only* mad mustache dad's epic rant, without the 11 year old girl who is too young to know how unwise it is to webcam her woes, or mess with /b/.
"I know! Who's emailin' and who's doin' it, and you've been reported to the state police and the cyber-police. And you better try one more thing and if you screw with my computer again, you'll be arrested. End of conversation! From her father."
I would like to learn more about these "backtraces" of which you speak, mustache dad. Know Your Meme explains, and Gawker posts less-funny background on the origins of this video, and the bullying involved. (thanks, SH-P!). |
| Posted: 16 Jul 2010 07:54 AM PDT I'm 39 tomorrow (and Disneyland is 55) (though these facts are not related), so I am taking some time off from the machine to celebrate. See you Monday! |
| Winds howl over the deserted moonscape behind Rupert Murdoch's UK newspaper paywalls Posted: 16 Jul 2010 08:16 AM PDT Newser's Michael Wolff has a report from behind Rupert Murdoch's notorious UK paywalls which went up this month around The Times and Sunday Times's sites, which are apparently ghost-towns, unpeopled even by the print subscribers who get free access but can't be arsed to log in (and never follow links to Times stories, since chances are anyone in a position to make such a link doesn't have an account for the site). What's Really Going on Behind Murdoch's Paywall? (via /.) (Image: Desert Moon Rising, a Creative Commons Attribution (2.0) image from joshsommers's photostream)
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| Rube Goldberg rat-run sends a neutral balloon through dozens of Dyson bladeless fans Posted: 16 Jul 2010 07:36 AM PDT Here's a lovely little sport: Dyson engineers rendered a helium balloon neutrally buoyant and then fed it into a Mousetrap-style rat-run composed of Dyson bladeless fans, through which it bumbled and slurped and bounced, drawn through on invisible air currents. All it wants for total nerdvana is colored smoke-streamers. We bought one of these fans last month during the Big Heat in London. We needed a new fan for the baby's room, one that was easy to adjust, one that she couldn't feed her fingers into (she's still small enough to get her fingers well into the grill on our bedroom fan) and to be honest, I just wanted to see how it worked for myself. It certainly cost a lot more than a "normal" fan, but it's not as though I buy a fan every month; spending extra on a one-time purchase bothers me a lot less than setting up recurring premium expenses. The verdict? We like it. It's spooky, of course, to have a bladeless fan that seems to conjure a breeze out of nothing. I'd heard reports that it was noisy, but relative to our other fan, it's actually quite quiet. I'd also read that it was a little underpowered, but again, not so I've noticed. I'm actually considering buying one for the office now. Balloons and Dyson Air Multiplier fans (via Make) |
| Vatican: ordaining women is as bad as raping children from the pulpit Posted: 16 Jul 2010 08:06 AM PDT A new set of directives from the Vatican marginally increase the Church's vigilance against paedophile priests (Bishops are now encouraged, but not required, to report rapist priests to civil authorities); however, the same document includes a list of "more grave delicts" that are on par with raping children. On that list are "heresy, apostasy, schism" and ordaining woman priests. Vatican Revises Abuse Process, but Causes Stir (via @jamie_love) |
| Buzzword Blank Verse: the Search Engine video podcast returns! Posted: 16 Jul 2010 07:51 AM PDT Jesse Brown of the Search Engine podcast has just kicked off a new season of video installments. He sez, "It's called 'The Guru', and consists of the jargon contained therein was submitted to me by Search Engine listeners. They swear they've heard it all used in earnest!" It's like blank verse composed by MBAs. The fact that some people get off on this phrasing is further proof of Rule 34. |
I loved Jack Mercer, and I got him. I understood him. And what helped me understand that Popeye voice -- it's a high voice and a low voice at the same time -- cause when I was a kid, we all used to try to do that and we all stunk. It didn't sound right. So one day, I see this film -- it was an independent film called Genghis Blues. And it was about this blind singer in San Francisco who wrote a hit for Steve Miller. ... And he was listening to a world-band radio one night, and he heard this strange noise. And it was a program about Tuvan singers. And Tuvans had a way of singing where they could do one and two voices. And I realized, 'Oh man, that's how this guy did it. Jack Mercer.' [He imitates both voices.] There'd be two voices, an octave apart. And he'd put them together." 
The wider implications of this emptiness are only just starting to become clear. A Murdoch and Fleet Street veteran with whom I've been corresponding about the paywall reported to me on his recent conversation with an A-list entertainment publicist: "What was really interesting to me was that this person volunteered a blinding realization. 'Why would I get any of my clients to talk to the Times or the Sunday Times if they are behind a paywall? Who can see it? I can't even share a link and they aren't on search. It's as though their writers don't exist anymore...'" 
The Vatican issued revisions to its internal laws on Thursday making it easier to discipline sex-abuser priests, but caused confusion by also stating that ordaining women as priests was as grave an offense as pedophilia. | You are subscribed to email updates from Boing Boing To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. | Email delivery powered by Google |
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