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TOM THE DANCING BUG: What Mischief Does Li'l Mitt Get Into This Time? Kodak had weapons-grade uranium Ed Piskor's hacker history comix Wizzywig, the book trailer Occupy footage exonerates journalist; cop lied under oath REM and Dan Rather: "What's the frequency, Kenneth?" Reflections on the acquittal of Byron Sonne The DeLorean of game developers? The Playstation Vita as a cellphone How to annoy people on Twitter Puzzle adventure Fract takes shape Cambridge Quad Notebook: The Best Graph Paper War Crimes trial for Ratko Mladic begins in The Hague Urban plant tags Anti-anonymous hacker doxed--perhaps a little too spectacularly Comparing gender in Lego minifig heads Apollo 10 space-a-versary: Space Meal, 1969 Maggie talking about decentralized electricity and the future of energy in New York City Reddit culture well-tuned to spot hoaxes Geology geeks: Time for a shopping spree Unpacking privilege: straight white male is the lowest difficulty setting in the game of life Alt Cartoonist Receives High Praise from Establishment Police loom over Byron Sonne's victory party Clay Shirky on the relationship between physical space and creativity History of gendering in Lego Rocking Horses of the Apocalypse Excerpt from Coldest War, sequel to Tregillis's fantastic supernatural alternate WWII novel Bitter Seedss Airplane converted into Space Shuttle food truck Paranoid, claustrophobic short film: The View From the Closet iPod Body Mod: magnetic wrist piercings become mount for Apple iPod Nano "How Yahoo Killed Flickr and Lost the Internet"—Mat Honan TOM THE DANCING BUG: What Mischief Does Li'l Mitt Get Into This Time?
By Ruben Bolling on May 16, 2012 12:30 pm Support Tom the Dancing Bug and receive BENEFITS and PRIVILEGES by joining the INNER HIVE right now! "My only argument with Ruben B. here is his apologetic tone for asking you to pay money for early access to his very good comics —- that is to say, something that YOU LIKE AND WANT. DO NOT ...
Read in browser Kodak had weapons-grade uranium
By David Pescovitz on May 16, 2012 12:06 pm For three decades, camera company Kodak had a secret deep inside an underground lab in its Rochester, New York research facility: weapons-grade uranium and a californium neutron flux multiplier. (No, not a flux capacitor.) They stored 3.5 pounds of the uranium, apparently not enough to make a nuclear weapon but still not something you'd expect ...
Read in browser Ed Piskor's hacker history comix Wizzywig, the book trailer
By Cory Doctorow on May 16, 2012 11:41 am Our own Ed Piskor's Wizzywig -- a graphic novel that is a fictionalized account of a Kevin Mitnick-type hacker and his run-ins with the law -- will shortly be available as a beautiful hardcover from the good folks at Top Shelf Comix, who put together the excellent book trailer you see above. Here are my ...
Read in browser Occupy footage exonerates journalist; cop lied under oath
By Rob Beschizza on May 16, 2012 11:34 am Photojournalist Alexander Arbuckle, arrested while covering Occupy Wall Street protests, was acquitted Tuesday after a short trial. Moreover, footage shown in court suggests that police lied about what happened. Arbuckle was charged with disorderly conduct when police rounded up New Year's Day protestors near Sixth Avenue. The arresting officer claimed that he was blocking traffic ...
Read in browser REM and Dan Rather: "What's the frequency, Kenneth?"
By David Pescovitz on May 16, 2012 11:11 am Jason and I were just revisiting the bizarrely fascinating story of Dan Rather getting assaulted in 1986 by an attacker who kept asking the newscaster "Kenneth, what is the frequency?" as he beat him. Of course, that led us to REM's 1994 song "What's the frequency, Kenneth?," culminating in Rather singing the song with the ...
Read in browser Reflections on the acquittal of Byron Sonne
By Cory Doctorow on May 16, 2012 11:06 am Yesterday, Byron Sonne was acquitted of all charges against him. Sonne is the Toronto-area security researcher who pointedly demonstrated the inadequacy and incoherence of the heavy-handed, $1.2B security arrangements for the G20 summit in 2010. Denise Balkissoon has done some of the best reporting on the bizarre trial that followed (after Sonne spent nearly a ...
Read in browser The DeLorean of game developers?
By Rob Beschizza on May 16, 2012 11:03 am A game development outfit took $75m from the state of Rhode Island to move there and hire 450 locals. Two years later, there's only half the jobs, questions over the company's solvency, and no game to show for it. Maybe Lotus can quickly bang something out for them to stuff a lawnmower engine in!
Read in browser The Playstation Vita as a cellphone
By Rob Beschizza on May 16, 2012 10:53 am Sony's tiny but powerful pocket game console has 3G, but no phone app. Skype to the rescue. [Ars]
Read in browser How to annoy people on Twitter
By Rob Beschizza on May 16, 2012 10:46 am There are 11 Ways You're Annoying On Twitter, reports Buzzfeed's Katie Heaney. And not a single one more!
Read in browser Puzzle adventure Fract takes shape
By Rob Beschizza on May 16, 2012 10:44 am Fract is a bizarre-looking game described as "Myst meets Rez meets Tron" in a world "inspired by synthesizers." Sold. Jim Rossignol interviews the creators. [Rock Paper Shotgun]
Read in browser Cambridge Quad Notebook: The Best Graph Paper
By Cool Tools on May 16, 2012 10:36 am Having just finished a year of math and science heavy coursework, I am confident in stating that the Cambridge Quad Wirebound Notebook is one of the best tools I've used all year. Notebooks may seem like a silly thing to get worked up about, but having used this day-in and day-out for a year I ...
Read in browser War Crimes trial for Ratko Mladic begins in The Hague
By Jasmina Tesanovic on May 16, 2012 10:27 am Photo: Jasmina in a former prison. "Despite the scale of the facility, it was densely crowded once." Shot by Bruce Sterling. This morning, The Hague tribunal commenced the trial of Ratko Mladic, ex commander of the army of the Serbian republic in Bosnia. Mothers of the slain gathered in front of the court. Twenty years ...
Read in browser Urban plant tags
By Maggie Koerth-Baker on May 16, 2012 10:18 am I'm amused and charmed by this theoretical public art project proposed by Minneapolis' Carmichael Lynch Creative. Urban Plant Tags explain the care, placement, and proper feeding of inanimate objects like benches, streetlights, and fire hydrants. You can go to the website to read those plant tags more clearly. But I love the care instructions for ...
Read in browser Anti-anonymous hacker doxed--perhaps a little too spectacularly
By Rob Beschizza on May 16, 2012 10:12 am The Jester, a vigilante hacker opposed to Anonymous and Wikileaks, was apparently exposed over the last few days. His blog, twitter account and other tracks were soon gone. Many, however, think he's just acting out a scheme to ransom details of the ostensibly "real" identity. [Sean Gallagher at Ars Technica]
Read in browser Comparing gender in Lego minifig heads
By Cory Doctorow on May 16, 2012 10:02 am From the Boing Boing Flickr pool, Maia Weinstock's chart of gender in Lego minifig heads. There's an accompanying blog post, where Weinstock explains: So many of LEGO's sets today are made in conjunction with a movie or other Hollywood media brand. It's a win-win for Hollywood producers and LEGO alike. But how many of those ...
Read in browser Apollo 10 space-a-versary: Space Meal, 1969
By Xeni Jardin on May 16, 2012 10:00 am To commemorate the May 18, 1969 launch of Apollo 10, our friends at the Smithsonian are celebrating the launch by sharing this photo of a meal package from the Apollo 10 mission: The Apollo 10 spacecraft launched from Cape Kennedy at 12:49 p.m. EST with commander Thomas Stafford, command module pilot John Young and lunar ...
Read in browser Maggie talking about decentralized electricity and the future of energy in New York City
By Maggie Koerth-Baker on May 16, 2012 09:50 am I'm going to be in New York at the end of May, talking about my new book Before the Lights Go Out. There's two great events you should join me for. On May 29th at 6:00 pm, I'll be talking about the electric grid, the process of writing a book, and how writing online has ...
Read in browser Reddit culture well-tuned to spot hoaxes
By Rob Beschizza on May 16, 2012 09:36 am In professor T. Mills Kelly's class, students act out clever public hoaxes. But while Wikipedians are easily fooled, Redditors exposed the latest jape—Do you think my 'Uncle' Joe was just weird or possibly a serial killer?— instantly. Yoni Appelbaum at The Atlantic unravels what happened. Although most communities treat their members with gentle regard, Reddit ...
Read in browser Geology geeks: Time for a shopping spree
By Maggie Koerth-Baker on May 16, 2012 09:20 am The United States Geological Survey is having a great big spring sale, with lots of maps, charts, and publications—some of them mid-century vintage—discounted to $1. Yes, $1. At that price, you can't afford to not own entirely too many USGS maps. (Via Travis Weller)
Read in browser Unpacking privilege: straight white male is the lowest difficulty setting in the game of life
By Cory Doctorow on May 16, 2012 09:00 am John Scalzi attempts to explain privilege using a video-game metaphor in "Straight White Male: The Lowest Difficulty Setting There Is." It's a good metaphor in that is illuminates more than it obscures (the litmus test for metaphors). Okay: In the role playing game known as The Real World, "Straight White Male" is the lowest difficulty ...
Read in browser Alt Cartoonist Receives High Praise from Establishment
By Glenn Fleishman on May 16, 2012 07:00 am Stereotypes abound of the political cartoonists found in so-called alternative papers: the weeklies full of escort ads in the back and snarky commentary in the front. Matt Bors, on the surface, seems to embody the characteristics. He's scruffy, doesn't own a suit, and lives in Portland. He expresses withering contempt at politicians, mainstream media, and ...
Read in browser Police loom over Byron Sonne's victory party
By Cory Doctorow on May 16, 2012 02:10 am Uh-oh. A tweet from Toronto notes that weirdly, there are 4 cop cars outside #hacklabto as they are having a party for #freebyron. HackLabTo is the Kensington Market hackerspace that Byron Sonne (who was acquitted yesterday on all counts related to his emperor-wears-no-clothesery of the Toronto G20 summit in 2010) is affiliated with. Update: they're ...
Read in browser Clay Shirky on the relationship between physical space and creativity
By Cory Doctorow on May 16, 2012 12:43 am I really liked Clay Shirky's essay on the relationship between physical space and creativity. It's one of those classic, Shirkian riffs that includes a bunch of seemingly glib and merely clever ideas and culminates with a thing that ties it all together and makes you realize that a bunch of stuff you've been taking for ...
Read in browser History of gendering in Lego
By Cory Doctorow on May 15, 2012 11:50 pm On Sociological Images, David Pickett is tracing the history of gendering in Lego toys, from the early efforts to produce girl-sets and boy-sets before 1988, to the full-blown gendering watershed attending the release of the Pirates minifigs, which had definite "girl" and "boy" characters. It all went downhill from there, too. He's got two parts ...
Read in browser Rocking Horses of the Apocalypse
By Cory Doctorow on May 15, 2012 11:08 pm Artist Carrin Welch's first foray into sculpture is a marvellous set of "Four Rocking Horses of the Apocalypse," made from wood. They're nearly finished, and eminently ridable. My interpretation of these horsemen from Revelations in the Bible is very loose, it's an artistic idea based mostly on how I want them to look, and less ...
Read in browser Excerpt from Coldest War, sequel to Tregillis's fantastic supernatural alternate WWII novel Bitter Seedss
By Cory Doctorow on May 15, 2012 09:53 pm Tor.com has just posted an excerpt from Ian Tregillis's The Coldest War, a sequel to his smashing debut Nazi X-men vs English warlocks alternate history, Bitter Seeds. I've got a review queued up for Coldest War (which is a captured-Nazi-Soviet-Xmen-Ninjas v English warlocks novel), and I just loved it. Tregillis is one of the most ...
Read in browser Airplane converted into Space Shuttle food truck
By David Pescovitz on May 15, 2012 09:52 pm The out-of-this-world Space Shuttle Cafe can be yours for $150,000. It sure would make a far-out food truck. (Sweet old car not included.) From the eBay listing: This kitchen is built inside the only road worthy DC3 Airplane licensed for street use in the world that we know of, painted in the theme of NASA'S ...
Read in browser Paranoid, claustrophobic short film: The View From the Closet
By Cory Doctorow on May 15, 2012 08:49 pm Tomek sends us his claustrophobic short film "The View From the Closet" ("A disturbed, paranoid individual enters his apartment to find himself being watched by something hiding in the closet"), which is an official selection at Los Angeles Short Film Festival. View From The Closet is now online (Thanks, Tomek!)
Read in browser iPod Body Mod: magnetic wrist piercings become mount for Apple iPod Nano
By Xeni Jardin on May 15, 2012 08:45 pm REUTERS/Keith Bedford Tattoo artist Dave Hurban displays an iPod Nano which he has attached to his wrists through magnetic piercings in his wrist in New York, May 14, 2012. Reuters has an interview with him here. "I just invented the strapless watch," he said on Monday of his Apple Inc device, set to display a ...
Read in browser "How Yahoo Killed Flickr and Lost the Internet"—Mat Honan
By Xeni Jardin on May 15, 2012 08:35 pm An excellent long-read about Flickr and Yahoo by Mat Honan at Gizmodo today. Anyone who has loved and been let down by the once-great photo-sharing site now caught in the purple zombie's death spiral will nod in agreement throughout. The opening graf: Web startups are made out of two things: people and code. The people ...
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