[Sponsor] Much like the iconic double decker buses in the UK, this British-designed limited edition Storm Trilogy Watch has two levels. The top floor is a traditional three-handed clock bolted onto the bottom floor, where two totally different one handed displays display two other timezones. On the right, one features a simple single hand for hours (if it lies in the middle of the 8 and 9, it's showing 8:30). To the bottom left, an obscured viewing area offers a unique way of displaying the time: a single double-sided hand points to the hours in two rows, with the shorter side pointing to the hours after 3 o'clock and the longer side pointing to the hours after 9.
Adam Savage's Maker Faire 2012 Talk: Why We Make Police officer fired for driving 143 mph while drunk gets his job back Cognitive Democracy: networked-based decision making as an alternative to markets and "nudging" Ted Kaczynski's Harvard alumni directory listing Sponsor Shout-Out: Watchismo Official Protesters of the London Olympics suspended on Twitter Molly Crabapple's Week in Hell: the book Police snatch local flag from Olympic torch-bearer Makies: custom-made, 3D printed action dolls Slinky on a treadmill Goblins attack Zimbabwe family Cakepops that look like gross boiled chicken feet Star Wars fig display table Castle made of Starburst Balloons that look like meat Bad news for people who love space, dinosaurs, and space dinosaurs A practical use for volcanic lightning (besides metal album covers) Climbing a rickety stair to the top of the forest Mozilla Webmaker: teaching people to make the Web New Yorkers: Spend Memorial Day with Maggie and Dean! Pirate Bay announces new IP address, proxy-friendly design Chinese technicians perfect hovering technology Cool projects from NYU's Interactive Telecommunications Program How much kid-stimulus is right? Republican revisionism and civil rights history 3D-printed "Death's Head Hawkmoth Skeleton" sculptures, inspired by The Silence of the Lambs Amateurs' role in grand challenges, by Jack Hitt The stunning packaging design for Arduino products Behind the scenes of making silly musical thank you notes Deep question about Public Enemy, from 7-year-old girl Adam Savage's Maker Faire 2012 Talk: Why We Make
By Mark Frauenfelder on May 24, 2012 12:57 pm [Video Link] It was so great to see Adam Savage at Maker Faire again this year. Thousands of people crammed into the the giant Fiesta Hall for Adam's presentation. Adam started by talking about his fedora, which is a replica of the one Harrison Ford wore in Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost ...
Read in browser Police officer fired for driving 143 mph while drunk gets his job back
By Mark Frauenfelder on May 24, 2012 12:03 pm In June 2010 Denver police officer Derrick Saunders was sentenced to 5 days in jail for driving 143 mph while drunk. The manager of safety fired Saunders, but yesterday the Civil Service Commission overturned the decision to fire him, based on "discretion and precedence." This is not good news for slow-moving McDonald's employees: Saunders previously ...
Read in browser Cognitive Democracy: networked-based decision making as an alternative to markets and "nudging"
By Cory Doctorow on May 24, 2012 11:48 am Henry Farrell (George Washington University) and Cosma Rohilla Shalizi (Carnegie-Mellon/The Santa Fe Institute) have just posted a paper, "Cognitive Democracy," to Crooked Timber. Farrell and Shalizi argue that neither the "libertarian paternalist" idea of "nudging" people to good choices, nor the market-based approach of letting price signals steer our decisions produce the best possible outcome ...
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By Cory Doctorow on May 24, 2012 11:19 am Ted Kaczynski updated his own entry in the Harvard alumni directory, just in time for his class's 50th reunion: While many of his classmates sent in lengthy updates on their lives for the 2 ½-inch-thick "red book," the entry for "Theodore John Kaczynski" only contains nine lines. The listing says his occupation is "Prisoner," and ...
Read in browser Sponsor Shout-Out: Watchismo
By Rob Beschizza on May 24, 2012 10:30 am Our thanks go to Watchismo for sponsoring Boing Boing Blast, our once-daily delivery of headlines by email. Much like the iconic double decker buses in the UK, this British-designed limited edition Storm Trilogy Watch has two levels. The top floor is a traditional three-handed clock bolted onto the bottom floor, where two totally different one ...
Read in browser Official Protesters of the London Olympics suspended on Twitter
By Cory Doctorow on May 24, 2012 10:00 am The Space Hijackers' Twitter account for their Official Protesters of the London 2012 Games has been suspended, following a complaint from the London Olympic committee: Twitter. That harbour of free speech, undaunted by various Arab dictators. However, it seems that a quick word from LOCOG, the unelected body in charge of the 2012 Olympic Games, ...
Read in browser Molly Crabapple's Week in Hell: the book
By Cory Doctorow on May 24, 2012 09:08 am Artist (and Boing Boing favorite) Molly Crabapple is just as clever with crowdfunding as she is with a Sharpie. For her 28th birthday, she Kickstartered the budget for a week locked in a NYC hotel suite whose every surface was covered with drawing paper. She spent the resulting "week in hell" drawing over every inch ...
Read in browser Police snatch local flag from Olympic torch-bearer
By Rob Beschizza on May 24, 2012 04:55 am I guess the flag of Cornwall is not an official sponsor of the Olympic Games.
Read in browser Makies: custom-made, 3D printed action dolls
By Cory Doctorow on May 24, 2012 02:43 am My wife Alice quit her job a year ago to found Makies with some friends in London and Helsinki. Makies is a 3D printing startup. The company's mission is to create toys and dolls from "playful" digital environments (games, social systems, stuff like that). Essentially, the idea is that you create digital people, along with ...
Read in browser Slinky on a treadmill
By Cory Doctorow on May 24, 2012 01:14 am Abzde set a slinky upon an inclined treadmill and the brave spring proceeded to slink its way down that machine for 3 heart-pounding minutes and 20 unbeatable seconds. Watch as the slinky moves from side to side, nearly -- but not quite -- going over the edge time and again, tempting fate and laughing at ...
Read in browser Goblins attack Zimbabwe family
By David Pescovitz on May 23, 2012 11:34 pm
"Three huts and a house were flattened last Sunday, while people are occasionally being pelted with stones by unseen things, believed to be goblins at a Chisumbanje homestead in Chipinge South where mysterious occurrences are haunting the Sithole Family," reports The Zimdiaspora. (via Fortean Times)
Read in browser Cakepops that look like gross boiled chicken feet
By Cory Doctorow on May 23, 2012 10:38 pm Miss Cakehead sends us these "Incredible and gross chicken feet cake pops created for the Evil Cake Shop by Miss Insomnia Tulip." The feet are made from vanilla & raspberry cake, triple dipped in white chocolate with the pop hand painted to resemble a boiled chicken foot; the chicken dipping sauce pop (top) covered with ...
Read in browser Star Wars fig display table
By Cory Doctorow on May 23, 2012 10:00 pm Etsy seller FaustX2 made this Star Wars fig display table out of printing-press trays and other salvage items, topped with tempered glass. This mixed media custom coffee table was made from reworked vintage printing press trays and a pair of vintage steel dock pallets. The interior display area is populated with a broad survey of ...
Read in browser Castle made of Starburst
By Cory Doctorow on May 23, 2012 09:00 pm DeviantArt's Ashleyisthebomb shows off a Starburst chewies castle whose individual bricks were melted together with a glue-less hot glue gun: "because there was no glue or anything, it was completely edible. My family and I had fun eating it until we got sick of starbursts, then i threw it out. It took FOREVER and ended ...
Read in browser Balloons that look like meat
By Cory Doctorow on May 23, 2012 08:06 pm These meat-shaped balloons were created as a storefront display by Object Design League, who will sell you a steak or sausage model for $8. DesignBoom has tons more pics and notes on the production: at the japan premium beef storefront, chicago-based design studio ODL (object design league) have created a meat-themed installation of their 'balloon ...
Read in browser Bad news for people who love space, dinosaurs, and space dinosaurs
By Maggie Koerth-Baker on May 23, 2012 07:54 pm Back in April, chemist Ronald Breslow published a fairly routine research paper on the topic of molecular evolution. His paper concluded with a left turn into dire warnings about the possibility of dinosaurs on other planets. Sadly, this paper has now been recalled by the Journal of the American Chemical Society. Essentially, they unpublished it. ...
Read in browser A practical use for volcanic lightning (besides metal album covers)
By Maggie Koerth-Baker on May 23, 2012 07:46 pm Here's a story that combines two favorite bits of volcano news into one interesting discovery. You know those great, freaky photos of volcanic lightning? (In case you don't, I've got one posted above.) Remember how the Icelandic volcanic eruptions totally screwed up everybody's airplane travel plans? Apparently, studying volcanic lightning could lead to better eruption ...
Read in browser Climbing a rickety stair to the top of the forest
By Maggie Koerth-Baker on May 23, 2012 07:29 pm Seventy-one feet above the Harvard Forest, you can stand on a plywood platform attached to a slightly swaying tower of metal scaffolding, and look out over miles of hemlock groves. On the ground, the trees are massive—trunks reaching up and up and up. From the top of the tower, though, the view feels a bit ...
Read in browser Mozilla Webmaker: teaching people to make the Web
By Cory Doctorow on May 23, 2012 07:02 pm Mozilla's new Webmaker project is a global initiative to "move people from using the Web to making the Web." They're running a series of events, including an upcoming Summer Code Party with interactive and recorded sessions on making stuff (I'll be doing one of these). That's just one piece; Seth Rosenblatt has more on CNet: ...
Read in browser New Yorkers: Spend Memorial Day with Maggie and Dean!
By Maggie Koerth-Baker on May 23, 2012 06:30 pm Neither I nor Dean Putney—BoingBoing's intrepid web developer—live in New York City. But we realized recently that we're both going to be visiting at the same time. So we're planning on meeting up for a little, informal Memorial Day picnic in Prospect Park, and we'd like you to join us. We'll be meeting up on ...
Read in browser Pirate Bay announces new IP address, proxy-friendly design
By Cory Doctorow on May 23, 2012 05:56 pm Courts around the world have instituted censorship regimes that require ISPs to block the Pirate Bay. In response, TPB has added a new IP address (194.71.107.80) by which it can be reached. It also has a new design that is especially friendly to proxies who wish to provide local, unblocked access. TorrentFreak explains: In most ...
Read in browser Chinese technicians perfect hovering technology
By Mark Frauenfelder on May 23, 2012 05:42 pm The Back to the Future hover skateboard is on its way! (Via Photoshop Disasters)
Read in browser Cool projects from NYU's Interactive Telecommunications Program
By Matt Richardson on May 23, 2012 05:21 pm Visitors to the ITP spring show were greeted by a sign designed by Trent RohnerAs a graduate student at NYU’s Interactive Telecommunications Program, I’m constantly surrounded with astounding creativity from my fellow students, who come from a wide array of disciplines. I’m working among musicians, architects, archeologists, lawyers, designers, physicists, and much more. Our commonality ...
Read in browser How much kid-stimulus is right?
By Cory Doctorow on May 23, 2012 05:00 pm Celeste Kidd from the University of Rochester writes in with news of a new study on PLoS One, which attempts to quantify the amount of stimulus that is optimal for amusing and engaging babies: This video discusses the results of eye-tracking study we recently did at the University of Rochester that explains how babies organize ...
Read in browser Republican revisionism and civil rights history
By Cory Doctorow on May 23, 2012 03:51 pm Jonathan Chait takes to New York Magazine to explain how a revisionist version of American civil rights history paints the Republicans as the party of racial equality: The civil rights movement, once a controversial left-wing fringe, has grown deeply embedded into the fabric of our national story. This is a salutary development, but a problematic ...
Read in browser 3D-printed "Death's Head Hawkmoth Skeleton" sculptures, inspired by The Silence of the Lambs
By Xeni Jardin on May 23, 2012 03:44 pm Joaquin Baldwin, whose animated films and 3D-printed sculptures we've featured here before a number of times, has completed a new work. I love these. Joaquin explains: I created the skeleton of a skeletal Lepidoptera. The Death's Head Hawkmoth (Acherontia atropos), seen in The Silence of the Lambs, has a skull marking on its back. I ...
Read in browser Amateurs' role in grand challenges, by Jack Hitt
By Mark Frauenfelder on May 23, 2012 03:28 pm Jack Hitt is the author of Bunch of Amateurs: A Search for the American Character, and a contributing editor to the New York Times Magazine, Harper’s, and public radio’s This American Life. He wrote the following piece for Boing Boing. This week, war gamers in the Defense Department have devised an energy-based combat scenario and ...
Read in browser The stunning packaging design for Arduino products
By Mark Frauenfelder on May 23, 2012 03:21 pm One the highlights of Maker Faire for me was meeting Massimo Banzi, the co-founder of the Arduino project. He's very friendly and we had a nice time talking about design. I also enjoyed meeting Luisa Castiglioni, his girlfriend. She's a writer for a number of design magazines, including Domus. (Here's an article she wrote for ...
Read in browser Behind the scenes of making silly musical thank you notes
By Dean Putney on May 23, 2012 03:18 pm I'm in New York this week and today I dropped in on Boing Boing pal and co-curator of Boing Boing's Virgin America in-flight channel Joe Sabia. Joe's in the middle of directing a series of short musical thank you note videos for people who request them online as a promotional campaign for AT&T's Facebook fan ...
Read in browser Deep question about Public Enemy, from 7-year-old girl
By Xeni Jardin on May 23, 2012 03:12 pm Scott Matthews shared a photograph with me, and I'm sharing it with all of you, with his permission. His daughter Sasha handed him this note yesterday. Sasha is a pretty special girl, in no small part because she's already been on Boing Boing once before. What, indeed, does it really mean? (thanks, Scott + Amy ...
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