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US Olympic Committee says sorry to knitters whom it claimed "denigrated" the games Fake vaginas sold as powerful Chinese medicinal mushrooms Circumvention Tools Hackfest in NYC before HOPE Video software to "see" someone's pulse Mac app changes desktop to local satellite image Computing pioneer Larry Smarr and his quantified self Covers from 1960s Russian tech-youth mag, and other SF/space art of the era 28-port USB hub Portraits made from thread passed around nail-heads St Colin and the Dragon: great torn paper kids' comic Two planets barely a million miles apart Pakistani police unfit Listen to the sounds of nature Turtles killed, fossilized while doing it EFF joins the defense in Charles Carreon v. The Whole Goddamned Internet Bruce Sterling interviewed about the New Aesthetic How to turn old car parts into a video game controller Open platform for peer-driven food production needs your help Loco: a new story by Rudy Rucker & Bruce Sterling Malware author taunts security researchers with built-in chat Infinite Schwarzenegger "Gear Up" scene The Beatings Will Continue Until Copyright is Respected Portal trick photo done with light painting Book trailer: Trust Me, I'm Lying Vacuum-nozzle "suction mat" cleans your shoes as you wipe them Visualizing pizza company's network: from the farm to local deliveries Effective and disorganized: a new thing upon this earth Caption competition Prison to inmates: defeat locks, win food Behind the scenes: Product recalls US Olympic Committee says sorry to knitters whom it claimed "denigrated" the games
By Cory Doctorow on Jun 22, 2012 12:44 pm The US Olympic Committee has apologized for describing the knitters' Ravelympics as "denigrating" to real athletes. Ravelympics are an activity on Ravelry, a community for knitters, in which members compete to complete knitting projects while watching Olympic events, producing hybrids like the "afghan marathon" and "scarf hockey." The Olympic Committee, worried that they will have ...
Read in browser Fake vaginas sold as powerful Chinese medicinal mushrooms
By David Pescovitz on Jun 22, 2012 12:31 pm While doing some construction work, residents of the Liucunbu village in China's Shaanxi province came across a fake vagina that they, um, mistakenly identified as a lingzhi mushroom, legendary in Chinese medicine for its reportedy super-powerful healing and anti-aging properties. It's not clear whether the villagers really thought the sex toy was a mushroom or ...
Read in browser Circumvention Tools Hackfest in NYC before HOPE
By Cory Doctorow on Jun 22, 2012 12:00 pm James Losey sez, The Open Internet Tools Project (OpenITP) is a collection of open source projects that help build a truly unfettered internet -- private, anonymous and resistant to control. In the week before HOPE in New York City, OpenITP has partnered with FreedomBox, InformSec and ISOC-NY to host a circumvention tools hackfest. OpenITP's James ...
Read in browser Video software to "see" someone's pulse
By David Pescovitz on Jun 22, 2012 11:45 am MIT researchers developed software that highlights differences between successive frames of video that are usually too subtle or quick to catch. "So, for instance, the software makes it possible to actually "see" someone's pulse, as the skin reddens and pales with the flow of blood (video stills above), and it can exaggerate tiny motions, making ...
Read in browser Mac app changes desktop to local satellite image
By David Pescovitz on Jun 22, 2012 11:40 am Satellite Eyes is a free OS X app that automatically updates your desktop wallpaper with satellite imagery of your current location.
Read in browser Computing pioneer Larry Smarr and his quantified self
By David Pescovitz on Jun 22, 2012 11:27 am BB pal Larry Smarr is director of the California Institute for Telecommunications and Information Technology and was director of the NCSA during the birth of Mosaic, the first popular Web browser. I have the opportunity to chat with Larry with some frequency as he's on the advisory board of Institute for the Future where I'm ...
Read in browser Covers from 1960s Russian tech-youth mag, and other SF/space art of the era
By David Pescovitz on Jun 22, 2012 11:16 am Dark Roasted Blend posted a fantastic gallery of pulp science fiction/space art from the mid-20th century. Above are covers of the Russian pop science magazine for young people, Tehnika Molodezhi ("Technology for the Youth"). "Rare & Wonderful 1950s Space Art" (Thanks, Ben Marks!)
Read in browser 28-port USB hub
By Cory Doctorow on Jun 22, 2012 11:00 am Manhattan's aptly named Mondohub is a 28-port USB hub (24 USB 2.0, 4 USB 3.0). The last time I set up a new desk, I went hunting for some $BIGNUM-port hubs and they all seemed to cap out at 10 or 12. As a result, I've got a ton of daisy-chained, impossible-to-debug USB hubs on ...
Read in browser Portraits made from thread passed around nail-heads
By Cory Doctorow on Jun 22, 2012 09:55 am Kumi Yamashita's "Constellation" series are portraits made from a continuous piece of black thread, strung around and around a dense mesh of nails hammered into a white-painted wooden board. Shown here: "Erik". Constellation
Read in browser St Colin and the Dragon: great torn paper kids' comic
By Cory Doctorow on Jun 22, 2012 09:17 am St Colin and the Dragon is a perfectly great 27-page kids' comic about a dragon that hatches in a faraway kingdom and the dumb things that the residents of the kingdom try to get rid of it. They give it an endless parade of sheep to eat, in the hopes that it will mature, grow ...
Read in browser Two planets barely a million miles apart
By Rob Beschizza on Jun 22, 2012 09:01 am Newly-discovered worlds, 1200 ly from Earth, have the closest orbits between two planets ever confirmed—on closest approach, only five times the distance between the Earth and its moon. [JPL. Artist impression: Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics]
Read in browser Pakistani police unfit
By Rob Beschizza on Jun 22, 2012 08:54 am After only a quarter of of Punjab's 19,000 police officers passed a fitness test, Pakistan is to insist on 38-inch waistlines. Senior officers are, of course, exempt. [Reuters]
Read in browser Listen to the sounds of nature
By Maggie Koerth-Baker on Jun 22, 2012 08:25 am The British Library has a collection of 268 nature recordings made in the first half of the 20th century. The recordings date back to the 1930s and include the songs of birds, noises made by large vertebrates like camels and panda bears, and even full-environment background sounds like this 1938 recording of an Afrotropical environment. ...
Read in browser Turtles killed, fossilized while doing it
By Maggie Koerth-Baker on Jun 22, 2012 08:18 am Teenagers, beware! Here is another very good reason to never, ever have sex. Like these 50-million-year-old turtles, you could get so caught up in the act, that you don't notice you are sinking into a bog full of toxic volcanic gasses. It's a real risk! This happened to more than one pair of filthy, sex-having ...
Read in browser EFF joins the defense in Charles Carreon v. The Whole Goddamned Internet
By Cory Doctorow on Jun 21, 2012 10:32 pm The Electronic Frontier Foundation has joined the defense team for Matthew Inman, creator of The Oatmeal, who is one of the parties named to a bizarre lawsuit by Charles Carreon, who recently threatened Inman with a $20,000 demand on behalf of the website Funnyjunk, then sued Inman (and a host of others) when he made ...
Read in browser Bruce Sterling interviewed about the New Aesthetic
By Cory Doctorow on Jun 21, 2012 09:00 pm David Cox interviews Bruce Sterling about the significance, lifecycle and future of the New Aesthetic movement: First to the issue of "is the New Aesthetic really new?" I'd say those images are "new'" pretty much by definition. Aesthetics obviously is very old. James Bridle doing a project called the "New Aesthetic Tumblr" is over, and ...
Read in browser How to turn old car parts into a video game controller
By Mark Frauenfelder on Jun 21, 2012 08:55 pm Jason Torchinsky of Jalopnik shows how to turn old car parts into a video game controller. The idea came to me while adjusting the mirrors in a car, and realizing that the little mirror-control joystick was better than many video game joysticks I used. I then had a waking dream of the grand possibilities of ...
Read in browser Open platform for peer-driven food production needs your help
By Cory Doctorow on Jun 21, 2012 08:00 pm Devin sez, We need the crowd's help to fund development (or just to find awesome pro-bono developers) of a platform that facilitates peer production driven local food systems. Think Craigslist meets Etsy with the ethos and practices of couchsurfing all about homemade, home grown and artisinal food. We're a small University of Michigan team and ...
Read in browser Loco: a new story by Rudy Rucker & Bruce Sterling
By Cory Doctorow on Jun 21, 2012 06:55 pm (illustration by Carl Wiens) "Loco," a new story by Rudy Rucker and Bruce Sterling is the weirdest fucking thing I've ever read that managed to still make sense. I've read pretty much every word both of them ever published and together, they are infinitely weirder and more interesting than they are on their own. I'm ...
Read in browser Malware author taunts security researchers with built-in chat
By Cory Doctorow on Jun 21, 2012 06:19 pm Security researchers from AVG were decompiling a trojan -- it had been originally posted to a Diablo III forum, masquerading as a how-to video -- when the malware's author popped up in a window on their screen. It turned out that the trojan had a built-in chat, as well as a screen-capture facility. The hacker ...
Read in browser Infinite Schwarzenegger "Gear Up" scene
By Rob Beschizza on Jun 21, 2012 05:28 pm Fond as all civilized people are of 1980s action movie "gear up" scenes, it is often noted that Mark Lester's Commando contains the genre's highest point of achievement. In the 1985 classic, Arnold Schwarzenegger's protagonist conducts an amphibious landing on a tropical beach. Unbundling his cargo, it is revealed to be an astounding collection of ...
Read in browser The Beatings Will Continue Until Copyright is Respected
By Cory Doctorow on Jun 21, 2012 05:00 pm Japan prepares to imprison children for listening to music the wrong way. "illegal downloaders could be hit by penalties of up to two years in prison, or files that extended up to 2 million yen (£16,000). Unauthorised uploaders on the other hand, can expect to be hit with five times the punishment: up to ten ...
Read in browser Portal trick photo done with light painting
By Cory Doctorow on Jun 21, 2012 03:55 pm Tackyshack's "The Portal is a Lie?" is a beautiful trick "painting with light" photo -- a camera is set with its shutter open in a dark place, and small lights are used selectively to illuminate parts of the image, and to draw shapes in space. The photo simulates a person going through a portal from ...
Read in browser Book trailer: Trust Me, I'm Lying
By Mark Frauenfelder on Jun 21, 2012 03:04 pm [Video Link] Here's the trailer for Ryan Holiday's new book, Trust Me, I'm Lying" Confessions of a Media Manipulator. Ryan has a terrific email newsletter of book recommendations that I look forward to each month, called What I Read. Ryan Holiday is a media strategist for notorious clients such as Tucker Max and Dov Charney. ...
Read in browser Vacuum-nozzle "suction mat" cleans your shoes as you wipe them
By Cory Doctorow on Jun 21, 2012 03:00 pm In this trade-show-floor video, a Japanese inventor shows off his ~$6,000 "suction mat," uses a sensor-triggered grid of vacuum nozzles to suck the grime off your shoes before you come through the door. It reminds me of the air-showers in the airlocks leading into chip-fab cleanrooms, and appeals to my inner compulsive neat-freak. Combine this ...
Read in browser Visualizing pizza company's network: from the farm to local deliveries
By David Pescovitz on Jun 21, 2012 02:41 pm This clip from the PBS (UK) program "America Revealed" visualizes the Domino's Pizza supply chain starting at the level of local deliveries.
Read in browser Effective and disorganized: a new thing upon this earth
By Cory Doctorow on Jun 21, 2012 02:12 pm My latest Guardian column is "Disorganised but effective: how technology lowers transaction costs," a piece about a new kind of group that has been enabled by the Internet -- a group with no formal structure that can still get stuff done, like Occupy and Anonymous. The things that one person can do define what is ...
Read in browser Caption competition
By Rob Beschizza on Jun 21, 2012 01:55 pm Photo: Mukesh Gupta with Reuters
Read in browser Prison to inmates: defeat locks, win food
By Rob Beschizza on Jun 21, 2012 01:50 pm WSBT news reports that inmates in Atlanta are being given the opportunity to win food by defeating new locks. Apparently the current locks don't work very well, allowing inmates to roam.
Read in browser Behind the scenes: Product recalls
By Maggie Koerth-Baker on Jun 21, 2012 01:49 pm The real story behind a product recall is not always the narrative of negligent corporation vs. the little guy consumer. In a great long read from Popular Mechanics, Dan Koeppel explains the complicated reality behind product recalls. Far more often than you might suspect, there's nothing demonstrably wrong with the product.
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