Terrific new biography of Li'l Abner creator Al Capp DEA wants to imprison 8% of West Virginians Dave Barry's Insane City Brain Rot: Hip Hop Family Tree, Wild Style Finale Smartphone backup! Nokia offers $15 phone with a month's battery life Iran censors cover Michelle Obama's cleavage Cory in Cambridge, Mass tonight! Science and gun violence: why is the research so weak? The Unicorn Chase Killer replaced victim's head backwards The Mongoliad: Book Three: Sword fighting, gallows humor, and the binge drinking of the Mongolian khan Real Genius in the style of M. Night Shyamalan Invisibility Cloak demoed at TED2013 How to turn Morrissey into John Lennon Best of Risk! #4 - one of my favorite podcasts Newspaper publisher apologizes to sheriff for making public records request Mark's mailing from Quarterly.co: EL wire, tiny microscope, and a black light flashlight Boing Boing reader's cat photos should probably become a meme Defendant in Maine Zumba prostitution case deleted emails, say police Toddler can't seem to get to sleep, despite it totally being naptime Libraries and Makerspaces: a match made in heaven Poltergeist soundtrack reissued on vinyl Loaded terms: How a Pittsburgh artist beat the most bogus trademark in drinking game history Stealth fighter pilots' planes making them sick. Air Force to pilots: Get over it. Harlem Shake, the chemotherapy edition First-person account of how cancer can affect a marriage Baja in my Westy: driving to Mexico in an '87 Volkswagen bus After internet-fame, police investigating possible abuse of 9yo child rapper in sex/drug-filled videos Geohot says the darndest things Scientific American in the late 1800s: eating horse flesh is good for the economy Terrific new biography of Li'l Abner creator Al Capp
By Mark Frauenfelder on Feb 26, 2013 12:39 pm Here's a preview from Michael Schumacher and Denis Kitchen's excellent new biography, Al Capp, A Life to the Contrary. More than thirty years have passed since Al Capp's death, and he may no longer be a household name. But at the height of his career, his groundbreaking comic strip, Li'l Abner, reached ninety million readers. ...
Read in browser DEA wants to imprison 8% of West Virginians
By Mark Frauenfelder on Feb 26, 2013 11:47 am Chron: "Scott Masumoto of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration cited state health statistics that more than 152,000 West Virginians have an addiction to prescription medication — more than 8 percent of the population. But Masumoto said the price of these pills can be $80 or more apiece, making it difficult for teenagers to sustain their ...
Read in browser Dave Barry's Insane City
By Cory Doctorow on Feb 26, 2013 11:46 am Dave Barry's Insane City is a tremendously fun novel that romps through a Miami full of grifters, pimps, thugs, sweet-hearted beachbunnies, honorable men with pythons, seductive women with spiked drinks who'll rob you blind, dope-sniffing dogs and the cops who handle them, and a girl-crazed orangutan. Enter Seth Weinstein, who is about to marry Tina, ...
Read in browser Brain Rot: Hip Hop Family Tree, Wild Style Finale
By Ed Piskor on Feb 26, 2013 11:00 am Read the rest of the Hip Hop Family Tree comics!
Read in browser Smartphone backup! Nokia offers $15 phone with a month's battery life
By Rob Beschizza on Feb 26, 2013 09:20 am Nokia's latest ultra-cheap candybar phone looks like a good replacement for my trusty e-ink Moto F3. A month's battery life on standby, an FM radio and an LED flashlight add up to a perfect "backup" phone for long-term blackouts, natural disasters and zombie holocausts. [Engadget]
Read in browser Iran censors cover Michelle Obama's cleavage
By Rob Beschizza on Feb 26, 2013 09:08 am Left, the first lady at the Academy Awards ceremony; right, as she appeared in a still shot on Iranian TV. Not the best idea, perhaps, when you're trying to bring attention to Argo's historical inaccuracies!
Read in browser Cory in Cambridge, Mass tonight!
By Cory Doctorow on Feb 26, 2013 09:02 am Hey, Cambridge, Mass! I'm speaking at Harvard Books tonight at 7PM! Tomorrow I'll be in Albuquerque, then in Lawrence, KS and Toronto. Come on out and say hi!
Read in browser Science and gun violence: why is the research so weak?
By Maggie Koerth-Baker on Feb 26, 2013 08:40 am The state of gun violence research is poor, and some people who own guns see politics at work in any system that allows that data to be gathered. But right now, whatever your beliefs on guns are, it's incredibly difficult to back them up with any solid science at all. If you want to be able to make any kind of statement about gun ownership and the effects thereof, the first step is to definitively know what effects guns and gun policies have on public health: yet we know almost nothing.
Read in browser The Unicorn Chase
By Rob Beschizza on Feb 26, 2013 08:35 am Unicorns from the Grande Rio samba school participate in the second night of the annual Carnival parade in Rio de Janeiro's Sambadrome, February 21, 2012. Photo: Nacho Doce with Reuters.
Read in browser Killer replaced victim's head backwards
By Rob Beschizza on Feb 26, 2013 08:33 am A man who decapitated his mother, replaced the head backwards, then performed Hannibal Lecter impressions during his arrest, was sentenced this week to indefinite psychiatric detention. [Court News UK via @nero]
Read in browser The Mongoliad: Book Three: Sword fighting, gallows humor, and the binge drinking of the Mongolian khan
By Mark Frauenfelder on Feb 26, 2013 08:00 am Cooper Moo and Erik Bear, two of the authors of the final book of the Mongoliad trilogy from Neal Stephenson and company, The Mongoliad: Book Three, wrote this exclusive essay for Boing Boing. About The Mongoliad: Book Three: The shadow of Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II hangs over the shattered Holy Roman Church as the ...
Read in browser Real Genius in the style of M. Night Shyamalan
By Cory Doctorow on Feb 25, 2013 09:47 pm How about the Real Genius trailer recut in the style of M. Night Shyamalan, by YouTuber dondrapersayswhat?
Read in browser Invisibility Cloak demoed at TED2013
By Carla Sinclair on Feb 25, 2013 09:45 pm I'm here at TED2013 in Long Beach, jacked up on amazing coffee and mind-blowing ideas from today's 4-minute TED fellow talks (the longer 18-minute talks start tomorrow). I was only part-way through the first day when I had to take a moment to track down Baile Zhang, an assistant professor of physics at Nanyang Technological ...
Read in browser How to turn Morrissey into John Lennon
By Rob Beschizza on Feb 25, 2013 07:44 pm Or Syd Barrett, whatever! Three semitones, 20% timestretch and a whole lotta reverb.
Read in browser Best of Risk! #4 - one of my favorite podcasts
By Mark Frauenfelder on Feb 25, 2013 07:42 pm Risk! is a podcast where people tell true stories "they thought they'd never dare to share," usually recorded in front of a live audience. The stories are sometimes confessional, sometimes X-rated, sometimes about criminal behavior, often moving, often tragic, and yet almost always funny. I love this podcast, and I'm happy to announce that Kevin ...
Read in browser Newspaper publisher apologizes to sheriff for making public records request
By Rob Beschizza on Feb 25, 2013 07:10 pm David Brown, the publisher of The Cherokee Scout in Murphy, N.C., has apologized for requesting public records about gun ownership from the local Sheriff's office. As reported by Romenesko: As publisher of your local newspaper, I want to apologize to everyone we unintentionally upset with our public records request for a list of those who ...
Read in browser Mark's mailing from Quarterly.co: EL wire, tiny microscope, and a black light flashlight
By Mark Frauenfelder on Feb 25, 2013 07:02 pm Quarterly.co is a subscription service for wonderful things. People can subscribe to a curator (such as Joel Johnson, Veronica Belmont, Tim Ferriss, Joshua Foer, Gretchen Rubin and others) and pay $25 per quarter to receive a box of items selected by the curator. I'm a curator and my most recent mailing includes things to stimulate ...
Read in browser Boing Boing reader's cat photos should probably become a meme
By Xeni Jardin on Feb 25, 2013 06:57 pm We found this cat in the Boing Boing Flickr Pool. Bill Benson shot this photo, and the one below. More in his Flickr stream. These cat photos have an awful lot of meme power within.
Read in browser Defendant in Maine Zumba prostitution case deleted emails, say police
By Xeni Jardin on Feb 25, 2013 06:46 pm A man charged with helping a Zumba instructor develop an uncharacteristically profitable Zumba operation is accused of deleting emails from his computer that may have amounted to damning evidence. [Associated Press]
Read in browser Toddler can't seem to get to sleep, despite it totally being naptime
By Xeni Jardin on Feb 25, 2013 06:42 pm "We popped open our baby monitor app in time to see what really happens when Jude is 'trying to go to sleep.'"
Read in browser Libraries and Makerspaces: a match made in heaven
By Cory Doctorow on Feb 25, 2013 06:30 pm I wrote a guest editorial for the Raincoast Books site, in honour of Freedom to Read Week. It's called "Libraries, Hackspaces and E-waste: how libraries can be the hub of a young maker revolution," and it's about the role of libraries in the 21st century: Every discussion of libraries in the age of austerity always ...
Read in browser Poltergeist soundtrack reissued on vinyl
By David Pescovitz on Feb 25, 2013 06:06 pm Poltergeist (1982) was the first movie I ever rented on videotape and it's, well, haunted me ever since. Jerry Goldsmith composed the score, including the sweetly nightmarish "Carol Anne's Theme" you can hear at right. He was nominated for an Academy Award but lost out to John Williams for E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial. I'm thrilled that ...
Read in browser Loaded terms: How a Pittsburgh artist beat the most bogus trademark in drinking game history
By Andrea James on Feb 25, 2013 06:00 pm Ali Spagnola spent three years and $30,000 of her own money to void a ridiculous trademark awarded by the US Patent and Trademark Office. She won, but the larger problem remains, with the odds stacked against independent artists who lack the financial and legal wherewithal to monitor the office for abusive filings or oppose them successfully.
Read in browser Stealth fighter pilots' planes making them sick. Air Force to pilots: Get over it.
By Xeni Jardin on Feb 25, 2013 05:48 pm Pilots of the US Air Force's F-22 Raptor stealth fighters are experiencing choking, coughing, memory loss, confusion, and blackouts (hypoxia) because of the way the planes are designed. At least one fatal crash is blamed on the phenomenon, and even ground crews have been sickened while working on F-22s when engines are running. The Air ...
Read in browser Harlem Shake, the chemotherapy edition
By Xeni Jardin on Feb 25, 2013 05:09 pm Man, I feel cheated. My chemotherapy infusions were nothing like this.
Read in browser First-person account of how cancer can affect a marriage
By Xeni Jardin on Feb 25, 2013 04:37 pm Ask women about their relationship, writes Jody Schoger, and "you're apt to hear variations on this theme, 'He never blinked,' or 'He really showed me how strong a man he truly is.' In other words, you're not apt to hear what it's truly like for some women." On her blog, she publishes a first-person account ...
Read in browser Baja in my Westy: driving to Mexico in an '87 Volkswagen bus
By Jason Weisberger on Feb 25, 2013 03:59 pm Hello from Pea Soup Andersen's, en route to Baja California, Mexico, from Marin County, California. I made it this far. I have to admit I haven't always been so sure. I've been hoping to find myself sitting right here, writing exactly this post for several months. It all started early last December. I'd failed to ...
Read in browser After internet-fame, police investigating possible abuse of 9yo child rapper in sex/drug-filled videos
By Xeni Jardin on Feb 25, 2013 03:45 pm "Lil Poopy" is a 9 year old rapper from Massachussetts whose videos include sexually suggestive content, and lulzy references to the use of cocaine. He has performed with P. Diddy, and his dad says he rakes in $7,500 per show. After an article about him in The Enterprise brought attention to the age-inappropriate content of ...
Read in browser Geohot says the darndest things
By Dean Putney on Feb 25, 2013 03:34 pm Famous hacker geohot just needs a nodding Cosby next to him.
Read in browser Scientific American in the late 1800s: eating horse flesh is good for the economy
By Xeni Jardin on Feb 25, 2013 03:31 pm At the Smithsonian's Smart News blog, a fun post looking at historic debates in America's science media about whether it's okay to eat horse meat, with links to some Scientific American articles from the 1860s and 1870s. One such article published in 1875, "Shall We Eat The Horse?," argues that "in not utilizing horse flesh ...
Read in browser Meet SparkTruck, an “educational build-mobile” for the twenty-first century.
Dreamed up by a group of Stanford d.school students and funded through Kickstarter, SparkTruck is a mobile maker space currently traveling across the United States. At schools and summer camps and libraries around the country, the SparkTruck team offers workshops to help kids “find their inner maker” as they design and build projects like stamps, stop-motion animation clips, and “vibrobots.”
[video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UmRKXqDwieY&feature=plcp]
This might seem all shiny and new. And it is—but only in part. What’s so striking (and exciting) about SparkTruck is the way it combines old and new. It does so in the tools it gets kids using, which range from pipe cleaners to laser cutters. It does so in its educational approach, which combines cutting-edge (get it?) STEM and design pedagogy with the fundamentals of an old-school shop class. And it does so in its method, which combines the iconic, century-old technology of the bookmobile with the hot new form of the maker space.
In doing so, SparkTruck joins a growing number of libraries which are combining time-tested principles (like equal access to information) with new technologies (like 3-D printers), putting in maker spaces and media production labs alongside bookshelves and meeting rooms. As I’ve argued over on bookmobility.org, these combinations make sense because reading and making actually have a lot in common. They’re both creative processes that take existing materials and combine them in new ways. Getting people engaged in those kinds of processes—through imaginative thinking, contemplation, hands-on problem-solving, and collaborative learning—is what both maker spaces and libraries are all about.
Taking that commitment on the road with scissors and hammers and 3-D printers and a great big bookmobile-like truck, SparkTruck serves as a laboratory for new approaches, as well as a reminder that trying new things doesn’t have to (and probably shouldn’t!) necessarily mean tossing old ones out.
After all, what would those vibrobots be without classically crafty pipe cleaners and tongue depressors? And what would a library be without the creative, participatory, straight-up awesome experience of reading?
SparkTruck schedule [sparktruck.org]
How to arrange a visit from SparkTruck [sparktruck.org]
SparkTruck YouTube channel [youtube.com]
Signature: --Derek Attig, bookmobility.org
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