The Day My Grandfather Groucho and I Saved 'You Bet Your Life' Epic Key Changes: a CDZA music video experiment BitTorrent Live: streaming video that gets easier to serve as more people watch it College student plays piano while Billy Joel sings along Preview of Peter Bagge's Other Stuff comics anthology Porno-copyright trolls Prenda Law get hauled in front of a very angry judge Help fund a documentary about art and rocket science "New" bacteria from Lake Vostok is not actually new (or from Lake Vostok) Soviet killer dolphins on the loose in the Black Sea A Salute to Bradley Manning, Whistleblower, As We Hear His Words For The First Time Here are two lobsters having sex Surviving a massive wildfire What ovarian cancer can teach us about medicine, as a whole Brain Rot: Hip Hop Family Tree, Grandmaster Flash to the Beat Tesla vs. Edison vs. The Myth of the Lone Inventor Random House reconsiders and improves the standard contracts in its new ebook imprints Leaked Audio of Bradley Manning's statement released by Freedom of the Press Foundation The Wind Whales of Ishmael, by Philip Jose Farmer - excerpt Proposed Maryland anti-zero-tolerance law would tell schools to stop suspending kids who point their fingers at each other and say "bang" Scowler: nightmare-fuel horror novel about a monstrous father Gweek 085: Maximum Sugar Rush LibDems leave over support for secret trials; I resign from the party Katie Fisher Day: bake cookies and send them to a friend Principles for 21st century living Hacking the Xbox, free in honor of Aaron Swartz Things, organized neatly: a kentucky site for knollers Trauma shears: Inexpensive plastic and sheet metal cutter Numbers stations on Twitter and other spook-y tweets Video of flame-shooting giant robotic octopus New Brazilian environmental political party based on social networking The Day My Grandfather Groucho and I Saved 'You Bet Your Life'
By Andy Marx on Mar 12, 2013 12:49 pm "He's right," Jack Nicholson chimed in. "Groucho, that stuff is classic. Listen to your grandson. Let them send the reels to you."
Read in browser Epic Key Changes: a CDZA music video experiment
By Xeni Jardin on Mar 12, 2013 12:40 pm "A KEY CHANGE: The best weapon to make any song that much more epic."
Read in browser BitTorrent Live: streaming video that gets easier to serve as more people watch it
By Cory Doctorow on Mar 12, 2013 12:35 pm Streaming video is one of the holy grails of torrent-style distribution systems, where everyone who requests a file from a server is directed to other downloaders who have already received pieces. This is a highly scalable architecture, since it means that the more people trying to download at once, the faster everyone's download becomes. But ...
Read in browser College student plays piano while Billy Joel sings along
By Mark Frauenfelder on Mar 12, 2013 12:30 pm College student asks if he can play piano for Billy Joel and Joel says OK. The results are fabulous!
Read in browser Preview of Peter Bagge's Other Stuff comics anthology
By Mark Frauenfelder on Mar 12, 2013 12:27 pm Here's a 20-page preview of Other Stuff, a 144-page anthology of Peter Bagge's collaborative comics, in which Bagge wrote scripts illustrated by Daniel Clowes, Gilbert Hernandez, Robert Crumb, Adrian Tomine, Johnny Ryan, and others. Peter Bagge's Other Stuff includes a few lesser-known Bagge characters, including the wacky modern party girl "Lovey" and the aging bobo ...
Read in browser Porno-copyright trolls Prenda Law get hauled in front of a very angry judge
By Cory Doctorow on Mar 12, 2013 12:25 pm Popehat's Ken White attended a hearing in United States District Court Judge Otis D. Wright II's California courtroom. Judge Wright is the judge most likely to put a halt to the astounding shenanigans of the notorious porno-copyright trolls Prenda Law, who have been accused of lying to the court; blackmailing thousands of people with legal ...
Read in browser Help fund a documentary about art and rocket science
By Maggie Koerth-Baker on Mar 12, 2013 12:03 pm Ed Belbruno is a mathematician who worked at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in the 1980s. While he was there, he devised a way to use chaos theory to help change the course of spaceships and put satellites into orbit for far less fuel than had ever been used before. His inspiration came from painting. Painting ...
Read in browser "New" bacteria from Lake Vostok is not actually new (or from Lake Vostok)
By Maggie Koerth-Baker on Mar 12, 2013 11:50 am "You can say anything you want in a press release". Sadly, that sentiment is too true. Turns out, recent reports of the discovery of previously unknown bacteria in samples hauled up from the waters of Antarctica's frozen Lake Vostok have turned out to be premature. The bacteria turned out to be contaminants carried by the ...
Read in browser Soviet killer dolphins on the loose in the Black Sea
By Maggie Koerth-Baker on Mar 12, 2013 11:45 am Using old Soviet Union techniques, Ukrainian scientists trained dolphins to attack and kill swimmers using knives and guns strapped to the heads of said dolphins. Like you do. Today, the dolphins escaped. No word on whether they are armed. (Is it just me, or does this sound like the set-up to a cheapo Eastern European ...
Read in browser A Salute to Bradley Manning, Whistleblower, As We Hear His Words For The First Time
By Daniel Ellsberg on Mar 12, 2013 11:37 am Today, the Freedom of the Press Foundation, an organization that I co-founded and for which I serve on the board, has published an audio recording of Bradley Manning's speech to a military court from two weeks ago, in which he gives his reasons and motivations behind leaking over 700,000 government documents to WikiLeaks.
Whoever made this recording, and I don't know who the person is, has done the American public a great service. This marks the first time the American public can hear Bradley Manning, in his own voice explain what he did and how he did it.
After listening to this recording and reading his testimony, I believe Bradley Manning is the personification of the word whistleblower.
Read in browser Here are two lobsters having sex
By Maggie Koerth-Baker on Mar 12, 2013 11:29 am From the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary Facebook page, here are two lobsters doing it — apparently in the missionary position. But looks can be misleading. What's actually going on here is external fertilization — that is to say, procreation without any of the potentially awkward penetration. Male lobsters produce spermatophores, packets of sperm, which ...
Read in browser Surviving a massive wildfire
By Maggie Koerth-Baker on Mar 12, 2013 11:14 am In 2011, the Pagami Creek Fire burned through 92,000 acres of Minnesota's Boundary Waters Canoe Area. At Outside magazine, Frank Bures tells the story of two kayakers caught in the inferno. Includes some amazing photos taken by one of the kayakers.
Read in browser What ovarian cancer can teach us about medicine, as a whole
By Maggie Koerth-Baker on Mar 12, 2013 11:09 am The New York Times has a story on problems with the treatment of ovarian cancer that holds lessons for many aspects of modern medicine. The big issue here: Local doctors, even local specialists, might not have the information necessary to properly treat patients who come in with problems those doctors don't have a lot of ...
Read in browser Brain Rot: Hip Hop Family Tree, Grandmaster Flash to the Beat
By Ed Piskor on Mar 12, 2013 11:00 am Read the rest of the Hip Hop Family Tree comics!
Read in browser Tesla vs. Edison vs. The Myth of the Lone Inventor
By Maggie Koerth-Baker on Mar 12, 2013 11:00 am We're going about this feud all wrong says Matt Novak, who blogs about techno-history at Paleofuture. "The question is not: Who was a better inventor, Edison or Tesla? The question is: Why do we still frame the debate in this way?" Novak asked in a talk yesterday at SXSW. He's got a damn fine point. ...
Read in browser Random House reconsiders and improves the standard contracts in its new ebook imprints
By Cory Doctorow on Mar 12, 2013 10:54 am Last week, I wrote about Random House's new all-digital imprints, which offered terrible contractual terms. After a week of bad publicity, Random House has significantly improved its contract, as you can see from this announcement. On Writer Beware, Victoria Strauss has a good summary: - Authors will now be offered their choice of two options: ...
Read in browser Leaked Audio of Bradley Manning's statement released by Freedom of the Press Foundation
By Xeni Jardin on Mar 12, 2013 10:49 am The Freedom of the Press Foundation today
published the leaked audio of Bradley Manning's statements to the court during his hearing last week.
Read in browser The Wind Whales of Ishmael, by Philip Jose Farmer - excerpt
By Mark Frauenfelder on Mar 12, 2013 10:09 am I discovered the work of Philip José Farmer when I was 12 or 13 years old. (I just reordered Image of the Beast to see if it's as bizarre and entertaining as I thought it was when I read it at age 15 or so.) He remains one of my favorite science fiction authors. I'm ...
Read in browser Proposed Maryland anti-zero-tolerance law would tell schools to stop suspending kids who point their fingers at each other and say "bang"
By Cory Doctorow on Mar 12, 2013 09:37 am Maryland State Senator J.B. Jennings (R) has introduced Senate Bill 1058, The Reasonable School Discipline Act of 2013, which is aimed at ending the incredibly stupid "zero tolerance" policies that result in kids being suspended or expelled for pointing a stick at another kid and saying "bang!" Here's the preamble: FOR the purpose of prohibiting ...
Read in browser Scowler: nightmare-fuel horror novel about a monstrous father
By Cory Doctorow on Mar 12, 2013 09:02 am Daniel Kraus's previous book, Rotters, was an outstandingly gross and delightful young adult novel about a kid who discovers that his dad is a grave-robber, and part of an ancient, mystic fraternity of corpse-stealers. It was full of squishy, spectacularly described scenes of decomposition and decay, taut suspense, and perfect gross-out moments. When I picked ...
Read in browser Gweek 085: Maximum Sugar Rush
By Mark Frauenfelder on Mar 12, 2013 08:30 am (Thanks to SoundCloud for hosting Boing Boing's podcasts!) Gweek is a podcast where the editors and friends of Boing Boing talk about comic books, science fiction and fantasy, video games, board games, TV shows, music, movies, tools, gadgets, apps, and other neat stuff. My guests in this episode: Peter Bebergal (left), the author of Too ...
Read in browser LibDems leave over support for secret trials; I resign from the party
By Cory Doctorow on Mar 12, 2013 03:02 am Philippe Sands, a professor of international law and prominent practicing lawyer, has resigned from the UK Liberal Democrats party. He is the third well-known party member to leave the LibDems this month. Dinah Rose, a respected human rights lawyer who represented Guantánamo detainee Binyam Mohamed,
Read in browser Katie Fisher Day: bake cookies and send them to a friend
By Cory Doctorow on Mar 12, 2013 12:18 am Remember Katie Fisher? She was the 24 year old who was killed crossing the street by a driver who ran a red light, only to have Progressive Insurance -- her own insurance company -- pay to defend her killer in court, and then lie about it. Her brother, comedian Matt Fisher, has decided to honor ...
Read in browser Principles for 21st century living
By Cory Doctorow on Mar 11, 2013 10:44 pm A list of principles for the 21st century, from Joi Ito, presently running the MIT Media Lab: Ito: There are nine or so principles to work in a world like this: 1. Resilience instead of strength, which means you want to yield and allow failure and you bounce back instead of trying to resist failure. ...
Read in browser Hacking the Xbox, free in honor of Aaron Swartz
By Cory Doctorow on Mar 11, 2013 10:23 pm Bunnie Huang's seminal book "Hacking the Xbox" is now a free PDF, released thus by the author in honor of Aaron Swartz. "Hacking the Xbox" is the "Our Bodies, Our Selves" of reverse engineering -- a brilliant and accessible text setting out the case for and the practicalities of reverse engineering and taking control of ...
Read in browser Things, organized neatly: a kentucky site for knollers
By Cory Doctorow on Mar 11, 2013 08:42 pm Things Organized Neatly is a Tumblr devoted to excellent knolling photos in which things are, well, organized neatly. Zomg, but this tickles something vulnerable in my hindbrain. Show here: a RepRap (in bits), and Cannoli in Buenos Aires. Things Organized Neatly (Thanks, Fipi Lele!)
Read in browser Trauma shears: Inexpensive plastic and sheet metal cutter
By Cool Tools on Mar 11, 2013 08:31 pm Several years ago I needed about half a dozen tools for a series of workshops I was hosting. I needed a hand tool that could safely and easily shape plastic and thin sheet metal, but not break the bank. I found trauma shears at the local hardware store for a couple dollars each and bought ...
Read in browser Numbers stations on Twitter and other spook-y tweets
By Cory Doctorow on Mar 11, 2013 07:38 pm Ken Layne takes us on a tour of weird, possibly espionage-related Twitter accounts, from a "numbers station" that has tweeted 318,000 hexadecimal numbers since 2009 (possibly from Khabarovsk), to a "joke" CIA account that seems to have a lot of inside dope, to a massive cluster of accounts that tweet nothing but "Iowa City schools ...
Read in browser Video of flame-shooting giant robotic octopus
By Mark Frauenfelder on Mar 11, 2013 07:36 pm Gawain Lavers shot this short video of El Pulpo Mecanico at Pier 15 in San Francisco. It was part of the festivities to celebrate the grand re-opening of The Exploratorium.
Read in browser New Brazilian environmental political party based on social networking
By Cory Doctorow on Mar 11, 2013 07:19 pm Gmoke sez, "Former Brazilian Environment Minister Marina Silva and recent Green Party Presidential candidate (she came in third to force a run-off election) launched the Sustainability Network in Brasilia on 16 February, 2013 and seeks to collect the required 500,000 signatures by September 2013 to become a legally recognized political party. From Sustainability Network's political ...
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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