Michael Madsen talks to Boing Boing about his hot sauce Video preview of 50 Girls 50 and Other Stories, by Al Williamson Student says f-word outside of class, college nearly ruins his career Bwaag… Whep? Iranian scientist invents machine that predicts the future $20 spy pen camera Travis Louie's monsters in Seattle Plague Nation excerpt WA grants MSFT $1.5B tax amnesty, resorts to taxing dance-clubs to make up shortfall Nano Quadcopter open source tiny drone kit North Miami mayoral candidate threatened by Vodou Celebrate Herbie Hancock's birthday with Rockit! (1984) Michael Madsen talks to Boing Boing about his hot sauce
By Mark Frauenfelder on Apr 12, 2013 10:01 pm Actor Michael Madsen came to my house to talk about his line of hot sauces. My favorite is his hot mustard. I put it on a frankfurter and devoured my "Reservoir Dog."
Read in browser Video preview of 50 Girls 50 and Other Stories, by Al Williamson
By Mark Frauenfelder on Apr 12, 2013 06:31 pm I didn't know that Fantagraphics posts videos of the books it publishes, but I'm glad they do. Here's one for an excellent book it just released, 50 Girls 50 and Other Stories, by Al Williamson. It's part of The EC Comics Library. Barely old enough to drink when he joined the EC Comics stable, Al ...
Read in browser Student says f-word outside of class, college nearly ruins his career
By Mark Frauenfelder on Apr 12, 2013 05:55 pm Ted Balaker says: "A 30-year-old college student, husband and father of two, studying to be a paramedic says 'fuck' outside of class, and his professor gets offended. She threatens him with detention (he's 30!), the administration boots him from the class and nearly ruins his career." "I was persecuted by my college for saying the ...
Read in browser Bwaag… Whep?
By Mark Frauenfelder on Apr 12, 2013 05:45 pm Some music to get your weekend started! (Thanks, D.S. Deboer in G+ BB Community!)
Read in browser Iranian scientist invents machine that predicts the future
By Mark Frauenfelder on Apr 12, 2013 05:40 pm Telegraph: “I have been working on this project for the last 10 years,” said Mr. Razeghi. “My invention easily fits into the size of a personal computer case and can predict details of the next 5-8 years of the life of its users. It will not take you into the future, it will bring the ...
Read in browser $20 spy pen camera
By Mark Frauenfelder on Apr 12, 2013 05:35 pm The kind of gadget that 007's Q would have spent thousands of dollars to make in his lab. Now the price of an Ian Fleming novel. (Thanks, Kenny in the G+ BB community!)
Read in browser Travis Louie's monsters in Seattle
By David Pescovitz on Apr 12, 2013 05:21 pm Seattle's legendary Roq La Rue Gallery is moving from its longtime Belltown location to a beautiful new space in Pioneer Square! Congratulations, Kirsten! This month is your last chance to visit the current digs, and there's quite a send-off show opening tonight. Monster keeper Travis Louie has a new solo exhibit of paintings hanging until ...
Read in browser Plague Nation excerpt
By Mark Frauenfelder on Apr 12, 2013 04:56 pm Here's an excerpt from Dana Fredsti's Plague Nation, sequel to the zombie novel Plague Town. Ashley Parker was a ordinary woman who was also a “wild card,” immune to the emerging zombie plague, drawn unwillingly into a shadowy paramilitary organization. Having stopped the wave of the undead that swarmed their facility, the worst is yet ...
Read in browser WA grants MSFT $1.5B tax amnesty, resorts to taxing dance-clubs to make up shortfall
By Cory Doctorow on Apr 12, 2013 02:35 pm Jeff Reifman sez, After granting Microsoft amnesty on its $1.5 billion Nevada tax dodge, state tax collectors are aggressively targeting Seattle dance clubs and night clubs over an obscure 'opportunity to dance' tax. Auditors search the Internet to find out whether people dance at specific clubs. One clubowner reports an auditor told him: 'You have ...
Read in browser Nano Quadcopter open source tiny drone kit
By David Pescovitz on Apr 12, 2013 02:24 pm Designed by Bitcraze, the Crazyflie Nano Quadcopter is an open source development kit to make your own tiny drones. It's $173 from Seeed Studio Depot and looks like great fun to make and fly! "Crazyflie Nano Quadcopter Kit 10-DOF with Crazyradio"
Read in browser North Miami mayoral candidate threatened by Vodou
By David Pescovitz on Apr 12, 2013 01:45 pm Above is Anna Pierre, singing her 1990s Creole-language tune Suk Su Bon Bon. Pierre is currently running for mayor of North Miami, Florida, but she claims that sinister forces are trying to knock her out of the race. She's found evidence of Haitian Vodou spells left on her doorstep. "I found little dolls with needles ...
Read in browser Celebrate Herbie Hancock's birthday with Rockit! (1984)
By David Pescovitz on Apr 12, 2013 01:04 pm Herbie Hancock and friends perform Rockit at the 1984 Grammy Awards.
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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