Government Attic: repository of noteworthy declassified/FOIA'd/public records access government docs Mid-Century Modern housing designs vs children Some Rollins Crossed bedside lamps turn each other off and on Widespread, illegal debtors' prisons in Ohio Skrillex cuddles Minnie Mouse Wrist-straps for pocket-watches Government Attic: repository of noteworthy declassified/FOIA'd/public records access government docs
By Cory Doctorow on Apr 07, 2013 12:12 pm A reader writes, GovernmentAttic.org, a noncommercial independent website, announces the publication of thousands of important government documents obtained through proper channels using public records access laws such as the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). Government Attic includes fascinating historical documents, oddities and fun stuff about government programs, and government "bloopers". Browsing the site is like ...
Read in browser Mid-Century Modern housing designs vs children
By Cory Doctorow on Apr 07, 2013 11:18 am Projectophile's Clare has a funny post about the hazards presented by beautiful mid-century modern home designs to children. My grandparents had a proper split-level MCM when I was a kid, and it's a wonder we survived. As Clare says, "I love open, flowing space as much as the next modern girl. But I know it ...
Read in browser Some Rollins
By Cory Doctorow on Apr 07, 2013 10:08 am JWZ, who has seen Henry Rollins "do his spoken word thing once a year since around 1912," has rounded up about an hour's worth of YouTube clips of some truly great Rollins rants for your Sunday viewing pleasure.
Read in browser Crossed bedside lamps turn each other off and on
By Cory Doctorow on Apr 07, 2013 09:14 am Today's maker project was a pair of bedside lamps that switch one another.
Read in browser Widespread, illegal debtors' prisons in Ohio
By Cory Doctorow on Apr 06, 2013 09:20 pm A new ACLU report called The Outskirts of Hope (PDF) documents the rise of illegal debtors prisons in Ohio. A majority of municipal and mayors' courts (an unregulated and rare system of courts only permitted in two states) surveyed by the ACLU routinely imprison people for their inability to pay fines, a practice banned in ...
Read in browser Skrillex cuddles Minnie Mouse
By Cory Doctorow on Apr 06, 2013 06:05 pm Dubstep legend Skrillex is apparently visiting a Disney themepark somewhere in the world and getting cuddles from a Minnie Mouse head-character. The world is a big and odd place. my new chick, sorry Mickey
Read in browser Wrist-straps for pocket-watches
By Cory Doctorow on Apr 06, 2013 03:03 pm Polish leatherworker MK makes some very nice wrist-straps for pocket-watches and car-watches. He's not the only one making these, but I find them particularly handsome, and rather nice retro-modern take on the massive wristwatch phenomenon. Wristbands for pocket watches. (Thanks, Nic!)
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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