The Latest from Boing Boing |  |
- Court limits right to sell used software
- Doc Hammer, Jackson Publick and the Cult of 'The Venture Bros.'
- Noooooooooooooooo!
- Die Antwoord $O$ album cover revealed
- Farmvillians: SF Weekly's Zynga hatchet piece
- Sweet Streets: Art Inspired by Japanese Street Fashion opening reception 9/11/2010
- Chef Wylie Dufresne on science you can NOM
- Return of At the Movies
- The American West: 1890, 1970, 1999
- Jordan Crane praises new Jaime Hernandez story in Love & Rockets
- A fun kids' kit: Blinkybugs!
- The Extremeophile Awards: honoring Earth's hardest-living bacteria
- Teaching robots to lie
- Never-before published photos of Lascaux paintings
- Michael Franti's "The Sound of Sunshine" in sign language
- Gene Roddenberry's Rolodex sells for $1280
- Maker Jim Henson in 1969: HOWTO make a puppet
- What happens when you refuse to answer a passport control officer's questions
- 12 volume set of books reprints Wikipedia's edits of the Iraq War entry
- Amtrak conducts random searches on passengers to "show force"
- Bit-52's: Robot band plays B-52's party classic "Rock Lobster"
- Steampunk robot theater -- for charity!
- SPECIAL FEATURE: Neo-Minimalism and the Rise of the Technomads
- A paean to hipster dickheads
- Raising money for paralyzed graffiti artist and open eye-tracker pioneer TEMPT1
- Chief NZ military scientist quits after lies he was connected with Jamaica's "Cool Runnings" team
| Court limits right to sell used software Posted: 10 Sep 2010 06:32 PM PDT The Ninth Circuit court ruled today that you do not have the right to sell used software if the license agreement forbids it. The case centered on legitimate copies of Autodesk sold second-hand on eBay, but the ruling spells trouble for any business (e.g. GameStop) that relies on America's increasingly cold-to-the-touch doctrine of first sale. [Ars]   |
| Doc Hammer, Jackson Publick and the Cult of 'The Venture Bros.' Posted: 10 Sep 2010 05:00 PM PDT Recent Boing Boing guestblogger Liz Ohanesian has a terrific piece up today at the LA Weekly about The Venture Bros., which begins the second half of its fourth season Sunday night at 11:30 on Adult Swim. As Liz notes, "[This] curious show hasn't won the awards that Robot Chicken and The Boondocks have. It didn't spawn a rock band with a Billboard top 20 album like Metalocalypse did. It doesn't have the super hip love-it-or-hate-it buzz of Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job! What they do have, though, is an extremely loyal, and vocal, fanbase."   |
| Posted: 10 Sep 2010 05:41 PM PDT |
| Die Antwoord $O$ album cover revealed Posted: 10 Sep 2010 06:04 PM PDT  Many Boing Boing readers are familiar with the South African rap rave revolution known as Die Antwoord. A series of posts here earlier this year helped catapult them from relative obscurity to center stage, bright blinding lights and all. Xeni blogged about them after her friend, photographer Clayton Cubitt, was hipped to them by a pal of his who assisted on a Capetown video shoot which resulted in this. A month later, on their first trip to the US, Xeni and I had breakfast with Ninja— we talked about their crazy-fast rise to internet stardom, and he tipped us off that they were in the process of signing to Interscope. A few months after that, while I was at a friends birthday BBQ in Brooklyn, Ninja phoned me with a proposition. Xeni had told him about my previous life as a designer in the music industry, and they wanted someone who "got it" to help them design their upcoming album, $O$. I spent the next month working on this while in Paris, and have been dying to show off the design ever since. Today, the band debuted it on their website with a countdown to October 12, 2010 as the US release date. Since the cat is out of the bag, I thought folks here would like to see it right away. In addition to this just being a really cool story of fans and artists coming together, it's been super fun to work with such a collection of creative and inspiring people. Looking back on the photos from that first morning when I met them, it almost seems like destiny. Global release dates coming soon, as well as a whole new host of tour dates. In the meantime I can tell you, I've heard the album—and it's amazing.
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| Farmvillians: SF Weekly's Zynga hatchet piece Posted: 10 Sep 2010 04:32 PM PDT "I don't fucking want innovation. You're not smarter than your competitor. Just copy what they do and do it until you get their numbers."—Zynga CEO Mark Pincus, if an anonymous former employee's quote in this SF Weekly feature article is to be believed. The piece makes Pincus and the entire Zynga organization to be not very happy-funtime. "Zynga's motto is 'Do Evil,'" this same ex-employee says. "I would venture to say it is one of the most evil places I've run into, from a culture perspective and in its business approach. I've tried my best to make sure that friends don't let friends work at Zynga."   |
| Sweet Streets: Art Inspired by Japanese Street Fashion opening reception 9/11/2010 Posted: 10 Sep 2010 04:15 PM PDT It's time for Sweet Streets 2, an art exhibition at Nucleus Art Gallery in Alhambra. Opening reception is 9/11/2010. Video above is from last year's Sweet Streets. Gallery Nucleus & Caro are excited to reprise the highly successful SWEET STREETS exhibit sponsored by Hi-Fructose, Tokyofashion.com and SOSO Happy! Last year's colorful exhibition inspired by Japanese streets attracted hundreds of art and fashion enthusiasts. This year, SWEET STREETS 2 aims to top the last with internationally known artists, photographers, and fashion designers. (I sure love that song. It's Girigiri Surf Rider, by Halcali.) SWEET STREETS 2 (Thanks, Barry!)
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| Chef Wylie Dufresne on science you can NOM Posted: 10 Sep 2010 03:36 PM PDT Love this series of interview clips on the Big Think, where Wylie Dufresne talks about how science has influenced—and improved—cooking over the past couple decades, and why molecular gastronomy is about more than high-falutin' restaurants where dinner comes in the form of foam. In this clip, Dufresne uses science to explain why you shouldn't sear a steak, and how to make your cooked veggies come out colorful and bright.
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| Posted: 10 Sep 2010 03:28 PM PDT  The amazing Roger Ebert is reviving At the Movies. "This is the rebirth of a dream," said Ebert, who partnered in recent years with Richard Roeper before cancer robbed him of the ability to speak. He said he will act as co-producer and employ a computer voice to appear on every episode with segments titled Roger's Office devoted to classic, overlooked and new films.Go, Roger! Roger Ebert presents At the Movies
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| The American West: 1890, 1970, 1999 Posted: 10 Sep 2010 03:19 PM PDT  I've come to accept that the closest I will ever get to time travel is matching up modern photos to historic shots of the same place. Usually, that means extensive time travel is restricted to cities, places where lots of people were taking lots of photographs at lots of different points over the years. The Third View project is a notable exception. Starting with geological survey photos from the late 1800s, the project then adds second shots of the same spots taken as part of a Rephotographic Survey in the 1970s. Finally, new images, taken between 1997 and 2000, show how the lonesome west changed over the course of 100 years.  It's not entirely what you might expect. Sure, some places got more populated, but a surprising number of the sites are still as empty and wild as they were in the 19th century. I'm particularly fond of this trio of images taken at Nevada's Comstock Mines, where you can see the way strip mining changed the landscape, and how nature is reclaiming the now-mostly abandoned site.
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| Jordan Crane praises new Jaime Hernandez story in Love & Rockets Posted: 10 Sep 2010 04:16 PM PDT  Jordan Crane is saying this, so I believe it. In the new issue of Love and Rockets (New Stories, no.3), Jaime has a story called Browntown. It just might be the best thing he's ever done. In fact, I'd go so far as to say, it just might be the best comic I've ever read. It's construction is durable yet intricate, a bunch of simple parts working together flawlessly. It's put together like a watch.Looks like I'm going to make a trip Meltdown this weekend. Love and Rockets: New Stories (Vol. 3)
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| Posted: 10 Sep 2010 02:51 PM PDT  Blinkybugs are little creatures with blinking LED eyes. The eyes blink when the bug's long wire "antennae" bounce against the LED's leads. They were invented by Ken Murphy. Earlier this week my 7-year-old daughter and I made a blinkybug from Murphy's new kit, Blinkybugs! Make Your Own Electronic Insects, published by Chronicle Books.
Because she made them, she seems to like them a lot more than she would if someone had given them to her pre-made. The bugs sit in her lap when she watches TV, and she puts them on the desk so they can watch her play on the computer. This is a great kit for any kid. Blinkybugs! Make Your Own Electronic Insects
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| The Extremeophile Awards: honoring Earth's hardest-living bacteria Posted: 10 Sep 2010 04:19 PM PDT The Lab Rat blog is handing out awards to the hardest-living bacteria on Earth. My favorite winner: Photobacterium profundum, which can live happy and reasonably healthy at a ridiculously wide range of pressures—from 14.5 psi (the standard pressure of our atmosphere), all the way up to 10,152 psi.   |
| Posted: 10 Sep 2010 01:50 PM PDT Come the robot revolution, we'll all probably be forced to play hide-and-seek a lot. Researchers at Georgia Tech have worked out algorithms that allow robots to learn when a situation might call for some less-than-honest behavior, and help our soon-to-be-overlords figure out how best to deceive us. So far, the robots have only used this new-found ability to lay false trails during games of hide-and-go-seek. But I think we all know what's coming. Eventually.   |
| Never-before published photos of Lascaux paintings Posted: 10 Sep 2010 12:33 PM PDT  Lascaux painting photographer Bernard Sury focuses a camera on prehistoric paintings on the ceiling at Lascaux, 1947. Previously unpublished Here's a treat from the archives of LIFE magazine -- the first photos of the cave paintings in Lascaux, including some unpublished photos. September 12, 1940. A warm afternoon in southwestern France. As two schoolboys hunt rabbits on a ridge covered with pine, oak, and blackberry brambles, their dog chases a hare down a hole beside a downed tree. Widening the hole, removing rocks, the boys follow -- and enter not merely another world, but another time. Underground, they discover "a Versailles of prehistory" -- a series of caves, today collectively known as Lascaux, boasting wall paintings up to 18,000 years old. In 1947, LIFE's Ralph Morse went to Lascaux, and became the first photographer to ever document the astonishing, vibrant paintings. Here, on the 70th anniversary of the discovery of the cave and its treasures, in a gallery featuring rare and never-published photographs, Morse -- still vibrant himself at 93 -- shares with LIFE.com his memories of what it was like to encounter the long-hidden, strikingly lifelike handiwork of a vanished people: the Cro-Magnon.Lascaux: Versailles of Prehistory
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| Michael Franti's "The Sound of Sunshine" in sign language Posted: 10 Sep 2010 12:16 PM PDT Video link. There's a whole genre of ASL (American Sign Language) music videos, exemplified perfectly by smokin' hot hottie-hot Jennie Batchelder in her fantastic interpretation of Michael Franti's "The Sound of Sunshine." Michael's had ASL interpreters at his shows for 11 years, so come check out more at the Power to the Peaceful Festival in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park on September 10-12, 2010.
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| Gene Roddenberry's Rolodex sells for $1280 Posted: 10 Sep 2010 12:18 PM PDT  Kevin says: "Thought you'd like to see this... William Shatner's info from Gene Roddenberry's Rolodex (redacted for his privacy, but genuine). The guy that bought the Rolodex (at the recent Star Trek auction) is a friend of mine here at work. He paid a whopping $1280 for the dang thing... more than three times as much as I would have even considered. It's got lots of cool information in it. I'll share more when my friend gets brave enough to bring the whole thing to work. He wants to put it in a clear box for display so nobody does anything foolish like sneezing on it." Not only was Shatner's info in there, so was Nimoy's, Carl Sagan's secretary, Astronaut Walter (Wally) Schirra, his wife (Majel) mobile phone number, all the numbers to house phones at his house, many relatives (surprisingly a lot are doctors in Georgia... does that make you think or what?!) and much, much more. I'm sure most if not all of the data here is very outdated and many of the people are no longer with us that are included on the cards, but it's cool anyway. I'm hoping to get a chance to shoot a photo of the actual Rolodex sometime, if he feels it is safe enough to bring it to work. What a treasure! My friend is considering checking out some of the numbers to see if they're still current. Who knows...One of Gene Roddenberry's Rolodex Cards
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| Maker Jim Henson in 1969: HOWTO make a puppet Posted: 10 Sep 2010 11:57 AM PDT Video link. Jim Henson teaches viewers how to make puppets from tennis balls, spoons, socks, cardboard tubes, envelopes, and other common household items. Lots of interesting commentary on puppet aesthetics and utility, too! Hearing his voice, which isn't a stretch from Kermit's, is always a treat.
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| What happens when you refuse to answer a passport control officer's questions Posted: 10 Sep 2010 11:28 AM PDT In April, Paul Karl Lukacs landed at San Francisco International Airport after visiting China, and he refused to tell the passport control officer why he was there. He reports what happened on his blog. "Why were you in China?" asked the passport control officer, a woman with the appearance and disposition of a prison matron.Detained By The Feds For Not Answering Questions
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| 12 volume set of books reprints Wikipedia's edits of the Iraq War entry Posted: 10 Sep 2010 11:12 AM PDT  James Bridle published "the 12,000 edits made to the controversial Wikipedia entry for the Iraq War between December 2004 to November 2009 as a 7,000 page, 12 volume set of books." Archiving Iraq: One Wikipedia Entry's Edit Wars, Printed in 12 Volumes
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| Amtrak conducts random searches on passengers to "show force" Posted: 10 Sep 2010 11:05 AM PDT "We've been doing random searches for years. None have been in response to particular threats. It's more to show force." - Amtrak spokesman Cliff Cole. (Via The Agitator)   |
| Bit-52's: Robot band plays B-52's party classic "Rock Lobster" Posted: 10 Sep 2010 11:12 AM PDT Happy Friday, everyone. Tara McGinley at Dangerous Minds found this sweet video of a robot ensemble performing an all-machines cover of the classic '80s party hit "Rock Lobster," by the B-52's. It's the work of a fellow who goes by the name bd594 at YouTube, aka one mister James Cochrane of Toronto, Canada. Video's at this YouTube link, and read more about it at Dangerous Minds.
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| Steampunk robot theater -- for charity! Posted: 10 Sep 2010 10:17 AM PDT  John sez, "I am producing 'An Evening of Steampunk and Robot Theatre.' Nine plays, six directors, and robots galore... for charity! Agents of Queen Victoria search for a secret weapon on the outer reaches of space. A disgruntled robot gets family counseling. A mad scientist aims to destroy the world with the help of a cyber-head and time traveling brothers. Bonus: opening night my blog will reveal a link to a steampunk and robot web anthology with original music, comic book art, and eight more plays." An Evening of Steampunk and Robot Theatre (Thanks, John!)
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| SPECIAL FEATURE: Neo-Minimalism and the Rise of the Technomads Posted: 10 Sep 2010 01:49 PM PDT By definition, "neo-minimalists" don't have an overabundance of things in their lives. But one thing they tend to have more and more of these days is visibility. Recently, The New York Times talked to some people participating in the 100 Thing Challenge about how it has affected their lives; The BBC looked into the "Cult of Less;" and here on Boing Boing, Mark has been getting down to the nitty-gritty of what the "lifestyle hack" involves. The common thread here is a growing number of people are realizing that our mountains of physical stuff are actually cluttering up more than just our houses. All of this is exciting to me, because it's something in which I have a growing personal interest: I have been taking steps to get rid of the mountains of stuff I now realize I have no reason to hang on to. In fact, I'm not just doing it myself--I'm trying to help start a revolution.
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| Posted: 10 Sep 2010 10:01 AM PDT |
| Raising money for paralyzed graffiti artist and open eye-tracker pioneer TEMPT1 Posted: 10 Sep 2010 09:00 AM PDT |
| Chief NZ military scientist quits after lies he was connected with Jamaica's "Cool Runnings" team Posted: 10 Sep 2010 06:38 AM PDT Why it's probably just as well New Zealand is a peaceful country: the nation's top military scientist has quit after allegations that his resume falsely claimed he was a former Marine, a nuclear weapons designer, and an Olympic bobsledder who raced against Jamaica's "Cool Runnings" team. (via Submitterator, thanks recoiled)   |
I accepted in a second, and we started brainstorming right then, on the phone. With some amazing photos Clayton shot as the base, we quickly arrived at a very clear vision of what the album would look like, including some costuming elements by another artist and friend, 
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