WATCHISMO TIME MACHINES - Timing is everything...
Fantasy-themed B&B in Belgium Pure evil causes birth defects Turning on a 100-year-old light bulb How Facebook ownership contract was 'forged' Dain Fagerholm's incredible animated GIFs Deepwater Horizon-related court filing in which an injured oil rig worker seeks justice through wit and metaphor Things that never, never work #3428172 And now, a moment of science fashion Whatever happened to Russia's Moon lander? Apps for Kids 015: Simple Physics Bathos in Sealand Laugh-Out-Loud Cats "Constellations" tee at w00t! Medvedev cat safe New geeks welcome, thank you Facebook passwords: many employers can snoop them, and don't need to ask AT-AT oil painting Soviet medallions scattered on Moon in 1959 Free, open, all-HTML/JS MMO from Mozilla Memorial reefs: cast your loved ones' cremains into concrete marine habitats Sony takes down game downloads to prevent homebrew Apps for Kids 015: Simple Physics City of Boston pays $170,000 to settle landmark case involving man arrested for recording police with cell phone 45-foot paper airplane flies All the window-cameos from the old Batman TV series Trying to close your AOL account is suspicious activity Spanish record industry cartel sues business prof who called their system an illegal cartel, claims "threatened honor" Boing Boing on Flipboard Norway's new Minister of International Development is a D&D champ who thinks LARPs can change the worlds Frog mask recalled German man accused of injuring child with poisoned chocolate bunny Fantasy-themed B&B in Belgium
By Cory Doctorow on Mar 28, 2012 11:47 am La Balade des Gnômes is a B&B in Durbuy, Belgium. It has a series of themed rooms kitted out with carved driftwood and various fantastic elements. As the name implies, many of the rooms look like something out of a Brian Fround illustration, but there's also a Jules Verne space-exploration room, Baba Yaga's hut, a ...
Read in browser Pure evil causes birth defects
By Maggie Koerth-Baker on Mar 28, 2012 11:29 am Unassailable evidence presented by the Institute for Dangerous Research's Department of Mad Biology. I don't know where penguinchris got this. But it's amazing.
Read in browser Turning on a 100-year-old light bulb
By Maggie Koerth-Baker on Mar 28, 2012 11:25 am Incandescent lights work by turning heat into light. You run an electric current through a filament, the filament heats up, and as it does, it starts to glow. The basic element has been around since 1809. The trick is finding material for a filament that will get hot enough to glow, but won't destroy itself ...
Read in browser How Facebook ownership contract was 'forged'
By Rob Beschizza on Mar 28, 2012 11:18 am The contract presented by Paul Ceglia, who claims he paid Zuck to build Facebook, was forged, according to a forensic report(PDF) by Stroz Friedberg. Wired's David Kravetz: "The metadata shows they were backdated to 2003 when Zuckerberg, as a Harvard University student, agreed to perform the contracted work for Ceglia. But the copies of the ...
Read in browser Dain Fagerholm's incredible animated GIFs
By Rob Beschizza on Mar 28, 2012 10:59 am Dain Fagerholm creates animated GIF art similar to traditional stereo 3D photos. Pictured here is Daydreamer. Other favorites of mine include Four creatures in a room and "Seven Headed Creature". Dain's latest, Creature in Cube with Gem looks anagyphic as well as stereoscopic (but I'm not sure if it is)! [via Illusion 360]
Read in browser Deepwater Horizon-related court filing in which an injured oil rig worker seeks justice through wit and metaphor
By Cory Doctorow on Mar 28, 2012 10:46 am This motion, filed on Mardi Gras in the US District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana, is a "metaphorical request for a ride on the streetcar named remand." Its author, Lance Lubel of Lubel Voyles LLP (on behalf of Buddy Trahan, who was aboard the Deepwater Horizon at the time of its catastrophe), produced ...
Read in browser Things that never, never work #3428172
By Maggie Koerth-Baker on Mar 28, 2012 10:43 am If you are a powerful corporation or individual and someone parodies you, challenging them with copyright infringement will not make the whole thing quietly go away. Scientists are boycotting the scientific publishing giant Elsevier. @FakeElsevier is a twitter account that mocks the real Elsevier's IP and paywall practices. Real Elsevier thinks they can take the ...
Read in browser And now, a moment of science fashion
By Maggie Koerth-Baker on Mar 28, 2012 10:29 am James Cameron. Steve Zissou. What is with submarine explorers and little knit caps? Slate investigates. (Via Miriam Goldstein)
Read in browser Whatever happened to Russia's Moon lander?
By Maggie Koerth-Baker on Mar 28, 2012 10:23 am The United State won the race to put a man on the Moon. But we weren't the first to land anything on the Moon. That prize went to the Soviet Union, which successfully put Luna 2 on the surface of the Moon in 1959. Their later missions were less successful and the USSR never made ...
Read in browser Apps for Kids 015: Simple Physics
By Mark Frauenfelder on Mar 28, 2012 10:12 am Simple Physics. We also discuss "endless runner" games in our "Listener Email" segment. If you would like to have us read your favorite game or gadget recommendation on the air, or if you have a question you'd like us to answer on the show, email us at appsforkids@boingboing.net. Include your age, and the city, state, ...
Read in browser Bathos in Sealand
By Rob Beschizza on Mar 28, 2012 10:11 am At Ars Technica, James Grimmelmann charts the failure of offshore datacenter HavenCo. Supposedly beyond the reach of national laws, HavenCo was located on Sealand, a tiny naval fort six miles off the English coast. Occupied since 1967 by a pirate radio DJ and touting itself as the world's smallest nation, Sealand's monarchical trappings are ever-mingled ...
Read in browser Laugh-Out-Loud Cats "Constellations" tee at w00t!
By Cory Doctorow on Mar 28, 2012 10:00 am Ape Lad writes, "Woot is selling a poster of one of my recent Laugh-Out-Loud Cats comics for a limited time. It shows an inaccurate depiction of the constellations." Connect the Dots Poster (Thanks, Ape Lad)
Read in browser Medvedev cat safe
By Rob Beschizza on Mar 28, 2012 09:35 am Following rumors that his cat had run away from home, Russian president Dmitry Medvedev reassured Twitter, the nation and the world that Dorofei is safe. This is not Dorofei's first scrape; he once lost a fight with neighbor and former president Mikhail Gorbachev's cat. [Reuters]
Read in browser New geeks welcome, thank you
By Rob Beschizza on Mar 28, 2012 09:26 am At Forbes, Tara Tiger Brown's attack on "fake" geek girls —"Pretentious females who have labeled themselves as a "geek girl" figured out that guys will pay a lot of attention to them"—has gotten the response it deserves. Here's Leigh Alexander: The author of the article takes great pains to establish her own authenticity and attack ...
Read in browser Facebook passwords: many employers can snoop them, and don't need to ask
By Cory Doctorow on Mar 28, 2012 09:00 am US senators are calling for action on employers' habit of demanding employees' Facebook passwords, but no one seems to notice that many companies configure their computers so that they can eavesdrop on your Facebook, bank, and webmail passwords, even when those passwords are "protected" by SSL. In my latest Guardian column, "Protecting your Facebook privacy ...
Read in browser AT-AT oil painting
By Cory Doctorow on Mar 27, 2012 11:16 pm Found on Ffffound, artist unknown, this beautiful oil-painting of an AT-AT Walker. Quoted from: ataturner600.jpg (JPEG Image, 600x446 pixels) (via Wil Wheaton)
Read in browser Soviet medallions scattered on Moon in 1959
By Mark Frauenfelder on Mar 27, 2012 09:28 pm Artist Randy Regier visited the Cosmosphere Museum in Hutchinson, Kansas. He snapped a photo of this Russian sphere, a duplicate of the one the Russians sent to the Moon in 1959. Here's the description: A Cosmic Calling Card Luna II becomes the first man-made object to impact the lunar surface, and the first to reach ...
Read in browser Free, open, all-HTML/JS MMO from Mozilla
By Cory Doctorow on Mar 27, 2012 09:13 pm The Mozilla Foundation is on a kick to show people just how amazing HTML5 can be, and to that end, they're releasing a series of free, open, ambitious in-browser apps to inspire developers and users. The latest of these is BrowserQuest, a multiplayer online role-playing game built completely out of native HTML, with no plugins, ...
Read in browser Memorial reefs: cast your loved ones' cremains into concrete marine habitats
By Cory Doctorow on Mar 27, 2012 09:00 pm Eternal Reefs is a company that will turn your cremains into concrete artificial coral reef and marine habitat. Families are allowed to attend the casting of the reef-component, put their handprints in it, view the finished item, and accompany the reef to the drop-site. Mariner Memorial Reef (large) 4' high by 6' wide 3800 - ...
Read in browser Sony takes down game downloads to prevent homebrew
By Rob Beschizza on Mar 27, 2012 08:31 pm Kyle Orland writes that Sony is preventing customers from re-downloading games they've already paid for, because code flaws in them may be used to run unsigned code on the portable console. The hack is reportedly useful only for homebrew, not for piracy. [Ars]
Read in browser Apps for Kids 015: Simple Physics
By Mark Frauenfelder on Mar 27, 2012 08:12 pm Apps for Kids is Boing Boing's podcast about cool smartphone apps for kids and parents. My co-host is my 9-year-old daughter, Jane Frauenfelder. In this week's episode Jane and I talk about the engineering construction simulation game,
Read in browser City of Boston pays $170,000 to settle landmark case involving man arrested for recording police with cell phone
By Mark Frauenfelder on Mar 27, 2012 07:20 pm In October 2007 Simon Glik used his phone to videotape police officers arresting a man in Boston. The police immediately turned their attention to Mr. Glik and arrested him for "illegal electronic surveillance." Glik filed a civil suit against the city, and he was awarded $170,000 in a settlement. Mr. Glik was forced to defend ...
Read in browser 45-foot paper airplane flies
By Cory Doctorow on Mar 27, 2012 07:00 pm Marilyn writes, "A part of its Giant Paper Airplane Project to get kids psyched about aviation and engineering, the Pima Air & Space Museum launched what may be the largest paper airplane (45-ft-long, 800 lbs, with a 24-ft wingspan) from a helicopter at 2,700 feet over the Arizona desert. It flew (glided actually) about 7 ...
Read in browser All the window-cameos from the old Batman TV series
By Cory Doctorow on Mar 27, 2012 04:55 pm In this compilation video, Loomyaire compiles all fourteen of the "window cameos" from the Adam West Batman TV series, in which real-life personages and characters from other TV shows popped out of windows while Batman and the Boy Wonder were scaling a building-face and traded Laugh-In style quips with the heroes. Included in the video ...
Read in browser Trying to close your AOL account is suspicious activity
By Rob Beschizza on Mar 27, 2012 04:48 pm A few days ago, AOL fired the staff developing AIM, its long-running instant messaging system. Having done this, it reset user accounts, locking them out of third-party IM clients until they confirmed and updated decade-old personal information. Having done so, I was displeased at such a shameless data mining ploy and tried to cancel AOL/AIM ...
Read in browser Spanish record industry cartel sues business prof who called their system an illegal cartel, claims "threatened honor"
By Cory Doctorow on Mar 27, 2012 04:36 pm Enrique Dans is a professor at Spain's IE Business School and a well-known blogger who has been a fierce critic of the entertainment industry. Last summer, Prof Dans wrote a blog post, Siete motivos por los que el caso SGAE es mucho más que la propia SGAE, which set out his view that Promusicae, the ...
Read in browser Boing Boing on Flipboard
By Mark Frauenfelder on Mar 27, 2012 04:34 pm Flipboard is an IOS application that presents Twitter feeds in the form of beautiful magazine pages. Boing Boing has always been one of Flipboard's most popular sites. Today, Flipboard released the "publisher" version of Boing Boing, which looks and feels even more like a digital magazine. I think it's fantastic. If you are reading this ...
Read in browser Norway's new Minister of International Development is a D&D champ who thinks LARPs can change the worlds
By Cory Doctorow on Mar 27, 2012 04:29 pm Here's an abridged translation of a Imagonem interview with Heikki Holmås, Norway's new minister of International Development. Holmås is a lifelong D&D player and LARPer who won the Norwegian D&D championships in 1989 and was sent to GenCon in Milwaukee. Holmås recounts his favorite campaigns and describes how he things RPGs and LARPs can be ...
Read in browser Frog mask recalled
By Mark Frauenfelder on Mar 27, 2012 04:16 pm "Target Corporation is recalling about 3,400 stuffed plush-fabric frog masks that the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission says pose a suffocation hazard when secured over a child's face. The thick mask has no nose or mouth holes." Frog mask recalled for suffocation risk (via tai-wiki-widbee)
Read in browser German man accused of injuring child with poisoned chocolate bunny
By Mark Frauenfelder on Mar 27, 2012 04:11 pm 68-year-old of Joerg-Werner Lubbe of Germany enjoys decorating his front yard with Easter candy. But he did not want children to get away with the crime of taking his sweets, so took steps to punish any child who did. [Lubbe] allegedly laced a batch of chocolate bunnies with ammonium hydroxide and hung them from a ...
Read in browser 
No comments:
Post a Comment