links.lmorchard.com

November 2011

798 bookmarks saved in November 2011

Cutting their own throats - Charlie's Diary

http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2011/11/cutting-their-own-throats.html
As ebook sales mushroom, the Big Six's insistence on DRM has proven to be a hideous mistake. Rather than reducing piracy[*], it has locked customers in Amazon's walled garden, which in turn increases Amazon's leverage over publishers. And unlike pirated copies (which don't automatically represent lost sales) Amazon is a direct revenue threat because Amazon are have no qualms about squeezing their suppliers — or trying to poach authors for their "direct" publishing channel by offering initially favourable terms. (Which will doubtless get a lot less favourable once the monopoly is secured ...)
#amazon #drm #ebooks #haha #kindle #publishing
archive.org #20069

Mayor Bloomberg: ‘I Have My Own Army’ | PolitickerNY

http://www.politickerny.com/2011/11/30/mayor-bloomberg-i-have-my-own-army-11-30-11
“I have my own army in the NYPD, which is the seventh biggest army in the world. I have my own State Department, much to Foggy Bottom’s annoyance. We have the United Nations in New York, and so we have an entree into the diplomatic world that Washington does not have,” Mayor Bloomberg said.
#newyork #occupy #ows #police #politics #scary
archive.org #20068

Citadel sequence cut from Mass Effect 2 returns in Mass Effect 3 | Joystiq

http://www.joystiq.com/2011/11/30/citadel-sequence-cut-from-mass-effect-2-returns-in-mass-effect-3
A segment of the Mass Effect story set in the Citadel, originally planned for Mass Effect 2, is finally being made for inclusion in Mass Effect 3, lead writer Mac Walters told OXM. "There was a Mass Effect 2 plot that was a kind of callback to the first Mass Effect that was going to be on the Citadel, and we cut it," he said. "But now it's made a resurrection in Mass Effect 3, so I'm happy, but I can't say what it is." That's right. Content that was conceived for the second game, and refers to the first game, is now in the third. And speaking of things that have been around since the first game, Walters acknowledged the difficulty of continuing the Mass Effect story after the second game's ending, which can kill off important characters. "The classic example [of a hurdle faced in writing ME3] is 'Hey, let's make the ending of Mass Effect 2 a suicide mission where all your henchmen can possibly die, and Shepard can even die!'" Walters said. "Oh right... and then we're gonna do another game after that. What the hell are we gonna do with all those guys?" Unfortunately, Walters didn't go on from there. We're going to have to wait until March to find out just what the hell does happen to all those guys. Citadel sequence cut from Mass Effect 2 returns in Mass Effect 3 originally appeared on Joystiq on Wed, 30 Nov 2011 12:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink | Email this | Comments
#needs-tags #shared #ttrss
archive.org #20067

Will nematodes conquer space before humans?

http://io9.com/5863124/will-nematodes-conquer-space-before-humans
Caenorhabditis elegans is a a less-than-one-millimeter-long nematode that matures and dutifully produces its next generation in space the same way it does on earth. C. elegans' biology shares certain important commonalities with that of humans. Therefore, University of Nottingham researchers are arguing that these roundworms should be used to model the effects of long stays in space on humans. In repeated experiments, Nottingham researchers found that C. elegans manages to execute all its basic life functions in space. The roundworms, which are small enough to comfortably establish a thriving community in a petri dish, managed to produce twelve generations, all while sitting in low orbit on the International Space Station. This is significant because C. elegans has long been a model for human biology. True, they were never a good model for spinal cord experiments, but certain biological functions mirror those in humans. These nematodes show signs of aging, which allows us to understand how certain conditions affect humans as they age. About 35% of their genes are similar to human genes. They're no chimpanzees, but it's a lot for a nematode. Additionally, C. elegans are hermaphroditic and often fertilize themselves. This process allows recessive genes to come to the fore, which helps scientists study their effects quickly and without genetic engineering. In an upcoming paper in Interface, the researchers argue that C. Elegans are the most viable way to test the effects of long space travel or off-earth colonization. Twelve generations in worm-years indicates that people may be able — with the right support and equipment — get by for hundreds of years in space, giving us plenty of time to get to another planet in the solar system or even travel to an exoplanet. The fact that the worms kept living means that wherever we go, they'll probably already be there. We can send them to various planets and orbital habitats to see if they survive for generations. They're the canary in the coal mine...and that coal mine is in space. Via Rutgers and to be published in Interface of the Royal Society.
#needs-tags #shared #ttrss
archive.org #20066

Banishing consciousness: the mystery of anaesthesia - health - 29 November 2011 - New Scientist

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21228402.300-banishing-consciousness-the-mystery-of-anaesthesia.html?full=true
The development of general anaesthesia has transformed surgery from a horrific ordeal into a gentle slumber. It is one of the commonest medical procedures in the world, yet we still don't know how the drugs work. Perhaps this isn't surprising: we still don't understand consciousness, so how can we comprehend its disappearance?
#anaesthesia #brain #cogsci #consciousness #medicine #mind #science
archive.org #20064

10 things the iPhone Siri will help you get instead of an abortion | The Raw Story

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/11/29/10-things-the-iphone-siri-will-help-you-get-instead-of-an-abortion
It’s an experience that’s being replicated by women around the country: despite plentiful online information about actual places to get an abortion, Siri doesn’t seem to provide it. It’s a similar experience for women seeking emergency contraception: in New York City, Siri doesn’t know what Plan B is and, asked for emergency contraception, offers up a Google results page of definitions. Didn't we learn from HAL 9000 that it doesn't really pay to give your tools their own opinionated personalities?
#abortion #apple #ios #iphone #mobile #siri #speech
archive.org #20063

When Used Books Attack: Banana Edition | BOOK RIOT

http://bookriot.com/2011/11/30/when-used-books-attack-banana-edition#.TtZXeqFvb50.twitter
This monstrosity is called a Banana Candle, which consists of a banana stuck in a pineapple slice, with mayonnaise and a maraschino cherry on top. And it is a crime against nature. If someone brought this into my home, I would slap them, and then burn my house down and salt the ground where it stood. This photo is the reason flocks of birds inexplicably die and fall to the ground. Goats and gangrene, who approved this picture??? Imagine my horror – I actually touched this book.
#bananas #food #funny #to:tumblr
archive.org #20062

Techmeme: Stross: publishers' insistence on DRM “hands Amazon a stick with which to beat them” (Cory Doctorow/Boing Boing)

http://www.techmeme.com/111130/p11#a111130p11
Cory Doctorow / Boing Boing:Stross: publishers' insistence on DRM “hands Amazon a stick with which to beat them”  —  Charlie Stross unloads both barrels on the big six publishers and their insistence on using DRM in connection with their ebooks, arguing that their demands for DRM lock their cu...
#shared #ttrss
archive.org #20061

Mozilla’s WebAPI for Firefox takes shape, porn sites quiver in anticipation | ExtremeTech

http://www.extremetech.com/computing/107211-mozillas-webapi-for-firefox-takes-shape-porn-sites-quiver-in-anticipation
The first fruits of Mozilla’s attempt to make a Chrome OS-like Firefox operating system — Boot 2 Gecko — are now beginning to take shape in the Nightly builds of Firefox for Android. Dubbed “WebAPI,” these recent additions allow Firefox to access an Android device’s hardware through a JavaScript API. As of the latest Nightly, Firefox 11 for Android can now read the battery state, capture images from the camera, send SMSes, and trigger the vibrator motor.
#firefox #mobile #mozilla #webapi #webdev
archive.org #20056

Berg's Little Printer churns out RSS feeds with a receipt and a smile -- Engadget

http://www.engadget.com/2011/11/30/bergs-little-printer-churns-out-rss-feeds-with-a-receipt-and-a
It's hard to think of a device more aptly named than BergCloud's Little Printer. It's little. It prints. It even smiles at you. And why wouldn't it? It's adorable. Equally notable is what it produces -- RSS feeds printed out on grocery store-style receipts. All you have to do is hook it up to yo...
#shared #ttrss
archive.org #20052

A List Apart: Articles: Say No to SOPA

http://www.alistapart.com/articles/say-no-to-sopa
A List Apart strongly opposes United States H.R.3261 AKA the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), an ill-conceived lobbyist-driven piece of legislation that is technically impossible to enforce, cripplingly burdensome to support, and would, without hyperbole, destroy the internet as we know it.
#copyfight #freedom #internet #sopa
archive.org #20050

Poe's Law - RationalWiki

http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Poe's_Law
Poe's Law is an axiom suggesting that it's difficult to distinguish between parodies of religious fundamentalism and its genuine proponents, since they both seem equally insane. For example, some conservatives consider noted homophobe Fred Phelps to be so over-the-top that they argue he's a "deep cover liberal" trying to discredit more mainstream homophobes.
#atheism #funny #parody #religion
archive.org #20048

HandyNES mod shrinks console, makes light gun look like light cannon -- Engadget

http://www.engadget.com/2011/11/29/handynes-mod-shrinks-console-makes-light-gun-look-like-light-ca
Vita schmita. This red mushroom-themed portable NES is the latest gaming tribute from modder LovableChevy, combining the original Entertainment System's innards with a 3.5-inch LCD screen, built-in controls and a rechargeable battery. The tinkerer has taken the time to include an AV out, headph...
#shared #ttrss
archive.org #20044

Internet Explorer 10 Platform Preview 4: Windows 7 users need not apply

http://arstechnica.com/microsoft/news/2011/11/internet-explorer-10-platform-preview-4-windows-7-users-need-not-apply.ars
Microsoft has released the fourth preview of Internet Explorer 10. As is the case with previous Platform Previews, the release is aimed at developers: the new features are important to those creating rich, complex Web applications, but will have less impact on Web users. However, even Web deve...
#shared #ttrss
archive.org #20042

Daily Kos: White House says Obama considering rolling back mandatory insurance coverage of contraception

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/11/29/1040891/-White-House-says-Obama-considering-rolling-back-mandatory-insurance-coverage-of-contraception
(Ceridwen/Wikimedia Commons) This, from Tuesday's press briefing, is infuriating: JAKE TAPPER (ABC):    I’ve heard from a lot of Democrats in the last few weeks who are concerned about President Obama possibly granting an exemption to Catholic churches, hospitals and universities from the requi...
#shared #ttrss
archive.org #20041

Freak Tofu Explosion Terrorizes Portland

http://gawker.com/5863550/freak-tofu-explosion-terrorizes-portland
A female resident of Portland, Oregon was at home cooking tofu when, suddenly and without warning, her kitchen exploded. The woman said she was rinsing her tofu pan in the sink when a mysterious force—she isn't sure what—burned her hand and knocked a six-foot window out of her home and onto the ...
#shared #ttrss
archive.org #20035

US judge orders hundreds of sites "de-indexed" from Google, Facebook

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/11/us-judge-orders-hundreds-of-sites-de-indexed-from-google-twitter-bing-facebook.ars
After a series of one-sided hearings, luxury goods maker Chanel has won recent court orders against hundreds of websites trafficking in counterfeit luxury goods. A federal judge in Nevada has agreed that Chanel can seize the domain names in question and transfer them all to US-based registrar GoDaddy. The judge also ordered "all Internet search engines" and "all social media websites"—explicitly naming Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Bing, Yahoo, and Google—to "de-index" the domain names and to remove them from any search results.
#chanel #copyfight #dns #freedom #internet #sopa
archive.org #20034

Watch a VC use my name to sell a con. | jwz

http://www.jwz.org/blog/2011/11/watch-a-vc-use-my-name-to-sell-a-con
He's telling you the story of, "If you bust your ass and don't sleep, you'll get rich" because the only way that people in his line of work get richer is if young, poorly-socialized, naive geniuses believe that story! Without those coat-tails to ride, VCs might have to work for a living. Once that kid burns out, they'll just slot a new one in.
#business #jwz #life #startups #vc #work
archive.org #20033

memeorandum: Perry blames editing for viral ‘drunk’ video, said it was a ‘good speech’ (Geneva Sands-Sadowitz/The Hill)

http://www.memeorandum.com/111102/p106#a111102p106
Article note: Testing article note. Geneva Sands-Sadowitz / The Hill:Perry blames editing for viral ‘drunk’ video, said it was a ‘good speech’  —  Texas Gov. Rick Perry said he “felt great” during the speech he gave Friday that turned into a viral video online and brought negative attention to...
#shared #ttrss
archive.org #20028

Sphero goes up for pre-order, ready to roll its way into your heart -- Engadget

http://www.engadget.com/2011/11/02/sphero-goes-up-for-pre-order-ready-to-roll-its-way-into-your-he
Our favorite iOS / Android-controlled toy ball is coming soon to an annoyed cat near you. You can pre-order Sphero now for $130 through Amazon, and it'll start shipping in December, just in time to remotely find its way into a stocking or two. Sphero goes up for pre-order, ready to roll its way...
#shared #ttrss
archive.org #20027

inessential.com: Mac Text Editors and Navigation

http://inessential.com/2011/11/27/mac_text_editors_and_navigation
Unfortunately, there’s no standard for Go to Line in Mac text editors. Each editor does it differently, and they usually screw up at least one part of it so that it’s not-particularly-usable. (Which causes me to curse through my nose, throw one of the plush toys they permit me to have, and then run back to Mama Terminal for solace.)
#dev #editing #mac #programming #text #tools
archive.org #20019

Ex-RIAA Boss Ignores All Criticisim Of SOPA/PIPA, Claims Any Complaints Are Trying To Justify Stealing | Techdirt

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20111127/22391516905/ex-riaa-boss-ignores-all-criticisim-sopapipa-claims-any-complaints-are-trying-to-justify-stealing.shtml
But, even more to the point, it's getting ridiculous how many people defending SOPA/PIPA are doing so using this logic. They brush off all of the specific concerns, the highlights of problematic language, and they conclude "why are you justifying theft?" Of course, that's ridiculous. Beyond the fact that "theft" and "infringement" are very different (don't get me started), nothing in anyone's complaints about SOPA or PIPA have anything to do with "justifying" infringement. In fact, in the post that was being discussed, we clearly noted that infringement is a problem. We just disagree that PIPA and SOPA are reasonably, or even effective, solutions.
#censorship #copyfight #freedom #internet #sopa
archive.org #19991

Microsoft's Cold Feet Over SOPA Behind BSA's 'Rethinking' Its Views | Techdirt

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20111123/11042416888/microsofts-cold-feet-over-sopa-behind-bsas-rethinking-its-views.shtml
One of the big surprises this week was that the normally "maximalist" organization, the Business Software Alliance (BSA) -- basically the RIAA of software -- did an abrupt and unexpected turnaround on SOPA. While it had been close to gushing in its initial support, it backed that down quite a bit, noting that the bill would likely have unintended consequences that needed to be dealt with. Behind that shift? Apparently Microsoft. Microsoft, who has been quite aggressive on copyright (and patent) enforcement lately, has always publicly supported these bills, in contrast to nearly all of the rest of the tech industry. However, even it appears to recognize that SOPA goes way too far, and apparently had a little discussion with the BSA about backing down.
#censorship #copyfight #law #sopa
archive.org #19989

Homebrewing: Do Your Annual Equipment Maintenance | Serious Eats: Drinks

http://drinks.seriouseats.com/2011/11/homebrewing-annual-equipment-maintenance-you-should-do.html
Once a year I like to take a day to go through all my homebrewing gear and make sure everything is clean and working right. It feels good to go into a deep-cleaning mode from time to time to make sure you're not picking up off flavors from your kettle or worse—infections from equipment that should have been discarded.
#beer #homebrewing #maintenance
archive.org #19988

Why Haunted House for the Atari 2600 so Great? | The Retroist

http://www.retroist.com/2011/11/28/why-haunted-house-for-the-atari-2600-so-great
As I sat upon the creaky wooden steps, I felt as though my grip on sanity was beginning to loosen. My breaths came in rapid, gasping spurts, and my heart was beating with such ferocity, I felt for certain it would leap from my chest and fall to the unforgiving floor where it would flop to and fro like a great crimson fish. My skin was slick with a veneer of cool, clammy sweat, and my hands, which held the source of my terror, shook a bit as I read each cursed word inscribed in that hellish tome. Why did I ever allow my curiosity concerning the priceless urn of the Graves Mansion get the better of me?
#atari2600 #gaming #hauntedmansion #retro
archive.org #19987

Radio hams pick up Mars rover Curiosity's signals • The Register

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/11/28/radio_hams_curiosity_signals
Amateur radio enthusiasts using a restored dish antenna in Germany say they have successfully picked up telemetry from NASA's Mars Science Laboratory spacecraft, now outward bound for Mars carrying a one-ton nuclear powered robot rover named Curiosity towards a date with destiny in the Elysium Planitia.
#hams #mars #nasa #nifty #radio #space
archive.org #19986

Google I/O Moved to June and Extended to 3 Days, Developers Will Have to Code for Tickets — SiliconFilter

http://siliconfilter.com/google-io-moved-to-june-and-extended-to-3-days-developers-will-have-to-code-for-tickets
Maybe even more interesting than the change in dates is the fact that Tran also hinted at a new application process for I/O. The last event famously sold out in less than an hour. This time around, it looks like developers will have to compete for spots at I/O. Tran tells potential attendees to use the two extra months to “brush up on [their] coding skills,” as this will “come in handy when the new application process opens in February.”
#coding #google #googleio #tech
archive.org #19984

18 Newt Gingrich Quotes That Disqualify Him From Ever Being President | Addicting Info

http://www.addictinginfo.org/2011/11/26/18-newt-gingrich-quotes-that-disqualify-him-from-ever-being-president
Newt Gingrich is currently the leader of the Republican field of presidential candidates. So it’s only fitting that the quotes come out of the skeleton closet. Here are more than a dozen quotes from Newt Gingrich that reveal his lies, his arrogance, his hatred, and his hypocrisy and disqualify him from ever being President.
#election #newtgingrich #politics #potus #republicans
archive.org #19983

My 10 years of blogging: Reflections, Lessons & Some Stats Too — Tech News and Analysis

http://gigaom.com/2011/11/26/10-years-gigaom
What does the future hold? It is a good question. I have actually been thinking a lot about that lately and wondering how to reinvent the art form that I embraced over a decade ago. I don’t really have an answer, except that it is somewhere in the past and in the reasons why I fell in love with blogging.
#blogging #history #metablogging #om #writing
archive.org #19972

Did Mayors, DHS Coordinate Occupy Attacks? - Uprising

http://inthesetimes.com/uprising/entry/12303/mayors_dhs_coordinated_occupy_attacks
When a series of crackdowns on the Occupy camps suddenly occurred in, more or less, the same week, many observers wondered if perhaps the attacks had been coordinated at a national level. Oakland Mayor Jean Quan confirmed that suspicion during an appearance on the BBC - excerpted on The Takeaway radio program - when she casually mentioned taking part in a conference call with the leaders of 18 US cities right before the raids.
#corruption #government #occupy #ows #politics #us
archive.org #19957

Raids on OWS coordinated with Obama’s FBI, Homeland Security & others :: News From Underground

http://markcrispinmiller.com/2011/11/raids-on-ows-coordinated-with-obamas-fbi-homeland-security-others
Over the past ten days, more than a dozen cities have moved to evict “Occupy” protesters from city parks and other public spaces. As was the case in last night’s move in New York City, each of the police actions shares a number of characteristics. And according to one Justice official, each of those actions was coordinated with help from Homeland Security, the FBI and other federal police agencies.
#corruption #dhs #government #occupy #ows #politics
archive.org #19956

The shocking truth about the crackdown on Occupy | Naomi Wolf | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2011/nov/25/shocking-truth-about-crackdown-occupy
So, when you connect the dots, properly understood, what happened this week is the first battle in a civil war; a civil war in which, for now, only one side is choosing violence. It is a battle in which members of Congress, with the collusion of the American president, sent violent, organised suppression against the people they are supposed to represent. Occupy has touched the third rail: personal congressional profits streams. Even though they are, as yet, unaware of what the implications of their movement are, those threatened by the stirrings of their dreams of reform are not.
#corruption #occupy #ows #politics #usa
archive.org #19955

The Death of the Fringe Suburb - NYTimes.com

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/26/opinion/the-death-of-the-fringe-suburb.html?_r=2&ref=opinion#h[FtlIit]
For too long, we over-invested in the wrong places. Those retail centers and subdivisions will never be worth what they cost to build. We have to stop throwing good money after bad. It is time to instead build what the market wants: mixed-income, walkable cities and suburbs that will support the knowledge economy, promote environmental sustainability and create jobs.
#cities #economy #jobs #suburbs
archive.org #19953

10 Things That Really Happened on 'A Very Gaga Thanksgiving' - NYTimes.com

http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/11/25/10-things-that-really-happened-on-a-very-gaga-thanksgiving
Perhaps some time after your Thanksgiving dinner, possibly in a stuporous, tryptophan-induced state, you turned on your television to see a glistening, eyebrowless humanoid engaging in acts for your ostensible entertainment. And while you may have concluded this was all a dream or a hallucination, let us assure you that “A Very Gaga Thanksgiving” was an actual holiday special that featured the pop star Lady Gaga and was indeed broadcast on the ABC network.
#gaga #music #special #thanksgiving
archive.org #19934

Occupy language: the struggle over meaning | Dan Gillmor | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2011/nov/22/occupy-language-struggle-over-meaning
If we know anything about the recent income and accumulated assets of the now notorious 1%, it is that much of this wealth, by any rational standard, is undeserved. This applies especially to the Wall Street bankers who looted the global economy with sleazy tactics and, sadly, also with impunity. That is why, if I was the editor in charge of any news organisation, I would flatly ban the use of the word "earned", when "profited" or "made" (as in money) would be much more accurate, or at least neutral. I would not try to say who "deserved" profits; only that profits were made.
#anger #economy #finance #money #occupy #ows #politics
archive.org #19911

Why SOPA endangers America's Internet leadership

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/11/why-sopa-endangers-americas-internet-leadership.ars
America's position of influence over the Internet economy is a valuable form of "soft power." If the US government uses this power judiciously, it can ensure that the Internet evolves in ways that serve US interests. Instead, American policymakers are rapidly squandering this soft power by giving US law enforcement agencies—and, under SOPA, even private copyright holders—free rein to exercise this power with minimal judicial oversight. The US is home to many of the world's leading search engines, advertising networks, and credit card payment networks. These firms not only serve the US market, they are also widely used overseas. If the US begins to use them as pawns in its war against file-sharing, foreigners and their governments will become more reluctant to rely on them.
#internet #morons #politics #sopa
archive.org #19910

New York Times Adds A Twist To Hyperlinks | The Daily Feed | Minyanville.com

http://www.minyanville.com/dailyfeed/new-york-times-adds-a
The Atlantic noticed that the New York Times updated its internal hyperlinks and allowed for special commands for more user control. Similar to cuing YouTube videos at a specific point, special code can be added at the end of URLs to link to or highlight specific paragraphs and sentences. Intended for bloggers to underscore certain passages, it's still a nifty trick for sharing excerpts between day-to-day readers.
#hyperlinks #news #nyt #webdev
archive.org #19906

Plan to Revive Two ABC Soap Operas Collapses - NYTimes.com

http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/11/23/plan-collapses-for-reviving-all-my-children-and-one-life-to-live
After four months of negotiations with actors, producers and unions, the company, Prospect Park, said Wednesday that it had suspended its efforts because of financial challenges. In a statement, it said that contractual demands from the unions “coupled with the program’s inherent economic challenges” led to the decision.
#entertainment #soapoperas #tv
archive.org #19905

A Cherry Pie, an Apple Pie and a Pumpkin Pie, Each Cooked Inside a Separate Cake, and Then All Cooked Together inside Another Cake

http://www.neatorama.com/2011/11/22/a-cherry-pie-an-apple-pie-and-a-pumpkin-pie-each-cooked-inside-a-separate-cake-and-then-all-cooked-together-inside-another-cake
It is a called a cherpumple, and it represents all that remains good and right in this fallen world. Pastry chef David Lowery made this 21 lb. 10 oz. concoction for guests at the Grand Geneva Resort in Wisconsin. I feel a rekindling of hope for the human race because we can still do great things like this.
#cakes #cherpumple #dessert #funny #pies
archive.org #19904

Daily Kos: Rick Santorum calls for low-income children to suffer

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/11/21/1038707/-Rick-Santorum-calls-for-low-income-children-to-suffer
That is not a healthy thing for children, it's not a healthy thing for society ... Suffering, if you're a Christian, suffering is a part of life. And it's not a bad thing, it is an essential thing in life ... There are all different ways to suffer. One way to suffer is through lack of food and shelter and there's another way to suffer which is lack of dignity and hope and there's all sorts of ways that people suffer and it's not just tangible, it's also intangible and we have to consider both.
#christianity #politics #santorum #suffering
archive.org #19902

Code: Flickr Developer Blog » Flipping Out

http://code.flickr.com/blog/2009/12/02/flipping-out
Flickr is somewhat unique in that it uses a code repository with no branches; everything is checked into head, and head is pushed to production several times a day. This works well for bug fixes that we want to go out immediately, but presents a problem when we’re working on a new feature that takes several months to complete. How do we solve that problem? With flags and flippers!
#flickr #programming #waffle #webdev
archive.org #19901

Fox News Viewers Know Less Than People Who Don't Watch Any News: Study

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/21/fox-news-viewers-less-informed-people-fairleigh-dickinson_n_1106305.html?comm_ref=false&ref=fb&src=sp#undefined
Dan Cassino, a political science professor at Fairleigh Dickinson, explained in a statement, "Because of the controls for partisanship, we know these results are not just driven by Republicans or other groups being more likely to watch Fox News. Rather, the results show us that there is something about watching Fox News that leads people to do worse on these questions than those who don’t watch any news at all."
#foxnews #morons #politics
archive.org #19900

UC Davis Pepper-Spray Incident Reveals Weakness Up Top | Matt Taibbi | Rolling Stone

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/blogs/taibblog/uc-davis-pepper-spray-incident-reveals-weakness-up-top-20111122
What happened at UC Davis was the inevitable result of our failure to make sure our government stayed in the business of defending our principles. When we stopped insisting on that relationship with our government, they became something separate from us.
#corruption #occupy #police #politics #ucdavis
archive.org #19899

University of Michigan News Service | 'Perfect black' coating can render a 3D object flat, raises intriguing dark veil possibility in astronomy

http://ns.umich.edu/new/releases/20088-perfect-black-coating-can-render-a-3d-object-flat-raises-intriguing-dark-veil-possibility-in-astronomy
The 70-micron coating, or carbon nanotube carpet, is about half the thickness of a sheet of paper. It absorbs 99.9 percent of the light that hits it, researchers say.
#nifty #physics #stealth
archive.org #19898

The Joy of Tinkertoys | The Retroist

http://www.retroist.com/2011/11/23/the-joy-of-tinkertoys
Tinkertoys were created in 1914 by Charles H. Pajeau and Robert Pettit in Evanston, Illinois. Pajeau, designed the toy after seeing children play with pencils and empty spools of thread. It did not take long for the toys to catch on and after 2 years they had sold millions of their sets.
#retro #tinkertoys #toys
archive.org #19897

Pepper Spray’s Fallout, From Crowd Control to Mocking Images - NYTimes.com

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/23/us/pepper-sprays-fallout-from-crowd-control-to-mocking-images.html
To some, pepper spray is a mild, temporary irritant and its use has been justified as cities and universities have sought to regain control of their streets, parks and campuses. After the video at Davis went viral, Megyn Kelly on Fox News dismissed pepper spray as “a food product, essentially.” To the American Civil Liberties Union, its use as a crowd-control device, particularly when those crowds are nonthreatening, is an excessive and unconstitutional use of force and violates the right to peaceably assemble.
#freedom #occupy #pepperspray #protest #ucdavis
archive.org #19878

Bronx Cheer For J. Lo's Phony Fiat Commercial | The Smoking Gun

http://www.thesmokinggun.com/documents/jennifer-lopez-phony-fiat-ad-564812
While Lopez, Fiat, the automotive firm’s PR people, and its Detroit ad agency would have consumers believe that the star deigned to return home to film a low-speed pilgrimage through the gritty streets of her hometown, she actually never set foot in the Bronx during the filming of the Fiat spots.
#ads #fakes #fiat #funny #lopez
archive.org #19877

Amazon Users Post Rave ‘Reviews’ Of UC Davis Pepper Spray | TPMDC

http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/11/amazon-users-post-rave-reviews-of-uc-davis-pepper-spray.php
In the name of due diligence, TPM called up UC Davis to make sure we identified the same pepper spray police used on protesters last week. It’s the same brand, though the police use a 7 percent formula. It’s not clear whether this formula matches exactly what the police used.
#amazon #funny #occupy #ows #pepperspray #police #ucdavis
archive.org #19860

Open Source (Almost) Everything

http://tom.preston-werner.com/2011/11/22/open-source-everything.html
Should we open source Grit or keep it proprietary? Keeping it private would provide a higher hurdle for competing Ruby-based Git hosting sites, giving us an advantage. Open sourcing it would mean thousands of people worldwide could use it to build interesting Git tools, creating an even more vibrant Git ecosystem. After a small amount of debate we decided to open source Grit. I don't recall the specifics of the conversation but that decision nearly four years ago has led to what I think is one of our most important core values: open source (almost) everything.
#business #culture #git #github #grit #opensource
archive.org #19859

'Pete & Pete' Reunion: Cast, Creative Crew Reunite In Los Angeles

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/22/pete-and-pete-reunion-cast_n_1107314.html
There's a reason why a certain generation looks back on "The Adventures of Pete & Pete" with a vast fondness and nostalgia that reaches almost mythic proportions: the show was all about looking back on childhood with a vast fondness and nostalgia in mythic proportions. For the first time since the show ended in 1996, the cast and creative crew behind the early Nickelodeon cult hit reunited for a panel to look back on their now iconic work. Both Petes -- older TV brother Mike Maronna and the younger, stranger TV brother Danny Tamberelli -- were in attendance on Saturday at LA's Cinefamily, as were creators Will McRobb and Chris Viscardi and a host of other cast members.
#entertainment #nickelodeon #pete&pete #tv
archive.org #19857

Sour Beers — Review - NYTimes.com

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/23/dining/sour-beers-review.html
Sour beer: It sounds like something worth spilling out, and not crying over. In fact, sour beer has enthralled many American craft brewers, who, like the one I visited, are turning out fascinating brews that will challenge many people’s expectations of what a beer can be.
#beer #nifty #sour
archive.org #19856

Daily Kos: Super Congress failed because of Republican allegiance to Grover Norquist

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/11/22/1039050/-Super-Congress-failed-because-of-Republican-allegiance-to-GroverNorquist
No, both sides aren't to blame for failure. That goes entirely to the Republicans. Maybe we should actually be giving credit to them for their refusal to accept the gutted sacred cows Democrats offered up on a silver platter. At this point you almost have to be grateful to Grover Norquist for keeping the Republicans in line and saving entitlement programs, this round.
#economy #politics #republicans #supercommittee
archive.org #19854

Michele Bachmann’s Entrance On Jimmy Fallon? The Fishbone Song ‘Lyin’ Ass Bitch’ | Mediaite

http://www.mediaite.com/tv/michele-bachmanns-entrance-music-on-jimmy-fallon-was-lyin-ass-bitch-song
Earlier this morning, our own Nando Di Fino critiqued Michele Bachmann’s appearance on last night’s Late Night with Jimmy Fallon by saying that that the first half of her segment, when she discussed her family life and Thanksgiving, was much better than her second, where she attempted to make “stale, rehearsed political humor.” However, it now seems that her spot on the show was tainted from the very beginning thanks to a sly commentary from Fallon’s house band, The Roots. In case anyone watching the show was curious why Bachmann’s entrance music appeared to be a rocking ska song, the song’s title, “Lyin’ Ass Bitch,” might explain things.
#bachmann #entertainment #jimmyfallon #politice #questlove #tv
archive.org #19853

Who Knew U.S. Airways Had Standing Room Only Tickets? - The Consumerist

http://consumerist.com/2011/11/who-knew-us-airways-had-standing-room-only-tickets.html
The passenger, who wrote of his troubles to consumer advocate Christopher Elliott, says that on a U.S. Airways flight from Philadelphia to Anchorage, the airline seated him next to a passenger who weighed more than 400 pounds. "His size required both armrests to be raised up and allowed for his body to cover half of my seat," the passenger tells Elliott.
#odd #travel #usairways
archive.org #19852

Software Makers Shun SOPA Bill - Government - Policy & Regulation - Informationweek

http://informationweek.com/news/government/policy/232200069
A group that represents a number of major software developers, including Microsoft, Adobe, and CA, has withdrawn its support for the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) bill, which would require Internet companies and other players in the tech ecosystem to deny services to suspected software pirates and copyright violators.
#bsa #copyfight #internet #law #sopa
archive.org #19851

MPAA Costs Hollywood More Than US BitTorrent Piracy | TorrentFreak

http://torrentfreak.com/mpaa-costs-hollywood-more-than-us-bittorrent-piracy-111122
During the last year Netflix managed to outgrow BitTorrent in terms of the amount of US Internet traffic it generates. A promising finding for Hollywood as it shows that there’s an overwhelming interest for the legal movie streaming service. At TorrentFreak we wondered what might happen if all US BitTorrent users made the switch to Netflix, and the results of this exploration are quite intriguing.
#bittorrent #copyfight #mpaa #netflix
archive.org #19849

N.Y.P.D. Stops Reporters With Badges and Fists - NYTimes.com

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/22/nyregion/nypd-stops-reporters-with-badges-and-fists.html?_r=1
Another truth co-exists. At least since the Republican National Convention of 2004, our police have grown accustomed to forcibly penning, arresting, and sometimes spraying and whacking protesters and reporters. On Monday, The New York Times and 12 other organizations sent a letter of protest to the Police Department. “The police actions of last week,” the authors said, “have been more hostile to the press than any other event in recent memory.”
#newyork #occupy #police #politics #press
archive.org #19845

Petition: Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly: Eat or drink a full dose of pepper spray on national television. | Change.org

http://www.change.org/petitions/fox-news-anchor-eat-or-drink-a-full-dose-of-pepper-spray-on-national-television
To back up your claim that pepper spray is a food product, please consume as much of it as was sprayed on each protestor's face, in one sitting, on camera at Fox News. You may mix the spray with one serving of food or drink, as I am not a sadist. Then, please relate the effects to your audience.
#foxnews #funny #pepperspray
archive.org #19844

America Occupies Wall Street Because Wall Street Occupies America

http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/275-42/8222-america-occupies-wall-street-because-wall-street-occupies-america
Why New York's Zuccotti Park is filled with people is no mystery. Reporters keep scratching their heads and asking: "Why are you here?" But it's clear they are occupying Wall Street because Wall Street has occupied the country. And that's why in public places across the country workaday Americans are standing up in solidarity. Did you see the sign a woman was carrying at a fraternal march in Iowa the other day? It read: "I can't afford to buy a politician so I bought this sign."
#journalism #occupy #ows #politics #wealthinequality
archive.org #19842

How a New Jobless Era Will Transform America - Magazine - The Atlantic

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2010/03/how-a-new-jobless-era-will-transform-america/7919?single_page=true
The Great Recession may be over, but this era of high joblessness is probably just beginning. Before it ends, it will likely change the life course and character of a generation of young adults. It will leave an indelible imprint on many blue-collar men. It could cripple marriage as an institution in many communities. It may already be plunging many inner cities into a despair not seen for decades. Ultimately, it is likely to warp our politics, our culture, and the character of our society for years to come.
#economy #jobs #psychology #unemployment #youth
archive.org #19841

SE Podcast #27 – Dave Winer - Blog – Stack Exchange

http://blog.stackoverflow.com/2011/11/se-podcast-27-dave-winer
Right now, Dave’s working on a “magnificent symphony of software” – it’s the communication system he wants to use. It involves a minimal blogging tool with only RSS output (plus a dongle that will push the RSS to twitter, etc), a “River of News” aggregator, and an overarching tool for creating content that can be picked apart and included on other platforms.
#davewiner #news #podcasts #rss #social #tech #twitter
archive.org #19840

Digital Badges May Highlight Job Seekers’ Skills - NYTimes.com

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/20/business/digital-badges-may-highlight-job-seekers-skills.html?_r=2&ref=business
“What people are learning in school is often not connected to the world of work,” she said. “Badges can fill that gap. They can be a kind of glue to connect informal and formal learning in and out of school.” If valued, they might also inspire students to accomplish new tasks.
#badges #learning #mozilla #work
archive.org #19839

Skyrim - CrAzY TF2 mode - YouTube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yeyzi8e6-yw
Favorite: Skyrim - CrAzY TF2 mode, by HouseholdGamer Team Fortress 2 Makeover for Skyrim! Watch in HD! If you change graphics settings enough, you can give Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim a new look. Activate TF2 Mode! Thanks ArmoredCavalry on Reddit for pointing this out! Thanks ArmoredCavalry on Reddit...
#videos #youtube
archive.org #19838

Microwave hack uses Arduino and TouchPad to play perfectly-timed YouTube videos while you cook | The Verge

http://www.theverge.com/2011/11/20/2574130/microwave-hack-arduino-touchpad-youtube
The μWave is a hack involving an Arduino and a TouchPad taped to a microwave door, which plays YouTube clips perfectly matched to your cooking time. This Frankenstein uses the Arduino to send data from the microwave's seven-segment displays to a web server, which finds a highly-rated YouTube video of the right length. The web client running in the browser treats you to a video clip that ends right when your food is done, then optionally tweets or sends a text message. The hack was created by students at the University of Pennsylvania, where it won first place in the PennApps Hackathon. There are no stated plans for commercialization, but the team will present the project to Google as part of the grand prize. If Mountain View announces a microwave any time soon, we'll know to expect great things.
#arduino #diy #funny #hacks #nifty #touchpad #youtube
archive.org #19837

Memo Reveals How Seriously Powerful Interests Take OWS | The Nation

http://www.thenation.com/blog/164715/memo-reveals-how-seriously-powerful-interests-take-ows
But if Rove thinks Occupy doesn’t present a clear message, why is he spending millions of dollars to attack them? Similarly, CLGC staffers are political professionals with many Wall Street clients, and the memo shows how seriously they consider the threat presented to powerful financial firms by the Occupy protests.
#occupy #ows #politics
archive.org #19836

Christian theocracy: How Newt Gingrich and the GOP would abolish courts and legislate morality. - Slate Magazine

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/human_nature/2011/11/christian_theocracy_how_newt_gingrich_and_the_gop_would_abolish_courts_and_legislate_morality_.html
Is the United States sliding toward theocracy? That’s what Republican presidential candidates have told us for more than a year. Radical Islam, they’ve argued, is on the verge of taking over our country through Sharia law. But this weekend, at an Iowa forum sparsely covered by the press, the candidates made clear that they don’t mind theocracy—in fact, they’d like to impose it—as long as it’s Christian.
#politics #religion #republicans #theocracy
archive.org #19835

Arduino kit beams low-fi Google Weather to VGA screens -- Engadget

http://www.engadget.com/2011/11/22/arduino-kit-beams-low-fi-google-weather-to-vga-screens
Looking for another way to use that aging VGA CRT screen hogging space in the closet? Try making your own dedicated weather screen by mixing together Google's meteorological data stream and some Arduino magic. It looks like parsing that Google Weather data was a bit of a challenge on the miniscule 2KB of RAM, but a tinkerer going by the handle Zmashiah has managed to do it. He's even managed to cram in a few extra graphical flourishes, including icons and background themes that change depending on the temperature and time of day. The entirely PC-free device grabs the data through an Ethernet connection and flashes up all the weather goodness in stunning VGA. Any meteorological mavens reading this can grab the full shopping list and procedure at the Instructables link below.
#arduino #gadgets #tech #vga #weather
archive.org #19834

Freaklabs' FredBoard gives the gift of hackerspace to Mothership HackerMoms -- Engadget

http://www.engadget.com/2011/11/21/freaklabs-fredboard-gives-the-gift-of-hackerspace-to-mothership
Come this (Black) Friday, it'll officially be the season for gift-giving and general family dysfunction. So, why not warm that tech-tinkering heart while heating up the creative juices of the baby-bound set with a Freaklabs purchase that puts your money to good use? The outfit's got a monster mash FredBoard up for order that splices together an Arduino and breadboard to make your first brush with homegrown modding a relatively painless affair. Oh, and the proceeds are destined for a Mommy-centric hackerspace -- dubbed Mothership HackerMoms -- in San Francisco that does double duty as a day care for little leg-clingers and a lab for their electronics-inclined parents. These ladies-in-programming currently swap house hosting duties, but with the boost from your potential feel-good donations, could snag a proper venue of their own. Feel like getting in the holiday spirit early? Then click on the source below to bring some early cheer to Bay Area baby Mommas.
#arduino #diy #tech #wishlist
archive.org #19832

Mimo Magic Touch adds 10 inches of capacitive touchscreen to your PC using only USB -- Engadget

http://www.engadget.com/2011/11/21/mimo-magic-touch-adds-10-inches-of-capacitive-touchscreen-to-you
We've seen monitors with touch input and displays powered only by USB, but combining both those features into a single unit would make for something truly unique. We've gotta hand it to Mimo Monitors for pulling it off -- the Magic Touch and Magic Touch Deluxe deliver 10.1 inches of capacitive interactivity using only a single USB 2.0 cable. The panel itself offers a resolution of 1024 x 600 for keeping video chats out of your way, displaying email or monitoring social networks. The Deluxe version also adds a two-port USB hub but, if you plan to charge your devices through it, you'll have to hook up the optional AC adapter. Sadly, while they can act as a secondary monitor regardless of OS, you'll need a Windows 7 machine to take advantage of the touch capabilities -- and even then it's single touch only (though, the panel itself is technically capable of four-point multitouch). Both models are available to pre-order now for $300 (Magic Touch) or $330 (Magic Touch Deluxe) with delivery expected before Christmas. Check out the complete PR after the break.
#gadgets #nifty #tech #usb
archive.org #19831

NBC’s “Whitney” and CBS’s “2 Broke Girls” : The New Yorker

http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/television/2011/11/28/111128crte_television_nussbaum?currentPage=all
The problem is that “Whitney” is a terrible show, though in ways that resonate with our culture’s debates about women and humor. Like so many comedians on TV, Cummings plays an off-brand version of herself, an acerbic photographer with a live-in boyfriend. She resists pressure to marry; she and her dude bicker over household habits; they party with friends at a local night club. But, while Cummings is lacerating and deadpan, her fictional avatar reminds me less of Roseanne, or even of Silverman, than of someone much older: Lucille Ball.
#cbs #comedy #entertainment #nbc #television #whitneycummings
archive.org #19830

Homeless-Mocking Foreclosure Firm Shutting Down -- Daily Intel

http://nymag.com/daily/intel/2011/11/homeless-mocking-foreclosure-firm-shutting-down.html
The New York law firm Steven J. Baum P.C., which specialized in mortgage foreclosures, announced that it would close today, less than a month after the New York Times published photos of its employees dressed as homeless people for Halloween, in a twist too absurd for 30 Rock. "Disrupting the livelihoods of so many dedicated and hardworking people is extremely painful, but the loss of so much business left us no choice but to file these notices," said Baum in a statement. Last week, following Times columnist Joe Nocera's publication of the offensive pictures from the company's Halloween party last year, Nocera received an angry e-mail from Baum: "Mr. Nocera — You have destroyed everything and everyone related to Steven J. Baum PC. It took 40 years to build this firm and three weeks to tear down." Our sympathy receptors must be broken today.
#banks #boohoo #economy #foreclosures #housing #mortgages
archive.org #19829

Facebook is gaslighting the web. We can fix it. - Anil Dash

http://dashes.com/anil/2011/11/facebook-is-gaslighting-the-web.html
Now, we've shown that Facebook promotes captive content on its network ahead of content on the web, prohibits users from bringing open content into their network, warns users not to visit web content, and places obstacles in front of visits to web sites even if they've embraced Facebook's technologies and registered in Facebook's centralized database of sites on the web.
#facebook #scams #sharing #social #socialmedia #webdev
archive.org #19827

Solving Firefox’s add-on compatibility problem « Blair’s Brain

http://theunfocused.net/2011/11/19/solving-firefoxs-add-on-compatibility-problem
This makes me sad. And it's a problem that's been magnified by the switch to rapid release. One of the strengths of Firefox is it's rich selection of add-ons. In fact, 85% of Firefox users have chosen to install an add-on. On average, those users have 5 add-ons installed. Firefox users really love their add-ons. So it's not surprising that they get frustrated when one of their favorite add-ons gets disabled because it's not marked as being compatible with the new Firefox update they just installed. So I started working on a project to fix it. The end result will be that most add-ons will automatically be compatible with Firefox, starting with (hopefully) Firefox 10.
#addons #firefox #mozilla #rapidrelease
archive.org #19826

The roots of the UC-Davis pepper-spraying - Salon.com

http://www.salon.com/2011/11/20/the_roots_of_the_uc_davis_pepper_spraying/singleton
The genius of this approach is how insidious its effects are: because the rights continue to be offered on paper, the citizenry continues to believe it is free. They believe that they are free to do everything they choose to do, because they have been “persuaded” — through fear and intimidation — to passively accept the status quo. As Rosa Luxemburg so perfectly put it: “Those who do not move, do not notice their chains.” Someone who sits at home and never protests or effectively challenges power factions will not realize that their rights of speech and assembly have been effectively eroded because they never seek to exercise those rights; it’s only when we see steadfast, courageous resistance from the likes of these UC-Davis students is this erosion of rights manifest.
#freedom #occupy #owd #pepperspray #protest #ucdavis
archive.org #19825

Amazon Simple Storage Service with s3cmd

http://www.bettervps.net/manuals/2010/04/08/amazon-s3-with-s3cmd
s3cmd is a command line tool for uploading, retrieving and managing data in Amazon S3. With s3cmd we can perform other related tasks as well, such as creating buckets, removing buckets, listing objects and synchronizing directory trees.
#amazon #s3 #s3cmd #tools
archive.org #19820

Alternative Controller for HHKB - geekhack forums

http://geekhack.org/showwiki.php?title=Island:12047
I wanted to add vi cursor keys and mouse keys to HHKB. Original HHKB controller is not programmable and firmware source code is not open. So, customizing HHKB needs to replace original controller with programmable one. I used Teensy++ as alternative controller. Though a Teensy has enough ports to drive HHKB, Teensy++ has clean pinout and it makes programing and wiring easier. I should look into this to see if I can fix the PS/2 HHKB that I apparently fried with a USB adapter.
#diy #hhkb #keyboard #teensy #tools #usb
archive.org #19817

Lt. John Pike Pepper Sprays Sitting Protesters, Boss ‘Very Proud’ of Her Officers - International Business Times

http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/252661/20111119/lt-john-pike-pepper-sprays-sitting-protesters.htm
“This was a tough scene to walk into. This was 50 people and before you knew it, it probably grew close to 200. When you encircle a group of officers that are just trying to do their jobs, it’s kinda scary,” she said. Those poor, scared, armored and armed police officers.
#occupy #ows #police #ucdavis
archive.org #19815

John Boehner’s Lobbyists Plan A Massive Hit Job On Occupy Wall Street

http://www.politicususa.com/en/ows-hit-job
In short, they are going to run a smear campaign that would use the same Fox News talking points that haven’t worked so far. They are going to claim that George Soros is funding Occupy Wall Street, and that the movement is being run by the Democratic Party. Most troubling is their plan to carry surveillance on social media. They are going to monitor the social media used by OWS and what they intend to do that the memo didn’t directly state was spam social media with anti-Occupy Wall Street propaganda.
#boehner #occupy #ows #protest #republicans
archive.org #19814

The Sad World Of The Misunderstood House Spider | Runt Of The Web

http://runt-of-the-web.com/the-sad-world-of-the-misunderstood-house-spider
If there’s one arthropod with an unfortunately bad rap with the human world, it’s the spider. Generally reclusive and non-threatening to people, spiders eat all the creatures that annoy humans (mosquitoes, flies, roaches) while occupying the empty crevices of human shelter. And yet their very presence makes the average person go after these benevolent creatures with a fury. And so is the sad world of the Misunderstood Spider:
#funny #sad #spiders
archive.org #19812

Who Smashed the Laptops from Occupy Wall Street? Inside the NYPD's Lost and Found | Motherboard

http://www.motherboard.tv/2011/11/18/who-smashed-the-laptops-from-occupy-wall-street-inside-the-nypd-s-lost-and-found
it was as if someone along the way purposefully destroyed all confiscated electronics, a strategic smashing of at least part of the digital record logged by full-on occupiers. “Dude, all the laptops are in a row," he tells us, baffled and raking his shock of brown hair. "They’ve all been smashed with bats.” When asked about the mangled property, LiPani admits that, inevitably, certain items could’ve been damaged in the shuffle: “I’m not surprised,” he says, to hear of damaged laptops. He adds that the DSNY is providing clearance forms to those occupiers concerned their property may’ve been mishandled or misplaced.
#laptops #nypd #occupy #ows #protest
archive.org #19811

Daily Kos: Confirmed: Police Executive Research Forum (PERF) coordinating Occupy raids

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/11/19/1038054/-Confirmed:-Police-Executive-Research-Forum-(PERF)-coordinating-Occupy-raids
Many of us have been wondering why the raids on Occupy camps across the country have had such a coordinated feel. If only the official response to real social ills could have been as timely and widespread as the crackdown on peaceful demonstrators expressing their freedom of speech, assembly, and the press covering their protest. An article at Examiner.com was understandably derided as being under-sourced for a charge as serious as a national DHS crackdown on non-violent protests. However, we have now received confirmation via Amy Goodman's interview on the 11/17 episode of Democracy Now! with PERF Executive Director Chuck Wexler that this private NGO coordinated high-level conference calls amongst 40 police chiefs, distinct from the mayoral "therapy session" referred to by Oakland Mayor Jean Quan, in order to broadcast advice and documentation about cracking down on the Occupy social movement.
#occupypolice #ows #politics #protest
archive.org #19809

How Facebook is ruining sharing | Molly Rants - CNET News

http://news.cnet.com/8301-31322_3-57324406-256/how-facebook-is-ruining-sharing
Sharing and recommendation shouldn't be passive. It should be conscious, thoughtful, and amusing--we are tickled by a story, picture, or video and we choose to share it, and if a startling number of Internet users also find that thing amusing, we, together, consciously create a tidal wave of meme that elevates that piece of media to viral status. We choose these gems from the noise. Open Graph will fill our feeds with noise, burying the gems.
#facebook #marketing #media #sharing #social
archive.org #19808

Yes of course pepper spray is a torture device - Hullabaloo

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2011/11/yes-of-course-pepper-spray-is-torture.html
In 1997, environmentalists were staging a sit-in against the cutting of old forest in Humboldt county. The police sprayed pepper spray directly into the protesters eyes in similar fashion to what happened in UC yesterday and then used liquified pepper spray and applied it directly to the protesters eyes with q-tips. I'm not kidding. There's video:
#ows #pepperspray #police #protest
archive.org #19806

UC Davis Police Pepper-Spray Seated Students In Occupy Dispute (VIDEO) (UPDATES)

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/19/uc-davis-police-pepper-spray-students_n_1102728.html
WASHINGTON -- On Friday, a group of University of California, Davis students, part of the Occupy Wall Street movement on campus, became the latest victims of alleged police brutality to be captured on video. The videos show the students seated on the ground as a UC Davis police officer brandishes a red canister of pepper spray, showing it off for the crowd before dousing the seated students in a heavy, thick mist.
#occupy #ows #pepperspray #police
archive.org #19805

Police Defend Use Of Force On ‘Occupy UC Davis’ « CBS Sacramento

http://sacramento.cbslocal.com/2011/11/18/police-defend-use-of-force-on-occupy-uc-davis
DAVIS (CBS13) – Law enforcement officials defended the tactics used Friday to dismantle an encampment set up by “Occupy Wall Street” sympathizers on the UC Davis quad, a raid that drew accusations of excessive force from students after sitting protesters were subjected to pepper spray at point-blank range.
#ows #polie #ucdavis
archive.org #19803

Twitter, the conversation-enabler? Actually, most news orgs use the service as a glorified RSS feed » Nieman Journalism Lab

http://www.niemanlab.org/2011/11/twitter-the-conversation-enabler-actually-most-news-orgs-use-the-service-as-a-glorified-rss-feed
A new Pew study finds news outlets using Twitter almost exclusively for one-way distribution — of their own content. And this is why I only follow live human beings on Twitter, for the most part. That, and funny bots.
#community #media #rss #social #socialmedia #twitter
archive.org #19800

bl.ocks.org - 1377729 - Force-based label placement

http://bl.ocks.org/1377729
A small demo of a pleasant, yet simple label placement algorithm for densely packed visualizations. The basic idea is to have labels orbit around their target node at a fixed distance, but repeal each other, so that they don't overlap, and orient themselves to the outside of clusters. To support that, labels on the right of their target node are left-aligned, and labels on the left of their target node are right-aligned; in between, we interpolate. In this example, one force layout governs the node placement, and the second one the label placement, but of course, the node placement could be computed by any other algorithm.
#graphics #javascript #svg #webdev
archive.org #19796

APIs are a Pain

http://www.subbu.org/blog/2011/11/apis-are-a-pain
I would love to see every API to be RESTful, consistent, hypertext driven, and more importantly, interoperable. The reality is that getting consistent APIs is hard – particularly those that are done by distributed teams. For the record – I vehemently hate SOAP APIs and the SOAP mindset. I dislike RPC-style operation names tunneled over HTTP. I frown and cringe whenever I see unnecessary custom headers and complicated formats. I wish POST+XML goes away. I wish every API gets rewritten to the modern understanding of HTTP and REST, serving JSON. But I would rather spend my time enabling interoperability than preaching for consistency.
#apis #rest #rpc #webdev
archive.org #19795

Memo to American Bankers Association from lobbyists spells out $850,000 anti-OWS plan - Boing Boing

http://boingboing.net/2011/11/19/memo-to-american-bankers-assoc.html
MSNBC's "Up with Chris Hayes" broke the story today of a memo by Washington D.C. lobbyists to the American Bankers Association on how to go about discrediting the Occupy Wall Street movement, which is evidently perceived as a powerful threat to the interests of the financial industry.
#banks #ows #politics
archive.org #19791

A Guide to the Occupy Wall Street API, Or Why the Nerdiest Way to Think About OWS Is So Useful - Technology - The Atlantic

http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/print/2011/11/a-guide-to-the-occupy-wall-street-api-or-why-the-nerdiest-way-to-think-about-ows-is-so-useful/248562
This idea crystallized for me yesterday when Jonathan Glick, a long-time digital journalist, tweeted, "I think #OWS was working better as an API than a destination site anyway." If you get the idea, go ahead and skip ahead to the documentation below. If you don't get, let me explain why it might be the most useful way of thinking about #Occupy.
#apis #internet #ows #twitter
archive.org #19789

Netflix, Fox ready to resurrect Arrested Development as a streaming exclusive in 2013 - Engadget

http://www.engadget.com/2011/11/18/netflix-fox-ready-to-resurrect-arrested-development-as-a-stream
The Bluth family has been off TV since Arrested Development was cancelled by Fox back in 2006, but after protracted rumors and a reported bidding war the show is ready to return as a Netflix-exclusive series. New episodes should be available in the first half of 2013 and represent another serious push into original content after Netflix signed up House of Cards, which will debut next year. The details are in the press release after the break, including interesting quotes from Fox execs celebrating this "new business model" allowing them to bring back another show, after Family Guy and Futurama made similar trips back from the dead with great success. After a summer of cancellations and PR gaffes, this should bring back goodwill at least from fans of this show, and likely heat up the campaigns to save other gone-too-soon TV shows. So what's next to get the Flatliners treatment? Firefly? Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles? Dollhouse? Community (six seasons and a movie!)?
#arresteddevelopment #entertainment #tv
archive.org #19787

Midway’s Space Zap Arcade Flyer (1980) | The Retroist

http://www.retroist.com/2011/11/18/midways-space-zap-arcade-flyer-1980
During the Retroist Arcade Meet Up last week, our very own Plcary asked the gurus of 1984 if they remembered an arcade game where you were positioned in the center of the screen and had to defeat wave after wave of enemies as they came rushing at you, not using a joystick but four directional buttons and a firing button. The gang at 1984 and myself were stumped on this one, but Plcary kept at it and found out the name of the arcade game and it is Midway’s Space Zap from back in 1980.
#arcade #gaming #midway #spacezap
archive.org #19786

Over 200 labels abandon streaming music and their future | The Verge

http://www.theverge.com/2011/11/18/2571658/200-labels-leave-spotify
NPD Group and NARM (the Music Business Association) recently conducted a study, which concluded that streaming music is damaging to record sales. That information has now caused distributor STHoldings to withdraw all of its music content — that's over 200 labels' worth — from Spotify, Simfy, Rdio, and Napster. STHoldings reported that only four of its labels said they wanted to continue streaming their content. It's a case of confirming exactly what some publishers want to hear: cheaper, user-friendly streaming services might be encroaching on the cushy sales models of years past. The reaction is reminiscent of the industry's bitterly reluctant adoption of the mp3 format in the heyday of CD supremacy, and we all know how that turned out.
#music #spotify #streaming
archive.org #19785

StarCraft changed my life | The Verge

http://www.theverge.com/2011/11/18/2571255/starcraft-changed-my-life
Back in the real world, at Legends, StarCraft fans continued to trickle in. We had the whole main floor to ourselves, and it finally started to fill up late in the afternoon, but "real" sports fans vastly outnumbered us for most of the day. Just after the soccer fans finally chilled out, some NY Giants fans congregated in the balcony and proceeded to be real jerks about it; one jersey-clad fan stood and pointed at us from above, as if we were a curiosity in a zoo. In a particularly tense moment, where the football fans started yelling irrationally at their own screens, StarCraft fans started chanting "MLG! MLG! MLG! MLG!," as if that would quiet the opposition.
#barcraft #gaming #sports #starcraft
archive.org #19784

The Silver Bear Cafe

http://www.silverbearcafe.com/private/10.11/gaoaudit.html
$16,000,000,000,000.00 had been secretly given out to US banks and corporations and foreign banks everywhere from France to Scotland. From the period between December 2007 and June 2010, the Federal Reserve had secretly bailed out many of the world’s banks, corporations, and governments. The Federal Reserve likes to refer to these secret bailouts as an all-inclusive loan program, but virtually none of the money has been returned and it was loaned out at 0% interest. Why the Federal Reserve had never been public about this or even informed the United States Congress about the $16 trillion dollar bailout is obvious - the American public would have been outraged to find out that the Federal Reserve bailed out foreign banks while Americans were struggling to find jobs.
#bailouts #economy #government #politics #wtf
archive.org #19781

Major Game Publishers Onboard with SOPA and Protect IP Act

http://www.gameranx.com/updates/id/3746/article/major-game-publishers-onboard-with-sopa-and-project-ip-act
Among the publishers include giants like Electronic Arts, Capcom USA, Microsoft, Nintendo, Sony, Sega, THQ, Square Enix, Take Two, and Ubisoft. Major developing studios have also declared where they stand with the proposed law that enables the government to blacklist websites and stifle freedom of speech. These studios include 38 Studios, Nival, and Gears of War developer Epic Games. A full list of ESA members can be found at the organization's website here.
#copyfight #freedom #gaming #internet #sopa
archive.org #19780

Congress Weighs Fighting Internet Piracy Like the War on Drugs - Conor Friedersdorf - Politics - The Atlantic

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2011/11/congress-weighs-fighting-internet-piracy-like-the-war-on-drugs/248690
Phone books list all sorts of businesses, a small percentage of which engage in illegal activity. Yet I could never call Pac Bell and demand, "Hey, my house got robbed a few weeks back, and when I went into this pawn shop, they had my television set. Remove them or you're liable!"
#copyfight #freedom #internet #sopa
archive.org #19778

Full disk encryption is too good, says US intelligence agency | ExtremeTech

http://www.extremetech.com/computing/105931-full-disk-encryption-is-too-good-says-us-intelligence-agency
It’s a tough situation: On the one hand, being able to crack full disk encryption is vital for the prosecution of white-collar criminals, child porn ringleaders, pharmaceutical spam barons, and the curtailment of terrorism — but on the other, it’s quite satisfying to know that, perhaps at long last, we have a way of escaping the ireful eye of Big Brother. Where do you stand on FDE?
#encryption #law #security
archive.org #19777

The End of Cheap Coffee: Why the Diner Staple Is About to Become a Luxury - Lifestyle - GOOD

http://www.good.is/post/the-end-of-cheap-coffee
Mother Nature might be on the side of Giuliano and his cohorts. At the exact moment that rare beans are becoming all the rage, all beans are becoming rarer. The price of a cup of coffee—whether it be a $6 pour-over, a $2.50 dark roast at Starbucks, or a $1.50 mug of diner swill—is being driven up by a complex combination of weather events, pest and fungus outbreaks, speculation on commodities exchanges, an unstable labor market in the developing world, and an unprecedented thirst for good coffee among a growing global middle class. The problem, in simple economic terms, is that supply has gone down and demand has gone up.
#climate #climatechange #coffee #culture #economy
archive.org #19776

Adafruit LPD8806 Netduino driver demo - YouTube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=td6ioE2f3tY
Favorite: Adafruit LPD8806 Netduino driver demo, by froyer67 16x10 RGB LED display built with an Adafruit LPD8806 LED strip and a Netduino mini as the controller. The display is capable of showing over 2 million colors. For build and code details, please check ... http://netduinohelpers.codeplex.com
#videos #youtube
archive.org #19775

How to Fry an Egg with a Sheet of Paper and Some Binder Clips

http://lifehacker.com/5860788/how-to-fry-an-egg-with-a-sheet-of-paper-and-some-binder-clips
Stefan Gates, author of The Extraordinary Cookbook, walks us through how to fry an egg with a frying pan made from a coat hanger, a sheet of paper, and those ever-useful binder clips we keep talking about. Just bend the coat hanger into a pan-like shape with a bit of a handle on one end, and then cut the shape of the pan out of the packing paper (leaving enough paper to wrap around the edges.) Attach the paper to the hanger with binder clips. Then just spread some cooking oil around the paper's surface, crack the egg into your paper "pan," and put it over the heat. Give it a few minutes, and the egg should be completely cooked, and ready to eat.
#cooking #odd
archive.org #19772

Is Layaway Ever a Good Idea?

http://lifehacker.com/5860490/is-layaway-ever-a-good-idea
Imagine a mother going to Wal-Mart on Oct. 17 and buying $100 worth of Christmas toys. She makes a down payment of $10 and pays a $5 service fee. Over the next two months she pays off the rest. In effect, she is paying $5 in interest for a $90 loan for two months: the equivalent of a credit card with a 44 percent annual percentage rate, a level most of us would consider predatory.
#credit #economy #layaway #walmart
archive.org #19771

Report: Good Old Games to offer Good New(ish) Games | Joystiq

http://www.joystiq.com/2011/11/17/report-good-old-games-to-offer-good-new-ish-games
"Traditionally, GOG.com has looked for great classics that are three years old or older," he said. "We will continue to add classic games, of course, but we are actively working to sign newer titles now." Rambourg noted that the newer games will cost more than most GOG releases --$13.99 to $16.99, but that the company plans to maintain its DRM-free model. The low prices suggest that these won't be brand new games, but simply games more recent than GOG's current three-year cutoff period.
#gaming #gog #retro
archive.org #19770

Daily Kos: House readies vote on Balanced Budget Amendment, another bill that's not about jobs

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/11/18/1037788/-House-readies-vote-on-Balanced-Budget-Amendment,-another-bill-thats-notaboutjobs
This afternoon the House will vote on another pointless, partisan, finger-pointing bill, but at least this one doesn't directly attack women, so there's that. Today it's the Balanced Budget Amendment, just about the worst idea for the economy as a whole they could come up with. Really.
#economy #government #politics #republicans
archive.org #19767

Report: NYPD cop pushes New York Supreme Court Judge into wall - Boing Boing

http://boingboing.net/2011/11/18/nypd-cop-pushes-new-york-supre.html
I was there to take down the names of people who were arrested… As I’m standing there, some African-American woman goes up to a police officer and says, ‘I need to get in. My daughter’s there. I want to know if she’s OK.’ And he said, ‘Move on, lady.’ And they kept pushing with their sticks, pushing back. And she was crying. And all of a sudden, out of nowhere, he throws her to the ground and starts hitting her in the head,” says Smith. “I walk over, and I say, ‘Look, cuff her if she’s done something, but you don’t need to do that.’ And he said, ‘Lady, do you want to get arrested?’ And I said, ‘Do you see my hat? I’m here as a legal observer.’ He said, ‘You want to get arrested?’ And he pushed me up against the wall.
#nys #ows #police
archive.org #19766

Neutrino experiment replicates faster-than-light finding : Nature News & Comment

http://www.nature.com/news/neutrino-experiment-replicates-faster-than-light-finding-1.9393
Physicists have replicated the finding that the subatomic particles called neutrinos seem to travel faster than light. It is a remarkable confirmation of a stunning result, yet most in the field remain sceptical that the ultimate cosmic speed limit has truly been broken.
#neutrinos #physics #science
archive.org #19764

European Parliament warns of global dangers of US domain revocation proposals | EDRI

http://www.edri.org/EU_parliament_SOPA
Responding to an intervention by EDRi (video, speech (PDF) at a hearing recently on attacks against computer systems, the European Parliament today adopted, by a large majority, a resolution on the upcoming EU/US summit stressing “the need to protect the integrity of the global internet and freedom of communication by refraining from unilateral measures to revoke IP addresses or domain names.”
#freedom #internet #law #sopa #us
archive.org #19759

Why Google gets no respect (from developers) — Cloud Computing News

http://gigaom.com/cloud/why-google-gets-no-respect-from-developers
If Google wants to win the hearts and minds of these developers, it has to get more systematic and clear about roadmaps, has to be more circumspect about changing things without notice, and be precise about how apps that run on Google infrastructure now will or won’t run on other infrastructure in the future. The problem is, it’s not all that clear that Google itself is serious about this market. And if it isn’t, why should anyone else take the plunge?
#business #developers #enterprise #google #webdev
archive.org #19757

Lovely Owl - YouTube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3G1PFLuTrgM
Favorite: Lovely Owl, by MrNuraT La protagonista di questo video è Molla, una "civetta comune" che ama le coccole. Tutti i gufi nel video appartengono a "i falconieri delle orobie" . https://www.facebook.com/TheNuraT Music: "Sid's Kids" author : John Powell all right reserved.
#videos #youtube
archive.org #19755

Monogamy Helps Geese Reduce Stress | Wired Science | Wired.com

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2011/11/goose-monogamy
“It seems to be one advantage of monogamy: If you have a long-term relationship, that helps you cope with stress. It’s a good thing to do compared to systems where you always have to find a new partner and have no support in such situations,” said Claudia Wascher, an ethologist at Austria’s Konrad Lorenz Research Station.
#biology #geese #health #monogamy
archive.org #19749

IBM Simon - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_Simon
Besides a mobile phone, the major applications were a calendar, address book, world clock, calculator, note pad, e-mail, and games. It had no physical buttons to dial with. Instead customers used a touchscreen to select phone numbers with a finger or create facsimiles and memos with an optional stylus. Text was entered with either a unique "predictive" on-screen keyboard or QWERTY keyboard. The Simon had an optional PCMCIA memory card.
#ibm #mobile #smartphones
archive.org #19748

Revisiting London Below: Gaiman’s “Neverwhere” on DVD « Nerdist

http://www.nerdist.com/2011/11/revisiting-london-below-gaimans-neverwhere-on-dvd
It’s been at least 10 years since I last saw Neverwhere, the six-part BBC series by Neil Gaiman and Lenny Henry that subsequently became a Gaiman novel and marked one of my earliest introductions to his work. Sometimes it’s really rough revisiting early works from writers you adore because – depending on the writer and the relative earliness of said work – the odds may be sizeable that it just won’t hold up. Which is why it delights me to say, after binging the Neverwhere 15th Anniversary Edition DVD the other night, that not only does the show hold up, but it cemented my opinion that, for works from exceptional storytellers like Gaiman, the best possible medium for any filmed adaptation is television.
#dvd #fantasy #gaiman #neverwhere
archive.org #19746

With a bold new redesign, AIM could finally be cool again (seriously) | VentureBeat

http://venturebeat.com/2011/11/16/aol-new-aim-preview
AOL launched a preview of its latest AIM vision today, which includes new desktop, mobile, and web apps. Surprisingly, AOL has cut out much of the clutter that previously made AIM a chore to use — it’s now streamlined and focused on conversations. Group chats are now a core part of the service, and video chats are seamlessly integrated.
#aim #aol #tech
archive.org #19744

unfinished work - I Believe In The Internet - The Content Industry Doesn't

http://bradburnham.tumblr.com/post/12739727902/i-believe-in-the-internet-the-content-industry
At a dinner earlier this week, Joi Ito, the head of the Media Lab at MIT described the Internet as a “belief system” and I suddenly understood. The Internet is not just a series of pipes. It’s core architecture embeds an assumption about human nature. The Internet is designed to empower individuals not control them. It assumes that the if individuals are empowered, they will do the right thing the vast majority of the time. Services like eBay, Craigslist, Etsy and AirBnB are built on the assumption that most people are honest. Other services like Tumblr, Twitter, YouTube, Wordpress, and Soundcloud assume people will be generous with their ideas, insights and creations. Wikipedia has proven that people will share their knowledge. Companies like Kickstarter show that people will even be generous with their money. This does not mean that there are not bad people out there. All of these companies spend a lot of time and money to battle spam and fraud. The companies are simply betting that there are many more good people than bad. The architecture of the Internet shares this assumption. It could have been designed to prevent bad behavior. Instead its design empowers good behavior.
#belief #freedom #internet #sopa
archive.org #19743

And Now... Back To Your Regularly Scheduled Posts (i.e., Not Just SOPA) | Techdirt

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20111116/13302516796/now-back-to-your-regularly-scheduled-posts-not-just-sopa.shtml
I recognize that all of the posts today have been about SOPA and the House Judiciary Committee hearings on SOPA. Some of you liked this. Some of you did not. We've never done anything like that before, focusing just on one issue for the entire day, but it is a big issue, one that I feel strongly about, one that I think impacts all of you... and one that there was a lot going on about.
#censorship #copyfight #law #sopa #tech
archive.org #19736

Skullgirls and mastering the art of defense | Joystiq

http://www.joystiq.com/2011/11/16/skullgirls-and-mastering-the-art-of-defense
These tutorial systems have been serviceable in the past -- for example, BlazBlue: Continuum Shift had a good tutorial system that taught players how to use each character -- but no tutorial system has better illustrated how to effectively master the genre. In BlazBlue, if you've never touched a 2D fighter, you're out of luck. If you've never devoted serious time to a 2D fighting game before, Skullgirls will teach you how to crawl, walk, then dominate your opponents. It wants to train you to be a master and I'm all for that.
#fighting #gaming #skullgirls
archive.org #19734

Lying on the Internet could soon be a federal crime

http://www.digitaltrends.com/social-media/lying-on-the-internet-could-soon-be-a-federal-crime
The US Department of Justice wants to make it a federal crime to violate the “terms of service” of any website, reports Declan McCullagh at CNet. According to this interpretation, breaching the terms of service of websites — which can be done by simply using a fake name on Facebook, lying about your weight on a dating site, or using Google if you’re under the age of 18 — could make you a criminal.
#crime #internet #law #wtf
archive.org #19732

Robotic bear pillow stops your snoring by gently mauling your face (video) -- Engadget

http://www.engadget.com/2011/11/16/robotic-bear-pillow-stops-your-snoring-by-gently-mauling-your-fa
Looking to stop snoring? What you need is Jusui-Kun, a robot bear that paws your face while you're sleeping. Okay, it's more of a "gentle tickling," according to the bear's creators. The key is to get the snorer sleeping on the pillow to move his or her head from side to side. Jusui-Kun has a built-in mic to detect the sleeper's snoring, while an equally cuddly hand monitor detects blood oxygen levels, letting the bear know when to issue one of its loving face swipes. Video after the break. What could go wrong?
#apnea #bears #sleep #toys #wtf
archive.org #19730

Internet Community Shut Out of Stop Online Piracy Act Hearing - Again | Electronic Frontier Foundation

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2011/11/public-shut-out-stop-online-piracy-act-hearings-again
This morning, EFF’s staff and concerned netizens across the country tuned into the live webcast of the House Judiciary Committee’s hearing on the Stop Online Piracy Act (H.R. 3261). At least we tried to. Unfortunately, we were confronted with an incredibly poor webcast stream for much of the hearing. We find it ironic and deeply concerning that Congress is unable to successfully stream video of an event this important to all Internet users, even as they are debating a dangerous plan to change the Internet in fundamental ways and deputize Internet intermediaries to act like content police.
#censorship #copyfight #hollywood #internet #law #sopa #us
archive.org #19726

At Web censorship hearing, Congress guns for "pro-pirate" Google

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/11/at-web-censorship-hearing-congress-guns-for-pro-pirate-google.ars
The House Judiciary Committee today held an important hearing on the Stop Online Piracy Act with a hugely stacked deck of witnesses—Google's lawyer was the only one of the six to object to the bill in a meaningful way. And it wasn't hard to see why. This wasn't a hearing designed to elicit complex thoughts about complex issues of free speech, censorship, and online piracy; despite the objections of the ACLU, dozens of foreign civil rights groups, tech giants like Google and eBay, the Consumer Electronics Association, China scholar Rebecca MacKinnon, hundreds of law professors and lawyers, the hearing was designed to shove the legislation forward and to brand companies who object as siding with "the pirates."
#copyfight #freedom #internet #sopa #tech
archive.org #19725

Tumblr Takes Fight Against SOPA Up A Notch, ‘Censors’ User Dashboards | TechCrunch

http://techcrunch.com/2011/11/16/tumblr-takes-fight-against-sopa-up-a-notch-censors-user-dashboards
Head to Tumblr right now and log into your Dashboard. You’ll find that your stream of content has been replaced with censorship blocks — with a link at the top of the page prompting users to Stop The Law That Will Censor The Internet. Click the link, and you’ll be prompted to enter your phone number and street address. Tumblr will then call you to run through some talking points and tell you how to call your House Representative.
#censorship #law #sopa #tumblr
archive.org #19724

A Look At The Testimony Given At Today's SOPA Lovefest Congressional Hearings... With A Surprise From MasterCard | Techdirt

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20111116/00035716786/look-testimony-given-todays-sopa-lovefest-congressional-hearings-with-surprise-mastercard.shtml
We already know that today's SOPA hearings for the House Judiciary Committee are totally stacked in favor of the bill. But with the hearings getting underway, we wanted to dive in and look at what's about to be said. Most of the testimony leaked out yesterday, allowing us to spend some time going through it -- it's all embedded below. However, here's a taste of what's going to be said... with some additional commentary (of course).
#copyfight #freedom #law #sopa
archive.org #19717

Burglar high on bath salts breaks into family's home, puts up Christmas decorations - NY Daily News

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/burglar-high-bath-salts-breaks-family-home-puts-christmas-decorations-article-1.977254
Cops in Vandalia, north of Dayton, say Terry Trent, 44, was high on the designer drug when he broke into a family’s home, put up some Christmas decorations and then plopped down on a couch to watch television, local station WHIO reported.
#burglars #crime #drugs #funny #odd
archive.org #19715

carton rouge

http://cartonrouge.cc/post/12870829823/84-year-old-occupy-seattle-participant-dorli
“Something funny happened on my way to a transportation meeting in Northgate. As I got off the bus at 3rd and Pine I heard helicopters above. Knowing that the problems of New York would certainly precipitate action by Occupy Seattle, I thought I better check it out. Especially since only yesterday the City Government made a grandiose gesture to protect free speech. Well free speech does have its limits as I found out as the cops shoved their bicycles into the crowd and simultaneously pepper sprayed the so captured protesters. If it had not been for my Hero (Iraq Vet Caleb) I would have been down on the ground and trampled. This is what democracy looks like. It certainly left an impression on the people who rode the No. 1 bus home with me. In the women’s movement there were signs which said: “Screw us and we multiply.’”
#freedom #ows #politics #protest
archive.org #19714

Rebecca Black's Latest Music Video Has Arrived

http://gawker.com/5859979/rebecca-blacks-latest-music-video-has-arrived
After her unintentionally horrible music video for "Friday" gripped the nation, Rebecca Black attempted to go legit with "This Is My Moment." Now we have "Person of Interest," Black's inane new teen pop pseudo-love anthem, which is set in an arcade and features the line, "Can't deny you're implicated in a mayhem in my mind." Pure poetry!
#music #rebeccablack #thehorror
archive.org #19712

Bill Maher: Elisabeth Hasselbeck 'Had Some Bug Up Her Ass'

http://gawker.com/5859961/bill-maher-elisabeth-hasselbeck-had-some-bug-up-her-ass
Elisabeth Hasselbeck had quite a bone to pick with Bill Maher on The View this morning about a joke he'd told about her months ago, and pick it she did. One would think he'd mind being attacked, but on tonight's Late Show, Maher told David Letterman he was actually pleased with how she reacted: "Thank you, Elisabeth Hasselbeck, for making me look good!"
#funny #politics #theview
archive.org #19710

Surprise, Homeland Security Coordinates #OWS Crackdowns

http://wonkette.com/456282/surprise-homeland-security-coordinates-ows-crackdowns-nationwide
Remember when people were freaking out over the Patriot Act and Homeland Security and all this other conveniently ready-to-go post-9/11 police state stuff, because it would obviously be just a matter of time before the whole apparatus was turned against non-Muslim Americans when they started getting complain-y about the social injustice and economic injustice and income inequality and endless recession and permanent unemployment? That day is now, and has been for some time. But it’s also now confirmed that it’s now, as some Justice Department official screwed up and admitted that the Department of Homeland Security coordinated the riot-cop raids on a dozen major #Occupy Wall Street demonstration camps nationwide yesterday and today. (Oh, and tonight, too: Seattle is being busted up by the riot cops right now, so be careful out there.)
#dhs #ows #patriotact #police #politics
archive.org #19709

SOPA Gives Me Powers That I Don't Want | Techdirt

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20111115/01142516772/sopa-gives-me-powers-that-i-dont-want.shtml
In reality though, most of the large tech companies that exist today were once very small and very fragile. If SOPA was in place, those companies would have never grown up, since the two guys in a garage would have required four lawyers to survive. Dropbox is a perfect example. Created by some college students, the company provides shared online storage space for a fee. Under SOPA, the company would have been cut off from its revenues as soon as a single accusation was made that it was hosting copyrighted material. As a small company this could have been crippling. Today though, I know that Dropbox is one of the most popular tools in the movie industry, since it allows easy sharing of new daily shots, music cues, draft movie posters and more. The innovative tech companies of the future will be extinguished before they have a chance to even get out the door.
#censorship #congress #copyfight #freedom #internet #law #sopa
archive.org #19707

Yes, There Are Black People in Your Hunger Games: The Strange Case of Rue & Cinna | Racialicious - the intersection of race and pop culture

http://www.racialicious.com/2011/11/15/yes-there-are-black-people-in-your-hunger-games-the-strange-case-of-rue-cinna
There were the usual complaints of actors not meeting book loyalist expectations. However, among the usual complaints of “She doesn’t look as young as I thought” or “Where are Effie’s pink curls?” There was a different kind of shock and surprise toward Rue & Cinna, who will be played by Amandla Stenberg and Lenny Kravitz, respectively.
#entertainment #hungergames #movies #race
archive.org #19706

Nerdy Epic Meal Time - YouTube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UqVOVGEHSAQ
Favorite: Nerdy Epic Meal Time, by SexyNerdGirlPresents http://sexynerdgirl.com - The first video on my SexyNerdGirlPresents channel is this parody of Epic Meal Time [http://www.youtube.com/EpicMealTime]. We make the McLlennium Falcon and the Dessert Star. Thanks to Brody Trainor ...
#videos #youtube
archive.org #19705

Google Friends Facebook to Fight Piracy Act - Bloomberg

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-11-15/google-friends-facebook-to-fight-hollywood-on-u-s-online-piracy-measure.html
Dodd, a Connecticut Democrat who served three decades in the Senate, is looking for a win in his new role as head of the MPAA, which grew powerful in Washington under the 38-year leadership of Jack Valenti, a onetime aide to Lyndon Johnson. The group’s members include Walt Disney Co. (DIS), Viacom Inc. (VIA/B)’s Paramount Pictures, Sony Corp. (6758), News Corp. (NWSA), Comcast Corp. (CMCSA)’s NBC Universal and Time Warner Inc. (TWX)’s Warner Bros.
#censorship #copyfight #hollywood #internet #law #us
archive.org #19704

American Censorship Day is this Wednesday — And You Can Join In! | Electronic Frontier Foundation

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2011/11/american-censorship-day-wednesday-and-you-can-join
This Wednesday, November 16, the disastrous "Stop Online Piracy Act" (SOPA) heads to the House Judiciary committee. In case you need a refresher, SOPA could allow the U.S. government and private corporations to create a blacklist of censored websites, and cut many more off from their ad networks and payment providers. This bill is bad news, and its supporters are trying to push it through before ordinary citizens realize just how much damage it can cause.
#censorship #internet #law #sopa #us #usa
archive.org #19703

Why You Should Set Up Your To-Do List in a Plain Text File (and How to Do It)

http://lifehacker.com/5859642/why-you-should-set-up-your-to+do-list-in-a-plain-text-file-and-how-to-do-it
Your to-do list is the hub of your personal productivity, so it makes sense that we're attracted to to-do apps filled with bells, whistles, and tassels. Then you realize you're spending more time fiddling with your app than getting things done. If you're tired of clicking around internet-needy webapps or getting locked into a specific to-do list service, it's time to switch to something simpler. Here's why a simple text file will make your to-do lists fast, easy to manage, and seamlessly integrate with everything else you use.
#lifehacks #productivity #todo
archive.org #19701

Dinosaur Jr. reissuing first three albums on cassette, harnessing the latest jurassic technology -- Engadget

http://www.engadget.com/2011/11/15/dinosaur-jr-reissuing-first-three-records-on-cassette-harnessi
Forget your Google Musics and Spotifys -- J Mascis, indie rock's favorite guitar-shredding gray haired curmudgeon and the rest of Dinosaur Jr. are stepping into the format time machine to reissue their first three LPs on cassette. Yep, Dinosaur, You're Living All Over Me and Bug will once again be heard the way they were meant to be: on the terrible, tiny speakers of your dusty old RadioShack tape deck. The three tapes are being sold as the Cassette Trilogy, a $39 screen-printed box set, limited to 500 copies -- one for every working tape player in America. The box set follows the cassette release of 1988's Bug this summer. You can pick the box up online now, for the rock and roll luddite on your holiday shopping list.
#cassettes #music #retro
archive.org #19700

PETA decides Super Mario 3D Land promotes animal cruelty – Video Games Reviews, Cheats | Geek.com

http://www.geek.com/articles/games/peta-decides-super-mario-3d-land-promotes-animal-cruelty-20111115
To help get the point across, PETA has drawn Mario in his Tanooki suit holding a racoon’s head with blood dripping all over the floor. You can also play Super Tanooki Skin 2D the game, which puts you in the role of a skinned raccoon performing jumps as you try to catch a flying Mario who is wearing your blood-drenched skin.
#animals #gaming #mario #nintendo #peta #tanooki
archive.org #19695

First Ad: "Who I Am" - YouTube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kE_wj6NHdEQ
Favorite: First Ad: "Who I Am", by ElizabethForMA I'm Elizabeth Warren. I'm running for the United States Senate and before you hear a bunch of ridiculous attack ads, I want to tell you who I am.
#videos #youtube
archive.org #19694

NASA working on nuclear rocket for manned Mars trips • The Register

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/11/15/nasa_nuclear_rocket_report
Since being redirected away from Bush-era plans for a base on the Moon towards a manned Mars mission, NASA has realigned its nuclear-tech-in-space efforts away from a Moonbase powerplant and towards an atomic-powered rocket able to get astronauts to the red planet quickly, without receiving dangerous exposure to cosmic radiation.
#nasa #space #tech
archive.org #19693

The Shareable Food Movement Meets The Law - Collaborative Consumption Blog Posts

http://www.collaborativeconsumption.com/insider-blog/archives/the_shareable_food_movement_meets_the_law.php
The Health Department didn’t show up when I made dinner for my neighbors last night. Fortunately, our health and safety laws don’t usually dictate how we prepare food in our personal and private realms. But humans have a natural tendency, an urge to feed each other, and the shareable food movement is taking that to new levels - levels that bring up some legal curiosities.
#cooking #food #law
archive.org #19691

The Shack® Blog » Blog Archive » The Great Create Arduino Challenge

http://blog.radioshack.com/2011/11/10/the-great-create-arduino-challenge
We have seen some amazing projects centered around the Arduino system and now that Arduino is available at RadioShack, we want to challenge you! What can you make with Arduino? You’ll have three weeks (11/11-12/2) to come up with an idea, build it, submit your project to the Great Create and leave a link to your project in the comments below. We’ll go through and pick the project that uses Arduino in the most creative and innovative way – the chosen project will get a $500 RadioShack gift card – just imagine the awesome projects you could build with that!
#arduino #diy #radioshack #tech
archive.org #19690

NBCs mid-season schedule benches Community, kills Prime Suspect, brings back 30 Rock - HitFix.com

http://www.hitfix.com/blogs/whats-alan-watching/posts/nbcs-mid-season-schedule-benches-community-kills-prime-suspect-brings-back-30-rock
"Community" is a mess ratings-wise, but it's one of NBC's few shows that still draws largely unabashed love from critics (and from its shrinking but passionate group of fans). Pulling it off the schedule temporarily given the ratings is understandable; pulling it off the schedule while leaving "Whitney" on is not. Either show is going to do the same pathetic numbers on Wednesdays at 8 - away from its "Office" cocoon, "Whitney" could easily do worse than "Community" would - and one move at least buys continued goodwill from the press and viewers, whereas there's no one outside the immediate families of Whitney Cummings and Chris D'Elia who will be happy that show continues to air, week after week.
#comedy #community #entertainment #nbc #tv #whitney #wtf
archive.org #19688

Hollywood's New War on Software Freedom and Internet Innovation | Electronic Frontier Foundation

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2011/11/hollywood-new-war-on-software-freedom-and-internet-innovation
In this new bill, Hollywood has expanded its censorship ambitions. No longer content to just blacklist entries in the Domain Name System, this version targets software developers and distributors as well. It allows the Attorney General (doing Hollywood or trademark holders' bidding) to go after more or less anyone who provides or offers a product or service that could be used to get around DNS blacklisting orders. This language is clearly aimed at Mozilla, which took a principled stand in refusing to assist the Department of Homeland Security's efforts to censor the domain name system, but we are also concerned that it could affect the open source community, internet innovation, and software freedom more broadly:
#copyfight #government #hollywood #internet #law #mozilla #sopa
archive.org #19685

Did Bloomberg do Occupy Wall Street a favor? - The Washington Post

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/post/did-bloomberg-do-occupy-wall-street-a-favor/2011/08/25/gIQAvQURON_blog.html
In aggressively clearing them from the park, Bloomberg spared them that fate. Zuccotti Park wasn’t emptied by weather, or the insufficient commitment of protesters. It was cleared by pepper spray and tear gas. It was cleared by police and authority. It was cleared by a billionaire mayor from Wall Street and a request by one of America’s largest commercial real estate developers. It was cleared, in other words, in a way that will temporarily reinvigorate the protesters and give Occupy Wall Street the best possible chance to become whatever it will become next.
#occupy #occupywallstreet #ows #politics #winter
archive.org #19684

Native UI for Firefox on Android | lucasr.org

http://lucasr.org/2011/11/15/native-ui-for-firefox-on-android
It’s been a month since Johnathan publicly announced the native UI for Firefox on Android. So it’s probably a good time to give everyone a quick status update. In case you haven’t heard about it yet, we are re-implementing Fennec’s UI using Android’s native platform to be able to deliver a much better performance and UX to our users on Android devices.
#android #firefox #mozilla #native
archive.org #19683

MIT student creates tesla coil musical hat for Halloween, survives -- Engadget

http://www.engadget.com/2011/11/15/mit-student-creates-tesla-coil-musical-hat-for-halloween-surviv
Some of us express our über-geeky tendencies by building Tron lightcycle case mods, or playing with Arduino. While others tend to err on the side of... insanity. MIT student Tyler Christensen would probably fall into that latter category, most recently strapping a tesla coil (and associated capacitors) to his head. The result is seriously impressive, and no animals (or humans) were harmed in the making of his costume -- though the DRSSTC (Dual Resonant Solid State Tesla Coil) didn't fare so well, considering that it "blew up" the day before the holiday weekend. Christensen still had a chance to test the contraption on camera before the incident, however, walking around town while zapping the sky to the tune of the Harry Potter theme song -- a seemingly appropriate selection. Check it out in the video after the break.
#funny #halloween #mit #tesla
archive.org #19682

Front Line Assembly - Provision - YouTube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YBIWW2bwfwk
Favorite: Front Line Assembly - Provision, by MetalKael Awesome track from industrial/EBM band Front Line Assembly, from their album Caustic Grip (1990). Lyrics: "Well I guess there's nothing for us to worry about, We're the ones who've got control." Look at all the fools With their eyes sticking...
#videos #youtube
archive.org #19679

Kill Screen - My Purple-Haired Made-Up Best Friend, and Why She Had to Die

http://killscreendaily.com/articles/my-purple-haired-made-best-friend-and-why-she-had-die
Before I tell you this story, I should introduce Rachael Webster. The trouble is, I’m not sure how to do that. Was she a friend of mine? Sure. A great friend. We spent nine months together as tight as Siamese twins. But she wasn’t family, and I never really met her in person. I could say she didn’t exist, but that’s a copout: she obviously existed, and had a life, and friends, and a career, at least until her budget ran out and I had to write her out of this world.
#alternate #fiction #gaming #marketing #reality #writing
archive.org #19672

Jeff Bezos Owns the Web in More Ways Than You Think | Magazine

http://www.wired.com/magazine/2011/11/ff_bezos
Bezos runs through the features that will soon set the tech world ablaze—the $199 price tag, the easy-to-hold size, the seamless access to Amazon’s rich and growing collection of digital media. When the Fire is introduced, analysts will declare it the strongest competitor yet to the iPad. Yet the Fire is not just a rival gadget, but something essentially different. The iPad is the flagship of the post-PC era—in which the desktop is replaced by lean, portable, gesture-driven tablets. As people will learn when Amazon ships it today, November 14, the Fire is an emblem of a post-web world, in which our devices are simply a means for us to directly connect with the goodies in someone’s data center.
#amazon #fire #media #web
archive.org #19669

A Conspiracy of Hogs: The McRib as Arbitrage | The Awl

http://www.theawl.com/2011/11/a-conspiracy-of-hogs-the-mcrib-as-arbitrage
And for its part, the McRib makes a mockery of this whole terribly labor-intensive system of barbecue, turning it into a capital-intensive one. The patty is assembled by machinery probably babysat by some lone sadsack, and it is shipped to distribution centers by black-beauty-addicted truckers, to be shipped again to franchises by different truckers, to be assembled at the point of sale by someone who McDonald’s corporate hopes can soon be replaced by a robot, and paid for using some form of electronic payment that will eventually render the cashier obsolete.
#business #economics #fastfood #mcdonalds #mcrib #pork #yuck
archive.org #19668

Interview: Getting to the core of Otomedius Excellent | Joystiq

http://www.joystiq.com/2011/11/10/interview-getting-to-the-core-of-otomedius-excellent
If you buy the Special Edition, you'll be able to see these entirely practical outfits on the characters in an artbook, as well as on ... a pillowcase. "When we were thinking of putting together the Special Edition," Lu said, "we were trying to come up with things fans would like. We had this beautiful artwork with Mine Yoshizaki, so we wanted to do something interesting and fun that would show it off. Also, one of the Japanese special editions comes with a bedsheet, so our super hardcore fans can have a full bed set." See? Practical through and through.
#gaming #gradius #odd #pillowcases #shmups
archive.org #19666

Stupid Raymond talent: Screaming carrier - The Old New Thing - Site Home - MSDN Blogs

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/oldnewthing/archive/2011/11/11/10235970.aspx
Similar to Mike, I was able to scream (not whistle: scream) a 300 baud carrier tone. This skill proved useful when I was in college and the mainframe system was down. Instead of sitting around waiting for the system to come back, I just went about my regular business around campus. Every so often, I would go to a nearby campus phone (like a free public phone but it can only make calls to other locations on campus), dial the 300 baud dial-up number, and scream the carrier tone. If I got a response, that meant that the mainframe was back online and I should wrap up what I was doing and head back to the lab.
#300baud #funny #history #oldschool #retro #tech
archive.org #19663

OpenDNS Tells Congress Not To Create The Great Firewall Of America | Techdirt

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20111108/10101816680/opendns-tells-congress-not-to-create-great-firewall-america.shtml
When I went to Washington DC a few weeks ago with other entrepreneurs and venture capitalists, one of those whom I had the pleasure of meeting and walking the halls of Congress with was David Ulevitch, the CEO of OpenDNS, the world's largest DNS and internet security service. His service protects over 30 million people every day, and is currently used to protect people in approximately one-third of every public K-12 school. Hearing his story and his concerns about PROTECT IP and SOPA was really eye-opening. He's someone who clearly understands DNS and DNS/IP blocking better than probably anyone. And he told me that if SOPA were in place when he was first creating OpenDNS, he wouldn't have bothered. The liability would be just too great.
#copyfight #law #netneutrality #us
archive.org #19662

How to Work from Home Without Going Insane

http://lifehacker.com/5858412/how-to-work-from-home-without-going-insane
So you've decided to work from home. As a rookie veteran of working without a traditional office for one year I'm here to tell you that it is the greatest and worst thing that can happen to your work life other—much like being transferred to a glitter-packing facility. What follows is a quick two minute guide of what you need to know before you take your pants off and turn up those old Hootie and the Blowfish albums.
#lifehacks #telecommuting #wfh
archive.org #19660

Adobe's future is controlling what you watch, not delivering it • The Register

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/11/11/adobe_flash_analysis
Adobe's decision to stop developing mobile Flash shouldn't surprise: Adobe can see there's more money in preventing people watching stuff than enabling them to do so. ... Amazon's Kindle might be the biggest kid on the block, but just about all the other electronic book readers rely on Adobe's Digital Editions DRM to protect (and distribute) their content (which is laid out using the Adobe-owned-but-happily-shared ePub format).
#adobe #copyfight #drm #flash
archive.org #19657

CouchDB "Joins" - Christopher Lenz

http://www.cmlenz.net/archives/2007/10/couchdb-joins
Obvious to Damien, but not at all obvious to the rest of us: it's fairly simple to make a view that includes both the content of the blog post document, and the content of all the comments associated with that post. The way you do that is by using complex keys. Until now we've been using simple string values for the view keys, but in fact they can be arbitrary JSON values, so let's make some use of that:
#couchdb #data #database #nosql #webdev
archive.org #19656

Zynga to employees: Give back our stock or you'll be fired | The Digital Home - CNET News

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13506_3-57322150-17/zynga-to-employees-give-back-our-stock-or-youll-be-fired
In order to determine which employees would be asked to give stock back, Pincus and his executives tried to pinpoint workers whose contributions to Zynga--in the execs' eyes--didn't necessarily justify the potential cash windfall they could receive when the company went public, the Journal claims. One Journal source said that Zynga executives were especially concerned with not creating a "Google chef" scenario.
#business #employment #farmville #tech #zynga
archive.org #19655

Why we won’t enable DNT by default | Mozilla Privacy Blog

http://blog.mozilla.com/privacy/2011/11/09/dnt-cannot-be-default
Mozilla’s mission is to give users this choice and control over their browsing experience. We won’t turn on Do Not Track by default because then it would be Mozilla making the choice, not the individual. Since this is a choice for the user to make, we cannot send the signal automatically but will empower them with the tools they need to do it.
#dnt #mozilla #privacy #tech
archive.org #19654

Setting up a Node.js development environment with NPM and Cloud9 IDE installed locally - Cambus.net

http://www.cambus.net/setting-up-a-node-js-development-environment-with-npm-and-cloud9-ide-installed-locally
In this tutorial, you will learn how to setup a complete Node.js development environment, including NPM (the Node Package Manager) and Cloud9 IDE to edit, run, and debug Node programs. The following installation instructions have been sucessfully tested on Debian 6.0 “Squeeze” and on Ubuntu 11.10 “Oneiric Ocelot”, but they should also work properly on previous versions as well.
#cloud9 #howto #javascript #node #nodejs #tech
archive.org #19651

The purported death of RSS

http://www.loopinsight.com/2011/11/10/the-purported-death-of-rss
Just as /Library is now hidden from an OS X Lion user, and just as the iOS platform is locked down and sandboxed, RSS is simply dropping off into the background. Content is being syndicated and aggregated just as before. Perhaps even more so than in the past. Virtually everyone with a Facebook, Google+, or Twitter account follows a news-providing entity. Those entities share content feeds. Those content feeds are generally derived from the XML and Atom feeds that comprise the RSS.
#feeds #news #rss #web #webdev
archive.org #19650

Al Franken Fact Checks Chuck Grassley: Marriage Has Evolved Over Time | ThinkProgress

http://thinkprogress.org/lgbt/2011/11/10/366309/al-franken-fact-checks-chuck-grassley-marriage-has-evolved-over-time
FRANKEN: I just believe you misstated the history of marriage. Marriage has not existed as a union between one man and one woman for thousands of years in every culture. In many cultures, men have been able to marry many women and young girls. For centuries, women have been treated as chattel in marriage. Further, if the religious purpose for marriage is procreation, why would we sanction marriage between an 89 year-old widower and an 80 year-old widow? I just think we need to be accurate when we talk about the history of marriage, the history of man and woman, the history of our institutions.
#culture #history #marriage
archive.org #19649

The Other Problem With Perry's 'Oops' Moment - NYTimes.com

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/11/10/the-other-problem-with-perrys-oops-moment
There’s really no arguing with the consensus view that, after repeatedly courting calamity in prior debates, Rick Perry did grave damage to his presidential campaign Wednesday night. First the guy says that anyone who disagrees with him on illegal immigration must not have a heart, then he gets all twisted up while trying to attack Mitt Romney, and finally comes this new gaffe about … um … hang on a second … wait, it’ll come to me.
#perry #politics #republicans
archive.org #19645

We're in trouble: time to limit future warming to just 2°C has nearly run out

http://arstechnica.com/science/news/2011/11/were-screwed-limiting-emissions-to-a-2c-temperature-rise-is-almost-beyond-reach.ars
In other words, we've got five years to make a dramatic shift in the sorts of power plants we're building, or there's no way we're going to limit climate change to stated goals. It's also worth noting that the IEA ran a "New Policies" scenario that takes into account all current pledges by national governments. It resulted in much higher emissions and a likely temperature rise of 3.5°C. Still, if the New Policies targets aren't implemented, then the IEA estimates that we would be on track for a rise of 6°C.
#climatechange #environment #politics
archive.org #19643

The Pirate Bay Trademark Handed To Alcohol Entrepreneur | TorrentFreak

http://torrentfreak.com/the-pirate-bay-trademark-handed-to-alcohol-entrepreneur-111110
A Sweden-based alcohol entrepreneur has successfully obtained the trademark “The Pirate Bay”. Colin Scragg, who made to complaints to police over share dealings at his former company earlier this year, had faced opposition at the Patents and Trademarks Office, but now the decision has swung in his favor.
#booze #piratebay #tech #wtf
archive.org #19638

Sci-Fi Short XXIT Gets Big Blade Runner Look From Small Camera | Underwire | Wired.com

http://www.wired.com/underwire/2011/11/xxit
XXIT’s plot revolves around a beautiful “BioClone” from the future who travels to San Francisco to rescue the humans whose DNA she shares. The short film’s acting may be standard issue, but the visuals point toward a promising future for low-budget sci-fi. The crew shot the production on the streets of San Francisco using six handheld cameras that cost $20,000 apiece.
#cg #movies #scifi #video
archive.org #19637

Rep. Joe Walsh Explains His 'Don't Blame Banks' Rant: I 'Was Working On An Empty Stomach' | ThinkProgress

http://thinkprogress.org/politics/2011/11/09/365349/walsh-rant-dont-blame-banks
After our story, the Capitol Fax, an Illinois political website, contacted Walsh for a response. Walsh wrote in an e-mail that he was “working on an empty stomach and had a quicker fuse than normal.” Despite the fact Walsh’s biggest campaign benefactors come from the banking industry — $132,329 in campaign contributions from the finance industry and $18,400 from bank employees — the freshman congressman claims that he’s “no pal of the big banks.” I guess along with his government healthcare, we need to make sure he has handlers that keep his blood sugar level up.
#politics #republicans #walksh
archive.org #19636

Warner Bros: we issued takedowns for files we never saw, didn't own copyright to

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/11/warner-admits-it-issues-takedowns-for-files-it-hasnt-looked-at.ars
In a Monday court filing, Warner Brothers admitted that it has issued takedown notices for files without looking at them first. The studio also acknowledged that it issued takedown notices for a number of URLs that its adversary, the locker site Hotfile, says were obviously not Warner Brothers' content.
#copyfight #media #warner
archive.org #19635

How the GOP Became the Party of the Rich | Politics News | Rolling Stone

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/how-the-gop-became-the-party-of-the-rich-20111109
After taking office, Clinton immediately seized the mantle of fiscal discipline from Republicans. Rather than simply trimming the federal deficit, as his GOP predecessors had done, he set out to balance the budget and begin paying down the national debt. To do so, he hiked the top tax bracket to nearly 40 percent and boosted the corporate tax rate to 35 percent. "It cost him both houses of Congress in the 1994 midterm elections," says Chafee, the former GOP senator. "But taming the deficit led to the best economy America's ever had." Following the tax hikes of 1993, the economy grew at a brisk clip of 3.2 percent, creating more than 11 million jobs. Average wages ticked up, and stocks soared by 78 percent. By the spring of 1997, the federal budget was headed into the black.
#gop #politics #republicans
archive.org #19634

Winter Warmer | Serious Eats : Recipes

http://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2011/11/homebrewing-winter-warmer-christmas-beer-recipe.html
Winter Warmer ales are like gingerbread and cognac wrapped up in a beer. Start with a good-tasting beer foundation, add some spice on top, and finish with some alcoholic warmth. This recipe clocks in at around 8.7% ABV.
#beer #homebrewing #todo #winter
archive.org #19624

Computer scrollbars: Why is Apple eradicating a linchpin of user interface design? - Slate Magazine

http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/technology/2011/11/computer_scrollbars_why_is_apple_eradicating_a_linchpin_of_user_interface_design_.html
I can understand the impulse here: Most scrollbars are kind of ugly. Even the skinny, rounded gray bar that Apple invented for the iPhone isn’t the prettiest interface element ever designed. But as unpleasant as they may be to look at, scrollbars serve a purpose on a busy screen: They tell you, at a glance, where you are in a list or a document. Because most modern scrollbars are proportional to the size of the document you’re looking at, they also give you a sense of how much lies off-screen—the smaller the scrollbar, the larger the document. And when you don’t see a scrollbar—or when the scrollbar is dimmed—this usually means there’s nothing outside the screen to look at.
#design #scrollbars #tech #ui #ux
archive.org #19620

Tests Show Most Store Honey Isn't Honey

http://www.foodsafetynews.com/2011/11/tests-show-most-store-honey-isnt-honey
Ultra filtering is a high-tech procedure where honey is heated, sometimes watered down and then forced at high pressure through extremely small filters to remove pollen, which is the only foolproof sign identifying the source of the honey. It is a spin-off of a technique refined by the Chinese, who have illegally dumped tons of their honey - some containing illegal antibiotics - on the U.S. market for years.
#food #gross #health #honey #safety
archive.org #19619

Is it Game Over for Nintendo DS and Sony PSP?

http://blog.flurry.com/bid/77424/Is-it-Game-Over-for-Nintendo-DS-and-Sony-PSP
Portable gaming, played primarily on Nintendo DS and Sony PSP devices, has been dominated by these two companies for over two decades. In this model, at retail, consumers pay around $200 for the gaming device and up to $40 for popular game cartridges. Because of the similar form factor, overlap in consumer base (especially younger players on iPod touch) and the casual nature of game content, Flurry combines iOS and Android devices with traditional portable devices to form the category. With the inclusion of smartphone game revenue into the category, shifts taking place in market share become clearer.
#android #gaming #ios #mobile #nintendo #sony
archive.org #19618

Poll: What Is Your Reaction to the Death of Mobile Flash?

http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/poll_what_is_your_reaction_to_the_death_of_mobile.php
The Web is singing this morning. The coming death of Flash on mobile devices has made a lot of tech pundits and developers very happy. There is a big fat "I told you so" coming from all corners the of Internet while all Adobe can do is quietly sit back and rue the day the original iPhone was announced.
#adobe #flash #html5 #iphone #mobile #webdev
archive.org #19617

Crisco TV Commercial featuring the Atari 2600 (1983) | The Retroist

http://www.retroist.com/2011/11/09/crisco-tv-commercial-featuring-the-atari-2600-1983
When frying chicken for your family it is important to never stop to play video games for an hour and leave your chicken floating in a pool of oil the entire time. But if you must insist on this behavior, make sure you hare using Crisco oil. It somehow goes against all logic and will allow your oil soaked chicken to not be oily or greasy.
#atari #crisco #funny #retro
archive.org #19616

Ex-Flash Manager: Adobe Ignored Smartphones Until It Was Too Late

http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/ex-flash_manager_adobe_ignored_smartphones_until_i.php
A former manager and engineer of Flash at Adobe said today that when the true smartphone revolution came in 2007 with the announcement of the iPhone is 2007, Adobe ignored it. Carlos Icaza co-founded Ansca Mobile, the creators of the Corona SDK, left Adobe in 2007 when his call for embracing the touchscreen smartphone evolution was ignored by Adobe executives.
#adobe #html5 #mobile #smartphones
archive.org #19615

It’s not just mobile — Adobe is abandoning Flash on TVs as well — Online Video News

http://gigaom.com/video/flash-tv-future
While the market for TV apps is incredibly fragmented, it doesn’t appear that Adobe’s Flash will provide a solution. The company confirmed through a statement that like mobile, it will no longer focus on porting the Flash plugin into web browsers on CE devices, but believes developers should build native apps on those devices instead.
#adobe #flash #tech
archive.org #19614

The mobile app is going the way of the CD-ROM: To the dustbin of history | VentureBeat

http://venturebeat.com/2011/11/09/mobile-web
For developers, it’s technologically more manageable to build one mobile web app than a half-dozen or even just two native apps. And given the state of mobile web standards, we’re quickly approaching a point where end users can’t tell the difference between the two. All that’s really left is a business model for mobile web apps, Sullivan contends.
#apps #html5 #mobile #webdev
archive.org #19613

TideArt - Web designers: Time to ditch Flash, Silverlight, and embrace HTML5

http://tideart.com/?id=4ebafb57
Yesterday, Adobe announced major job cuts and a company restructuring, and indicated that their focus on Flash may not be what it used to be, by cutting off Flash development on Android and the Playbook. Meanwhile last week, Microsoft was reluctantly admitting that Silverlight isn't a big part of their future either. The message is clear, and even if it means some relearning for long time web designers, it's time to switch to HTML5 if you haven't already.
#adobe #flash #html5 #silverlight #webdev
archive.org #19612

End Bonuses for Bankers - NYTimes.com

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/08/opinion/end-bonuses-for-bankers.html?_r=1
What would banking look like if bonuses were eliminated? It would not be too different from what it was like when I was a bank intern in the 1980s, before the wave of deregulation that culminated in the 1999 repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act, the Depression-era law that had separated investment and commercial banking. Before then, bankers and lenders were boring “lifers.” Banking was bland and predictable; the chairman’s income was less than that of today’s junior trader. Investment banks, which paid bonuses and weren’t allowed to lend, were partnerships with skin in the game, not gamblers playing with other people’s money.
#bailouts #banking #economy #politics
archive.org #19611

Depeche Mode So Cruel "U2 Cover" - YouTube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m1E5a3-oHrA
Favorite: Depeche Mode So Cruel "U2 Cover", by DepecheSam1 "We first heard Achtung Baby working on Songs Of Faith And Devotion with Flood. It was the closest our bands ever got: U2 had become more electronic while Depeche Mode were working on a new rock vision. But there was never a rivalry. Bono...
#videos #youtube
archive.org #19610

Check Out: Nine Inch Nails, Depeche Mode, The Killers cover U2 « Consequence of Sound

http://consequenceofsound.net/2011/10/check-out-nine-inch-nails-depeche-mode-the-killers-cover-u2
As previously reported, UK’s Q Magazine has assembled a massive U2 tribute album to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the band’s landmark album Achtung Baby. The compilation, titled AHK-toong BAY-bi Covered, features covers of Achtung Baby tracks by a number of music heavyweights, including Jack White, Nine Inch Nails, Depeche Mode, The Killers, and more.
#awesome #music #nifty #nin #nineinchnails #u2
archive.org #19608

McCain Predicts Rise of Third Party

http://politicalwire.com/archives/2011/11/09/mccain_predicts_rise_of_third_party.html
Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) predicted a third political party will emerge in response to Americans' economic frustrations and said it might as well be called "the Fed-Up Party," Reuters reports.
#mccain #politics
archive.org #19607

danah boyd | apophenia » open-access is the future: boycott locked-down academic journals

http://www.zephoria.org/thoughts/archives/2008/02/06/openaccess_is_t.html
Making systemic change like this is hard and it will require every invested party to stand up for what they know is right and chip away at the old system. I don’t have tenure (and at this rate, no one will ever let me). I am a young punk scholar and I strongly believe that we have a responsibility to stand up for what’s right. Open-access is right. Heavy metal gates and expensive gatekeepers isn’t. It’s time for change to happen! To all of the academics out there, I beg you to help me make this change reality. Let’s stop being silenced by academic publishers.
#academia #access #journals #open #publishing #research #scholarship
archive.org #19592

Daily Kos: Mitch McConnell: Obama jobs bill was designed to make Republicans look bad for rejecting it

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/11/08/1034347/-Mitch-McConnell:-Obama-jobs-bill-was-designed-to-make-Republicans-look-bad-for-rejecting-it
You know what, Mitch? If you don't want to look "intransigent" ... then don't be intransigent! If you don't want to look like you're sabotaging the economy ... then don't sabotage the economy! And if you think rejecting the jobs bill makes you look bad ... then don't reject it!
#economy #jobs #politics #republicans
archive.org #19588

Fox News successfully creates climate confusion, but only among conservatives

http://arstechnica.com/science/news/2011/11/fox-news-successfully-creates-climate-confusion-but-only-among-conservatives.ars
A while back, a memo surfaced that reportedly came from a Fox News executive, in which he directed his staff to always present opposing views on something we can essentially regard as a fact: our planet has been getting warmer. There has been plenty of anecdotal indications that this strategy has been carried out, including a truly bizarre incident in which Bill Nye, on the channel in order to discuss volcanic activity on the Moon, was asked if these volcanoes raised doubts about climate change.
#climate #climatechange #conservatives #fox #foxnews #morons #politics #republicans
archive.org #19587

jtnimoy: The Work of Josh Nimoy

http://jtnimoy.net/?q=178
I spent a half year writing software art to generate special effects for Tron Legacy, working at Digital Domain with Bradley "GMUNK" Munkowitz, Jake Sargeant, and David "dlew" Lewandowski. This page has taken a long time to be published because I've had to await clearance. A lot of my team's work was done using Adobe software and Cinema 4D. The rest of it got written in C++ using OpenFrameworks and wxWidgets, the way I've always done it with this team ;) Uniquely however, Digital Domain's CG artists were able to port my apps over to Houdini for further evolution and better rendering than OpenGL could ever provide. Special thanks to Andy King for showing me that what seasoned CG artists do at DD is actually not so far off from what's going on in the Processing community.
#animation #cg #design #film #graphics #movies #processing #scifi #specialeffects #tron
archive.org #19586

Viacom so devastated by piracy that CEO gets $50 million raise

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/11/viacom-so-devastated-by-piracy-that-ceo-only-gets-50m-raise.ars
For years, the Motion Picture Association of America has been pushing legislation to ratchet up copyright enforcement. In 2008, the association helped push through the PRO-IP Act , which allowed the federal government to seize domain names used for copyright infringement and created a new federal...
#copyfight #viacom
archive.org #19584

Ketchup Fountain

http://laughingsquid.com/ketchup-fountain
The Ketchup Fountain is a fountain of recirculating ketchup that Savannah College of Art & Design alumnus and illustrator Britt Spencer created out of a repurposed chocolate fountain. The fountain was used in his thesis exhibition titled Dagnabit!!! on September 9, 2011. All food was provided by McDonald’s for the show.
#awesome #food #fountain #ketchup #to:tumblr
archive.org #19583

Why Google Plus Pages (Will) Beat Facebook. And Twitter | Wired Enterprise | Wired.com

http://www.wired.com/wiredenterprise/2011/11/google-plus-pages
And though many point to the similarities between Plus and Facebook — and the similarities have only grown with the addition of branded pages — the addition of Pages may be more of a challenge to Twitter. While a certain portion of the population is accustomed to information in 140 character bites, Google+ provides a richer forum where companies can release news to the public.
#google #plus #social #tech
archive.org #19569

Stealth Bastard - Launch Trailer - YouTube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z1dLNLji5n0
Favorite: Stealth Bastard - Launch Trailer, by curvestudios Launches 4th November, 2011! Who said stealth had to be so SLOW? Introducing Stealth Bastard - the game that injects a syringe-full-o'-adrenaline and a liberal dash of bastard-hardness into the hide-em-up. N... http://www.stealthbastard.com
#videos #youtube
archive.org #19568

GOP Rep. Joe Walsh Melts Down, Screams At Constituents: 'Dont Blame Banks!...I Am Tired Of Hearing That Crap!' | ThinkProgress

http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2011/11/08/364180/joe-walsh-melts-down-bank-lobby
Freshman Rep. Joe Walsh (R-IL) is known for his anti-Obama rhetoric on cable television and his inability to pay his child support payments. But during a recent meeting with constituents in his Chicago-area suburban district, Walsh lost his cool when several attendees asked about why banks have so much power in government. At one point, Walsh even threatened to eject a man who asked Walsh about the revolving door of bank lobbyists infiltrating Congress and financial regulatory agencies.
#banks #economy #politics
archive.org #19567

Obama Now Attempting To Get Each Word Of Jobs Bill Passed Individually | The Onion - America's Finest News Source

http://www.theonion.com/articles/obama-now-attempting-to-get-each-word-of-jobs-bill,26570
"This is a truly vital piece of legislation that needs to be approved in a bipartisan manner as swiftly as possible, and if that means passing it one single linguistic element at a time, then so be it," the president told reporters, claiming he and Republican lawmakers had already agreed on several synonyms that could be substituted for various controversial modifiers.
#funny #obama #politics #theonion
archive.org #19565

An Open Love Letter to My Bloody Valentine’s Loveless | Underwire | Wired.com

http://www.wired.com/underwire/2011/11/my-bloody-valentine-loveless
“I just kind of found my own way, and my own feel, my own way of playing,” Shields said of his ax modulations in Mike McGonigal’s book-length analysis of Loveless from 2007. “I found that if there was only one guitar track whilst the vocals were going, split between different amps and mics, the sound was bigger, especially when you use open strings and tunings and the tremolo arm. I didn’t have to consciously think about it; I was able to express this constant feeling of expression. It’s hard to explain the sound of the guitar bending. What you hear is what it is between the sound.”
#music
archive.org #19562

Busted! Two New Fed GPS Trackers Found on SUV | Threat Level | Wired.com

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2011/11/gps-tracker-times-two
The 25-year-old resident of San Jose, California, says he found the first one about three weeks ago on his Volvo SUV while visiting his mother in Modesto, about 80 miles northeast of San Jose. After contacting Wired and allowing a photographer to snap pictures of the device, it was swapped out and replaced with a second tracking device. A witness also reported seeing a strange man looking beneath the vehicle of the young man’s girlfriend while her car was parked at work, suggesting that a tracking device may have been retrieved from her car. I wonder what kind of hubbub it would cause if someone put a tracker in the tracker and figured out where it went when it got retrieved?
#gps #law #police #surveillance
archive.org #19561

This is How My Son Does Dishes - YouTube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=arZ8mPhW6Vo
Favorite: This is How My Son Does Dishes, by Dedzig Frankie asked if I could put Smooth Criminal on while he did the dishes. Wasn't long before I heard rustling coming from the kitchen. PLEASE READ BEFORE YOU COMMENT: This channel is kid-friendly and I will mod the comments to reflect that. Gener...
#videos #youtube
archive.org #19553

Birth of Bronx Zoo’s M’bura Overcomes Okapi Odds - NYTimes.com

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/08/science/birth-of-bronx-zoos-mbura-overcomes-okapi-odds.html
Not exactly. Okapis are the only known relative of the giraffe, but with the silhouette of an antelope. They are notoriously skittish, so adept at avoiding other animals in the wild — including other okapis — that Western researchers didn’t even document their existence until 1901.
#animals #okapi
archive.org #19549

Daily Kos: Republican filibuster of infrastructure bill is one more piece of economic sabotage

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/11/07/1034078/-Republican-filibuster-of-infrastructure-bill-is-one-more-piece-of-economicsabotage
What we're seeing here is another piece of evidence that Republicans are more committed—much more committed—to opposing Barack Obama than to doing even the most basic, routine things to keep the economy going and keep bridges from collapsing under us. Filibusters like this are exactly why 50 percent of people believe Republicans are intentionally sabotaging the economy. (And, of course, Joe Lieberman and Ben Nelson are joining them.)
#economy #infrastructure #jobs #politics
archive.org #19548

Watch an Innocent Guy Get Shot with a Rubber Bullet By the Oakland Police for No Reason

http://gizmodo.com/5857129/an-innocent-guy-got-shot-with-a-rubber-bullet-by-the-oakland-police-for-no-reason
If you watch the video, you can hear Campbell repeatedly ask the police if "this is okay?". I think it's safe to assume that Campbell was verifying with the police if it was okay to film them and if he was at a proper distance from the police line. He asks this question multiple times before continuing to film. Hearing nothing back, Campbell films the rest of the police line at a respectable distance until... he gets shot by an asshole police officer. What the hell? You can see the rubber bullet (bean bag? another projectile?) being fired and hitting Campbell in the video.
#occupyoakland #ows #police #to:tumblr
archive.org #19545

RIAA lawyer says DMCA may need overhaul | Media Maverick - CNET News

http://news.cnet.com/8301-31001_3-57319344-261/riaa-lawyer-says-dmca-may-need-overhaul?tag=mncol;cnetRiver
"I think Congress got it right, but I think the courts are getting it wrong," Pariser said during a panel discussion at the NY Entertainment & Technology Law Conference. "I think the courts are interpreting Congress' statute in a manner that is entirely too restrictive of content owners' rights and too open to [Internet] service providers. "We might need to go to Congress at some point for a fix," Pariser added. "Not because the statute was badly drafted but because the interpretation has been so hamstrung by court decisions."
#assholes #copyfight #dmca #politics #riaa
archive.org #19544

3,000 sign whitehouse.gov petition seeking "vapid response," cookies

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/11/over-21000-sign-whitehousegov-petition-seeking-vapid-response-cookies.ars
The tone of the White House's response to many of the petitions has spawned the latest rapidly-rising request for a White House response, so far signed by over 3,000 registered site users. A less sarcastic, but equally critical petition criticizing the White House's treatment of the petitions has reached 13,000 signatures.
#funny #petitions #politics
archive.org #19542

U.S. Government Glossed Over Cancer Concerns As It Rolled Out Airport X-Ray Scanners - ProPublica

http://www.propublica.org/article/u.s.-government-glossed-over-cancer-concerns-as-it-rolled-out-airport-x-ray
A ProPublica/PBS NewsHour investigation of how this decision was made shows that in post-9/11 America, security issues can trump even long-established medical conventions. The final call to deploy the X-ray machines was made not by the FDA, which regulates drugs and medical devices, but by the TSA, an agency whose primary mission is to prevent terrorist attacks.
#airport #cancer #health #radiation #terror #terrorism #travel #tsa
archive.org #19541

Google keyword: Pepsi | MetaFilter

http://www.metafilter.com/109207/Google-keyword-Pepsi
Two weeks ago, Google disabled the + operator for searches, requiring quotation marks to force inclusion of a word. Today, Google Plus rolled out a new feature - Pages for companies and brands, so you can "build relationships with all the things you care about". Included is Direct Connect - go straight to Pepsi's Google+ page by searching for +Pepsi.
#aol #google #google+ #search #tech
archive.org #19540

So Long, Launchpads: Pentagon Wants Jets to Send Sats Into Orbit | Danger Room | Wired.com

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2011/11/darpa-satellite-launchers
The technology to launch an orbiter from the sky, rather than the ground, already exists. The Pegasus rocket launcher, for example, has performed over 40 aerial launches: A carrier aircraft flies the rocket up, and then fires it off — satellite included — into the stratosphere. But to refine that system, then strip it of human personnel, is a tall order — the launching system would need to be entirely self-sufficient. Indeed, Darpa notes that ALASA is looking for a launcher requiring “no recurring maintenance or support, and no specific integration to prepare for launch.”
#darpa #googlereader #ifttt #satelites #space #tech
archive.org #19537

Harness the Mental, Creative, and Emotional Benefits of Regular Writing

http://lifehacker.com/5855019/how-to-harness-the-mental-and-emotional-benefits-of-regular-writing
Since writing also makes you take those ideas out of your head and put them into real words, it also challenges you to think about how you can communicate those ideas to others in a way that makes sense. You'll have to turn your abstract ideas into something that's concrete and understandable by others, and it'll challenge you to grow and develop the language and communications skills required to get those ideas across. Even if you deal in facts and figures, creative writing can help you learn to communicate complex ideas more effectively.
#googlereader #ifttt #lifehacks #writing
archive.org #19536

Steven Poole: Whatever made you think it was your data anyway?

http://stevenpoole.net/blog/whatever-made-you-think-it-was-your-data-anyway
In case it helps, I hereby declare the following iron law of “free” internet services: If you’re not paying for something, you have no reason to expect it to be there tomorrow. This is an important corollary to the law “If you’re not paying for something, you’re not a customer; you’re the product being sold”.
#cloud #data #fuckthecloud #googlereader #ifttt #social #web20
archive.org #19513

Evercube

http://evercu.be
The kit contains everything — except harddisks — that is needed to build the Evercube: enclosure, motherboard (with onboard CPU and memory), 5-port SATA multiplexer backplane, internal disk scaffold, ultra-silent fan, power supply, wires, clamps, wedges, screws, nuts, washers ... everything.
#diy #hardware #server #tech
archive.org #19512

The DRM graveyard: A brief history of digital rights management in music | opensource.com

http://opensource.com/life/11/11/drm-graveyard-brief-history-digital-rights-management-music
There are more than a few reasons digital rights management (DRM) has been largely unsuccessful. But the easiest way to explain to a consumer why DRM doesn't work is to put it in terms he understands: "What happens to the music you paid for if that company changes its mind?" It was one thing when it was a theoretical question. Now it's a historical one. Rhapsody just had the next in a line of DRM music services to go--this week the company told its users than anyone with RAX files has unil November 7 to back them up in another format or lose them the next time they upgrade their systems.
#drm #failure #googlereader #ifttt #music
archive.org #19511

Johnny Depp: 'I'm not ready to give up my American citizenship' | Film | The Guardian

http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2011/nov/06/johnny-depp-interview-rum-diary
I think it's Depp's own innocence – expressed as indiscriminate adoration for those he admires – that might be what men respond to. It's an odd thing, but a star with a weakness for public hero worship seems to inspire deliriously wide-eyed hero worship in his fans. Depp is a famous enthusiast, with great taste – he loves Withnail & I, The Fast Show, Jack Kerouac, gonzo journalism, hard liquor, good wine and rock guitar. But then, so do a lot of the men in my local bar in Hackney. Only in today's Hollywood, where most heartthrobs are traditionally either too insecure or undiscerning to share these tastes with boyishly humble enthusiasm, do they confer the status of Jean-Paul Sartre crossed with James Dean.
#depp #entertainment #movies
archive.org #19508

The Politics of Austerity - NYTimes.com

http://campaignstops.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/11/05/the-politics-of-austerity
In many respects, austerity feeds on itself. If the country needs to invest in education and rebuilding infrastructure to regain competitiveness, as many economists of varying ideological stripes argue, those initiatives are in large part precluded in a political environment that places top priority on deficit and debt reduction. Retrenchment, in effect, becomes a noose, choking off prospects for growth.
#economy #government #politics
archive.org #19506

MPAA Helped Police Seize 'Pirated' DVDs That Were Actually Fully Authorized | Techdirt

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20111029/09443916562/mpaa-helped-police-seize-pirated-dvds-that-were-actually-fully-authorized.shtml
Here's a story that touches on a few different issues of importance around these parts. We'll get to the details of the legal ruling in a bit, but the background is really the key part. At the beginning of 2009, a company in Valencia, California, called L&M Optical Disc West, received an order from an authorized partner of the producers of the film Milk to manufacture the DVDs of the film. They began doing exactly that. On February 2nd, as part of a supposedly unrelated police raid, police saw those DVDs and found them "suspicious." They rang up the MPAA who sent over an "investigator," who falsely declared that the DVDs were unauthorized, leading the police to seize them (though, oddly, allowing the private investigation firm to hold them) and to declare to the press that they had found "pirated" DVDs of Milk. This happened despite multiple attempts by L&M staff to explain that they had a legitimate order, even offering to show the "investigator" the details of the order.
#business #copyfight #mpaa
archive.org #19505

Daily Kos: Another incident of domestic terrorism thwarted; another Fox News connection

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/11/06/1032611/-Another-incident-of-domestic-terrorism-thwarted;-another-Fox-News-connection
Yes, yes. All these plots are "unrelated." We can't possibly blame them on a right-wing ideology that revels in paranoid claims about the future of the country and how extraordinary measures are required to save it from whatever the latest bogeyman is (usually, revolving around some not-conservative figure being the ideological equivalent of Stalin, for reasons that are, shall we say, never well explained), because that would be mean. We can't blame the authors and promoters of far-right fantasias (the men in this story were inspired by a fictional novel about murdering government workers fer freedomz, etc) because that would be "persecuting" them or some such, and heaven knows the right wing feels "persecuted" enough already. And heaven forfend anyone point out how very, very often these stories have a Fox News connection or find that the alleged terrorist had written long, rambling messages on some well-known conservative blog.
#extremists #foxnews #politics #terrorism
archive.org #19502

Rich Class fighting 99%, winning big-time - Paul B. Farrell - MarketWatch

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/rich-class-beating-99-to-a-pulp-2011-11-01?Link=obinsite
They’re fighting you, winning big-time, and you’re the loser. It’s just one generation since conservatives put Reagan in office: In those three short decades the income and wealth of the top 1% has tripled while the income of the bottom 99% of all Americans has stagnated or dropped. ... Yes, folks, America really is under attack daily. We are fighting on the defense in an historic class warfare. Yes, the Rich Class really did start this war. And yes, they really are winning, big-time. And yes, they are addicted to winning at all costs, to get richer and richer just for the sake of getting richer and richer.
#economy #jobs #money #occupy #occupywallstreet #ows #politics #wealth
archive.org #19501

Louis C. K. Plans Online Broadcast of Comedy Concert | MetaFilter

http://www.metafilter.com/109178/Louis-C-K-Plans-Online-Broadcast-of-Comedy-Concert
Louis C. K. Plans Online Broadcast of Comedy Concert Stand up comedian Louis C.K. announced on the Conan show (forward to about 9'10" into the video for the discussion) that he is taping a comedy special that will be broadcast only on the Internet. The show itself will be performed on November 10...
#blork #comedy #entertainment #ifttt #louisck #nifty
archive.org #19500

Marshall Kirkpatrick's Blog » Social Media is Not Ruining Journalism

http://marshallk.com/social-media-is-not-ruining-journalism
I found myself responding to a Google+ thread this morning wherein a respected technology leader said “copying and pasting from social networking sites is not journalism.” Apparently he’d been seeing random Tweets referenced on TV and thought it was lazy, pointless and a sign that journalism is going down the tubes.
#journalism #social #web
archive.org #19498

Web 2.0 Development and Business Lessons: CoffeeScript Means Giving Up on JavaScript

http://www.w2lessons.com/2011/11/coffeescript-means-giving-up-on.html
While many of you will probably disagree with me, I find the trend towards writing in languages that compile to JavaScript somewhat alarming. The most notable of these languages CoffeeScript, and it's one that has gained a good degree of traction over the last year or so.
#coffeescript #javascript #languages #tech #webdev
archive.org #19496

Don't use MongoDB | Hacker News

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3202081
From CTO of 10gen First, I tried to find any client of ours with a track record like this and have been unsuccessful. I personally have looked at every single customer case that’s every come in (there are about 1600 of them) and cannot match this story to any of them. I am confused as to the origin here, so answers cannot be complete in some cases.
#data #database #mongodb #nosql #webdev
archive.org #19494

The Rise Of Pinterest And The Shift From Search To Discovery | TechCrunch

http://techcrunch.com/2011/11/06/rise-pinterest-shift-search-discovery
The current toast of the web is Pinterest, the visual pinboard for collecting and sharing content online. The “pinning” phenomena is spreading from its modest beginnings to appearing in national media outlets. There are over 2.5m monthly active Pinterest users on Facebook. A co-founder of the site has over 500,000 followers on Pinterest. Ron Conway (an investor in the site) remarked that Pinterest’s user growth rate is what Facebook’s was five years ago. Earlier in 2011, it was valued through venture financing at $40m and, most recently, just a few months later, at around $200m.
#pinboard #sharing #social
archive.org #19491

Rush is a Band Blog: Clockwork Angels update: writing completed, recording underway

http://www.rushisaband.com/blog/2011/11/06/2892/Clockwork-Angels-update-writing-completed-recording-underway
The process which began early last year with the recording and release of Caravan and BU2B is finally starting to come to a close. According to recent interviews by both Geddy Lee and Alex Lifeson, Rush's upcoming Clockwork Angels studio album is nearing completion. Geddy was interviewed by Rolli...
#blork #ifttt #music #rush
archive.org #19489

Java is not the new COBOL | Craig Tataryn's .plan

http://tataryn.net/2011/11/java-is-not-the-new-cobol
Given the above facts I think you’ll agree, Java is not stagnant, it’s getting much better on the eyes and fingers and it has been adopted by cool, non-stodgy companies. Then perhaps you’ll also agree it’s wrong to say Java is the new COBOL, just as wrong as saying Ruby is the new Java. Nope, not buying it.
#cobol #java #programming #tech
archive.org #19488

Talking the Monster to Death - Television Tropes & Idioms

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TalkingTheMonsterToDeath
The hero has cornered the vicious monster. It's taken out everyone who has confronted it thus far, and the hero seems like no exception. That's when the hero, rather than drawing a sword, pulls out his cue cards. He begins a speech about the good things in life, the wonders of good, how Humans Are Special and the monster should respect that, yadda yadda, could someone hit the mute button please? And it works. This hideous monster surrenders, lets itself die, chooses to Ascend to a Higher Plane of Existence, disappears in a Puff of Logic, or what-have-you.
#funny #scifi #tropes #tv
archive.org #19486

"You Just Don't Get It, Do You?" - A Montage of Cinema's Worst Writing Cliche on Vimeo

http://vimeo.com/24669583
A montage that I edited early-mid 2011 under my Bottoms Up Productions label for acclaimed movie blog FilmDrunk.com. Was a viral hit, featured on several websites that include The Huffington Post, NY Mag, The Daily What, and critic Roger Ebert's blog. See source link: filmdrunk.uproxx.com/​2011/​06/​cinemas-most-overused-line-you-just-dont-get-it-do-you
#funny #movies #to:tumblr #videos
archive.org #19476

Quantified Awesome: Development-driven behaviour and integrated tests for life | sacha chua :: living an awesome life

http://sachachua.com/blog/2011/11/quantified-awesome-development-driven-behaviour
I am pleasantly boggled that this is possible, and will probably write all sorts of odd tests now. Because Cucumber can fill in web forms, click on stuff, and so on, I might even be able to use it to check information on other sites. (When I check my mail, then all the messages in my inbox should be less than a week old?)
#lifehacks #quantified #selfhelp #testing
archive.org #19471

Grandpa Aaron loves Bioshock, can't wait to see you for Thanksgiving | Joystiq

http://www.joystiq.com/2011/11/05/grandpa-aaron-loves-bioshock-cant-wait-to-see-you-for-thanksgi
It's getting to be that time of year where mushy, sentimental and "awww"-inducing chatter overwhelms all channels of media and fills your heart with a warm sense of home, whether you like it or not. For example: Reddit user Jungleradio gave his 80 year-old grandfather copies of Bioshock, Red Dead Redemption, Braid and Castlevania: Symphony of the Night for his birthday, with quaint, heartwarming results.
#awesome #gaming #grandpa
archive.org #19470

memeorandum: Michigan City Removes Streetlights In Desperate Budget Cut (ThinkProgress)

http://www.memeorandum.com/111104/p98#a111104p98
ThinkProgress:Michigan City Removes Streetlights In Desperate Budget Cut  —  States and cities around the country have desperately slashed spending in the face of record budget deficits, including unpaving roads, shrinking schools, closing libraries, and even a failed attempt to decriminalize ...
#detroit #economy #michigan #shared #ttrss
archive.org #19460

Jub Jub, A St. Bernard That Balances Everything on His Nose

http://laughingsquid.com/jub-jub-a-st-bernard-that-balances-everything-on-his-nose
Watch as Jub Jub the St. Bernard dog balances everything from a laptop to a lacrosse stick to a handgun to a slice of pizza, and nearly everything in between, in the video, Jub Jub Nose How To Balance. Jub Jub’s human companion, Stew McFadden, has created a Facebook profile for this talented po...
#animals #cute #dogs #pets #shared #ttrss
archive.org #19457

memeorandum: Dippin' Dots Files for Bankruptcy (Katy Stech/Wall Street Journal)

http://www.memeorandum.com/111104/p65#a111104p65
Katy Stech / Wall Street Journal:Dippin' Dots Files for Bankruptcy  —  The future of ice cream is having trouble surviving today.  —  Dippin' Dots Inc., the self-described “ice cream of the future,” filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection Thursday in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Paducah, Ky., ne...
#desserts #dippindots #sad #shared #ttrss
archive.org #19456

memeorandum: Senate blocks $60 billion infrastructure plan, another part of Obama jobs bill (Rosalind S. Helderman/Washington Post)

http://www.memeorandum.com/111104/p62#a111104p62
Rosalind S. Helderman / Washington Post:Senate blocks $60 billion infrastructure plan, another part of Obama jobs bill  —  The Senate shot down another piece of President Obama's $447 billion jobs bill Thursday, as a stalemated Congress goes through the motions of attempting legislation to spur...
#economy #jobs #politics #shared #taxes #ttrss
archive.org #19455

Retro Thing: Build An Insanely Complicated Transistor Clock

http://www.retrothing.com/2011/11/build-an-insanely-complicated-transistor-clock.html
Brandon Schader writes, "As an electronics hobbyist, I gravitate toward endlessly cool yet hopelessly commercially impractical projects. This company's offerings definitely qualify.Stumbled upon this site about a year ago based upon a 'Nuts and Volts' write-up. The coolest project at that time was the Transistor Clock. This is simply a digital clock built entirely with discrete transistors and diodes-no ICs anywhere! Display consists of six 7-segment LED displays. I've built one, and although it's not cheap, it's simply transcendentally awesome.Now I see he has outdone himself. He now features a "Transistor Clock" kit as described above which uses Nixies rather than LEDs as the displays. This meets the definition of retro in every possible way because it genuinely could have been built as is with no mods in the 60s." I like soldering electronics, sometimes for an hour or two at a stretch. It's a great way to clear the mind and focus on creating a physical thing. However, the $239 KABtronics Nixie Transistor Clock Kit might be taking things a bit too far. Instead of using logic ICs or microcontrollers, it features 215 discrete transistors, 518 diodes, 472 resistors and 101 capacitors on a massive 10" x 14" printed circuit board.  KABtronics also offers a $199 version with a 7-segment LED display, along with smaller and less expensive models that incorporate newfangled integrated circuits. And if the idea of solid state electronics is too much for you, there's apparently a mechanical relay clock in the works, too. KABtronics Timepiece Kits
#needs-tags #shared #ttrss
archive.org #19454

Conan O'Brien officiates first same-sex marriage on a late night TV show - Boing Boing

http://boingboing.net/2011/11/04/conan-obrien-officiates-first-same-sex-marriage-on-a-late-night-tv-show.html
Conan O'Brien officiated the first same-sex marriage on a late-night TV show last night. It was the wedding of "CONAN" costume designer Scott Cronick and his partner David Gorshein. Bravo's Andy Cohen walked Scott down the aisle on stage at the Beacon Theater. "The wedding was performed while...
#conan #entertainment #gay #marriage #shared #ttrss #tv
archive.org #19453

I Met Air Supply!!! « Nerdist

http://www.nerdist.com/2011/11/me-n-air-supply
I’m on Late Night w/ Fallon tonight along w/ Kirsten Dunst and AIR SUPPLY! I love those guys. Unironically. This is my front facing camera from Jimmy’s couch while A.S. rocked the SHIT out of that studio with a The Roots-backed rendition of “Here I Am.” I sang along and air-drummed through the ...
#airsupply #nerdist #nifty #shared #ttrss
archive.org #19452

We ask a OPD officer why he had his name badge covered.... on Vimeo

http://vimeo.com/31568216
This how to properly engage with police when they do suspicious things. We were riding by on bikes and noticed hes hiding his name and has no badge number. SO we decided to ask him. He did not answer, we asked a ranking officer is that policy? The LT. quickly went about fixing his attitude. This is a common practice among cops at occupy's around the US .That way he/she cannot be named or referenced if he participates in police miss-conduct . Its in most police departments policies that all officers in uniform must show some form of identification. OPD does not wear badges with #'s, how do we hold anyone accountable?
#occupy #occupyoakland #occupywallstreet #ows #police #to:tumblr #video
archive.org #19448

Daily Kos: Two thirds of Iowa Republicans are really, really stupid

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/11/04/1033262/-Two-thirds-of-Iowa-Republicans-are-really,-really-stupid
Two-thirds of likely Iowa Republican caucus goers earning less than $50,000 a year believe they personally would be better off or in the same situation under Herman Cain’s 9-9-9 tax plan, The Des Moines Register’s new Iowa Poll shows. Research-group reviews of the plan have found that most families making $100,000 or less would pay thousands of dollars more each year.
#cain #economy #politics #taxes
archive.org #19446

CSS Media Queries

http://cssmediaqueries.com
HTML4 and CSS2 currently support media-dependent style sheets tailored for different media types. A media query consists of a media type and zero or more expressions that check for the conditions of particular media features. Seems like a nifty site to vet media queries on all my devices
#css #design #mediaqueries #webdev
archive.org #19438

3 Google Reader Changes Need Repair Now - Internet - Google - Informationweek

http://www.informationweek.com/news/internet/google/231902111
This is essential. There were several feeds that I subscribed to from individuals that were an absolutely vital part of my informational flow. Now, I no longer have access to those feeds. Instead, Google hopes that I'll watch those same people in Google+ to see what they share publicly. Only these were private feeds meant pretty much only for me. In the 36 hours or so that I've been using the new Reader, I've been unable to access these feeds or find alternatives that are as easy to use.
#feeds #fuckthecloud #news #occupygooglereader #rss
archive.org #19437

GeekMom » Blog Archive » Why Curated Content Matters: A Lament for Reader Share

http://www.geekmom.com/2011/11/why-curated-content-matters-a-lament-for-reader-share
And that is exactly what’s bugging me about the death of Reader Share. It was an info pantry, not a colander—a place well stocked with nourishing brain food. I followed a number of people who had demonstrated, day after day, a sharp eye for items worth my time. Every time I clicked that “people you follow” link to see what they’d shared, I could count on learning something.
#feeds #fuckthecloud #news #occupygooglereader #rss
archive.org #19436

Unoccupy Google Reader | Jack Shafer

http://blogs.reuters.com/jackshafer/2011/11/03/unoccupy-google-reader
We users had been warned for weeks that a redesign of the popular (and free) RSS reader was in the making, so the appearance of a new version didn’t come as a shock. The only shock was how terrible the new version is. It subverts users’ needs in favor of Google’s. The company wants to fight Facebook with a uniform interface for its free suite of services—which also includes Gmail, Calendar, and Docs—that will encourage sharing of content on its newish social-networking product, Google+. But in making the whole Google product line visually consistent, the company has crippled one of its best offerings.
#feeds #fuckthecloud #news #occupygooglereader #rss
archive.org #19435

Google Reader Backlash: A Fuss Over Nothing? - Rebecca J. Rosen - Technology - The Atlantic

http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2011/11/google-reader-backlash-a-fuss-over-nothing/247707
But for people who used Google Reader's sharing features, the upgrade is a big loss, for all intents and purposes ruining that aspect of Reader. The old sharing methods have been totally supplanted with Google+ tools, which, quality aside, are too different to satisfy the same needs. I'm going to dive into the nitty-gritty here, so consider yourself warned.
#feeds #fuckthecloud #news #occupygooglereader #rss
archive.org #19434

Google Doesn't Seem to Want to Fix Reader - Rebecca J. Rosen - Technology - The Atlantic

http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2011/11/google-doesnt-want-to-fix-reader/247858
Even before Google unveiled it's changes to Reader, it did not care what users thought. In the first blog post announcing the changes, Google said, "We recognize, however, that some of you may feel like the product is no longer for you." As a nice gesture, Google gave people tools for transferring their feeds and social data to other RSS aggregators, but the point was clear: You don't have to like what we're about to do.
#feeds #fuckthecloud #news #occupygooglereader #rss
archive.org #19433

CIA Drones Kill Large Groups Without Knowing Who They Are | Danger Room | Wired.com

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2011/11/cia-drones-marked-for-death
As long as the CIA — now backed by the military and the State Department — has a free hand to wage the secret drone war in tribal Pakistan, it will continue to bottle up al-Qaida and its allies, degrading the threat they pose. They will also kill more Tariqs and Waheeds. And because the drone war remains a classified CIA program, the CIA will not have to account for its actions to anybody, least of all the U.S. or Pakistani publics. This headline is wussy. Impersonal DRONES don't kill people, assassin pilots at remote consoles kill people. This isn't Terminator, yet.
#cia #drones #politics #war
archive.org #19430

Jon Stewart Scolds the 'Bad Occupiers' of Occupy Wall Street

http://gawker.com/5856284/jon-stewart-scolds-occupy-wall-street-a-leaderless-movement
Jon Stewart started out on tonight's Daily Show by acknowledging that the Occupy Wall Street movement resonates with many people across the country. Except for "one small caveat." Stewart then replayed footage from a previous episode in which he warned the movement against violence, followed by ...
#ifttt #occupy #occupywallstreet #ows #shared
archive.org #19408

Senator Gretchen Whitmer Responds to Pro-Bullying Legislation - YouTube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDK-ja8PLgg
Favorite: Senator Gretchen Whitmer Responds to Pro-Bullying Legislation, by MISenDems Senate Democratic Leader Gretchen Whitmer responded to Republicans gutting an anti-bullying bill by inserting language that specifically allows bullying to occur based on religious or moral reasons. This legisla...
#bullying #ifttt #michigan #republicans #videos #youtube
archive.org #19406

Daily Kos: Rick Perry steals joke from President Obama that he once condemned

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/11/03/1032809/-Rick-Perry-steals-joke-from-President-Obama-that-he-oncecondemned
Remember when President Obama made the same alligator moat joke?  Rick Perry called it reprehensible back then. Rick Perry yesterday, mocking the idea of building a fence along the border: HANNITY: You don't need a fence, in your view? PERRY: Oh, I think there's places that strategic fencing.....
#ifttt #politics #republicans #shared
archive.org #19405

Coffee Table MAME Console — DIY How-to from Make: Projects

http://makeprojects.com/Project/Coffee-Table-MAME-Console/1378/1
Oftentimes makers will build MAME cabinets that resemble old-time arcade games, but ultimately they’re just PCs with buttons and joysticks wired in. With the Coffee Table MAME Console, we’re going to build a stripped-down version of the arcade machine. It doesn’t need a monitor because you can use your TV, and instead of having the computer inside the enclosure, the console connects to your PC via Bluetooth.
#arduino #bluetooth #diy #gaming
archive.org #19404

MAKE | Build a Classic Video Game Console from MAKE Volume 28

http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2011/11/build-a-classic-video-game-console-from-make-volume-28.html
We’re super excited about our new issue, MAKE Volume 28, which just hit newsstands last week. The issue theme is Toys and Games, and naturally, our entire focus was on fun, from the playful 8-bit graphics style of the cover design by eBoy to the 176 pages of projects and profiles that give you ...
#arduino #diy #gaming #make
archive.org #19403

memeorandum: Boehner: Debt deal will include new tax revenues (Nancy Cordes/CBS News)

http://www.memeorandum.com/111103/p134#a111103p134
Nancy Cordes / CBS News:Boehner: Debt deal will include new tax revenues  —  House Speaker John Boehner addressed one of the biggest sticking points for the 12 member Congressional “supercommittee” today, acknowledging that any bipartisan agreement will need to include some new tax revenue.
#economy #politics #republicans #taxes
archive.org #19402

Beta registration opened for upcoming sci-fi MMOFPS Repulse | Massively

http://massively.joystiq.com/2011/11/03/beta-registration-opened-for-upcoming-sci-fi-mmofps-repulse
Filed under: Betas, Sci-fi, Galleries, Trailers, Video, New titles, News items It's proving to be quite the year for MMOFPS fans, with several upcoming titles aimed in precisely that direction. Repulse is another entry in the genre from Aeria Games, set in a future setting wherein human beings...
#gaming #mmofps #repulse
archive.org #19401

Star Trek Online opens up testing for the dilithium exchange | Massively

http://massively.joystiq.com/2011/11/03/star-trek-online-opens-up-testing-for-the-dilithium-exchange
Filed under: Sci-fi, Business models, Previews, News items, Star Trek Online, Free-to-play The economy of free-to-play games can be a tricky business. Usually, they're managed by keeping a strict distinction between in-game currency and purchased currency, but Star Trek Online is taking a slig...
#gaming #mmorpgs #scifi #startrek
archive.org #19400

Motherlode of Dark Crystal and Labyrinth art comes to New York!

http://io9.com/5856224/motherlode-of-dark-crystal-and-labyrinth-art-comes-to-new-york/gallery/1
The exhibition Brian Froud: Visions for Film & Faerie opens Dec. 2 at the Animazing Gallery in SoHo, New York. In addition to all the Dark Crystal art, there's a site-specific installation — and Wendy Froud has recreated Kira, Dark Crystal's Gelfling, for the exhibition. Kira stands 33 inches tall and was sculpted using hair and beading from the original film production.
#art #brianfroud #faerie #nifty #nyc
archive.org #19399

It's Apple's Sandbox, Developers Just Play In It

http://www.readwriteweb.com/hack/2011/11/its-apples-sandbox-developers.php
Despite a number of cogent arguments against it, Apple is going through with the requirement for apps in the Mac App Store to be sandboxed. A number of Mac developers have already spoken up about the policy, but Apple's going through with it anyway. Initially set to go into effect this month, A...
#apple #appstore #ifttt #shared #tech
archive.org #19398

Using WebSocket with PIC microcontrollers - Hack a Day

http://hackaday.com/2011/11/03/using-websocket-with-pic-microcontrollers
[Blaise Jarrett] has been grinding away to get the WebSocket protocol to play nicely with PIC microcontrollers. Here he’s using the PIC 18F4620 along with a Roving Networks RN-XV WiFi module to get the device on the network. He had started with a smaller processor but ran into some RAM restricti...
#diy #hacks #pic #tech
archive.org #19397

The Best Podcast Manager for Android

http://lifehacker.com/5855861/the-best-podcast-manager-for-android
There's no shortage of podcast managers for Android, but they run the gamut from simplistic to feature-rich. We tested a few, but found that DoggCatcher is the best option to find, download, and organize your podcasts on your Android phone. More »
#android #mobile #podcasts
archive.org #19396

The sods must be crazy: OLPC to drop tablets from helicopters to isolated villages

http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/news/2011/11/the-sods-must-be-crazy-olpc-to-drop-tablets-from-helicopters-to-isolated-villages.ars
The One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) project has devised a bizarre plan for deploying its new XO-3 tablet. The organization plans to drop the touchscreen computers from helicopters near remote villages in developing countries. The devices will then be abandoned and left for the villagers to find, di...
#olpc #tech
archive.org #19393

Commodore USA goes Extreme, stuffs a 2.2GHz quad-core i7 into its C64x -- Engadget

http://www.engadget.com/2011/11/03/commodore-usa-goes-extreme-stuffs-a-2-2ghz-quad-core-i7-into-it
We've loved Commodore USA's C64 computer recreations ever since it began producing them back in 2010. Much to our delight, the company recently outed its third variant, the C64x Extreme. This unit features the '80s flair we've come to appreciate, but supercharged to 2011 spec. Crammed inside its...
#shared #ttrss
archive.org #19391

The Evolution of Fail Pets | UX Magazine

http://uxmag.com/articles/the-evolution-of-fail-pets
Fred Wenzel refers to error mascots, such as Twitter’s Fail Whale (Figure 1) as fail pets. Fail pets are of particular interest in terms of branding because they can result in brand recognition through earned media. However, that same recognition carries the danger of highlighting service failure. This article discusses the rise of and changes to the depictions of fail pets, from the initial, highly recognizable fail pets, to markedly more cautious error message imagery in later products.
#failpets #web20 #wenzel
archive.org #19386

Do a barrel roll

http://kottke.org/11/11/do-a-barrel-roll
The most fun on the internet right now: go to Google and search for "do a barrel roll" (no quotes). Whee! Tags: Google   search   web development
#shared #ttrss
archive.org #19382

NASA says we've been looking for Martian life in all the wrong places

http://io9.com/5855891/nasa-says-weve-been-looking-for-martian-life-in-all-the-wrong-places
Don't worry—if we do find evidence of Martians, it will still be on Mars, we'll probably just have to dig a little deeper to find it. A new NASA study has concluded that if life ever thrived on the Red Planet, it probably did so underground, just below the planet's surface. In other words, life...
#life #mars #space
archive.org #19380

Entertainment industry incredibly profitable, healthy: but demands special pirate-hunting laws anyway - Boing Boing

http://boingboing.net/2011/11/03/entertainment-industry-incredibly-profitable-healthy-but-demands-special-pirate-hunting-laws-anyway.html
You know how we hear so much about piracy destroying the entertainment industry? Well, not according to the industry itself. The Intellectual Property Alliance's report on the health of the industry paints a rosy picture, which begs the question: why are we prepared to sacrifice free speech, fr...
#shared #ttrss
archive.org #19379

Woman Needs to Chill out About the Rogue Plastic Flamingos in Her Yard

http://gawker.com/5855945/woman-needs-to-chill-out-about-the-rogue-plastic-flamingos-in-her-yard
Every autumn for the past three years the well-intentioned senior boys and girls at Quincy High School in Quincy, Massachusetts have gone around sticking dozens of cheap plastic flamingos in people's yards along with signs asking for $20 donations. They call their activity "flocking." It's a har...
#flamingos #funny
archive.org #19378

Woman Burns Down Friend's House For Defriending Her on Facebook

http://gawker.com/5855931/woman-burns-down-friends-house-for-defriending-her-on-facebook
One day, years from now, Jennifer Christine Harris will scroll back to this week on her Facebook Timeline and regret everything she sees. (She'll also be, like, "I still don't get the point of Facebook Timeline. The interface is so confusing and the pictures are way too big!") The Des Moines nat...
#facebook #funny #nutters
archive.org #19377

Dreams, discernment, and Google Reader | massless

http://massless.org/?p=174
The shareable social object of subscribe-able items makes Reader’s network unique and the answer to why change is painful for many of its users is because no obvious alternative network exists with exactly that object. The social object of Google+ is…nearly anything and its diffuse model is harder to evaluate or appreciate. The value of a social network seems to map proportionally to the perceived value of its main object. (Examples: sharing best-of-web links on Metafilter or sharing hi-res photos on Flickr or sharing video art on Vimeo or sharing statuses on Twitter/Facebook or sharing questions on Quora.) If you want a community with stronger ties, provide more definition to your social object.
#feeds #fuckthecloud #google #occupygooglereader #reader #rss
archive.org #19373

memeorandum: Obama: God backs jobs plan (Agence France Presse)

http://www.memeorandum.com/111102/p155#a111102p155
Agence France Presse:Obama: God backs jobs plan  —  President Barack Obama Wednesday said even God wanted to put Americans back to work, invoking divine blessing for his joust with Republicans over measures designed to slice into high unemployment.  —  Obama also taunted his foes with historic ...
#shared #ttrss
archive.org #19365

Electric 2012 Ford Focus now available to reserve online | The Verge

http://www.theverge.com/2011/11/2/2533771/2012-ford-focus-electric
Article note: I kind of want this. While it may not have the style of an electric DeLorean, Ford's now letting consumers get in line for the 2012 all-electric Focus, which carries a base MSRP of $39,200. The Focus will be going head to head with Nissan's Leaf and Chevy's Volt in the expanding e...
#auto #cars #electric #focus #ford
archive.org #19364

Nick Bradbury: The Long-Term Failure of Web APIs

http://nick.typepad.com/blog/2011/11/the-long-term-failure-of-web-apis.html
But we've also learned that while web APIs enable us to tap into a wealth of data, they can only be relied upon in the short term. The expiration date of software we create has been shortened due to the whims of those who create the web APIs we rely on. IMO, this goes for almost anything with net-based DRM, as well.
#apis #social #web20
archive.org #19360

A Note of Praise for The Verge

http://www.readwriteweb.com/enterprise/2011/11/a-note-of-praise-for-the-verge.php
I'll start with my disclaimer up front: These are my opinions you're about to read, not necessarily those of ReadWriteWeb. Now, maybe you've noticed this yourself already, but I actually don't read much "tech news" on the Web on a regular basis, besides what we publish here and what some friend...
#blogs #metablogging
archive.org #19354

Joining the board of Code for America « John’s Blog

http://john.jubjubs.net/2011/11/02/joining-the-board-of-code-for-america
I’m super, super excited to announce that I’ve joined the board of directors of Code for America, an organization started by Jen Pahlka two years ago aimed at getting some of the smartest and most motivated techies & designers among us working on solving some of the core problems facing our comm...
#shared #ttrss
archive.org #19353

How Google Reader's Overhaul Betrayed and Irked Its Most Passionate Users

http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/how_google_readers_overhaul_betrayed_and_irked_its.php
Yesterday, I got an email from a good friend with a subject line that needed no further explanation: "Google Reader." It was sent to a group of mutual friends, bemoaning the recent changes to Reader's interface, thereby kicking off a lengthy dis...
#feeds #fuckthecloud #google #occupygooglereader #reader #rss #sharing #social
archive.org #19349

In praise of "crap" technology - Boing Boing

http://boingboing.net/2011/11/02/in-praise-of-crap-technology.html
I visited my little brother, a dedicated minimalist, last month. In general, I think of myself as not particularly consumerist-y. But hanging out with somebody who is sooo much better at not consuming pointlessly has left me with a lot to think about. Gadgets are one of the biggest things I've...
#shared #ttrss
archive.org #19348

Yield Thought, Work Is Fascinating: The Metagame

http://yieldthought.com/post/5862066767/work-is-fascinating-metagame
"I started thinking about programmer performance a while ago. Everybody will tell you that you can’t measure programmer productivity, but this is at best a half-truth. We can, and we should. Perhaps what we shouldn’t do is use those measurements to compare programmers to each other, but we can definitely measure ourselves."
#automation #development #productivity #programming #work
archive.org #19341

Proposed Copyright Bill Threatens Whistleblowing and Human Rights | Electronic Frontier Foundation

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2011/11/proposed-copyright-bill-threatens-whistleblowing-and-human-rights
"It’s unclear whether SOPA’s authors intended it to cover these websites that are vital to whistleblowing and human rights. If they didn’t, they need to press re-set; and next time, consult with the numerous Internet communities the bill could affect, rather than exclusively Hollywood lobbyists. But the immediate need is clear: the bill must be killed. If you care about free speech and a free Internet, act now!"
#copyfight #freedom #hollywood #internet #speech
archive.org #19339

Locus Online Perspectives » Cory Doctorow: It’s Time to Stop Talking About Copyright

http://www.locusmag.com/Perspectives/2011/11/cory-doctorow-its-time-to-stop-talking-about-copyright
I’m all for sorting out the rules that govern the entertainment’s supply chain, but let’s keep some perspective here: when we ‘‘solve’’ copyright problems at the expense of the Internet, we solve them at the expense of 21st-century society as a whole.
#copyfight #internet #politics
archive.org #19338

Yahoo's 'Manhattan' To Rescue Web From the iPad | Wired Enterprise | Wired.com

http://www.wired.com/wiredenterprise/2011/11/yahoos-manhattan
On Wednesday, Yahoo launched a virtual newsstand atop its site — dubbed Livestand — and Manhattan will provide a means of building digital publications for this service. But developers will also have the freedom to run their apps wherever they like. The only restriction is that applications must be built with standard web technologies. Early next year, before the arrival of Manhattan, Yahoo will open-source a programming platform dubbed “Mojito.” Based on a widely used open source project known as Node.js, Mojito will allow developers to build entire applications with JavaScript, the web’s standard scripting language. Typically, JavaScript is used to build an application’s front end — the bit that runs on the user’s device — but with Node.js and Mojito, you can also use JavaScript on the back end — the bit that runs on the server.
#manhattan #mojito #webdev #yahoo
archive.org #19337

Your movie on every platform, sort of, for a while: how the new UltraViolet DRM fails

http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/news/2011/11/your-movie-on-every-platform-sort-of-for-a-while-how-the-new-ultraviolet-drm-fails.ars
UltraViolet is a digital rights authentication system developed by the movie industry to give consumers access to the content they have purchased across a number of devices. It sounds straightforward enough, but when we bought a Blu-ray copy of Horrible Bosses in order to see how well UltraViolet is implemented, we found it to be too tied down to proprietary apps, its access limited in too many ways, and the viewing experience subpar. It's a hassle.
#copyfight #entertainment #movies #ultraviolet
archive.org #19335

Daily Kos: Senate Republicans united in obstructing job creation, infrastructure repair

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/11/02/1032490/-Senate-Republicans-united-in-obstructing-job-creation,-infrastructurerepair
Today, the Senate is talking about whether they should vote to debate a jobs bill. Another Republican filibuster looms, in which the Republican Senate won't even vote to allow the Senate to debate and vote on doing a little something to try to save this economy. In this madness, Democratic leadership hopes to at the very least shame Republicans and possibly get a few of them to peel off from the Republican agenda of wrecking everything in sight and stealing all the rest.
#economy #jobs #politics #republicans
archive.org #19333

Two decades of productivity: Vim's 20th anniversary

http://arstechnica.com/open-source/news/2011/11/two-decades-of-productivity-vims-20th-anniversary.ars
The Vim text editor was first released to the public on November 2, 1991—exactly 20 years ago today. Although it was originally designed as a vi clone for the Amiga, it was soon ported to other platforms and eventually grew to become the most popular vi-compatible text editor. It is still actively developed and widely used across several operating systems.
#editors #history #tech #vi #vim
archive.org #19332

Loyal Opposition to Const, Private, Freeze, Non-Configurable, Non-Writable...

https://mail.mozilla.org/pipermail/es-discuss/2011-November/017872.html
And JavaScript is one of the *most* dynamic of the mainstream programming languages. Not only can you can pass any object to any function, but you can call a method with any number of arguments, easily modify the prototypes of other objects, introspect on any object's properties with a simple loop, replace any member function with a wrapped version, attach new properties to any object ... the list goes on.
#javascript #programming #webdev
archive.org #19331

Anne Rice picks a fight with Stephenie Meyer: "Lestat and Louie feel sorry for vampires that sparkle"

http://io9.com/5855615/anne-rice-picks-a-fight-with-stephenie-meyer-lestat-and-louie-feel-sorry-for-vampires-that-sparkle
Lestat and Louie feel sorry for vampires that sparkle in the sun. They would never hurt immortals who choose to spend eternity going to high school over and over again in a small town —— anymore than they would hurt the physically disabled or the mentally challenged. My vampires possess gravitas. They can afford to be merciful.
#annerice #funny #twilight #vampires #wtf
archive.org #19328

Watch Neil Gaiman, Amanda Palmer, Moby, and Stephen Merritt sing Rocky Horror

http://io9.com/5855635/watch-neil-gaiman-amanda-palmer-moby-and-stephen-merritt-sing-rocky-horror
Wow, it's all our favorite people singing our favorite song. While on Craig Ferguson's show, this amazing quartet made up of our favorite author, a Dresden Doll, part of The Magnetic Fields, and Moby sang "Science Fiction Double Feature" from The Rocky Horror Picture Show. Try not to pass out.
#craigferguson #nifty #rhps #tv
archive.org #19327

The 10 Most Explosively Masculine Captain Kirk Battle Techniques

http://io9.com/5855581/the-10-most-explosively-masculine-captain-kirk-battle-techniques
James Tiberius Kirk: lover, explorer, chanteur, a veritable 23rd-century bon vivant. Captain Kirk has many fine traits, but his martial prowess is perhaps most deserving of our fear and respect. Here are 10 fighting maneuvers that should be enshrined by Starfleet as "The Decalogue of Whooping Ass."
#funny #kirk #scifi #startrek
archive.org #19326

“I finally cracked it” – Marco.org

http://www.marco.org/2011/10/23/the-apple-tv-set
If all they do is make a really nice TV set like everyone else’s, it’ll probably be as interesting as the Airport Extreme: a nice product in its category, but not exciting or scaring the crap out of anyone. But if they’ve managed to pull off something more interesting, I’d hate to be in the TV business when it’s released.
#apple #appletv #cable #cordcutting #entertainment #media #tv
archive.org #19322

Must Watch: Bill Nye, Neil deGrasse Tyson, Pamela Gay, and Lawrence Krauss discuss our future in space

http://io9.com/5851956/must-watch-bill-nye-neil-degrasse-tyson-pamela-gay-and-lawrence-krauss-discuss-our-future-in-space
The video, originally shot back in July at TAM 2011 Las Vegas, is of a panel featuring Bill Nye, astronomers Neil DeGrasse Tyson & Pamela Gay, and theoretical physicist Lawrence Krauss—and the entire discussion is moderated by Bad Astronomy's Phil Plait. The subjects raised are consequential, the discussions thought provoking, and the opinions of the panelists refreshingly diverse (and often conflicting).
#astronomy #science #space #videos
archive.org #19320

The end of an era: Internet Explorer drops below 50% of Web usage

http://arstechnica.com/microsoft/news/2011/11/the-end-of-an-era-internet-explorer-drops-below-50-percent-of-web-usage.ars
A couple of interesting things happened in the world of Web browser usage during October. The more significant one is that Internet Explorer's share of global browser usage dropped below 50 percent for the first time in more than a decade. Less significant, but also notable, is that Chrome for the first time overtook Firefox here at Ars, making it the technologist's browser of choice.
#MSFT #browsers #chrome #firefox #msie #webdev
archive.org #19319

Off My Mind: The Dangers of Flash's New Powers - Comic Vine

http://www.comicvine.com/news/off-my-mind-the-dangers-of-flashs-new-powers/143800
When Barry was trying to figure out if it was possible for him to go even faster. His friend, Dr. Elias, found some interesting information. It turns out that Barry's body is using the speed force to its full extent but his brain is not. In other words, Barry has to use his brain to gain more speed.
#comics #flash
archive.org #19317

The Wall-Mounted Gaming Consoles Workspace

http://lifehacker.com/5855559/the-wall+mounted-gaming-consoles-workspace
This triple monitor workspace not only has floating monitors mounted to the wall, but also an impressive gaming console wall. "The Wall" holds a Wii, PS3, and XBox, as well as the necessary HDMI switch and other peripherals.
#gaming #nifty
archive.org #19315

Video: Judge Savagely Beats His Daughter For Illegal Downloads | TorrentFreak

http://torrentfreak.com/video-judge-savagely-beats-his-daughter-for-illegal-downloads-111102
Downloading copyright material without the permission of rightsholders is often portrayed as a heinous crime and treated as such by many judges across the United States. But what is an appropriate punishment for this apparently increasingly wicked act? Multi-million dollar fines? Jail? For one sixteen year-old girl using file-sharing software KaZaA, it was a savage beating, delivered by the leather belt of her father, Judge William Adams. And it was all caught on camera.
#beatings #copyfight #judges
archive.org #19313

Daily Kos: Herman Cain warns China trying to get nukes they've had since 1960s

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/11/02/1032454/-Herman-Cain-warns-China-trying-to-get-nukes-theyve-had-since-1960s
JUDY WOODRUFF: Do you view China as a potential military threat to the United States? HERMAN CAIN: I do view China as a potential military threat to the United States. [...] They've indicated that they're trying to develop nuclear capability and they want to develop more aircraft carriers like we have. So yes, we have to consider them a military threat.
#china #hermancain #nukes #politics
archive.org #19312

The Pragmatic Bookshelf | PragPub 2011-10 | Up Front

http://pragprog.com/magazines/2011-10/up-front
Oh, I am so so tempted to commit to this for "Tinkering with Activity Streams", even though it's already over a day into November "PragProWriMo is all about helping you write that technical book you’d really like to write but for some reason haven’t been able to get started. We’ll provide supporting materials and encouragement and all you have to do is to write 60 pages toward that book during the month of November."
#books #tech #writing
archive.org #19310

Stop Sharing Your Files When You Travel

http://www.readwriteweb.com/hack/2011/11/stop-sharing-your-files-when-y.php
I have been on the road a lot in the past several months, and one thing I keep seeing is that folks are over-sharing. I am not talking about putting up those ribald pictures on your Facebook account, or forwarding those questionable email "jokes." But literally sharing your computer's data files across the hotel (and some airports too). Here is what my Mac Finder looks like at a Hilton that I was at earlier in the week (you can see that I am connected to several of my fellow travelers' PCs):
#mac #networking #security #tech
archive.org #19309

Scripting News: Don't remove features from products

http://scripting.com/stories/2011/11/01/dontRemoveFeaturesFromProd.html
And then the product just died. Sales disappeared, until we could get out a version of the product that had most of the features of the other two, and added some new twists. Even then the product didn't get on a good footing until a year after that, when we came out with a product that did a lot more than any of our previous products. But I learned a lesson I would never forget. Even when you aren't actually taking features out of a product, you can't appear to the users to be doing that. They will make you pay for it. #
#dev #features #software #tech
archive.org #19307

MPAA Lashes Out Against Rogue Cyberlockers | TorrentFreak

http://torrentfreak.com/mpaa-lashes-out-against-rogue-cyberlockers-111101
An internal MPAA fact-sheet obtained by TorrentFreak shows that the movie industry is preparing a full-frontal attack on the business model of what they call “rogue cyberlockers”. The document summarizes how these file-hosting sites offer affiliates cash in return for signing up new premium members. According to the MPAA these practices facilitate mass-copyright infringement.
#copyfight #cyberlockers #mpaa
archive.org #19304

How the Hashtag Became a Campaign Battleground - Nancy Scola - Politics - The Atlantic

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2011/11/how-the-hashtag-became-a-campaign-battleground/247488
"It's all geek culture," says Lotan, "and it's amazing how Twitter has brought it to the masses so that everyone and their mother is using it. It's about letting people dive into conversations they wouldn't have seen otherwise. Twitter is one massive conversation, and those conventions let you dive into ideas, into funny inside jokes."
#hashtags #social #twitter
archive.org #19301

Mayor Bloomberg: 'It Was Not The Banks That Created The Mortgage Crisis' | ThinkProgress

http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2011/11/01/358482/bloomberg-mortgage-crisis
A favorite conservative pastime since the financial crisis of 2008 struck is to try and deflect blame away from Wall Street and its excesses and onto Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and government housing policy. No matter how many times the theory that the government mortgage giants caused the crisis gets debunked, it keeps on coming back to life.
#bloomberg #economy #occupy #occupywallstreet #ows #politics
archive.org #19297

Radar-like sensors bring touch sensitivity to everyday items | The Verge

http://www.theverge.com/2011/11/1/2529957/radar-like-sensors-bring-touch-sensitivity-to-everyday-items
Utilizing a technology known as time domain reflectometry, a pulse is sent through a wire every time it's touched until it hits a detector, which reflects the pulse back. Based on the speed of the pulse and the time it takes to return, software can pinpoint the starting point of the pulse. The touch-sensitive wire can be placed onto any regular item — the wire can even take the place of a guitar string, while a wire pattern can be embedded inside deformable objects like clothes.
#science #tdr #tech #touch
archive.org #19296

US Navy's electromagnetic railgun hits testing milestone: 1,000 shots fired -- Engadget

http://www.engadget.com/2011/11/01/us-navys-electromagnetic-railgun-hits-testing-milestone-1-000
If there's one thing you want your multi-million dollar electromagnetic railgun to be, it's reliable, and the US Navy announced today that it's reached a key milestone towards that goal. It's now successfully fired its prototype gun 1,000 times, which translates to as many as 15 shots per week. In recent years, those tests have generally been conducted at a 1.5 megajoule launch energy, which the Navy puts into perspective by noting that "a one-ton vehicle moving at 100 mph has approximately one megajoule of kinetic energy." Eventually, the Navy hopes to install even more advanced and far more powerful railgun weapons systems on ships, although the project's future remains a bit up in the air given some recent funding battles in the US Senate.
#navy #railguns #weapons
archive.org #19295

5 reasons you should love classic World of Warcraft

http://wow.joystiq.com/2011/11/01/5-reasons-you-should-love-classic-world-of-warcraft
I have a lot of love for World of Warcraft in each of its iterations. When I wrote 5 reasons you should love Mists of Pandaria, it really made me start to look back at the history of the game -- not necessarily the lore and story that I usually write about, but the various expansions from classic all the way to the upcoming Mists. Though the expansions themselves were vastly different in terms of story and progression, there are still things to love about every single one -- yes, including Cataclysm.
#blizzard #gaming #warcraft #wow
archive.org #19293

City lights could reveal alien civilizations | ExtremeTech

http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/102661-city-lights-on-other-planets-could-reveal-alien-life
New research conducted by Abraham Loeb from Harvard and Edwin Turner from Princeton shows that electric, artificial lights on remote planets could be detected using next-generation ground and space telescopes. The basic approach is simple: planets that are exclusively illuminated by a local sun will have one “light signature,” while a planet with artificial lights will have another. Loeb and Turner say that this technique, with our current telescopes, would be able to pick out a major terrestrial city on the edge of the Solar System, in the Kuiper belt (50 AU) — but future telescopes, or the telescopes belonging to advanced, alien races, could see farther.
#aliens #civilizations #science #space
archive.org #19292

Coffee & Power: Work For Each Other, Not The Man

http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/coffee_and_power.php
Coffee & Power is what Rosedale calls a "meta-company," a framework for doing business with no managers or middlemen, all arranged through a website, an iPhone app and the workclub. The site, the app and the first workclub on Market Street in San Francisco all go live today after a rapidly developed beta period starting this summer. Workers of the world, take notice: this San Francisco startup wants to make each of us the boss.
#coffee #work
archive.org #19291

Nick Bradbury: Anti-social FeedDemon (Killing Features, Part II)

http://nick.typepad.com/blog/2011/11/anti-social-feeddemon-killing-features-part-ii.html
Last night the changes to Google Reader went live, and as promised, they've removed the sharing features. This means that the sharing features in FeedDemon which rely on Google Reader will eventually stop working, so I'm forced to remove them.
#fuckthecloud #google #occupygooglereader #reader #rss #sharing #social #web20
archive.org #19287

Bank Of America CEO To Activists: The Pressure Is Working » Rainforest Action Network Blog

http://understory.ran.org/2011/10/31/bank-of-america-ceo-to-activists-the-pressure-is-working
Via Crooks & Liars we learn that Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan is “incensed” about all the pressure being brought to bear on his bank and its shady practices. In other words, what Moynihan is saying is: “The pressure is working. Keep it up.”
#banks #bofa #economy #occupy #occupywallstreet #ows
archive.org #19286

Occupy Google Reader Takes to the Streets - Forbes

http://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2011/10/28/occupy-google-reader-takes-to-the-streets
Okay, so it’s not exactly Occupy Wall Street, and the cause isn’t quite so dire as the recklessness of investment bankers gone wild or the government bailouts, but Google Reader is being cut off at the knees, and a number of its die-hard fans (including a few I know from Google Reader) have taken to the street to protest.
#fuckthecloud #google #occupygooglereader #reader #rss
archive.org #19285

Occupy Google Reader: Changes to the RSS feed irk the ‘sharebros’ - Arts Post - The Washington Post

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/arts-post/post/occupy-google-reader-changes-to-the-rss-feed-irk-the-sharebros/2011/10/27/gIQA7GbBMM_blog.html
When Google announced last week that Google Reader, an RSS aggregator with social-networking capability, would be rolling its social features into Google+, its disappointed readers felt helpless and disenfranchised against a powerful force.
#fuckthecloud #google #occupygooglereader #reader #rss
archive.org #19282

Occupy Google Reader: A report from the protest's front lines - @TBD Arts | TBD.com

http://www.tbd.com/blogs/tbd-arts/2011/10/occupy-google-reader-a-report-from-the-protest-s-front-lines--13343.html
The skies are threatening as Ryan Ellis briskly walks up I Street NW to join a small group of people who had spent the last half-hour making signs in front of Google's D.C. headquarters. "This is the most loserish protest ever!" he laughs, taking up a sign that read "GOOGLE: DON'T MARK ALL AS READ."
#fuckthecloud #google #occupygooglereader #reader #rss
archive.org #19281

Occupy Google Reader: My God, Google, Why Have You Forsaken Us? | WordStream

http://www.wordstream.com/blog/ws/2011/10/28/rip-google-reader
In short: This sucks. Google is trying to force its very loyal Reader user base into using Google+ instead. And I don’t wanna! Google Reader already works for me; it’s not broken. And I’m not the only one who’s pissed. In the Atlantic, Adam Clark Estes notes that “the world is surprisingly angry about the end of Google Reader.” Of course, it’s not the whole world that cares, but primarly the “Sharebros”
#fuckthecloud #google #occupygooglereader #reader #rss
archive.org #19280

Reader redesign: Terrible decision, or worst decision? - *

http://brianshih.com/78073742
Google released the previously announced set of changes around G+ integration and UI updates today, and boy is it a disaster. Since the general changes were pre-announced last week, most of us were prepared for the letdown, but actually seeing how it works end to end has made several flaws abundantly clear. Let's start with the obvious.
#fuckthecloud #google #news #occupygooglereader #rants #reader #readerpocalypse #rss #social #web20
archive.org #19279