Fiat pickup design study
It doesn’t exist, but I like it.
Tim Buckley – Song To The Siren
Footage from Alphaville. Directed by Jean-Luc Godard
remind me what journalists are supposed to do again?
McCaughey’s latest falsehoods have taken hold with a disturbingly large portion of the American public. But she couldn’t get them past “Daily Show” host Jon Stewart, who had her on his show Thursday night and subjected her to one of his better interviews, meticulously picking her points apart and demonstrating their inaccuracy, leaving her stumbling and stammering in an attempt to defend her position. By the end of it, he told her, “I like you — but I don’t understand how your brain works.“
Chinese Graffiti
“Graffiti art in China has got rid of the strong rebelliousness and confrontational attitude in Western graffiti,” said Luo Zhongli, head of the Sichuan Fine Arts Institute.
“It is related to the aesthetics of people’s lives, and leans more towards fashion.”
Swima bombiviridis, green bombers
“We found a whole new group of fairly large, extraordinary animals that we never knew anything about before,” Osborn said in a statement. “These are not rare animals. Often when we see them they number in the hundreds. What’s unique is that their habitat is really hard to sample.”
To thwart prey:
They have appendages, some round, others oval or long, which they release when they are disturbed, she said. Once release the appendage, it glows bright green.
“They drop one or two at a time and if you keep harassing them they will keep dropping them,” she said, adding that the worms are able to regenerate the body parts.
Is this photographable?
Hydrophonic Sound
This underwater recording of “ghostly creaking and the scuttling of claws against the hulls of briny shipwreck.” The claw scuttling reminds me of hot bacon grease crackling in a frying pan. Some of the strangest sounds I have heard in long time.
NB: It sounds better with headphones.
The town without news
Death of local news articles are a dime a dozen, but I honestly think this is the first time I have seen this observation:
Claire Enders of Enders Analysis notes that the people who most need information about local goings-on are the immobile old and the poor, for whom the news that a local clinic is about to close can be vital. They are the people least likely to have access to broadband. As newspapers close, people will seek local news on television and radio, much of it supplied by the BBC. It will not be nearly as detailed.
Have I been reading the wrong pieces, or has that dicussion been neglected?
Total Amnesia
A well educated man wakes up in Seattle’s Discovery park, but cannot remember who he is:
The blond-haired man with the walrus mustache wandered out of Seattle’s Discovery Park three weeks ago, with pressed khakis, an expensive dress shirt, a blue blazer and $600 hidden in his sock. He was uninjured — but said he was confused, lost and frightened.
This much is clear: He is fluent in English, French and German. He possesses a professorial knowledge of European cultural history. He seems to have traveled the world. And he says he is a widower.
But he said he doesn’t know who he is or when he was born. Or how he got here and why. Or whether he even wants to know.
He has been recognized as Edward Lighthart, an English teacher who taught in China.
Over The Rhine – I’m On A Roll
I happened to see them last night in concert. It was a brilliant show and, as it turns out, their pedal steel player, Kenny Hutson, is a good man to drink bourbon with.
Oh my
An Esquire article on a new religion being born here.
(via Russell King’s email newsletter)
Karl Wirsum | Screamin’ Jay Hawkins (1968)
Karl Wirsum. Screamin’ Jay Hawkins. 1968.
Art Institute of Chicago.
Speaking (as we were) of armpits . . .
ARMPIT RUBBER
Someone Stole Your Idea
This is a very exciting time and we are both humbled and honored to be at the forefront of this new wave of music programming. So please welcome to 101.5 The Pole, the first of what will soon be the lap dance heard around the world. The Classic Non Stop Stripper Hits sound of 101.5 The Pole.
So sorry. NSFW-ish.
I’m sorry to do this to you
The Peekaru — like a Snuggie, but creepier.
When Did Your County’s Jobs Disappear?
The 3 key parts of news stories you usually don’t get
Matt Thompson uses US healthcare reform as a launchpad for analyzing the best and worst of journalism. This is a must read. (via waxy)
Take a look at this Washington Post topic page on health reform. As I write, it includes a list of headlines signaling recent events in the health-care debate: several Democrats called the public plan essential, key senators are pushing cooperatives as an alternative, patients want more transparency on doctors’ links to Pharma, etc.
This stuff is what most news organizations consider the foundation of journalism: the news. To the extent that any of the other parts of a news story get traction, they must fit into a structure where the news is the main attraction.
Of course, this is also the most ephemeral piece of a news story. The reality that these headlines reflect today will likely be completely changed tomorrow. The lead article, about Nancy Pelosi and other Democrats calling the public plan essential, encapsulates an isolated moment of political posturing in a neverending storm of signals sent in press releases, conferences, and interviews, through spokespeople and Twitter accounts, during appearances on Sunday talk shows. By October, this story will lose most of its present meaning.
We often theorize that over time, the accumulated weight of all this news compresses into a sort of understanding, but I remain unconvinced.
the moon has more bandwidth than you.
Or one of its satellites does anyway:
On its current space scouting mission, NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) is using a pumped up communications device to deliver 461 gigabytes of data and images per day, at a rate of up to 100 Mbps
The best part? The data transfer requires a tube.
A traveling wave tube is needed for high frequency and high power applications such as deep space communications because of its higher power capability and efficiency when compared to solid-state devices, NASA stated. The amplifier uses a new waveguide for input and output that adds strength to withstand mechanical shock and vibrations for enhanced reliability while traveling in the harsh environment of space.
(thanks, Tom)
Four things that should happen, but won’t.
Andy Kessler reimagines our national communications policy:
• End phone exclusivity. Any device should work on any network. Data flows freely.
• Transition away from “owning” airwaves. As we’ve seen with license-free bandwidth via Wi-Fi networking, we can share the airwaves without interfering with each other. Let new carriers emerge based on quality of service rather than spectrum owned. Cellphone coverage from huge cell towers will naturally migrate seamlessly into offices and even homes via Wi-Fi networking. No more dropped calls in the bathroom.
• End municipal exclusivity deals for cable companies. TV channels are like voice pipes, part of an era that is about to pass. A little competition for cable will help the transition to paying for shows instead of overpaying for little-watched networks. Competition brings de facto network neutrality and open access (if you don’t like one service blocking apps, use another), thus one less set of artificial rules to be gamed.
• Encourage faster and faster data connections to our homes and phones. It should more than double every two years. To homes, five megabits today should be 10 megabits in 2011, 25 megabits in 2013 and 100 megabits in 2017. These data-connection speeds are technically doable today, with obsolete voice and video policy holding it back.
The lost image is no image
with teeth that bite
This is the course profile of Levi’s Gran Fondo, a 103 mile bike ride in Sonoma County that includes 6,500 feet of climbing. The ride will be the most difficult physical challenge I’ve ever faced and I’d be lying if I didn’t say I was a little nervous. Part of me thinks I can’t do it and that got me thinking:
Dear Clusterflock,
What things do you do or have you done that change your understanding of what you think you’re capable of?
From Duncan
O Daddy
I am intoxicated by the liquor
of your butt crack.
Your sweet, sweet funk is enough
to sustain my joy—
just barely.
I can’t tell if you’re scratching my head
or pushing me away.
As if I care!
Throw the damned ball.
Throw it now.
Throw it.
My Chicago rendezvous with India
Raspberry marzipan torte. Café Selmarie. Lincoln Square, Chicago. August 19, 2009.
was brief but glorious. Of course, there was cake.
So Oleta, Rick and me nipped into Central Park…
and we ended up in here.
Everything Must Change
Oleta Adams – Everything Must Change from Phil Bebbington on Vimeo.
Discovered after I followed Phil’s giant.
MIT Media Lab’s Persona
After pointing to this site yesterday afternoon, I realized it would be a heck of a lot more fun to visualize clusterflock.
