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I've just posted a new short-short story to my podcast: "Sensored" was commissioned by the UK Open University's computer science department for use in My digital life (TU100), its ubiquitous computing course. It's licensed Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike. I'm pleased with how it worked out, and I'm honoured to be a Visiting Senior Lecturer in the OU's comp sci department. Sensored MP3 Link Podcast feed Previously:Bruce Sterling speech at Ubicomp - video - Boing Boing Gershenfeld pulls down the pants of ubicomp - Boing Boing Boing Boing: Sterling on Ubiquitous Computing and the canard of ... Notes from "Roboflies, Flexonics, and the Social Life of Smart ... Boing Boing: Ethics and RFIDs - video of Adam "Everyware" Greenfield Camera glasses on...
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As case classification goes, the BookBook, offered in black and red for 13" and 15" laptops, would fit in the 'hardback leather' category. But where, pray tell, does it go under Dewey? An iPad edition is planned, too. Wouldn't a real book, cut hollow and appropriately modified, do the trick for less than the $80 price? [TwelveSouth]...
 
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Sometimes, a bag full of bite-sized, custard-filled, Hello Kitty-shaped pancakes is all you need to be happy. At this storefront in Harajuku, a woman in a pink bandanna in a small pink Hello Kitty-ed out room takes your order through a Hello Kitty head-shaped window with a giant pink ribbon. When she hands you the bag full of Hello Kitty pancakes, she says: "Please take your Kitty-chan!" Why do Hello Kitty-branded businesses always have to go for overkill?...
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Mamma always said you can do anything you put your mind to. But that's both a blessing and a curse. Science has made some amazing strides in medicine, but where minds—and money—aren't applied, progress sputters. Chagas is a parasitic disease spread by a bug. Somewhere between 8 and 20 million people—mostly in the Americas—are infected. No one knows for sure. Most of the victims are poor. A little over 100 years after the parasite that causes Chagas was first discovered, this disease is still difficult to diagnose, treatment regimens are complicated and fraught with side-effects and 20,000 people die from Chagas each year. The best hopes are prevention campaigns, and a new generation of drugs that researchers hope will be...
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(Thanks, John/Reproduced by permission of Flower&Fleurons)...
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I thought you might be interested in this video from a recent Kim Stanley Robinson talk in which he describes life in the present as a science fiction novel we all collaborate on. This is an excerpt from a pair of talks he gave at the Duke in January; the entirety of the other talk is available here. Here's a transcript of the first part of the video:" KSR: I think it's very true that we are living in a science fiction novel that we all collaborate on, and it's because everything that science fiction was about through its historical named period, the twentieth century, has kind of come true. And also we live in a world that is so...
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Inventor Taras Wankewycz shows me a table-top hydrogen power station that can extract hydrogen from water to be used in fuel cells. You heard right -- a personal hydrogen power station that can sit right on your kitchen counter.
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Copyrighthater says, Here is a video documenting every violent act in the 2010 superbowl ads. i dunno what's dumber: the marketers for being this pathetic, or the consumers for giving marketers the impression we're this pathetic. My money's on BOTH....
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Science fiction editor David Hartwell has written a sweet and moving obituary for writer Kage Baker, who lost her struggle with cancer on Jan 31. Two years ago, I had a plan to get together with Kage Baker. After several years of knowing her only through phone calls and the occasional meeting at a conference, I was pleased to have the opportunity to better know this witty and imaginative author. I was in Southern California at the Eaton conference in Riverside, and she and her terrific sister Kathleen were supposed to drive over. But their car broke down and I didn't get the chance to spend time with her that day. We tried again last June, when I was out...
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This camouflaged Dutch ship successfully disguised itself as a small tropical island and avoided the Japanese Navy after the Battle of the Java Sea. HNLMS Abraham Crijnssen was stationed in the Dutch East Indies when WW II began. After the destruction of the Allied Fleet by the Japanese during the Battle of the Java Sea in February 1942, Crijnssen's captain was ordered to escape with his ship to Australia. Covered with tree branches, the minesweeper crossed the Japanese naval lines camouflaged as a tropical island. HNLMS ABRAHAM CRIJNSSEN (A925) (via Make) Previously:Weird but effective dazzle camouflage schemes - Boing Boing Desiree Palmen's photos of camouflaged people - Boing Boing Boing Boing: Octopus camouflage video Camouflage any webpage as "work-safe" Word...
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The incomparable Olga Nunes has released the latest and greatest iteration of the net's appreciation for Discovery Channel's "Boom-De-Yadda" commercial, reinacting the XKCD version with "Neil Gaiman, Wil Wheaton, Cory Doctorow, Lawrence Lessig, Bruce Schneier, Jason Kottke, Google Zurich, Hank Green, MC Frontalot, Patrick & Teresa Nielsen Hayden, Mr. Toast, Miss Cellania, Team Genius, Phil Plait, Allan Amato, Maddy Gaiman, Charissa Gilreath, Belinda Casas, Chuck Martinez, Jeremy James, Joanna Gaunder, Lee Israel & Octavio Coleman Esq. of The Jejune Institute." We Love xkcd (via Making Light)...
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More random wall art from Kathmandu's Patan Hospital: two newspaper clippings circa 2002 and 2003 that remind us that alcoholism is very bad for society. According to these snippets, alcoholism (and in the former case, girls too) cause disco brawls and premature death. I left this bulletin board itching to know what the continuation of the first article was. What is it that boys usually do at Babylon disco?...
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What again was it that happens in 2012? [NYT. ]...
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Hey, lookit this: you can watch the Daily Show from anywhere, defeating geo-restrictions, with a little Firefox tweaking! (Thanks, Malakith!)...
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Here's the entire video of Jon Stewart's Fox interview with Bill O'Reilly. I know I'm biased, but I think that Stewart comes across as smart, funny and substantive and O'Reilly comes across as a defensive, deluded nut. Man, it's good to see Jon Stewart again. It's been a year or so since Comedy Central started blocking Daily Show clips from the UK, where I live -- I know I could just use a proxy to get at them, but I'm always racing the clock and there's always something else that I can watch without messing around, and I somehow never get around to it. But I missed Jon. Entire Jon Stewart Interview (Thanks, Fipi Lele!) Previously:Boing Boing: Jon Stewart's Crossfire...
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Flickr user Normative's 8-minute video on remix culture talks about how this isn't just about sitting around your house remixing, but often turns into a social event among remixers and their friends. It's a very good piece, and resonates with fanfic and other social forms of audience participation -- remixing isn't just about saying something back to a creator, but also about talking with your friends. The Evolution of Remix Culture (Thanks, Jim!) Previously:Gibson on remix culture - Boing Boing Good Copy, Bad Copy: superb copyright documentary on the remix ... Video explains fair use for video (video video) - Boing Boing Copyright documentary from Australian radio - Boing Boing Jay-Z v. the Beatles -- "Grey Album" food fight -...
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"The odds of getting killed during karaoke may be higher in the Philippines." And more so if you sing a particular song, according to the NYT. (via Julian Dibbell)...
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The artists/hackers at @fffffat just tweeted, "WE JUST BUGGED A GOOGLE STREETVIEW CAR WITH A GPS TRACKER IN BERLIN." And lo, it appears they sure did. The map is here. (thanks Souris)...
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Pen spinning gets competitive in Hong Kong, where 100 contestants were recently judged on the style, difficulty, creativity, and fluidity of their pen tricks.
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Hayyyyyy. How'd Pedobear get into the mascot lineup for the 2010 Vancouver Olympics in this highly esteemed Polish newspaper (hi-res scan JPEG)? Who cares! Buzzfeed article, and more here about the pedoshop disaster. Anything's possible on the internet, maybe the whole thing's a hoax, but it looks like this /b/eautiful art really did get published in Poland. Update: More online news coverage indicates this really happened. LOL. And BB moderator Antinous points out that a sports blog in Spain did the same thing, even straightfacedly crediting the guy who altered the image as the artist behind the official mascot drawings. (via @veronica, @jpdef) Previously:Vancouver 2010 Olympic mascots include a Sasquatch...
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Mark usually has Boing Boing's ukelele beat covered, and Lisa's our go-to Japan expert. But neither of those guys are blogging today, so here goes. U900, "Diamond Head" Japanese Ukulele Duo! Features a crocheted bear and a bunny on a beach, and is the very definition of kawaii. They has a myspace, too. (thanks, Susannah Breslin!) Update: Mark previously blogged an earlier video from these cuties, "Walk, Don't Run."...
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[Photo: Andy Davis for Mahala.] If you missed this week's nuclear memesplosion of white trash Afrikaans zef-rap Next Level Shit with petite jailbait, Haring-esque wall art, and a Progeria survivor spiritual genius, here is the first BB post, and here is the second. Die Antwoord is the latest of many projects founded by Watkin Tudor Jones (aka "Waddy," aka "Ninja") and his classically-trained partner Yolandi Visser (aka "Yo-landi Vi$$er"). Today, Phillip de Wet of the South African newspaper The Daily Maverick emailed me, Embarrassingly enough, you turned me onto these guys. As you did with plenty of other people. Does that make their next phase partially your creation? Anyway, that's why I thought I should point you to this piece...
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Gingasquid makes lovely and weird textiles with fairtrade beads, stones, and all manner of stuff. This is her latest, an arm warmer with sewn-on jewelry. Ginga Squid: ....and more Arm Warmers with Sewn-On Beaded Jewelry (Thanks, Vicky!)...
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Two models of a 12-story building are tested on a shake table. The one on the right is supported by a base isolation system, which effectively puts a shock-absorbing barrier between the building's foundation and potentially shaky ground. In fact, during the tests, which took place in 2007, this particular base isolation system, called Earthquake Protector, turned out to be many times more effective than any other system then known. There are three trials on the video. Watch it through to the end for the final fall. Learn more at the Network for Earthquake Engineering Thumbnail is a USGS photo taken in San Francisco after the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake. This is the kind of damage that could cause a...
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Jamie sez, "Denver artist Jonathan Alberico has created two fully functional steam punk guns. Black Betty, a dual barrel pistol uses flash paper to shoot fire balls. Doris is a beastly air cannon that fires bouncey ball at high enough speeds to rip through boxes and even bounce back and catch the videographer in the hip! Both pieces have corresponding youtube clips of them in action." functional Steampunk rifle functional Steampunk gun 1 (Thanks, Jamie!) Previously:Steampunk Nerf guns - Boing Boing Steampunk Magazine #2 - Boing Boing Mass-produced gun as olde worlde heirloom - Boing Boing Steampunk Star Wars modded action figures -- woah! - Boing Boing Steampunk Justice League costumes - Boing Boing Steampunk PC from Datamancer: The Archbishop...
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It's time once again for the annual Locus Poll and Survey , where you, the readers of science fiction, get to vote for the best books and stories of the year....
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Here's a fascinating profile on radical Santa Fe Institute economist Samuel Bowles, an empiricist who says his research doesn't support the Chicago School efficient marketplace hypothesis. Instead, Bowles argues that the wealth inequality created by strict market economics creates inefficiencies because society has to devote so much effort to stopping the poor from expropriating the rich. He calls this "guard labor" and says that one in four Americans is employed to in the sector -- labor that could otherwise be used to increase the nation's wealth and progress. The greater the inequalities in a society, the more guard labor it requires, Bowles finds. This holds true among US states, with relatively unequal states like New Mexico employing a greater share...
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An Indian U of Maryland physics prof came up with these zero rupee notes that Indians can slip to officials who demand bribes. They've been wildly successful, with a total run over over 1,000,000 notes, and the reports from the field suggest that they shock grafters into honesty. Fifth Pillar is the NGO that produces the notes, and they're available for download in Hindi, Tamil, Telugu, Kannada and Malayalam. One such story was our earlier case about the old lady and her troubles with the Revenue Department official over a land title. Fed up with requests for bribes and equipped with a zero rupee note, the old lady handed the note to the official. He was stunned. Remarkably, the official...
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Zooko sez, Tahoe-LAFS is a p2p filesystem. You pool your spare hard drive space together with that of your friends. This forms a distributed filesystem which endures even if some of your friends' computers are unreachable. Everything is automatically encrypted, so backing up your files onto the distributed filesystem doesn't necessarily mean sharing the files with your friends. But, it is easy to share specific files or directories with specific friends. It comes with a command-line interface and a web interface. If you choose, you can allow remote HTTP clients to connect to the web interface. We've configured our test grid to do that so that you can take Tahoe-LAFS for a test drive just by clicking here. Please try...
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