The teenager who allegedly received texts from Anthony Weiner wrote an open letter to FBI director James Comey to let him know that his sloppy, sleazy actions violated her privacy. "I now add you to the list of people who have victimized me," she writes. From Buzzfeed:Mr. James ComeyFBI DirectorNovember 2, 2016I am the 15-year-old (now 16) who was the victim of Anthony Weiner. I now add you to the list of people who have victimized me. I told my story originally to protect other young girls that might be a victim of online predators.Your letter to Congress has now brought this whole matter back into the media spotlight. Not even 10 minutes after being forensically interviewed with the FBI for seven hours, I received a phone call from a REPORTER asking for a statement. Why didn’t you communicate with the local FBI agents that I had just spoken to? They could have scheduled our interview sooner or scheduled a time to interview me later, or change locations of the interview. My neighborhood has been canvassed by reporters asking for details about me.In your letter, you chose to use a vague approach, meaning the media had to keep searching to try and find out what evidence you had uncovered and how. Every media outlet from local to national has contacted me and my family to get my “story.” Why couldn’t your letter have waited until after the election, so I would not have to be the center of attention the last week of the election cycle?In his “cooperation” with you and with his love of the spotlight, Anthony Weiner has given information that led to the media finding me. You have assisted him in further victimizing me on every news outlet. I can only assume that you saw an opportunity for political propaganda.I thought your job as FBI Director was to protect me. I thought if I cooperated with your investigation, my identity as a minor would be kept secret. That is no longer the case. My family and I are barraged by reporters’ phone calls and emails. I have been even been blamed in a newspaper for causing Donald Trump to now be leading in some polls and costing Hillary the election.Anthony Weiner is the abuser. Your letter helped that abuse to continue. How can I rebuild my life when you have made finding out my “story” the goal of every reporter? When I meet with my therapist next time, she will already know what we are going to talk about before I get there by reading Friday, October 28th, 2016’s New York Times article.I may have been Weiner’s victim, but the real story here is that I am a survivor. I am strong, intelligent, and certain that I will come out from under this nightmare, but it will not be as a result of your doing your job to protect me. I hope that by making my letter to you public, you will think about how your actions affect the victims of the crimes you are investigating. The election is important, yes, but what happened to me and how it makes me feel and how others see me, is much more important. It’s time that the FBI Director puts his victims’ rights above political views.— Girl that lost her faith in AmericaP.S. To all reporters: AP, FOX, CBS, NBC, and all other media outlets, please respect my position and stop interrupting my life!

On Friday, the Ohio State Marching Band performed this fantastic halftime show right at the intersection of two powerful geek subcultures: comic fans and band geeks.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBH5ChbMpWEDaveed Diggs is the fastest rapper on Broadway thanks to his stunning performances in the roles of Thomas Jefferson and the Marquis de Lafayette in Hamilton. (more…)

The 44mm Klok watch started life as a crowdfunding campaign and has now graduated to full-fledged article of commerce, priced between €400-430. (more…)

Bellerby & Co is one of the last companies that handmakes globes. It's a team of 15 people including woodworkers, painters, and a digital cartographer. (Great Big Story)

Drunken Bear took a recording of 14 crying babies and slowed it down, turning it into a soundtrack for a horror movie.Image: Brandon Baunach

Trump's press team no longer lets him control his own Twitter account, according to campaign insiders who spoke to the New York Times; now he must dictate proposed tweets to grownups who decide whether to publish them. (more…)

81-year-old Peg Holcomb of Amherst, Mass wasn't home when a low-flying Massachusetts National Guard helicopter and seven ground-based law-enforcement vehicles raided her home, and demanded that her son allow them to seize a single marijuana plant she'd been cultivating in her back yard. (more…)

While noise-canceling over-ear headphones usually cost in the $200-300 range, A-Audio's well-reviewed release is now available on sale for just $79.99. But are they legit? In terms of sound, these headphones really do deliver. They're built with powerful circuitry and 40 mm drivers that provide impressive audio. With their patented 3-Stage technology, these headphones also allow you to switch between passive audio, bass enhanced, and active noise cancellation modes—meaning you get to pick the listening experience that suits you best in any given situation. The ear cups are actually made with memory foam, which may sound excessive, but is actually incredibly comfortable. You can wear them comfortably for hours at a time. It also helps to isolate the sound and block outside noises. The noise canceling functionality all-in-all is very effective. The design is fairly durable, too—thanks to chrome plating, steel construction, and zinc hinges. The Sound Guys gave the A-Audio Legacy Headphones an 8.5 out of 10, and CES named them a 2015 Honoree at their exclusive Innovation Awards.For a limited time, the A-Audio Legacy Headphones can be yours for 73% off retail, just $79.99. You won't find a better pair at that price. Also explore the Best-Sellers on our network right now:Cord-CuttingGhost Indoor HDTV Antenna (57% off)SpeakersBraven 705 Bluetooth Speaker (50% off)PythonPython Programming Bootcamp ($39) CodingLearn to Code 2016 Bundle (Pay What You Want)AIDeep Learning & Artificial Intelligence Bundle ($39)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KvtT3UyhibQKulning, or herding calls, is a form of singing traditionally used to summon livestock. Depicted here by Jonna Jinton, it has peculiar acoustic properties dependent on the uniquely reverberant landscape of Scandinavia. And cow magic, obv. [via]I made this for you, dear readers. YouTube Doubler

The FBI has cleared Hillary Clinton over the "new" emails found on disgraced Democratic politician Anthony Weiner's seized computer. The emails, which the FBI thought may be relevant to an earlier investigation of Clinton's inappropriate use of a private email server while in office, turned out to be mostly duplicates of those already covered by the investigation.FBI Director James Comey told lawmakers Sunday the agency hasn't changed its opinion that Hillary Clinton should not face criminal charges after a review of new emails."Based on our review, we have not changed our conclusions that we expressed in July," Comey wrote in the new letter to congressional committee chairmen.Comey dropped a bombshell on the presidential race last month when he sent a letter to Congress saying the FBI had discovered emails in a separate investigation that could be connected to the now-closed probe of whether Clinton mishandled classified information. The move infuriated Democrats and emboldened Republican nominee Donald Trump.The announcement brings to an end a week of political chaos triggered by Comey's vague letter insinuating—at least to Republicans and the media—that Clinton once again risked legal sanction over the personal email account. Comey, in an oddly Comey-centered press event earlier this summer, then described the private email server as inappropriate but not something worthy of indictment. In the days that followed Comey's letter to congress, sent barely two weeks before election day, even Clinton's foes found themselves discomfited by the FBI's exquisitely-timed involvement in domestic politics. Trump, though, exalted as polls tightened: though Clinton still leads, the possibility of a landslide (or indeed a Democrat Senate) is now deemed less likely by poll trackers.

The final major ad buy of millionaire Donald Trump's presidential campaign? A sinister affair featuring financial elites, piles of money, (((global special interests))), international entities, oh and lets make sure there are plenty of actual Jews in there in case people don't get the message.As he talks about the “levers of power in Washington” and the “global special interests,” images of billionaire George Soros, a Jewish hedge fund tycoon, philanthropist, and a major backer of liberal causes, and Janet Yellen, the Jewish chairman of the Federal Reserve, appear on the video.In addition, an image of the Jewish CEO of Goldman Sachs, Lloyd Blankfein, also appears when Trump talks about the “global power structure that is responsible for the economic decisions that have robbed our working class, stripped our country of its wealth and put that money into the pockets of a handful of large corporations and political entities.” The speech from which the two-minute ad was excerpted, and which Trump is shown delivering as the ad winds to a close, was given at a rally last month in West Palm Beach, Florida. That speech had already been condemned for what critics described as drawing on anti-Semitic conspiracy theories about the global control of Jewish bankers and its echoes of the 19th century anti-Semitic tract “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion.”Also, black rappers.

You can make a plan for voting in tomorrow’s election right here.

Consumer site Extreamist confirms what many suspected: Netflix has sharply reduced its streaming library titles by over 50% from an estimated 11,000 in 2012 to about 5,300 today. (more…)

The new Netflix series The Crown dropped this weekend and while it’s great (I’m reviewing it for The A.V. Club), there's one notable weak spot: Of the four directors who helmed the show's 10-episode first season, not one was a woman. Oscar-nominated director/activist Lexi Alexander (Green Street, Punisher: War Zone) took to Twitter to point out the inequality:https://twitter.com/Lexialex/status/794776122521108480https://twitter.com/Lexialex/status/794778788756193280https://twitter.com/Lexialex/status/794781540924276736Ironically, the show was central to a "girl power" Emmy campaign that Netflix released earlier this year. So it only makes sense to question why that girl power message doesn't extend behind the scenes too. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tw2-K8w8l7I

Crank it to 4K and go full-screen to feel as if you're floating through the International Space Station. It's cool to think about how quaint this technology will look someday, like a wooden sailing ship, but for now, it's still mind-blowingly cool. (more…)

The only way to stop the Donald from making a few hundred last minute, rage filled tweets was to take away his account. Presumably, after the election he'll be in charge again-- one way or another.Via the Verge:The result, the Times notes, has been “robbing Hillary Clinton of her most potent weapon: Mr. Trump’s self-sabotaging eruptions, which have repeatedly undermined his candidacy.” The profile shows a candidate who is unaccustomed to giving up control, and who frequently ignores the advice of his advisors. With that in mind, Trump relinquishing control of this account is nothing short of remarkable.Multiple people handle the account, but it seems that the tweets coming directly from Trump himself can be identified as coming from his Samsung Galaxy smartphone, which are tagged as originating from Twitter for Android. In February, Trump advocated for a boycott of Apple products following the company’s refusal to create a backdoor into the phone.The last tweet on Trump’s account sent from an Android phone was on Saturday morning:Since then, Trump’s tweets have been sent from an iPhone, which is in line with previous tweets sent out by his aides. The account has since been inviting supporters to come to rallies and sharing articles supportive of the candidate. The shift presents a new, managed tone for the account.

Need I say more? (via Punk Fashion)

Enjoyment:Second to the traditional Rider-Waite deck, my new favorite set of tarot cards is the Tao Oracle. It is the I-Ching, without the coin throwing, in beautifully-illustrated oversized cards. The guide book itself is a sacred text. I often just read random pages for quick, calming wisdom. — Claudia LamarDestinations:Whenever I travel I google my destination at the Atlas Obscura website. It will yield dozens of very obscure, very offbeat attractions in the area. How else can you find a nearby museum of parasites, or trail of doll heads, or a restaurant of robots, underground tunnels, or a store for time travel? — Kevin KellyReadables:When you go to Recommend Me a Book you are presented with the first page of a novel, but you are not told the name of the book or the author. If you don’t like what you’ve read, click “Next Book.” If you do like it, click “Reveal Title & Author,” and buy it from Amazon. I wish it let you buy a book without finding out who wrote it, so it was a surprise when it arrived in the mail. — Mark FrauenfelderConsumable:Box wine is under-appreciated. I can get decent red wine in a collapsible bag/box so that I can drink just one glass daily (for medicinal purposes!) and have the full 3 liters never expire. Trader Joe's has a good Cabernet Sauvignon in a box. — KKTravel:I used the Red Bike service when I was in Cincinnati last month. A 24-hour pass costs a measly $8. You just grab a bike at any of the dozens of stations (an app shows you how many bikes are available on a map) and start pedaling. The bikes have baskets and locks. It’s a lot more fun than Uber! — MFWatchable:The Mask You Live In is a heartbreaking glimpse into how the media and ideals of masculinity are affecting young boys in America. The most poignant part of the documentary for me were the interviews with San Quentin’s Juvenile Lifers. They shared their experiences, and regret, about how being unable to articulate and share emotions as a child contributed to their rage and subsequent crimes. Available for streaming on Netflix. — CLGet the Recomendo weekly newsletter a week early by email.

While I wouldn't normally find a USB hub very interesting, this 28-port hub caught my eye. The MondoHub Master USB Hub is seriously the biggest USB hub I've seen, period. Plug it into your PC or Mac to go from two to 28 USB ports. Four of those ports feature SuperSpeed USB 3.0 for ridiculously fast data transfer or charging, so you won’t have to worry about waiting forever for your devices to power up.If you’re not using some of the ports, you can actually turn them off individually to save power. And most notably, MondoHub won’t ever fry your gadgets or computers because it comes with automatic overcurrent protection. The MondoHub is currently on sale in the Boing Boing Store at its lowest price. It can be yours for 30% off retail, just $55.99.Also explore the Best-Sellers on our network right now:Music + EntertainmentBrain.fm: 3-Year Subscription ($29)Cord-CuttingGhost Indoor HDTV Antenna (57% off)PythonPython Programming Bootcamp ($39) Self-ImprovementBamboo Bed Sheets: 6-Piece Set White (84% off)CodingLearn to Code 2016 Bundle (Pay What You Want)

https://vimeo.com/126708041Filmmaker Brian Gersten writes, "'The Hollerin' Contest at Spivey's Corner' is a documentary short about the history, characters, and sounds of the National Hollerin' Contest. Hollerin' itself is considered by some to be the earliest form of communication between humans, and the competition has been held annually in the small town of Spivey's Corner, NC since 1969. The film follows the stories of three former champions as they attempt to reclaim their titles, and keep the oft-forgotten tradition of hollerin' alive." (more…)

Speaking at the Stand Up For Heroes event, Jon Stewart tells the story of how Donald Trump went on an anti-Semitic tear, repeating over and over that Stewart's birth surname was Leibowitz, implying that he'd changed it to disguise his Jewish ancestry. (more…)

A reader writes, "According to last week's Shadow Brokers leak, the NSA compromised a DNS server of the Hague-based Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons in September 2000, two years after the Iraq Liberation Act and Operation Desert Fox, but before the Bush election." (more…)

French electronic music pioneer Jean-Jacques Perrey died Friday at 87. He quit medical school after encountering synthesizers to spend his life making beautiful sounds with them. Frequent collaborator Dana Countryman writes:For those who don’t realize it, Jean-Jacques first started recording electronic music in 1952, long beforethe Moog synthesizer was first made for sale in 1967. Relocating from Paris to New York City, JJ actuallyowned and recorded with the second Moog ever produced, and with his musical partner GershonKingsley, they released their first Moog album -- almost two years before Wendy Carlos released herfirst Moog album. Jean-Jacques was truly the pioneer of popular electronic music.His crazy, happy music has been heard everywhere from commercials, to Sesame Street - in hip-hopsongs, in dance remixes and most famously, for decades in the delightful featured music in Disneyland’s“Main Street Electrical Parade”. In recent years, his music has even made appearances on The Simpsons,and on Comedy Central’s “South Park”.As a teenager growing up in the ‘70s, I was charmed by Jean-Jacques’ inventive Moog albums releasedby Vanguard Records, and many times I secretly would smuggle those albums into my high schoolFrench class. There, instead of conjugating French verbs and nouns, (when the teacher wasn’t looking)I would carefully sneak peeks at the back cover liner notes. I’d spend the class time dreaming impossibledreams of someday owning a Moog synthesizer of my own, and having a chance to twirl its manyknobs, to unleash its wild cornucopia of never-heard-before sounds.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dXTGN_St-hoPohoto by bthrewww - Flickr: Jean-Jacques Perrey & Dana Countryman - original - 228923657, CC BY-SA 2.0, Link

The Gulf of Ob is a remote Siberian reach of the Russian empire, and its beaches are covered in gigantic snowballs up to a meter across. The BBC reports that they're the result of a "rare environmental process where small pieces of ice form, are rolled by wind and water, and end up as giant snowballs." (Photo: SERGEI BYCHENKOV)

Len Testa writes, "Back in the early 1960's, Walt was interested in buying and developing the Mineral King ski area in California, which was being put up for sale by the U.S. government. Another potential bidder on the project was industrialist Robert Brandt, husband of Hollywood actress Janet Leigh." (more…)

I have spent a lot of time running a bar of wax over my Belstaff jacket. No longer, now I use spray on Nikwax. Every now and then my waxed cotton jacket needs a touch up. Nikwax is about 1000x easier to use than a solid or cream wax. You liberally spray this on, rub it in and let it dry. I find it has a pleasant, not noxious scent. There are two colors: green and neutral. Make sure you check the label, although green will work fine on black. It is a very light tint and won't show through, at least on my ancient jacket.California's recent rains show this stuff not only goes on easy, but works well. Nikwax Wax Cotton Proof via Amazon

Rebecca Solnit (previously), one of my favorite writers, has published an open letter to Donald Trump, "New York City Is a Book Conservatives Should Read," which celebrates the city's teeming, messy, multicultural vigor -- something she delves into deeply with Nonstop Metropolis: A New York City Atlas, a book about the "innumerable unbound experiences of New York City [with] twenty-six imaginative maps and informative essays" (just ordered mine). (more…)

Throughout the election cycle, The GOP Arcade has been releasing satirical 8-bit games about the GOP and right-wing politics in America; the New York Times commissioned a special one, based on the classic Oregon Trail, in which you play one of three voters attempting to cast a vote in either Texas (where you are a Latina nurse); Wisconsin (where you are a black salesman) or California (where you are a white programmer). (more…)

Daniel Dale is the Washington Bureau Chief for the Toronto Star; for the duration of the campaign, he's been compiling daily lists of Trump's lies: now, with the election days away, the Star has put these together in one gigantic list, with citations refuting each of Trump's whoppers. (more…)

I have the earlier model of the Kmashi 20,000mAh portable USB charger. It's the one I take with me on trips lasting more than a couple of days. It can keep my iPhone fully charged for days without having to plug into an AC outlet. It's $33 but if you use code GEBLIOJ7 on Amazon you can get it for $20.

I had a chance to play with a Cubetto recently. It's a little, wooden, happy face robot on two wheels. You can control which way it goes by inserting colorful plastic chips on programming board (which also has a wood top). There are four kinds of chips: turn clockwise, turn counterclockwise, move forward, and call subroutine. You unfold a mat with a grid of colorful squares and illustrations and set the robot on top of it. An included booklet presents challenges to move the robot from one square on the grid to another.My wife, 13-year-daughter, and I are not the intended users of Cubetto, but we spent a very fun hour going through the challenges in the booklet and then coming up with our own challenges. My guess is that a kindergartner or pre=schooler would love this and learn a lot from it.The overall product design is gorgeous, too. I wish the manufacturer, Primo, made consumer technology for grown-ups.Cubetto costs $225 and can be purchased directly from the manufacturer.https://youtu.be/m8_cgYjWrRMhttps://youtu.be/iVd4abtmT38

Former Central Intelligence Agency and National Security Agency chief Michael Hayden, now a private security consultant and George Mason University professor, writes in the Washington Post that a Trump presidency would be tantamount to handing America over to Russian power interests. (more…)

My hypertalented friend Lawrence Azerrad, who is designing the Voyager Golden Record: 40th Anniversary Edition and has created packaging for Wilco, Esperanza Spalding, Silversun Pickups, and many other artists (images below), is leading a new effort to explore and cultivate the historical link between design and music. It a fantastic new initiative within the AIGA, the professional associate for design, that will begin with a rich Web site, workshops, and educational programs. Beautiful album artwork and package design isn't the past of the music-listening experience. Rather it's essential to its future. From AIGA:Azerrad says designers need to help engender transitional thinking: design can help the music industry, and the music industry can help designers. But for him, the crux of the matter seems to be in helping people engage with music in a way that can—without exaggeration—change lives. Something tactile may have been lost, but music today still moves us and frames the world and our cultural experiences. “The way we’re engaging with music now is very passive,” he says. “Streaming allows you to listen to any song any time, but we may be listening to it more as background music. The deeper, more life-marking changes happen in a more narrow spectrum. You still have hardcore fans, your Taylor Swift freaks or whatever, but music is now what you listen to while you’re driving or working out.“Music has always been a key way to mark critical moments, like when you fall in love or lose a loved one. It has the ability to raise the spirit and the soul, that’s why music is a key part of religion and storytelling or ethnic heritage, wherever you’re from. It’s a critical part of defining the human experience, but it’s important we address this now because we’re seeing this atrophy of this part of our culture visually and culturally. If you think about the impact of Bowie and Aladdin Sane, it shaped ideas around queer identity: it mattered to people’s lives. When music is a more passive background experience, people are missing out. There’s less impact and a loss of that emotional resonance.”"The Design + Music Industries are BFFs—They Just Don’t Know it Yet" (AIGA)

John Podesta practices Aleister Crowley-inspired blood sex semen magic, reports Drudge Report, citing Infowars, which cites Wikileaks. They just went Full Drudge. You never go full Drudge. (more…)

Prosecutors in Germany have launched a formal investigation of Mark Zuckerberg and other executives at Facebook, the Munich prosecutor's office said Friday, over a complaint that Facebook broke German laws against hate speech and sedition by failing to remove racist hate-posts on the social media service. (more…)

As the Samsung Galaxy Note 7 exploding phone fiasco continues, Samsung Electronics announced yet another product recall on Friday. The South Korean technology firm will recall roughly 2.8 million top-loading washing machines sold in the U.S. after multiple reports of injuries caused by defective design. (more…)

“Love at first sight,” shared on IMGUR by hellssatans.

As soon as Pesco posted this, I knew I had to have the minifigs, especially the Blue Meanie. The LEGO Yellow submarine is now shipping!LEGO Ideas Yellow Submarine 21306 Building Kit via Amazon

Yakutsk (pop. 269,601), the capital city of the Sakha Republic in Russia, is the coldest city on earth, where temperatures can drop to -50 degrees Celsius (-58 degrees Fahrenheit). Lonely Planet has a galley of photos by Amos Chapple. (Photo here is by Maarten Takens from Flickr)

Samsung has recalled 2.8 million washing machines after users reported "impact injuries" including a broken jaw. (more…)

Want to label things like Mom and Dad did?I needed a label gun, but I hate the printer-in-your-hands models. What I needed was an old-style click-wheel embossing label maker!KA-Click! KA-Click!I remember spending hours as kid making labels with my dad's click wheel embosser! A hard plastic tape runs through a mini-printing press, and you simply squeeze to emboss letters on to it. This click wheel is simple to mash, I remember my parents one as taking Herculean effort. The tape comes in all sorts of great colors too! DYMO Organizer Xpress Handheld Embossing Label Maker via Amazon

Grant Thompson took a moment from his trip to Hawaii to show how to bust open a coconut without expending more energy than the coconut will provide. There are two parts: getting through the outer husk, and cracking the nut itself. (more…)

...and it drops on Dec 2, with a $14.49 pre-order option: featuring tracks that didn't make the stage play, as well as Busta Rhymes' remix of "My Shot" and other guest appearances from Queen Latifah, Ben Folds, Kelly Clarkson, Jimmy Fallon, Ashanti, Wiz Khalifa, Chance the Rapper, Usher... I ordered this so hard it broke my mouse. (via Kottke)

The star of the upcoming Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them breaks down the intricacies of Potter lore.

Be sure to watch with the sound on.

With Putin and Russia in the news more and more thanks to Trump and Steven Seagal, maybe it's high time to learn how to pronounce Russian text. Thanks to the instructor's lovely accent in this ten-minute tutorial, you'll be pronouncing (if not understanding) in short order. (more…)

Hiromi Tango creates sculptures of colorful textiles, neon, and mirrors, then interacts with the pieces as performance art, like this exploration of the amygdala, part of her Dynamic Emotions series. (more…)

Accoording to Hutson & Harris, Attorneys in Texas, if you make 1.5 pounds of brownies with a bit of pot in them, the law considers it to be as much of a crime as having 1.5 pounds of heroin. You could go to jail for life.Marijuana edibles are extremely (legally) dangerous in Texas. We did a separate video that explains the problem with more math, but people seem to like songs better, so here's this. There's some humor, but we believe it's a serious message that needs to be shared.

Tony Ortega at The Underground Bunker posted a fascinating overview of Gold Base, aka Int Base, the Scientology compound near Hemet, California. It includes beautifully piloted and filmed drone footage from an anonymous contributor. The 4K is so detailed you can watch adherents playing soccer. (more…)