Michigan is one of the last states to keep an "anti-sodomy" law on the books, which criminalizes oral and anal sex -- most states dropped theirs when the Supreme Court ruled that law like these are unconstitutional. (more…)

See sample pages from this book at Wink.Martin Vargic, the 17-year-old cartographic wunderkind from Slovakia responsible for the "Map of Stereotypes" that went viral last year, has done some seriously fine work in this collection of highly-detailed, thoroughly researched and beautiful maps. While some are factual maps based on data and infographic in nature, many are the product of Vargic's imagination, research, and incredible information organization skills. He uses classic cartographic techniques to map out abstract landscapes like music, gaming and the internet. As Vargic says in the introduction of the book, drawing something out as a map gives you a unique opportunity to present many different metrics of visual information all at once. Charting maps of these systems, landscapes, and fields of culture provides so many dimensions for the reader to dig into and analyze: the size, color, geographic traits, and bordering territories of each region offer a new way to think about all of the pieces in relation to one another. Every page is filled with hundreds of opportunities to pick up some trivia (e.g. "Subway has forty-three thousand locations worldwide"), inspire a quick Google (e.g. "Wait, 'baroque pop' is a thing?"), or jog a memory (e.g. "Aww, I miss Encyclopedia Britannica!"). Flipping the book open to a random page can almost be a little disorienting, because there's just so much to look at. This is the perfect book to look through with a friend or two, pouring over the maps together to discuss, debate and learn. (If you've got a friend who likes to play professor, this is an awesome way to spend time together.) The imagined maps are playful, dense and sometimes, a little cheeky; the factual, infographic maps are clustered together in threes to present different data stories. If you're into coffee table books, this one would certainly be a worthy addition to your collection. The pages are a good, heavy paper with a muted color scheme and gorgeous, ornate illustrations. Some of the larger maps, like "Map of Music" and "Map of Sports" are blown up and fold out. A full-size wall map of "Map of Stereotypes" is included in a pouch in the back. You might consider digging up a magnifying glass to be able to fully appreciate the fine print.TL;DR: Internet nerds, data geeks, and pop culture aficionados alike will have nothing but love for Vargic's Miscellany of Curious Maps. – Michelle KaatzVargic's Miscellany of Curious Maps: Mapping the Modern WorldVargic's Miscellany of Curious Maps: Mapping the Modern Worldby Martin VargicThe Experiment2015, 128 pages, 10.2 x 12.2 x 0.8 inches $24 Buy a copy on Amazon

https://youtu.be/riG85oA6Wy4It's hard to believe that fifty years ago, The Monkees' television series premiered. The band is often denigrated as phony, but I don't care. They had some of the best songwriters and studio musicians in the business, and if you listen to the final product with an unprejudiced ear, it's good stuff. Lead singer Davy Jones died in 2012, but that is not stopping Micky Dolenz and Peter Tork from hitting the road and cutting a new LP (Michael Nesmith is most likely sitting out on the tour) this year. The album is called Good Times, and will be released June 10, 2016.Radio.com:Surviving members Micky Dolenz, Michael Nesmith and Peter Tork perform on the entire album, which brings together songs originally penned for the group in the 1960s along with newer work by Cuomo, Gibbard, XTC’s Andy Partridge and more. One song written by Neil Diamond, “Love to Love,” features Davy Jones with a vintage vocal.

In 1969 the Lockheed Aircraft Corporation took a break from making planes to drop bombs on Vietnamese villages and turned their attention to making films about dropping acid. The results of both their efforts were awful. And of course they were richly rewarded at the taxpayer's expenses.From Night Flight:Lockheed ended up borrowing $400 million from a consortium of banks in 1969, even they would still end up declaring multimillion dollar losses for the company for ’69 and 1970. It wasn’t enough money, however, and so the failing aerospace giant once again turned to our federal government, who then granted them a $250 million dollar loan guarantee, which Nixon’s administration actually proposed and Congress narrowly ended up passing in August 1971, passing that sizable debt on to the U.S. taxpayer by showing that Lockheed — just like the banks — was simply too big to fail.Lockheed would survive and grow in the 1970s, of course, ultimately buying another defense contractor, Martin Marietta, and becoming the mega-huge Lockheed Martin, the world’s biggest defense contractor, which was later described by Jonathan Vankin in The Big Book of Scandal as “a company that sold billions of dollars in weapons every year, while covertly functioning as one of the world’s largest organized crime syndicates.”

https://youtu.be/CbdGVRywBV0According to WorldNews247 the fellow in this video pushed the elevator button, and when it didn't open, he gave the door a flying kick, which dislodged it. He walked through the opening and fell down the shaft. He survived.

Robert Ito wrote a wonderful profile of cartoonist Daniel Clowes in California Sunday Magazine. It includes some nice illustrations of Clowes by other cartoonists.In the third issue of Eightball, Clowes published “The Return of Young Dan Pussey,” a scathing takedown of the comics industry. In the strip’s satirical alternate reality, Marvel Comics founder Stan Lee is a glad-handing cheapskate with an eye for prostitutes, while Fantagraphics co-founder Gary Groth is a bully who consults a thesaurus mid-rant to come up with fresh ways to insult his artists. Art Spiegelman is a creepy, chain-smoking taskmaster who forces his stable of unpaid artists to create work for his comics magazine in a miserable hovel with burlap sacks for beds. “I just felt it was nasty, snotty, gratuitous,” recalls Spiegelman. Françoise Mouly, his Raw co-creator, says, “I became aware of [Clowes] as a wise­ass a long time ago.” Clowes has a different explanation. “Jealousy isn’t the right word, but I just had a longing to be a part of that world and had that feeling that I wasn’t,” he says. “It was sort of an expression of rage and self-pity and trying to make myself feel better about that.”Clowes' full-length graphic novel, Patience, will by published March 1, 2016 by Fantagraphics.

https://vimeo.com/111576518In 1996, in the midst of the Clinton administration's attack on the Internet and cryptography, Grateful Dead lyricist and EFF co-founder John Perry Barlow sat down in Davos, Switzerland, where he'd been addressing world leaders on the subject of the Internet and human rights, and wrote one of net-culture's formative documents: The Declaration of Independence of Cyberspace. (more…)

We should all have a Walken closet, obviously, even if the verdict's still out on a Kia.Runner up: Helen Mirren's Bud-branded drink-driving PSA.https://youtu.be/Rb2VXVmUga4

Football is about one thing and one thing only: dance. As far as I can tell American rules football is where men in elaborate costumes, featuring tight pants, seek to stop other men from dancing.Colloquially known as a touchdown celebration, the body of rules and regulations managed by the credible governing body, the National Football League, seems to focus on allowable practices to bar the opposing team from dancing. After they've determined what you can do to stop a dancer, and what things are permissible to get the dancer on to the dance floor, known as an "end zone," the NFL then heavily regulates what type of dancing is appropriate. We have seen Footloose, sad things happen when you try to stop people from dancing. In the NFL this frustration frequently seems to present as abuse and other ugly, unacceptable social behaviors.I do like the commercials.

A very rich guy, who owns an NFL team, Robert McNair, feels the team name Redskins isn't offensive. McNair confirmed his deep understanding of complex native's rights issues by stating that while members of the Cherokee tribe can't hold their whiskey, Cherokee courage merits respect. From ICMNT:McNair told me that he grew up in western North Carolina, around many Cherokee Indians. ‘‘Everybody respected their courage,’’ McNair told me of the Indians. ‘‘They might not have respected the way they held their whiskey, but. . . .’’ He laughed. ‘‘We respected their courage. They’re very brave people.’’ Put McNair down as not offended by ‘‘Redskins.’’McNair, who is #194 of the Forbes 400 with a RealTime worth of $3.3 billion, gave $10,000 last year to help repeal a ballot initiative in Houston that protected gays and lesbians from forms of discrimination.Consider the matter settled?https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mR-tbOxlhvE

We take all kinds of pills that give us all kind of thrills, but the thrill we've never known,Is the thrill that'll getcha when you get your picture on the cover of the Rollin' Stone!

New York will investigate high levels of radioactive contamination found in groundwater at Indian Point Energy Center, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said Saturday. "Radioactive tritium-contaminated water" leaked into groundwater at the nuclear facility, and caused “alarming levels” of radioactivity to be found at three of the 40 monitoring wells at the nuclear facility. (more…)

Cute, and useful, this skull shaped tea spoon is perfect for removing and straining tea bags. For $3.50 this novelty spoon is worth having. SUCK UK Sugar Skull Tea Spoon via Amazon

Due to inactivity IKEA lost its trademark to a small Indonesian manufacturer of rattan furniture. Will people be confused by their Wickerdjammar? Rattanfoljer? International Business Times reports:PT Ratania Khatulistiwa registered its Ikea trademark in December 2013, where Ikea is an acronym for Intan Khatulistiwa Esa Abadi, Indonesian words referring to the rattan industry, according to the AP. The company took Ikea to court when its store outside Jakarta was still under construction, and won. Ikea appealed against the lower court ruling last year, but the Supreme Court also ruled against it, the AP reported, adding that the ruling was made in May last year, but only became public knowledge after it was published on the court’s website Thursday.

Retired Marietta Police Officer Matt Hickey thought it'd be simple to retire and take his partner, Ajax home with him. Policy said retired dogs could be bought by their handlers for $1. The wrinkle in his plan? Hickey was retiring and Ajax still had some time left to as "valuable" on community books. With the help of Marietta's mayor, and $70,000 in crowd funded donations, Ajax is going home. (more…)

All over the world, couples have caught a memetic virus that causes them to festoon fences, trees, railings and other objects with padlocks that represent the love between them. (more…)

If you've ever locked yourself out of your home and googled for a locksmith, you've seen that it's virtually impossible to reach a real local locksmith. (more…)

Vietnamese gentleman Thái Ngọc claims that ever since he suffered a terrible fever in 1973, he hasn't slept a wink. There's also Ines Fernandez who says she's been awake for decades. Of course, these curious individuals and others with similar stories may actually be suffering from a very strange sleep disorder called sleep state misperception (SSM) in which the individuals think they were up all night but actually slept just fine. At Mysterious Universe, Martin J. Clemens looks at SSM and the very scary rare disease called Fatal Familial Insomnia (FFI), presented as total insomnia that can last the rest of the person's life, which is usually only 18 months or so after the onset of symptoms. From Mysterious Universe:FFI is a neurological condition caused by a misfolded protein in the DNA of the afflicted, of which there have been only about 100 cases. That protein, called a prion protein, is known as PrPSc (PrPC in non-FFI subjects). Essentially, the prion form of the protein causes a change in certain amino acids – due to the protein strand folding incorrectly – which, when combined with other genetic markers, then affects the brain’s sleep centers. FFI is genetic, and therefore hereditary, but there is an even rarer form known as Sporadic Fatal Insomnia (sFI) that occurs spontaneously, the cause of which is not understood. You may wish to know that PrPSc is the same protein that’s responsible for bovine spongiform encephalopathy, also known as Mad Cow Disease."The Woman Who Stayed Awake for 30 Years…Or Did She?"

The general impression of the View-Master Virtual Reality viewer is that it's an excellent Google Cardboard viewer for any Android phone or iPhone, but that the View-Master app "reels" aren't very good. My family and I love Google Cardboard - the experience of walking around Paris and Tokyo is amazing. For $18, it seems like a good deal. Has anyone tried it?

I live near San Francisco, where there seems to be a thing going on for Superb Owls. I like owls. Here are a few. Many were gifts, some I have collected. The one pictured above is by artist Gus Harper.This is a pitcher. My friends, who know about Superb Owls, tell me there are no such thing as pitchers in the San Francisco Superb Owl, but here is proof of a Superb Owl pitcher. My Mom gave me these Superb Owl salt and pepper grinders. Two for one. And an impossible bottle, from Jaimie D. Grant. I found the decanter and pitchers on eBay or in thrift shops. My parents gave me the adorable mug. I've got more owls, but I'm coming up short of 50. Add yours in the comments!

Unsure what to do about local Satanists who wanted to present the opening prayer generally reserved for adherents of Jesus at a City Council meeting in Phoenix, Arizona, the council has ended the tradition. (more…)

Manhattan's Metropolitan Correctional Center has a special wing, 10-South, in which terrorism suspects who have been kidnapped from foreign territories are imprisoned and tortured in secret, before being given secret trials and lengthy sentences. (more…)

Maurice White, founder of the incredible psychedelic R&B group Earth, Wind & Fire, has died at age 74.“Although we were basically jazz musicians, we played soul, funk, gospel, blues, jazz, rock and dance music … which somehow ended up becoming pop,” White wrote. “We were coming out of a decade of experimentation, mind expansion and cosmic awareness. I wanted our music to convey messages of universal love and harmony without force-feeding listeners’ spiritual content.”(New York Times)

My favorite avant-garde classical group Kronos Quartet are holding their Kronos Festival 2016 this weekend at the SF JAZZ Center! I attended the Kronos Festival 2015 and it was easily one of my favorite performances of last year. This year's program weaves experimental and contemporary classical music with a stunning array of international musical traditions from West Africa, Vietnam, Ukraine, Finland, and Afghanistan. Open your ears, eyes, and mind. While based in San Francisco, Kronos Quartet spends much of the year traveling and performing around the world. This festival brings some of that home to San Francisco. Virtuoso pipa player Wu Man will be the festival’s artist-in-residence. The festival showcases Kronos in collaboration with guest performers David Coulter (born in the UK), Fodé Lassana Diabaté (Mali), Ritva Koistinen(Finland), Mariana Sadovska (born in Ukraine), and Vân-Ánh Võ (born in Vietnam). The San Francisco Girls Chorus and musicians from Ruth Asawa San Francisco School of the Arts also join Kronos onstage to perform new works, and the festival culminates in a daytime family concert celebrating the Lunar New Year.Kronos Festival 2016: Explorer Series

Ban GMO Pokemon. The sick creation of Alex Osager, Pokemon Fusion will take two Pokemon of your choice, or at random, and create a horrifying mutant combination thereof.

Seems the charges are "reckless endangerment and aviation in and over the city."Via Philly.comA New Jersey man was arrested on Thursday after a drone he was flying crashed into the 40th floor of the Empire State Building in New York City, police said.The 29-year-old man was taken into custody after a small aircraft he was piloting struck the iconic building before coming to rest on the 35th floor on Thursday evening, the New York City Police Department said.The man asked building security personnel for his drone back after they retrieved it, but instead they called authorities, a police spokesman said.

The design perfectly transmutes the cheap minimalist beauty of the classic ZX Spectrum home computer into a unique handheld game console. But does the ZX Vega capture the experience of the early 80's machine?Indie Retro News reviews it and finds it well-worth your £99, so long as you know what you're getting: a weird British contraption from the early 80s, and only the game-related features of it at that.Hardcore Speccy fans may have been shouting to have room for expansion but, it's plain to see that this is not what it's about. If you look at this at what it's meant to be, a handheld Speccy to play games on, you can't got far wrong. I agree that you can't beat the original Speccy, the same goes for any original computer but as a pick-up-and-play, it fits perfectly.

Real engineers build things. Super cool engineers build things with their hands and fingers, like our engineering forefathers did. No idea where to even begin to do that? This step by step Arduino course is now 92% off and is going to get you up and running, from zero to hero, in no time. So don’t be intimidated. This open source electronics platform is user friendly once you know the basics and after these guided hours of training, you’ll pretty much be a master builder. With inputs from sensors, using Arduino you can control lights, motors and dozens of other accessories. The principles of programming micro-controllers can be easy to understand once you start working on your very own projects here, using interactive lessons to build electronic devices. Connecting your Arduino to the internet will allow you to report and control and you’ll be studying a wide variety of sensors and components. The instructor in an electrical engineer himself with a PhD and over thirteen years of experience in the field. His teaching style is hands-on so you’ll have a good feel for exactly what you’re building.There are twenty two hours of training in this course and even if you’ve never programmed before, you’ll get up to snuff. Already familiar with the platform? You’ll sharpen your skills to master level, now for 92% off. You will need an Arduino controller and a few other materials to get started, but once you’re ready to build, the world is your oyster. Check out the link below for more details.Save 92% on this Step-by-Step Arduino Training Guide in the Boing Boing Store.

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Laura Poitras is the Macarthur-winning, Oscar-winning documentarian who made Citizenfour. Her life has been dogged by government surveillance and harassment, and she has had to become a paranoid OPSEC ninja just to survive. (more…)

Bunnie has a years of experience partnering with manufacturers in Shenzhen, so he knows what he's talking about. This looks like a fantastic resource for hardware entrepreneurs.Bunnie Huang, the infamous hardware hacker known for reverse engineering the XBox and the Novena, is publishing “The Essential Guide to Electronics in Shenzhen.” He started a crowdfunding campaign on Crowd Supply yesterday and it soared past its goal of $10K (at $35/ copy) in less than 24 hours.This is a must-have guide for any hardware startup founder, maker, or IoT developer looking to China to manufacture. With Overcoming the language barrier is one of the keys to unlocking the market’s full potential, and this book’s point-to-translate format enables a fluidity of interaction with market vendors that no translation app or guide book can match. "Going to Shenzhen, China is a massive enabler for Makers, hackers, and entrepreneurs alike. The Essential Guide to Electronics in Shenzhen is the book I wish I had when I first stepped foot into China a decade ago.” - bunnie

I'm a hardcore traveler and Google Flights is my tool of choice for figuring out my weird, complex, ever-changing plans. (more…)

Securedrop is a robust, secure, anonymous system for whistleblowers to convey documents to news organizations, created by Aaron Swartz and taken up by the Freedom of the Press Foundation after his death. (more…)

How do Google and YouTube really work? It turns out, Python kind of runs things around those parts. And with this bootcamp, you’ll get whipped into shape and ready to start programming yourself. Whether you’re a Python pro and just want to sharpen your skills, or a total tech newbie with little or no coding experience, this pack of courses that’s now 96% off will walk you through the Python maze from the basics to expert level. Hope you’re not afraid of snakes.There are six courses here that together offer over fifty hours of instruction. There’s a network programming class that will teach you to build seven apps like a subnet calculator, even use a SSH or Telnet, or a DHCP client stimulator. The step by step Python coding guide will show you how to install the software on any operating system and how to work with data types including strings, lists, tuples, dictionaries, booleans and more. The Python for Offensive PenTest course will show you how to create your own tools using unlimited third party libraries to get the job done with just a few lines. There’s even a course on analytics, machine learning and NLP in Python.You’ll learn at your own pace, on your own time, giving you a flexible schedule to absorb the content specifically tuned to your learning style. For 96% off today you’ll get access to dozens of hours of content that you can watch and revisit as many times as you need, with hands on, interactive learning and quizzes so you’ll get a true feel for Python. Check out the link below for even more details.Right now you can get the Python Programming Bootcamp bundle for 96% off in the Boing Boing Store.

Skier and snow artist Simon Beck stomps around in the snow for 11 hours or more to make each of his beautiful fractal snow art masterpieces. He has to walk around 25 or 30 miles to stamp a design of about 100 meters square, using only his two snowshoes. It began as a form of exercise, and has become far more.From The Finch and Pea:For more than a decade, Beck has made elaborate designs in snow, mainly in the French Alps, using only snowshoes and a compass. He started out making mandala-like circular shapes, but moved on to much more complex designs over the years. Beck told Discovery News that he started incorporating fractal patterns into his work after reading James Gleick’s book “Chaos: Making a New Science.”More images at the artist's website and on Facebook.About the image below, he explains:The first attempt to draw the dragon made for Baslev's movie DRAKONY, in Siberia (Yakutsk) in October 2015. This was rejected as I had used a bit too much artistic licence and not drawn accurately enough according to the sketch I had been given![caption id="attachment_446496" align="aligncenter" width="500"] Mandelbrot Set in progress[/caption][Via Smithsonian Magazine]

For his Low Pixel ceramic sculpture series, Japanese artist Toshiya Masuda “pixelates” common objects. Soda cans, flowers, liquor bottles, all are reduced to low rez video game style facsimiles. (more…)

This deal is probably for US customers only, but it's a good one. The highly rated Poweradd Pilot X1 5200mAh Portable Charger External Battery Pack is regularly $13, but if you use code E879NFK8 at final checkout you can get it for $4.59. I just bought one, because I can never have enough battery packs.

iBleeedorange posted this pretty GIF that shows the 5-fold pattern traced out by an imaginary line between the Earth and Venus.Sunsunsun made an audio representation of the orbital relationship between Earth and Venus:The left side is Venus and the right side is Earth. It takes about 1:36 to synch up, but it almost synchs up (the planets would be directly opposite each other) around 46 seconds in. Each 8 bars represents an orbit around the sun. Do not listen to this without headphones, it makes no sense without being able to separate them.Make you own "dances of the planets" here.[via]

See the extended director's cut gif here.

During the rainy season I a always looking for new toys to entertain my Cavalier King Charles, Pretzel. The Orbee-Tuff Snoop is a simple, clean and easy toy that buys me 30-45 minutes of fascinated with something other than me time. Snack filled puzzle toys tend to make a lot of noise. Not so with the Snoop, it is made of a soft rubber compound that doesn't rattle and bang when knocked around, and survives the dogs tearing at it. Simply pop the Snoop inside out, load it with some kibble, turn it it rightside out and let the dog have at it. Pretzel bats it around and then pins it. This toy will not withstand deep interest from my Great Pyrenees, Nemo. It is perfect for 15-30lb dogs. I do worry about giving her too much food, and she tends towards the sausage shape, so I reduce her meal time kibble to allow for these kinds of toys. Planet Dog Orbee-Tuff Snoop Treat Dispensing Dog Toys via Amazon

[My friend Peter Sheridan is a Los Angeles-based correspondent for British national newspapers. He has covered revolutions, civil wars, riots, wildfires, and Hollywood celebrity misdeeds for longer than he cares to remember. As part of his job, he must read all the weekly tabloids. For the past couple of years, he's been posting terrific weekly tabloid recaps on Facebook and has graciously given us permission to run them on Boing Boing. Enjoy! - Mark]It’s America’s worst nightmare.Faced with the existential threats of terrorism, global warming, nuclear proliferation and Donald Trump, the National Enquirer reports that “America’s worst nightmare” is . . . the possibility that jailed Unabomber Ted Kaczynski may have secretly fathered a child.Sure, that’s what keeps me awake at night.There’s a wealth of speculative, fanciful, thin-as-air and barely-there shock-horror stories in this week’s tabloids.Bernie Sanders could be a Russian spy, “flipped" during a 1988 visit to Moscow, says the Enquirer. “Vlad's been pulling Bernie’s strings for decades,” a former Secret Service agent, evidently on first name terms with Russian premier Putin, reportedly tells the Enquirer.Actress and singer Cher “shares her dying secrets” in a new memoir, and the National Enquirer has all the details - except she hasn’t written the book yet.The unwritten memoir also reportedly reveals “why she didn’t have sex with Elvis Presley and Marlon Brando.” Hopefully we can look forward to sequels in which Cher reveals she didn’t have sex with Albert Einstein, O.J. Simpson, and Bernie Sanders.As for the Unabomber, the Enquirer stretches its wishful thinking to the limit, claiming that Ted Kaczynski “may have fathered a child” by having his sperm smuggled out of the Supermax prison. Some 90 boxes of Kaczynski’s writings reportedly include a file of papers containing three documents on the subject of prisoners’ rights to artificially inseminate women. That’s enough evidence for the Enquirer to conclude that Kaczynski could have sneaked his sperm out of the nation’s most secure lockup. And now that I’m writing about this, it’s perfectly possible that the Enquirer will report that I may have smuggled my sperm into the Supermax prison. It could happen.Britain’s Prince Charles had a “secret fling” for two years with actress Catherine Zeta Jones, claims the Globe magazine, based on absolutely no visible evidence. But there are photos of their “trysts” - the “lovers” meeting at a charity event surrounded by dozens of others, and Charles presenting Zeta Jones with a Royal honor, during which “Charles fondled her breasts in public” - which is the Globe’s interpretation of Charles simply fixing a pin to her lapel.“Drunk Obama resigns!” says the Globe, which must be disappointed to add: “But President destroyed letter when he sobered up.” Obama allegedly wrote: “Take this job and shove it” after a frustrating day, “according to a highly placed political insider.” Probably Bo, Obama’s Portuguese Water Dog.Burt Reynolds is “hooked again,” says the Globe. Or, as its “source close to the fast-fading actor” admits, that’s just what “worried pals fear.” Because what are friends for if not to speculate wildly about their “fears" in the tabloids. Maybe Burt also has a dog with loose lips.Thankfully we have Us magazine’s crack investigative team to tell us that Natalie Portman wore it best, TV’s "Bachelor" Ben Higgins exclusively reveals “morning is my favorite time of the day,” actress Lily James carries headphones, glasses and keys in her Burberry bag, and the stars are just like us: they hail cabs, try crossword puzzles, shower after swimming, travel by bike and check their iPads. The revelations just keep on coming.Us mag splashes with “Madonna’s nightmare,” as son Rocco allegedly chooses to stay with easy-going dad Guy Ritchie rather than return to strict “disciplinarian” Material Mom. I’m sure he’ll live to regret that decision when he drops out of school and has nothing to fall back on but his parents’ $400 million inheritance.People magazine devotes its cover to the Duggar megafamily’s cousin Amy talking about “her wild and sexy newlywed life.”I. Could. Not. Care. Less.The only reason that the Duggar family’s 15 minutes of fame has lasted so long is because each family member demanded their own 15 minutes, and there’s enough of them to drag that out for years. “I’m just a free bird,” says Amy. “I was true to myself . . I play by my own rules.” And she avoids clichés like the plague.My favorite story in People mag is on Charles Manson’s women - “Where are they now?”Jail, jail, and jail, is the answer for Susan Atkins, Patricia Krenwinkel and Leslie Van Houten. Which explains why it’s such a short story. But where is Linda Kasabian? People reporters have no idea, saying that “she reportedly changed her name and lives in the Pacific Northwest.” Great work, People mag. Really insightful.Why couldn’t they be more like the tabloids, and say that Kasabian may be hooked on drugs, having an affair with Prince Charles and could be a Russian spy, friends fear?Onwards and downwards . . .

Follow @RubenBolling on Twitter and Facebook.Please join Tom the Dancing Bug's subscription club, the INNER HIVE, for early access to comics, and more. And/or buy Ruben Bolling’s new book series for kids, The EMU Club Adventures. Book One here. Book Two here. More Tom the Dancing Bug comics on Boing Boing! (more…)

Solid Oak Sketches has filed copyright registrations in the tattoo designs that decorate the bodies of some of basketball's biggest stars (LeBron James, Kobe Bryant, Kenyon Martin, DeAndre Jordan, Eric Bledsoe, etc), and has sued Take-Two Software, maker of NBA 2K16 and other basketball video games, for reproducing tattoos as part of the likenesses of the players. (more…)

An exceptionally broad proposal before the Council of the EU lumps the traffickers who cram refugees into unsafe boats with the volunteers and NGOs who rescue drowning refugees when those boats sink. (more…)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Drwl5M3m8YEDavid sez, "The Tesseract Dice are unique, science themed dice, with shapes ranging from 4-D cubes, to Tesla coils to atomic explosions. Its goal is to bring unique and fun science themed game pieces to the gaming community." (more…)

Needs Apollo and Zeus.

The most common way to die from taking a selfie is falling from a heights, followed by drowning. From Priceonomics:One-third of all people who met their demise in the midst of a selfie fell from heights — most commonly, a cliff or a building.In late August of 2015, for example, a 25 year-old man Chinese man ventured off-trail to snap a selfie at the top of Long Men waterfall in eastern China. Distracted by the camera, he took a misstep and plunged 100 feet down into a ravine, where he died instantly. When authorities recovered his body several days later, his selfie stick-mounted phone — still intact — contained a picture of him in the process of falling.The following month, a 17 year-old Russian student climbed a nine-story building near Moscow, and hung off the ledge to make it appear as if he were falling. He intended to capture the “ultimate” selfie for his Instagram page; instead, his hand slipped, and he fell to his death. Just weeks earlier, he’d posted a similar image of himself in a precarious position: Всем ку, могла быть моей последней фоткой😊жаль что смазалась😢 A photo posted by Drews🐥🐤🐣 (@drewsssik) on Aug 25, 2015 at 4:11pm PDT