Boing Boing

Everyone loves Halloween, including the hippos at the Cincinnati Zoo, because they get to chomp down on delicious pumpkins. (more…)

A brand manager at Dong Energy finally convinced them that their company name might be getting in the way of their messaging. They will be Ørsted from here out. (more…)

Once a species is considered extinct, it usually stays that way. But not so for an Australian stick insect that had been considered extinct since the early 1920s, and officially extinct by 1986. Alas, they have come back from the dead. The "tree lobster," or "land lobster," or Dryococelus australis, was a native to Australia's Lord Howe Island, but was wiped out after a 1918 shipwreck unleashed black rats, which decimated not only the D. australis species on the island but other species as well, including "five birds, two plants and 13 invertebrates (including D. australis) - not found anywhere else in the world," according to Science Alert. Then in 2001, the insect was discovered alive on nearby sea volcano, Ball's Pyramid, yet it wasn't official that these creatures were indeed the tree lobster – they didn't look quite the same as their Lord Howe Island ancestors. But "DNA testing has confirmed that the insects are, indeed, D. australis - an extremely rare success story."According to Science Alert:Although the Ball's Pyramid insects didn't look like the Lord Howe Island specimens, comparison between the genomes of the two found less than 1 percent difference - a small enough difference that they can officially be declared the same species.This means that eventually, they may be reintroduced to Lord Howe Island, pending the completion of a rat eradication program that is due to commence in 2018.Here's a really cool 2012 video about them:https://youtu.be/Eg3dcYJ2oI4Image: Granitethighs

Rodney Brooks -- eminent computer scientist and roboticist who has served as head of MIT's Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory and CTO of Irobot -- has written a scorching, provocative list of the seven most common errors made (or cards palmed) by pundits and other fortune-tellers when they predict the future of AI. (more…)

Thirty years ago, the collapse of the USSR and the ascendancy of the neoliberal policies of Thatcher, Reagan, Pinochet and Mulroney sent the left into retreat, and what has passed for the left ever since has been dominated by Bill Clinton/Tony Blair-style "triangulation" or "humanized capitalism," whose core hypothesis might be summed up as, "Rather than allowing 150 white male CEOs to run the world, we should ensure that at least half of them are women and/or people of color." (more…)

Sarah Emerson created a cool print of the Beatles' "Hey Jude" lyrics as a flowchart

Even if you were born with perfect pitch, nimble fingers, and rock-hard calluses, getting good at guitar takes a long time. There’s no easy way to solidify scales and positions into your muscle memory, but FRETX significantly speeds up the process of learning fundamental patterns. This clever teaching tool attaches to your guitar neck, and uses colorful LEDs to mark where your fingers are supposed to go on the fretboard itself. Right now you can get one in the Boing Boing Store for $69.99.The FRETX device fits any size guitar neck, no matter if you have a baseball-bat acoustic or a speedy electric guitar. Installation is easy — just line up the LEDs with your strings, and wrap the excess material around. Everything sticks on with semi-permanent adhesive strips, so you won’t have to worry about ruining your guitar’s finish. Once you’re all set up, you can start learning essential chords right away with their free mobile app.https://www.youtube.com/embed/eihus-1PN7oIn the FRETX app, budding guitarists will find a variety of useful resources, including chord diagrams and a tuner. Built-in song lessons make use of the device’s LED indicators to display chord voicings and melodies in real time. Since the app can listen to you play with your phone’s built-in mic, you get fully dynamic feedback to help you practice more effectively. It lets you know if you hit a wrong note immediately, and keeps track of your progress over time. Songs can be played at whatever speed feels most comfortable, and you can even loop specific phrases to get them down perfectly.After you graduate from the beginner material, your teacher can program new songs and chord exercises. FRETX’s open platform makes sharing instructional content easy, and opens the doors for future 3rd-party app integration. If you want to start learning how to strum and shred as quickly as possible, you can grab a FRETX Smart Guitar Learning Device here for $69.99.BUY NOW

Norwegian band a-ha recently took to the stage to sing an acoustic version of their 1985 hit song, "Take On Me." It's nice to hear that lead singer Morten Harket can still hit those high notes after all these years.The band will begin an MTV Unplugged acoustic tour through Europe in early 2018, followed by a full-electric tour in the summer. (The Loop)Previously: A-ha! This app turns your living room into a 1980's music video using augmented reality

Security researcher Amit Serper reports getting command-line access to a set of supermarket scales, and he wasn't even trying: "The app that displays the weight crashed and dropped into a management screen." This is how you get free jalopeno olive salad, people.https://twitter.com/0xAmit/status/916810108516134912https://twitter.com/4n6expert/status/916850590390525952Previously.https://twitter.com/ftrain/status/917358996675354625

In August, Dutch photographer Michel Klooster captured these unusual photos of a newlywed couple.HuffPost reports:For one image, the couple posed as if they were having sex in a maroon pickup truck.Then they took another picture that can only be described as “blue.” In the photo, the bride appears to be performing oral sex on her new hubby.Klooster told HuffPost that the bride’s mother suggested that photo to him.“We were taking photos and she [told] me that they wanted that kind of picture, but the bride and groom didn’t dare ask me,” he said in a Facebook message. “Then I just said, ‘Of course, we are gonna do it.’ So I suggested where they need to stand for the right vibe!”Did I mention they're NSFW?While the wedding took place on August 17 in the Netherlands, the images were just shared October 2 on the photographer's Facebook page. Naturally, they went viral.images by Michel Klooster

After Speaker Rebecca Kadaga ordered opposition party members evicted during a debate on lifting a presidential age limit, things got a little heated. (more…)

Destinyland writes, "The Church of the Subgenius has moved online. (Founded in 1979, the 38-year-old parody religion combines UFOs and conspiracy theories with some social commentary and a few H.P. Lovecraft characters.) Their official Facebook page is now touting a new video channel on YouTube -- and in 'Adventures in the Forbidden Sciences,' former church CEO K'taden Legume makes a big announcement." (more…)

For professional creatives, it can be a pain to tackle administrative duties when you would rather be making things. If you are self-employed and struggle with bookkeeping, AND CO can automate a variety of your admin tasks, and you can get a subscription from the Boing Boing Store for $39.99.By connecting your business bank account to AND CO, you can simplify the process of getting paid for your work. Invoices are quick and easy to prepare and invoice, and you can allow your clients to pay you directly with credit, ACH transfers, and a variety of payment providers like PayPal. It can also track your expenses automatically, and will prepare your income statements when it’s tax time.With AND CO, you’ll be well-equipped to handle the tedious aspects of your freelancing job. A lifetime subscription to AND CO's Graphite Plan is $39.99 when you order it here.More Deals from the Boing Boing Store:Social Media Rockstar Bundle: $29 (97% off)Clip & Snap Smartphone Camera Lenses: $17.99 (74% off)4-Piece Knife and Peeler Set: $26.99 (73% off)

Parents of Georgia middle schoolers are saying a teacher gave students an assignment asking them to create a mascot for the Nazi party. WSB-TV Atlanta reports sixth graders from Shiloh Middle School in Snellville were handed a homework assignment to imagine being commissioned by nazis, then draw and name them a mascot based on all their teachings about Hitler and nazis. “Directions: The year is 1935 and you have been tasked with creating a mascot to represent the Nazi party at its political rallies,” the directions read. “Think about all the information that you have learned about Hitler and the Nazi party. You will create a COLORFUL illustration of the mascot. Give the mascot a NAME. You will also write an explanation as to why the mascot was chosen to represent the Nazi party.” Via WSB-TV Atlanta: Gwinnett County Schools said learning about Nazism, the use of propaganda and the events that resulted in the Holocaust is part of the sixth grade social studies curriculum.However, a school district spokesperson said in a statement, “This assignment is not a part of the approved materials provided by our Social Studies department and is not appropriate and the school is addressing the use of this assignment with the teacher."Image: DrRandomFactor

TastyFloats is a "contactless food delivery system" that uses ultrasound to raise bits of food and droplets of drink to your mouth without any utensils at all. While this method to levitate small objects is well known, what's fascinating is that a small scientific study shows that the levitated food apparently tastes better. Researchers from the University of Sussex describe TastyFloats and their sensory experiment in a scientific paper they'll present at this month's ACM Interactive Surfaces and Spaces conference. From IEEE Spectrum:The researchers experimented with three of the five basic tastes: sweet (a positive taste), bitter (a negative taste), and umami, which is a savory taste that can also enhance other flavors. The researchers asked a group of volunteers to test TastyFloats with the three basic tastes, delivered in three different volumes (5 microliters, 10µL, and 20µL), with tongue delivery via pipette as a non-levitating control. Participants were asked to identify each droplet, and then rated each on intensity, pleasantness, and satisfaction.The most significant difference between levitated tastes and tastes delivered via pipette was in intensity: sweet tastes were more intense and recognizable, while bitter tastes were harder to distinguish. The researchers suggest that this might make TastyFloats more suitable for dessert delivery, although it could also be used to make bitter but healthy foods (like broccoli) more palatable to people who wouldn't otherwise enjoy them.

I was honored to be yesterday's guest on my favorite interview podcast, Erik Davis's Expanding Mind. Erik and I have been friends since the cyberdelic early 1990s. He is a brilliant head and prolific writer who explores the cultures of consciousness with rigor, wit, and genuine curiosity. On the podcast, Erik and I had a freewheeling conversation about the Voyager Golden Record vinyl release that I co-produced with Tim Daly and Lawrence Azerrad, my work at the Institute for the Future, and the intersection of science, art, and magic to spark the imagination. Have a listen:

Canada's filthy tar sands are the world's most carbon-intensive petroleum source, and in the boom years, they flooded the country with so much filthy money that the country spent a decade making war on science and trashing democratic fundamentals in a bid to sustain the tar-sands bubble. (more…)

The first thing I thought when I saw these glow-in-the-dark pacifiers was that they'd be easy to find when junior flings them in the middle of the night.Then I thought, oh these can't be for real babies, these must be for ravers.But no, they are actually for babies (and toddlers). These fancy orthodontic BPA-free binkies come in three "stages" to fit your child's mouth. Or yours. I don't judge.They're made by the design team at Smilo and are available for $9.99/3-pack.(Cool Mom Picks)

Here's a rare historical gem from Walt Disney World's history: the 15-minute long promotional video for Walt's utopian EPCOT Center (Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow). The Disney Parks Blog writes that they pulled it out of the "video vault" for Epcot's 35th anniversary:This film, which offers a look inside WED Enterprises during the “Imagineering” of EPCOT Center in the 1970s, originally ran on a loop in the EPCOT Preview Center at Magic Kingdom Park. The purpose of the film was to introduce a new kind of Disney theme park to guests, showcasing exciting experiences they could have in the park’s Future World and World Showcase areas. The film offered sneak peaks at attraction models, renderings and animation for The Living Seas, Horizons, World of Motion, CommuniCore and Spaceship Earth, as well as early construction footage. It also offered a first-listen to some of the fun music composed for this new park, including songs like “It’s Fun to Be Free,” “Universe of Energy” and “Listen to the Land.”As a bonus, here's the TV opening special for EPCOT which aired on October 23, 1982 (the park opened on October 1st of that year). It's hosted by Danny Kaye:https://youtu.be/TyKOA9k9qrw

Biomechanist Katy Bowman uses the metaphor of nutrients – and nutritious movement vs. junk food movement – to unpack what’s not working for most of us about our modern lifestyle. Turns out that even those we consider “active” spend most of their time sedentary, according to research. And our shoes, furniture, pillows and other props mean that we are not getting the full range of motion – the essential movement nutrients – out of the limited activity that we do. This video is a decent entry point into Katy Bowman’s eco-system. She’s also written eight books and published piles of free content on her blog. You can even watch a video tour of her house showing the movement-hacks the family has made around their home.Once you start thinking about movement from an ancestral point of view – what our bodies evolved to expect – you won’t be able to go back to the exercise/not exercise dichotomy.

Here is an amazing motorcycle backflip by stunt performer Travis Pastrana. With only a 75-foot gap between two barges in London's river Thames, Pastrana pulled off a stunt that hasn't been tried in 11 years. The last guy to try, freestyle motocross rider Mike Metzger, did some serious damage fracturing his vertebrae. According to Reuters:Set against the backdrop of London’s O2 arena, Pastrana had only 150 feet to accelerate to takeoff speed before jumping, with only 36 feet to come to a stop before he would have fallen into the river.The vessels used in the attempt were fitted with a steep ramp for the rider’s take-off and a more gently inclined one for him to land on.Congrats to Pastrana, who in the past has "broken more than 90 bones and suffered 25 concussions."

(NSFW)Len Enders writes, "(On December 8, 1989), a friend and I threw a party at our house to celebrate our 19th birthday. We rented a video camera for the occasion and this is a short edit of the remaining footage from that night." (via r/ObscureMedia, thanks, UPSO!)

Did celebrities take last week off?It seems that way, as so many of the stories in this week’s tabloids relate to events that happened years, even decades ago, though naturally they are presented as “news” complete with the mandatory exclamation points.Tom Cruise “self destructs over cancer diagnosis!” would seem to be a shocking new story in the National Enquirer, but of course it isn’t Tom who was diagnosed with cancer, but his father, who died . . . wait for it . . . 33 years ago. Tom was well aware of his father’s cancer, since he was at his dying dad’s bedside, so his father’s cancer diagnosis could hardly come as a shock, or news, to the actor.Demi Moore "cheats death in cocaine overdose," screams the Enquirer headline. When did this supposedly happen? In 1985 – 32 years ago, barely a year after Tom Cruise’s father’s cancer diagnosis.Continuing its streak of hot breaking news, the Enquirer reveals Sandra Bullock’s “cheating hunk hit her!” When was she allegedly assaulted by a boyfriend? In high school - 35 years ago.Globe joins in the fun with its story "Diana Ross put in mental ward!" This must seem like it happened only yesterday – back in 2001, a mere 16 years ago. "Rabid Rambo disembowels reality queen!” screams another Globe headline above a lurid true crime story that seems fresh by comparison – this only occurred in 2015.Is there nothing new happening in the tabloids? Of course there is, if you count slain Nicole Brown Simpson’s ghost haunting O.J. Simpson, and the “Mad Pooper In Deep Doo-Doo,” referring to a phantom defecator outside a Colorado family’s home, both courtesy of Globe.The Enquirer tells us that Gwen Stefani is pregnant (because she appears to have a slightly bulging stomach in some photos) while the Globe cover story claims that Prince Charles’ wife Camilla is “dying” and “has 8 months to live” after being diagnosed with liver cancer – a story that somehow eluded the entire Royal press corps in England, and which hasn’t prompted a word of coverage in the U.K. It also mysteriously lacks the usually self-congratulatory “Globe World Exclusive” tag that such stories boast when the Editor at least thinks there may be a slim chance it’s accurate.Whatever happened to former White House aide Dick Morris, whose regular Enquirer column of Trump sycophancy carries the promise: “The most feared voice in politics”? He’s penned a rant with the catchy title “How to kill Obamacare without even asking Congress!” But you won’t find it in this week’s Enquirer, because they didn’t have room for it. Must be all that decades-old news pushing his fine prose off the pages. Instead, you have to look for his “feared voice” online at the Enquirer website. Morris must be even more fearful online, I’m sure.Thankfully we have the crack investigative team at Us magazine to tell us that Hailey Baldwin wore it best, Scandal star Bellamy Young is a “crazy good knitter,” that The Blacklist actress Megan Boone carries foundation, highlighter and lip tint in her Maison Mayle purse, and that the stars are just like us: they do gardening, exercise, shop and carry too many bags (because when the paparazzi come around they send home their gardeners, personal trainers, personal shoppers and personal assistants.)Us gives us the softest of softball interviews with First Daughter Ivanka Trump, this week’s cover girl revealing “My Life at the White House” – but don’t expect any revelations. Ivanka won’t tell us if she’s crazy good at knitting, or if she carries lip tint in her purse. Instead, we learn that she feels “so blessed every day to be able to come in to work at the White House,” though she avoids reading criticism because “If I engaged too deeply, I wouldn’t be able to prioritize the things I came here to do.”Ivanka also reveals the biggest misconception about her father, President Donald Trump: “… how empathetic he is doesn’t always come through.” Ya think?People magazine devotes its cover to the “Nightmare in Las Vegas – Heartbreak & Heroes,” which tells the stories of survivors, but can’t help fetishizing human suffering, and makes each story sound like the “journey” of a contestant on American Idol.Leave it to the National Examiner to bring us the oldest breaking news of the week: newly declassified CIA files allegedly offer evidence that Hitler was alive in Colombia after World War II – in 1955. That’s only 62 years ago, which qualifies as breaking news in this week’s tabloids.Onwards and downwards . . .

https://youtu.be/-2TbYYXajNYDami Lee on the Qoobo: "Do you enjoy the sensation of petting a cat or dog, but hate the unconditional love and the fact that they have heads and limbs?"I'm looking forward to hacking one of these so that whenever it is petted, it emits a man's muffled screams.

If you can’t contain your excitement to get the new Google Pixel, you can enter now for a chance to get it free, along with the Daydream View VR Headset and Google Home.Building on one of the best Android handsets to date, the relatively still mysterious Pixel XL 2 is sure to be one of the biggest releases this year. To take advantage of the new phone’s improved specs, we’re bundling it with a Daydream View and a Google Home. The Daydream View is designed to fit Pixel devices perfectly, so you can immerse yourself in a variety of VR experiences from the Play Store, while Google Home gives you the capability to turn your home into a veritable Smart House.All three of these items have a combined value of $977, but you can register to win them all for free through the New Google Pixel & Friends Giveaway.More Deals from the Boing Boing Store:Social Media Rockstar Bundle: $29 (97% off)Clip & Snap Smartphone Camera Lenses: $17.99 (74% off)4-Piece Knife and Peeler Set: $26.99 (73% off)

Sadly, this reboot cycle was one infinite loop. Mercifully, restoring to a Time Machine backup:I'll guess I'll give it another try a couple of point releases in.Update: https://twitter.com/Beschizza/status/915382802778087425Let it not be said I'm playing favorites!

A Rice University chemist found that adding asphalt to lithium batteries allowed the battery to go "from zero charge to full charge in five minutes, rather than the typical two hours or more needed with other batteries."The Rice lab of chemist James Tour developed anodes comprising porous carbon made from asphalt that showed exceptional stability after more than 500 charge-discharge cycles. A high-current density of 20 milliamps per square centimeter demonstrated the material’s promise for use in rapid charge and discharge devices that require high-power density. The finding is reported in the American Chemical Society journal ACS Nano.

Japan-born British writer Kazuo Ishiguro, author of The Remains of the Day, Never Let Me Go and A Pale View of Hills, is 2017's winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature.The novelist was praised by the Swedish Academy as a writer "who, in novels of great emotional force, has uncovered the abyss beneath our illusory sense of connection with the world".On living on cultural peripheries:Ishiguro left Japan in 1960 at the age of 5 and did not return to visit until 1989, nearly 30 years later, as a participant in the Japan Foundation Short-Term Visitors Program. In an interview with Kenzaburō Ōe, Ishiguro acknowledged that the Japanese settings of his first two novels were imaginary: "I grew up with a very strong image in my head of this other country, a very important other country to which I had a strong emotional tie ... In England I was all the time building up this picture in my head, an imaginary Japan."When discussing his Japanese heritage and its influence on his upbringing, the author has stated, "I'm not entirely like English people because I've been brought up by Japanese parents in a Japanese-speaking home. My parents didn't realize that we were going to stay in this country for so long, they felt responsible for keeping me in touch with Japanese values. I do have a distinct background. I think differently, my perspectives are slightly different." When asked to what extent he identifies as either Japanese or English the author insists, "People are not two-thirds one thing and the remainder something else. Temperament, personality, or outlook don't divide quite like that. The bits don't separate clearly. You end up a funny homogeneous mixture. This is something that will become more common in the latter part of the century—people with mixed cultural backgrounds, and mixed racial backgrounds. That's the way the world is going."His latest—his first novel in a decade—is the historical fantasy The Buried Giant, set in Arthurian times.

The remains of proto-Santa may have been found. An intact tomb has been found beneath the Church of Saint Nicholas in Demre, a popular site for pilgrimages due to the belief it is the final resting place of the Christmas phantom.Via BBC:An intact tomb has been found underneath Saint Nicholas Church, in the Demre district of Turkey's south-west province of Antalya.Demre was built on the ruins of Myra, where St Nicholas was thought to have lived in the 4th Century.Until now, the bones of St Nicholas were believed to be in Bari, Italy.It had been thought they were taken by Italian merchants in 1087 when Myra - at the time a Greek town - was invaded by the Seljuk Turks.By then St Nicholas was already revered among Christians for his generosity, in particular to children, and his humility.The church of St Nicholas in Demre is a popular destination for pilgrims as the site of St Nicholas's final resting place, and archaeological excavations have been taking place there for 20 years.

No need to lie to your kids about why Santa Claus didn’t come this year since Turkish archeologists believe they know where his dead body lies. Archeologists discovered a temple underneath Saint Nicholas Church in the Turkish province of Antalya and believe it may be the site where the 4th-century saint could have been buried, according to Hurriyet Daily News. “We have obtained very good results but real work starta now,” said Cemil Karabayram, Antalya Director of Surveying and Monuments. “We will reach the ground and maybe we will find the untouched body of St. Nicholas.” Karabayram told the Turkish newspaper CT scanning and geo-radar were used to survey the church, and excavations will begin after preserving the church’s mosaics. Via Hurriyet Daily News: Karabayram said there had been many comprehensive works related to the tomb of St. Nicholas. “We studied all of the documents from between 1942 and 1966. There were some notes there. According to these notes, this church was demolished and rebuilt. During the reconstruction, traders in Bari took the bones. But it is said that these bones did not belong to St. Nicholas but to another priest. One of those to have said this was Professor Yıldız Ötüken, an academic of Hacettepe University’s history of art department. She says that St Nicholas is kept in a special section,” he added. Image: Steve Jurvetson

The FDA is finally putting a stop to food companies trying to tempt customers who can’t distinguish baking ingredients from symbolic forms of affection. Officials from the US Food and Drug Administration sent a letter to the owners of Nashoba Brook Bakery warning them the company was violating label regulations by listing “love” as an ingredient in its granola, according to Bloomberg News. "Love" is not a common or usual name of an ingredient, and is considered to be intervening material because it is not part of the common or usual name of the ingredient,” the FDA wrote in the letter.John Gates, CEO of Nashoba Brook Bakery, said the FDA’s warning about the granola “ingredient” was “silly.”“I really like that we list ‘love’ in the granola,” Gates said in a telephone interview with Bloomberg News Tuesday. “People ask us what makes it so good. It’s kind of nice that this artisan bakery can say there’s love in it and it puts a smile on people’s face. Situations like that where the government is telling you you can’t list ‘love’ as an ingredient, because it might be deceptive, just feels so silly.” The letter also warned food products were “prepared, packed, or held under insanitary conditions whereby they may have become contaminated with filth, or whereby they may have been rendered injurious to health.” “Some of FDA’s observations, particularly on some of the sanitation issues, were helpful,” Gates said.Image: pxhere

Tanner, I think you need to be reminded from time to time that you are one of the few people on this team who is not a Jew, spic, nigger, pansy or a booger-eating moron. So you'd better cool it or we may be disposed to beat the crap out of you.I always wished they had let Alfred Ogilvie, the Bad News Bears statistician, beat the heck out of Tanner Boyle right there.Is it baseball season?

This is Mochi, a St. Bernard from Sioux Falls, South Dakota, who set a Guinness Word Record for her impressive tongue. Mochi is a rescue dog now happily living with Carla and Craig Rickert. From Laughing Squid:According to Carla, Mochi came to them as an abused and neglected two year old, but quickly became an integral part of the family. Carla also revealed that Mochi absolutely adores peanut butter.Mo is resilient, comical, loving and eternally grateful and loyal to us – her forever family. This once abused and neglected pup has taught us that it’s okay to be different. We are proud of her unique feature… Officially measured by a vet at 18.58 cm (7.3 in) – the equivalent of two-and-a-half Jenga blocks in a row – Mochi’s was verified as the Longest tongue on a dog (current).

Two NYPD plainclothes detectives and their supervisor have been placed on "modified duty" pending an Internal Affairs Bureau investigation into claims that they handcuffed and raped a teenager in a police department van. In their defense, Brooklyn South Narcotics Detectives Edward Martins and Richard Hall are claiming the girl happily consented to having sex with them after she'd been handcuffed, kidnapped, thrown in a van, and taken to a deserted spot.From The New York Times:The detectives searched the occupants of the car for drugs, [the woman’s lawyer, Michael David] said, and demanded that the woman lift her shirt. “They said, ‘We want to make sure there is nothing under there, so show it,’” Mr. David said, recounting his client’s account. “She was petrified, so she showed it. She said, ‘See, I’m not hiding anything.’”Immediately after, the woman was ordered out of the car, placed in handcuffs and put into the back seat of the detectives’ black Dodge van, Mr. David said. She was told she would be driven to the 60th Precinct, about a mile and a half from the park.Instead, the lawyer said, the detectives drove to a parking lot of a nearby Chipotle restaurant, where she said they raped her.The woman remained handcuffed during the entire ordeal, her lawyer said.About 45 minutes after she was handcuffed, the woman said she was shoved out of the van not far from the 60th Precinct, Mr. David said. The woman contacted her mother, who took her to Maimonides Medical Center in Borough Park, Brooklyn.From The New York Daily News:The detectives handcuffed the teen after finding marijuana and the anxiety drug Klonopin in a bag next to her and drove her away, according to the friend, who said he was suspicious about the cops from the start.“I had Prozac on me,” said the friend, who declined to be named. “They said that it’s supposed to be in the bottle but they just gave it back to me.”They only handcuffed the woman, telling her friends that they were taking her to the 60th Precinct on W. Eighth St. in Coney Island for processing.Instead, Martins and Hall allegedly took her to a secluded spot about two blocks from the 60th Precinct stationhouse, where she says she was forced to perform a sex act on both cops.Image: Youngking11/Wikipedia

Former Equifax CEO Richard Smith -- who retired with $90m for his year's work after overseeing a breach of 145,500,000 Americans' most sensitive date -- testified before Congress yesterday and explained the cause of the breach: "The human error was that the individual who's responsible for communicating in the organization to apply the patch, did not." (more…)

Rule #1 of hacking is "attribution is hard" (other contenders: "don't be on fire," "don't get involved in a land-war in Asia" or "there is no security in obscurity"), which is to say, it's really hard to say who hacked you, in part because it's really easy for hackers to make it look like someone else did the deed. (more…)

Trump might be a moron, as far as Secretary of State Rex Tillerson is concerned, but the pay's good enough for him. In a hastily-arranged press conference following NBC News' morning report about Tillerson-Trump friction, he denied one key claim--that he had to be talked out of quitting--but did not deny calling his boss a "moron" in front of others.Tillerson, after denying the report, vaulted into a round of obsequious praise aimed at an audience of one.He loves this country. He puts Americans and America first. He's smart. He demands results wherever he goes and he holds those around him accountable for whether they've done the job he asked them to do. Accountability is one of the bedrock values the president and I share.Pretty humiliating, but you don't get where Rex got by having self-respect. https://twitter.com/business/status/915594445772308480

Last March, a Nevada court indicted April Parks, proprietor of A Private Professional Guardian, which had secured court guardianship over four hundred elderly Nevadans, working with crooked doctors and social workers to find the identities of old people who had considerable assets, then using a streamlined court process with no checks and balances to have those people declared to be unable to care for themselves. (more…)

Participatory journalism pioneer Dan Gillmor (previously) has just launched Co/Lab, a new project at Arizona State University's Cronkite School of Journalism for "creating, testing, and promoting innovations that will help make the news ecosystem more robust and valuable for all participants." (more…)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yB9pN0H7saATheresa May's speech to the Conservative Party conference last night was a "nightmare," from the moment when comedian Lee Nelson (last seen showering corrupt FIFA boss with handfuls of money) crept up to the stage and handed the Prime Minister a P45 form (the form that bosses in the UK use to formally fire their employees), telling her "Boris told me to do it." (more…)

Colorspike is a programmable LED wand a yard or so long, designed to create lighting moods for filmmakers. A crackling fire just out of shot, for example, or the suggestion of a computer scanning a body for life signs — all easily accomplished with a small battery-powered gadget. It seems incredibly versatile and a must for anyone who wants to shoot narrative on a budget, but we won't know if it lives up to the demos until it Kickstarts. At $300, it seems reasonably-priced, too — compare to Ice Light [Amazon], a similar light that only does unprogrammed 5500&deg and has found its way into just about everyone's bag in the last few years.

In 1848, five years before Japan opened its closed society to the West, a lone American in a whaleboat landed on the country's northern shore, drawn only by a sense of mystery and a love of adventure. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll follow Ranald MacDonald as he travels the length of Japan toward a destiny that will transform the country.We'll also remember a Soviet hero and puzzle over some security-conscious neighbors.Show notesPlease support us on Patreon!

Scuba Diving magazine announced the winners of its underwater photography contest and the results are an awe-inspiring glimpse of another world that exists within our own. Above, Kevin Richter's magnificent photo of an octopus in Lembeh Strait, Indonesia, took first place in the compact camera category. Below: Rodney Bursiel took first prize in the wide angle category for this shot of a whale calf breaching in Tavarua, Fiji; Eduardo Acevedo's image of this ribbon eel in Lembeh Strait, Indonesia won second place for macro photography.See the rest at Scuba Diving Magazine.

Turns out that the total number of people whose lives Equifax ruined by doxing them and then dumping all their most sensitive personal and financial data is 145,500,000, not 143,000,000. The company's new CEO apologized for the misunderstanding, and persisted in calling the people his company destroyed "customers" despite the fact that the vast majority of them were not Equifax customers, just random people whom Equifax compiled massive dossiers on, and then lost control over.

The object of this retro arcade game, called Thoughts and Prayers is to send and many thoughts and prayers as you can in order to stop mass shootings before the timer runs out. Play it it and post your score in the comments.

The Intercept's Sharon Lerner is the best journalist on Trumpian science appointees going, and her piece on Michael Dourson, whom Trump wants confirmed as the EPA's second most powerful executive as Director of the Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention is a scorcher. (more…)

The Simulation Hypothesis holds that alien races (or future versions of humanity) will eventually get the computing power and programming techniques to simulate the whole universe and that when they do, they will probably do so millions of times, meaning that most universes are simulations, and thus the odds that this universe is not a simulation are vanishingly small. (more…)

Carmen Yulin Cruz is the outspoken mayor of San Juan, the capital of Puerto Rico, who was publicly denounced by Donald Trump for pointing out the federal government's inaction during the worst humanitarian disaster in modern US history. Trump went on to characterize Puerto Ricans -- chest deep in sewage raw sewage with no fresh water, no homes, no power and no gasoline -- as "wanting everything done for them." (more…)