Really, Thinkgeek's $150 Star Trek White Noise Sleep Machine does it all: projects a moving starfield on your ceiling, plays starship-like white noise loops while you drift off, presents a goofily plausible UI and form-factor straight out of the Roddenverse, and can even play the red alert klaxon as its alarm-tone. (more…)

Venom expert Dr. Christie Wilcox debunks three popular myths about stings and bites from toxic creatures: jellyfish, snakes and spiders.Myth #1: Pee on a jellyfish sting to ease the pain.Dr. Wilcox tested this "urban legend" in her lab and found that this is absolutely not true. In fact, in some cases urine actually made it worse.

In Lock It and Still Lose It—On the (In)Securityof Automotive Remote Keyless Entry Systems, a paper given at the current Usenix Security conference in Austin, researchers with a proven track record of uncovering serious defects in automotive keyless entry and ignition systems revealed a technique for unlocking over 100,000 million Volkswagen cars, using $40 worth of hardware; they also revealed a technique for hijacking the locking systems of millions of other vehicles from other manufacturers. (more…)

Trump's algorithm is to say semi-random things until his crowd roars its approval, then he iteratively modifies those statements, seeking more and more approval, until he maxes out and tries a new tack. (more…)

You won't want to hit another music festival without these essentials. Read on to find out what we're packing for the final festivals of the year.This Smart Charger Always Knows Where The Car Is ParkedIn addition to charging your phone, the Zus Smart Car Charger and Locator ($29.99) helps you locate your car no matter where you’ve parked it. Just plug it into the socket, and whenever you’ve forgotten where you parked (say, when you’re at a music festival and need to get some extra toilet paper from the car) use the accompanying app on your smartphone to get step by step directions to your vehicle.Need More Battery Power? Just Add SunshineThere’s nothing worse than having your phone die on you when you’re at a music festival. And that goes double when you’ve lost all your friends somewhere in the crowd. That’s why we’re excited about the ZeroLemon SolarJuice 20000mAh Battery ($49.99): it uses solar power to charge your phone with a huge 20,000mAh of portable energy.2-for-1 Cables: Fully Charged While You’re Sleeping In Your TentWhen you’re trying to charge your phone when you’re away from home, it’s not always easy to find a place to charge that’s near where you’re sleeping. But when you combine the ZeroLemon SolarJuice Battery with a 2 pack of Extra Long MFi-Certified Lightning Cables ($19.99), you don’t have to worry. These cables will also let you charge your device from a distance with 10 feet of cable. For a short time, you can get two cables shipped either domestically or internationally.

My first exposure to fencing was on Happy Days. (Video evidence below.) This Vox video above explains the sport much better.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BCLy8Por4fo

When racist thug John Hennigan called Judge Patricia Lynch QC a "bit of a cunt" during his sentencing for the latest in a long string of convictions, she had the perfect response: "You are a bit of a cunt yourself." (more…)

See sample pages from this book at Wink.A Wild Swan and Other Tales

Striking and to the point, but also funny. The story behind it writes itself, given the stunning abundance of hot material from the last few weeks provided by the Republican millionaire and candidate for president. But this quote, from a Clinton advisor, sums things up very nicely:

Combo Pool is simple and great fun: use the arrows to aim your ball, and hit c to fire it.

Hurrah for the Sonoma County Sheriff deputy who took no guff from a Border Patrol officer who headed for a disabled parking spot at a NASCAR race— than flashed his badge when caught. Not everyone gets a ticket: sometimes they're just told to get lost. Sadly for this gentleman, his bully move earned a fine: according to KRON, up to $1075.

Matthew Vandeputte, a Belgian timelapse photographer, shot this video of the stars as seen from Vanuatu in the South Pacific.

Most phones already come equipped with an Airplane Mode for flights, a Do Not Disturb mode for watching movies or ignoring people, and a Low Power mode for when your battery is about to die. But what happens when you’re in an emergency? (more…)

Boing Boing is proudly sponsored in part by Meh.Our sponsor Meh is a cool daily deals site that doesn't over-promise, but delivers thoughtfully curated mostly cheap off-brand gadgets.(more…)

On August 6, artist Todd Vaziri observed that all of Trump's angry tweets come from the Twitter client for Android, while the more presidential, less batshit ones come from an Iphone; Vaziri speculated that the latter were sent by a staffer. (more…)

Today we go to a future where animal products are banned. It’s one that lots of listeners have asked for so here you go. We talk about what happens to the land, the animals and the humans in this equation.Flash Forward:RSS|iTunes|Twitter| Facebook|Web|Patreon |RedditIn this episode we discuss the arguments in favor and against banning meat. How does that impact culture? Why should we do it? Does it help or hurt the environment? Can you really grow meat in a lab? And is that meat vegan?

I love fairy doors as much as the next hopeless geek romantic. I even had a fairy post office made as an illustration for my last book. But why let the hippie fairies have all of the pixie-perfect fun? Goth fairies need self-expression, too. And what better way to share a little whimsical gloom than with a wee fairy graveyard in the woods?For $60, a terrarium company called Jpants sells a 25-tombstone miniature graveyard kit. The polymer resin tombstones average about 2" in height. The "Spooky-Ass Mini Graveyard Kit" is sold as a terrarium accessory, but we think it'd look equally at home behind the tree in the park with the fairy door. Circle o' life. [Via Dirge]

I've had the Plugable 5-Port 36W USB Universal Smart Charger for over a year. I take it with me on all trips, including business and family travel. Having five USB ports means I can charge everyone's phones and a battery at the same time.Instead of plugging directly into the wall outlet, the charger has a 48-inch power cord. This is an important feature, because it means I can plug the cord into a hard-to-get-to outlet and set the charging unit itself on a table or desk. The model with 5 smart ports is $22, and the model with 2 smart ports and 3 universal ports is $15.

Ten years ago, British domestic security claimed to have caught a terrorist cell that had planned to blow up airplanes with a gel they'd carry on in a Gatorade bottle and detonate with an Ipod. (more…)

See sample pages from this book at Wink.The Creative Cottage

"It works. I don't wanna bark anymore."[via]

The Citizens United ruling says that organizations like the NRA can spend as much as they want to support political candidates, provided that they don't coordinate with the campaign, which means that it's just a happy coincidence that the day after Donald Trump called on gun enthusiasts to assassinate Hillary Clinton and federal judges, the NRA announced that it would spend $3M on the most-expensive-to-date pro-Trump ad, which would focus on Hillary Clinton's alleged plan to "leave you defenseless" by taking away your guns. (more…)

Celebrate the golden era of useless-but-cool-looking gamer peripherals with the Power Mitt, a $15 oven mitt that comes in lefty or righty. (via Wonderland)

Science fiction author Ted Chiang's Nebula award-winning short story "Story of Your Life" is getting the big-budget Hollywood treatment. Arrival, starring Amy Adams, Jeremy Renner, and Forest Whitaker, comes out in November.From Wikipedia:

Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen funded the Allen Brain Observatory, a detailed, rich data-set derived from parts of a mouse-brain: what's striking is that the Allen Institute released all the data into the public domain, at once, as soon as it was available, which is exactly what you'd want the publicly funded alternatives to do, and what they almost never do. (more…)

People's Ride is a co-op ride-hailing company in Grand Rapids, Michigan: drivers own the service in common and collectively decide how to spend its profits (for example, on deploying an app to go with its website); for-profit competitors like Uber take 30% commissions from their drivers and deliver them to investors, while People's Ride spends all the revenue paying drivers and improving the service. (more…)

1210 white and transparent pieces make up the LEGO Architecture Studio. This fantastic set is geared towards builders!Summer is here and I'm running out of ways to occupy the kid!Aside from a while lot of pieces, I'm impressed with this set. Switching to a solid white color scheme eliminates a lot of random searching for just the right shape and COLOR piece. The guide book will teach you to build architectural features, and inspire you to design buildings on your own, which is what this set is for.LEGO Architecture Studio 21050 Playset via Amazon

Royal Brunei Airlines's first all-women deck crew flew into Saudi Arabia this week. Unfortunately, they will not be allowed to drive there, since Muslim clerics in that country forbid it.From The Independent:In December 2014, Loujain al-Hathloul was detained after she tried to drive into Saudi Arabia from the United Arab Emirates. Maysa al-Amoudi, a friend who turned up to support her, was also detained. Both were released after more than 70 days in custody.Sarah Leah Whitson, the Middle East and North Africa director for Human Rights Watch said at the time: “After years of false promises to end its absurd restrictions on women, Saudi authorities are still arresting them for getting behind the wheel."The Saudi government’s degrading restrictions on women are what bring shame to the country, not the brave activists standing up for their rights.”

British science writer Ed Yong's new book I Contain Multitudes: The Microbes Within Us and a Grander View of Life is a history of gut flora and bacteria, which first entered our consciousness as a scourge to be eliminated and has lately become something between a cure-all (see the universe of "probiotic" food supplements) and a superfood (think of the fecal transplants that have shown such promise in treating a variety of debilitating and dangerous health conditions). (more…)

Lenny Grekko says: "Last night we were camping in the Adirondacks and a bear opened the door of my neighbors car looking for food. He got in and destroyed it before the forest ranger was able to come."

Isn't this the way everyone who rides Ryanair boards their plane?

Public transit upholstery is a marvel of stain-resistance, long-wearing durability and bizarre abstract patterns meant to deny the shifting conventions of fashion: all these make it (semi-)perfect for "Bustour," German artist Menja Stevenson's 2008 transit couture project, which has her creating lovely -- if stiff and uncomfortable -- outfits out of transit fabric and then riding trains, documenting the reactions of people who encounter her chameleonsuit look. (more…)

I’ve traveled to Japan many times over the decades and seen some really strange shit. (more…)

I was born in 1958, a tail-end Baby Boomer, and as a young boy—evidently like a lot of others—I faithfully read Famous Monsters of Filmland every month and spent an inordinate amount of time watching horror movies on WPIX channel 11, WNEW channel 5, and WOR channel 9—all local channels out of New York City. (more…)

In the 15 years between 1997 and 2012: 72,000 small US manufacturers shut down; as did 108,000 local retailers and 13,000 community banks (fully half of America's complement of small banks!). The number of US startups has dropped by 50% since 1970. These statistics are not the result of the changing times: they're due to massive, monopolistic corporations stacking the deck against small competitors through unfair and corrupt practices, to the detriment of American growth, equality and democracy. (more…)

Castles is a fascinating web toy by Nico Disseldorp. Left-click to add a castle to the outside of your castle—and watch as every part of the castle, including the added part, changes to reflect the form of the new whole. Right click to spin it around so you don't go mad. He's made other mind-melting recursion toys too. (more…)

Buried nearly 2,000 years ago in Serbia, rolls of gold and silver etched with "magic spells" are baffling archaologists. Reuters reports on a "Middle Eastern mystery" unearthed at the site of an ancient Roman city.

Monday: Titties ✔

From the Boing Boing Flickr Pool: SuppaDuppa 666's You can't imagine how fun is summer for a Wookie.

Team dolphin all the way, you guys.A woman at SeaWorld Orlando was trying to take a photograph of the marine mammal show with her iPad, when a dolphin popped up out of the water and grabbed it from her."As you can see, the dolphins can reach your loose items," a voice can be heard saying over a loudspeaker.(more…)

Last night in Charles City, Iowa, a freight train car separated from the track as it was changing connections and tipped right into the back of a bar. The name of the trackside tavern? DeRailed.Nobody was injured.(KCCI)

One year ago, Hugohugo gifted us the fine Immortan Joe/Uncle Sam mashup; this year, it's Rosie the Riveter meets Dr. Jillian Holtzmann (my all-time science hero!), also available as an art print or tee. (via Wil Wheaton)

Drew Hayes' Fred the Vampire accountant series is hilarious! I'd been waiting for his third installment, Bloody Acquisitions.Fred was boring in life, in death he isn't much better. Turned into a monster and abandoned, Fred has made a life for himself not knowing much about the vampire life. Fred's cool, he's an accountant! A really good one, too! Problem is a whole clan of bloodsuckers have come to town following some stories about a heroic, mysterious master vampire and all they're gonna find is Fred.Hope an accountant doesn't disappoint them!I can't recommend this series enough. Drew Hayes is clearly having a lot of fun!Bloody Acquisitions (Fred Book 3) by Drew Hayes via AmazonPreviously on Boing Boing:The Utterly Uninteresting and Unadventurous Tales of Fred, The Vampire Accountant

The "International Consortium of Investigators for Fairness in Trial Data Sharing" -- a group that appears to have just been formed, backed by 282 researcher in 33 countries -- has objected to a plan to limit exclusivity over clinical trial data derived from medical volunteers, insisting instead that the fair thing to do is to lock up this uncopyrightable, factual data for up to five years. (more…)

Oleg Cricket from Siberia shows off his parkour skills on a Hong Kong skyscraper. For some reason, watching these kinds of high-altitude daredevil videos make the soles of my feet ache. Does that happen to anyone else?If you want more, here's a guy riding a unicycle and juggling on an 8-inch wide parapet of the Vidraru Dam, with a drop of 166 meters:https://youtu.be/F1mnz-OXTOc[via]

BlackPanther2016 says Warner Brothers didn't show him the version of Suicide Squad that the trailer advertised. He's taking the movie studio and DC to court for "false advertising, misleading visual images and gaining a profit from us and millions others due to these acts." He says the case has been accepted.From Reddit:I drove 300 miles to London to go watch these specific scenes they had explicitly advertised in their TV ads…and they didn't show them to me. Adding to this, they were also two specific Katana scenes they advertised that were also the reason I wanted to go watch the movie. These scenes were: Katana’s eyes going black, and a slow motion shot of her and her sword taking souls in a smoky kind of style. These scenes were advertised several times in the first trailer and many TV ads but they didn’t show it to me in the movie. I wasted a lot of money paying and travelling to go watch this movie because of these specific scenes they had advertised to me and all of us saying, ‘Hey, check out our preview! This will all be in our movie, come watch it on the 5th!’ All lies.I told the theatre about this unjust act and said ‘I didn’t get what I came here to see, can I have my money back?’ They laughed at me and kicked me out. So I’m now taking this to court. I want my refund, the trauma of being embarrassed as I was being kicked out and people laughing at me for wanting my refund, and also the £160 of fuel money I used to drive to London from Scotland.”

Facebook claims it has developed a way to force ads to appear irrespective of whether visitors are using adblockers, and will soon begin doing so. The Wall Street Journal reports that the technique is "relatively easy" because Facebook doesn't use third-party ad tech—another way of saying that as Facebook serves both content and ads itself, it is at liberty to make them technically indistinguishable from one another.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uF_jNJ1FSYcThe tamper-evident "Warrant Void If Removed" stickers violate the Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act of 1975, which allows device owners to take their gadgets for service at independent depots without voiding their warranties. (more…)

Fuck Yeah Tarot Decks is a tumblr dedicated to the resurgence of interest—tinged as it is in irony and self-reflection—in divinatory decks and the many awesome franchises and tropes they can be adapted to. The amazing thing you see above? $1 at Dollar Tree. [via Metafilter] (more…)