https://youtu.be/R0yLYCvPSgUI've seen this kind of jittery-but-effective 3D effect before. In fact, you can take old stereoscope cards and make looping Gifs with the two images. A new iPhone app called Slide uses the same principle, but takes out the grunt work. (more…)

No one's sure how the story of suicides increasing during holiday season got started (some researchers think it may have come from It's a Wonderful Life!), but it's not true. (more…)

Harvard Business School's Benjamin Edelman, Michael Luca, and Dan Svirsky created 20 identical Airbnb profiles, ten of which had names meant to sound African-American, ten of which were meant to sound white and undertook thousands of attempted Airbnb bookings in Baltimore, Dallas, LA, St Louis and DC. They found that black-seeming Airbnb users were 16% more likely to have their requests declined than white-seeming users. (more…)

The inimitable Charles Barkley goes to town on Donald Trump."Your life sucks because of you, not because of Hispanics.”(TNT's "Inside the NBA," thanks UPSO!)

https://youtu.be/QNmhiTFeyiYRecord producer and DJ Boogie Belgique assembled this crisp black-and-white footage of post-WWII Tokyo. The clips "take us for a ride down a shopping street in the Shinbashi district, past market stalls in Shibuya, alongside the river, and even into areas meant exclusively for the occupying American forces," says Colin Marshall at Open Culture.I've been to Tokyo a half a dozen times and the city shown here is unrecognizable to me.Rocket News 24 has a lot of interesting speculation about the footage (commenters say the film is second unit footage for the movie Tokyo Joe, which came out in November of 1949).

Keep fucking that chicken.

In 2007, 19-year-old MIT Media Lab student named Star Simpson went to Boston's Logan Airport to meet a friend wearing a sweater she'd decorated with LEDs in the shape of a star; the Logan police responded (with machine guns) to a call about a "dark-skinned man" with a suspicious device. (more…)

After a Kickstarter campaign raised $3.5m to make drones only to fly away into the void, it brought the shortcomings of crowdfunding into sharp relief. But Kickstarter itself is hiring an investigator to unravel the circumstances of the failed venture.What's more, the pick isn't a buttoned-up accountant-type, but a journalist, Mark Harris—signaling its intent to tell a meaningful story of how things can go wrong on its platform. James Vincent reports that the drone's backers are an audience—and that they deserve the truth.

Prynt is a $140 printer that's also a (bulky, impractical) phone case. It looks cute and brings instant-print nostalgia to the cellphone you already have and to your very large cargo-pants pocket.Wired's Molly McHugh reports on the strangely-appealing gadget and its prospects against the resurgent instant cameras from Fujifim and "Polaroid."

The Obama administration, which has staffed up on savvy pro-privacy technologists, even as its law enforcement arm has called for a "magic pony" that would let Internet users attain technological security without compromising the ability to wiretap them, has promised to release a statement indicating whether it will make policy based on science or fear. (more…)

https://youtu.be/LoWCMzHWlRkActor, Comedian, and “balding redhead dude” Bill Burr, who you may remember as a thug for hire on Breaking Bad, teaches you how to make a wonderful homemade pie crust.(more…)

https://youtu.be/FgFeVlw2YwgI do love my citrus-squeezer and spiralizer, but I'll agree that the badly-designed shitgadgets that author/chef Alton Brown highlights in this Daily Dot viral video are indeed super dumb.

Just before the 2015 holidays hit, America's 3 largest airlines are banning hoverboards. Why? In-flight fire danger from the lithium-ion batteries that power them.(more…)

In the same way that anything longer than it is wide can be a phallic symbol, Frank Wu demonstrates that all isosceles triangles are potential Star Destroyers.

Walt Kelly's Fairy Tales is a 300-page anthology of Golden Age comic book stories by the great Walk Kelly. It's edited by comic book historian Craig Yoe.(more…)

Penguin Magic printed just 500 decks of these Christmas themed playing cards.(more…)

From the Cincinnati Zoo's wonderful Instagram feed:

​Practice the digital dark arts for the good guys, and make more than an honest living as a White Hat Hacker. Information Security and related I.T. career fields can pay upwards of six figures within the first few years of employment, and this bundle will teach you the techniques to get you there. ​Learn to think like a hacker in order to stop attacks before they hit--saving the day one penetration test at a time.With this bundle, you can master penetration testing in 7 courses (60+ hrs) that dig into Hacking Node.js Apps, Windows OS, Wi-Fi devices, and more.How this “pay what you want” deal works: Simply beat the average price to unlock over 60+ hours of content in the White Hat Hacker Bundle.Here's everything included in the bundle:1The Complete Hacking Course: Go from Beginner to Advanced!2Learn Wi-Fi Hacking/Penetration Testing From Scratch$199 Value3Windows Exploit Development Megaprimer$99 Value4Intensive Ethical Hacking Series$69 Value5Ultimate Wi-Fi Hacking & Security Series$69 Value6Node.js Security: Pentesting & Exploitation$65 Value7Cross Site Scripting (XSS) Attacks for Pentesters$65 ValueGet it now in the Boing Boing Store: White Hat Hacker Bundle

The blockbuster podcast Serial starts a long-awaited second season today, looking at a different case, but if you are still interested in the story of Adnan Syed, there's "Undisclosed." (more…)

See more photos at Wink Fun.King Ludwig II of Bavaria, having built Neuschwanstein, has tasked players in their role as builders to build him the most extravagant and amazing castle ever. You'll have both open and secret goals based on the king's desires, and every round, someone will take a turn as the master builder setting prices for the individual rooms that are available. If they're not chosen, they'll be discounted on the following turns.Castles of Mad King Ludwig is a superb game. Not only are you having to juggle the layout to determine what you can place in your castle, but you must complete rooms by connecting other rooms to them to earn points and other bonuses. How you price the individual rooms is another strong element when you're playing the part of the master builder. You need to interpret what you think your opponents want to build, and put it just within their monetary reach, since you're paid any money they spend on rooms while you're the master builder.You'll end up with highly unlikely layouts in the quest to get all the rooms to fit into your castle. Trying to figure out what your opponents really want, and what bonus cards they might have is tough, particularly since more of them can be drawn during the course of play. After several rounds the game ends, and after points are awarded for the secret and the public goals, the most points wins. – James OrrCastles of Mad King Ludwig

Despite the French Ministry of Interior's demands to crack down on Internet anonymity, Prime Minister Manual Valls has gone on record saying he won't allow such a thing to pass: (more…)

https://youtu.be/MTY1Kje0yLgAP physics teacher Dan Burns gave a fun demonstration about spacetime curvature in 2012 at Los Gatos High School. Here's the 10 minute video.Here's another good one from Burns: the "Pole and Barn Paradox":https://youtu.be/coCVkiA5_IY

Liabru's Fractal Gears is a beautiful webtoy that draws randomly meshed gears of descending ratios, with a set of sliders you can use to tweak their parameters. (via Kottke)

After years of technology training seminars in which Miriam Posner ran through a lecture or tutorial and watched as some students got it and others didn't, but were too embarrassed about breaking up the class's flow to raise their hands, she switched tactics, and hit on a great, successful strategy. (more…)

Coffee enemas have been around since the 19th century (when medical science was a mess) and they persist today (when woo advocates like to hold up the fact that medical practices have persisted since the 19th century as proof that they work). In case you were wondering, they're bad for you. (more…)

"This was a very unfortunate incident and I'm deeply sorry that this happened, but the procedures we're putting in place today are so above industry norms that we are going to be the safest place to eat," Chipotle founder and co-Chief Executive Officer Steve Ells said on NBC's "Today" program. He was responded this week's news that 80 people were taken ill with norovirus after dining at a Chipotle Mexican Grill Inc restaurant in Boston. Earlier this year Chipotle restaurants in nine states made 52 people sick, causing the closures in some locations.From HuffPo:

https://youtu.be/fFzKi-o4rHwInstagram husband is related to Instagram parent of a teenage daughter.

Michael C. Ford has pleaded guilty to accusations that he spent at least two years coercing at least 75 women into sending him naked photos of themselves and other women he demanded that they covertly photograph in dressing rooms and changing rooms. Ford worked at the US embassy in London while committing his crimes. (more…)

Helen Briggs reports that a litter of beagle and beagle-spaniel puppies are the first born through in-vitro fertilization after decades of attempts to use the fertility treatment in dogs.The puppies—Ivy, Cannon, Beaker, Buddy, Nelly, Red and Green—were born over the summer but kept secret until their wellbeing was secure. All but one are said to have been placed in new homes.

http://imgur.com/ISf6IExnatsdorf via r/aww.

Boing Boing is thrilled to welcome 3D Robotics as a sponsor!Want a truly unique gift for someone special (even if that someone is you)? Then check out the 3DR Solo, the first smart drone. Designed like no other personal drone on the market, Solo’s dual computers deliver cutting-edge features, while making Solo amazingly easy to operate.https://youtu.be/SP3Dgr9S4pMOnly Solo optimizes the full powers of your GoPro™ and even lets you control the camera during flight. Want to fly and shoot like a pro, right out of the box? Then use Solo’s automatic Smart Shots™ that make capturing cinema-quality aerial footage as easy as pushing a button. Worried about safety? Solo’s software includes airspace safety information to make flying Solo as safe as it is easy.Solo is also the gift that keeps on giving. Its expansion bay and free software updates ensure you always have the latest and greatest technology – you won’t have to buy next year’s drone to get next year’s technology.

The Bug Racer is Mattel's $50 electronic "science" car toy that requires that you fill a sensor cavity with up to six crickets; the toy measures the crickets' movement in the cavity and uses them to guide the car's movements (though the car will reverse when it hits an obstacle, regardless of the crickets' movement). (more…)

Slap Kirk allows you to refresh the captain of the Starship Enterprise until the man comes to his goddamn senses. Warning: loud noises.

Lewisham Police's grim, barrier-squished Christmas tree has been judged the most depressing one in the UK, writes Hannah Al-Othman.Draped with a single string of bland white lights, the tree leans at a odd angle and appears to be imprisoned outside the south London police department.

The European Commission is considering new Internet regulations that would make online services legally liable for their users' bad actions, meaning that services like Youtube, Facebook, and the comments section of your favorite website would have to somehow review everything that users post before making it public, assessing all user-submitted material for its legal compliance with a bewildering array of international guidelines. (more…)

A woman who works for California's Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (they handle prisons and parole and stuff) is under investigation after she was filmed mocking a Muslim man who was praying in a Bay Area park.(more…)

https://vimeo.com/148374388Despite zero indication the people responsible for recent terrorist attacks in Paris and San Bernardino used encryption, the FBI is launching an all-out PR war on crypto.Now, FBI director James Comey is making tech firms that offer end-to-end encryption tools an offer they can't refuse: they should reconsider “their business model,” he said today, and instead adopt encryption techniques that let them intercept communications, and hand them over to law enforcement when asked.(more…)

A mother in northeast France received a text from a phone traced to Syria: “Your son died as a martyr Nov. 13.”(more…)

Facebook CEO Executive Mark Zuckerberg said today that he supports Muslims in America, and around the world.(more…)

Whenever a clueless authority figure who apparently knows nothing about security (like, apparently, FBI director James Comey) calls for a ban on crypto, here's the article you should show them.(more…)

Oh, my heart! An amazing human/primate interaction, caught on video.(more…)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=166&v=78VDqoQdavYThe Ovo-Tech Rz-1 breaks eggs like nobody's business.(more…)

Marina Gorbis, executive director at Institute for the Future where I'm a researcher, is in Washington DC at a U.S. Department of Labor Symposium where they're talking about the on-demand economy and digital platforms for work. As Marina says, "the battles between Uber and taxi companies and the 1099 vs. W-2 debate are just the first signs of the upheaval." Whether it all goes to hell depends on the decisions we make today. In an essay on Medium, Marina talks about how we need to design "a new operating system for work:"

Josh Rosenthal is the cratedigger and DIY musicologist behind such fantastic collections as the Grammy-nominated "He Is My Story: The Sanctified Soul of Arizona Dranes," "Work Hard, Play Hard, Pray Hard : Hard Time, Good Time & End Time Music : 1923-1936," and dozens of other fine releases on his own Tompkins Square Label. Rosenthal recently self-published a combination memoir and musical history, Record Store of the Mind, that tells his own personal story through the lens of the artists he loves and has championed, from 1950s country pioneer Charlie Louvin to Big Star's Alex Chilton to finger-picking folk guitar master John Fahey. It's a wonderful read and a great reminder that no music streaming service could ever replace the magical moment of visiting your local record store and flipping through the bins to uncover the music that moves you. From a KQED profile of Rosenthal:

Phillip Rogaway, an eminent computer scientist and cryptographer at UC Davis, has made a stir in information security circles with a long, thoughtful paper called The Moral Character of Cryptographic Work. (more…)

[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]Countless wannabes are dying to be stars, so perhaps it makes perverse sense that so many stars are sick or dying – at least to judge by this week’s tabloids and celebrity magazines.“Tumor-stricken ‘Top Gun’ hero” Val Kilmer has “three months to live” according to the Globe, which has photos of the 55-year-old actor wearing what appears to be a medical throat tube in his neck.Burt Reynolds suffered a “heart attack drama” according to the National Enquirer, with photos of the Deliverance star sprawled on the floor – though it turns out that he merely stumbled, went straight on with a TV appearance, and it’s merely an unnamed “friend” suggesting that “Burt is a heart attack waiting to happen!”Not to be outdone in the pursuit of medical scoops, the Examiner runs a spread on “Stars Battling Hepatitis,” which is as tasteful and sensitive as you’d imagine.Add singer-actress Cher “dying” in the Globe, Kim Kardashian sharing details of her placenta accreta in People magazine, the Enquirer exposing Ben Affleck allegedly undergoing cosmetic surgery and an eyelid lift, and the Enquirer also recounting how Pope Francis cured a baby girl’s brain tumor with a kiss, and this week’s celebrity magazines are just like reading the American Journal of Medicine (though without the peer review, control testing, or facts.)Speaking of facts, the Enquirer's cover reveals that there are “93 Secret ISIS Cells Here” in America. Not 92 cells. Not 94. Because the Enquirer has counted them. And they are all “ready to kill Americans,” the Enquirer adds helpfully. Consider yourself warned.Fortunately, we have hard-hitting investigative reporters to tell us that Jessica Alba wore it best, prima ballerina Misty Copeland eats Cheez-Its “almost every day,” and that Betsy Brandt carries keys, mascara, Band-Aids and Kleenex in her purse. Why don’t celebrities ever admit to carrying condoms and tampons in their bags? I suspect some selective editing here.And the stars are still like us! Us magazine informs us they mug for selfies, walk their dogs, pick up new appliances, go for rides and cheer for the team. Good to know.Kim Kardashian and her placenta obsess Us and People mags this week. "You can tell that Kim’s very close with her family,” a “Kardashian insider” tells People magazine – the sort of insight you won’t find anywhere else.It’s early December in the real world, but in celebrity magazine world it’s already December 21 – check the dates on every cover – so that explains the end-of-year round-ups. People offers its “25 most intriguing people,” while the Globe gives us its “Most Shocking True Crimes of 2015,” a horror-drenched ten-page extravaganza filled with what passes in the tabloids for seasonal cheer.Onwards and downwards . . .