Here's how the spike trick is supposed to work: a magician shows the spectator a large nail mounted on a block of wood. He sets it on the table so the nail is pointed up. Then he covers the nail with a paper bag. He places three identical paper bags next to the bag covering the nail. He turns his back and asks the spectator to shuffle the four bags around on the table so that the magician has no idea which one has the nail. The magician turns around to face the bags, then slams his hand down one a bag. It was empty. He repeats the process until only one bag is left. He lifts the bag to reveal the nail. It's a nerve-wracking trick.Recently a magician performed the trick and made a bad mistake, driving the nail through his hand. You can see the photos here. Fortunately, he's going to recover.And here's a video from 2007 that captures another magician stabbing himself. It's not too graphic, but it is hard to watch anyway because you know what's coming.I have no interest in performing this trick.

What was once the busiest freight port in the world recently held another freight hauling competition, but with a catch: all the boats were remote-controlled, had to fit in a 2'x2'x2' box, and had to be 3D printed. The Red Hook Regatta was a race to see how many "shipping containers" (actually, brick sized pieces of foam) teams could ferry to "cranes" (guys with fishing poles dangling down from the pier) through the choppy waters of New York Harbor.Steering and propulsion are standardized, so it was a test of ship design, building, piloting, stevedorism, and Poseidon's whims.The event was a collaboration between two Brookyln-based groups - high tech job training Digital Stewards and artists Pioneer Works.More coverage at The Brooklyn Paper, PIX11 News (video), and The New York Times.Image: 3d printed boat, by Creative Tools/3D Benchy

Join LA's best comedy troupe 2Headed Dog next Tuesday night, 8pm, at the Steve Allen theater!Jim Turner, Mark Fite, Dave "Gruber" Allen and Craig Anton put up the most fun show I have seen in years! Individually they are brilliant, accomplished actors, as a team 2Headed Dog is an unstoppable absurdist force.I understand that Jim Turner's Choam Underhill will be making an appearance. I'm certain to attend, as I lack enlightenment.

Mirror Lake will make a procedurally generated bowl for you. Sometimes the bowl is empty, which sounds like a parable, but mostly it is just a bowl. Sometimes it is in space.Click again, and you'll be greeted with another bowl. Other features of its landscape may include: mountains, trees, stones, ponds, birds, comets, planets, stars.Mirror Lake was created by Katie Rose Pipkin for the recent Procedural Generation Jam, which encouraged people to make generative games, tools and art—to "make something that makes something." In this case, hauntingly pretty monochromatic space bowls.Pipkin previously made a bot that creates tweets peppered with tiny star fields, and co-created another bot that draws and names procedurally generated moths.If you want to see Mirror Lake in all its odd glory, trying expanding it to full screen; make sure the sound is up so you can hear the ambient hum. Even the bugs are nice to look at:https://twitter.com/katierosepipkin/status/665146269690667008

What if we could automate the writing of clickbait headlines, thus freeing up clickbait writers to do useful work? That's the question Lars Eidnes wanted to answer when he programmed a recurrent neural network to generate "formulaic and unoriginal" headlines like these:

I loved watching the 1986 comedy TV series "Sledge Hammer!" as a kid. David Rasche's portrayal of San Francisco's most aggressive, least sensitive, and completely absurd police detective, the titular Sledge, is fantastic.(more…)

Dead since Halloween 1926, Harry Houdini just won’t die. That’s a paradox, but the old bastard really won’t go away.The question has always lingered about how much of the myth of Houdini was created and perpetuated by his wife and others after his death, versus how deeply he was actually embedded into American pop culture while he was alive. Yes, he was certainly famous and successful—mostly as an escape artist, less so as a magician. Why is he still stuck so acutely in America’s collective cultural subconscious today?Who knows, and while he has stubbornly refused to show up at the séance held each Halloween on the date of his death, he’s still with us. His ostensibly “lost” film The Grim Game, seen by only a handful of people over the last 75 years, debuted on Turner Movie Classics a month or so ago.I recently attended the 14th Los Angeles Conference on the History of Magic (more about this sooner or later) and met Casey J. Wong, who has the blood of Famous Monsters of Filmland running deeply through his veins. Casey is a makeup artist at Universal Studios Hollywood and, even though he is not a magician, this ongoing odd pop-culture fascination with Houdini grabbed him by the gonads and he spent an enormous amount of time creating what he calls his “artist’s impression” of Houdini at age 52, the year he died. If you can find an unretouched photo of Harry from that period (not easy — he always had his skin smoothed like a newborn), he indeed looks tired as hell, and 10 years older than his age. He was a fearless lunatic who pushed himself to the breaking point, literally to death, because he refused to go to the doctor despite his appendix rupturing.Casey Wong, seen here recreating Wally Westmore’s original makeup for Freddie March in 1931’s Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, presented an interesting talk at the LA Conference on what the lengthy process of recreating his impression of Houdini entailed. The art of special effects makeup is fascinating, and I don’t have to tell you anything more than the fact that every single hair on Houdini’s head was punched in one by one in order for you to get an idea of the amount of time and effort that goes into it. We see it all so often on film and TV that we take it for granted, but the hundreds of hours these specialized makeup artists put into their work is staggering.And so, here is Casey’s marvelous impression of the middle-aged Houdini. You can almost see the old boy thinking, “Oy, when are these people going to let me go already!”

This is apparently a 2500:1 shot of a White-lipped snail, showing its finery in the finest detail. Eye of Science is the source, and offers many more striking examples of nature photography. [via]

In the New Yorker's annual tech issue, Emily Witt profiles the founders of Erowid, "a couple in their mid-forties -- a man and a woman who call themselves Earth and Fire, respectively."

https://youtu.be/-IcULTH0OekVideo from Anonymous tells ISIS "we will lay waste to every digital tool you use to recruit and fight. Governments of the world, if you want to defeat ISIS, all you must do is step aside."

Honestly, some parents. What on Earth were they thinking?The Doctor's real name revealed in 1980 comic book. Credit to u/swanzie for image. [r/doctorwho]

As previously mentioned, the nice folks at Shaken sell subscriptions to monthly cocktail kits, which comprise a selection of rare and delicious ingredients and simple instructions for mixing and varying new and delicious boozy concoctions. (more…)

After my spam hit a point where I couldn't actually download my email faster than it was arriving, I spent a month clicking the unsubscribe links in all the spams in my inbox. Weirdly, it worked. (more…)

This preview of next season's engines reveals categorical differences with the current specifications. (Reddit, amazingly, found the original.)

If you think the recent Steve Jobs movie was oversimplified, wait until you get a load of The Careers of the Founders, a visualization of famous entrepreneurs' hits and misses.

Proposed rules in the Mormon church would deny baptism to the children of gay parents until they are 18 years old, and mandate that they denounce homosexuality in order to receive it.The BBC reports that the plans have triggered a threat of "mass resignations" among less bigoted Mormons.

Robbo writes, "Giapetta's Workshop is a multi-faceted interactive adventure story and hand-crafting jewelry kit, all-in-one, for 8-12 year olds that teaches the fundamentals of coding. They're running a Kickstarter campaign to get everything rolling with the goal of getting 5,000 girls coding in 30 days." (more…)

Read the rest of the Hip Hop Family Tree comics! (more…)

Set the mood with the ilumi A21 Bluetooth Smartbulb, a color-tunable LED light you can control and program wirelessly from your smartphone. Log onto the free app to choose from millions of colors, adjust the brightness of your lighting experience, and explore the library of amazing built-in programs. With a life expectancy of 20 years and five times the energy efficiency of a regular bulb, the A21 will optimize the way you light your life.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b6mlr_MX2VISome of Miller's TIG welding power supplies come intentionally crippled, locking out many useful functions until you buy a $400 SD card. (more…)

The deaths from terrorism are unspeakable tragedies. It goes without saying. But the mortality due to terrorism -- total deaths per capita -- are very low, lower than car-wrecks or traditional murder. Likewise, the costs from terrorism -- damage to physical structures, damage to economies -- are high, but, when you look at the numbers, you find they're just not that high. (more…)

The Arxi collection from Ukrainian designer Konstantin Kofta is a series of bags inspired by the ornaments of Baroque architecture. (more…)

A camping trip went horribly awry. It sounds exactly like a horror movie. This horrible news from CBS19 Anderson County, Texas:

At 1pm PT today (in 5 minutes!) I'll be on a Skillshare Ask Me Anything. As the title suggests, you can ask me anything, but I'll primarily be talking about Arduino and DIY tools and techniques for makers.

https://youtu.be/UFNpMyMNqK0It's part toy, part political cartoon: Indies Alejandro "Aquma" Quan-Madrid and Arjun "Archie" Prakash have created an iOS and Android app that envisions Donald Trump, known immigrant-hater, as a piñata you can whack to produce candy."I'm half Chinese and half Mexican, and I feel like the crazy shit Trump says really demonizes both of my people," Aquma writes to me in an email. "Seeing as how physical Donald Trump piñatas were popular in Mexican communities throughout the country, we wondered why no digital version existed yet. So then we made one."(more…)

For $1.5 million, you can be the proud new owner of Westland, Michigan's Eloise Complex, a building that started in 1839 as a poorhouse and has served as a tuberculosis ward and insane asylum before closing in 1984. During the Great Depression, it had as many as 10,000 residents. Oh, did I mention that it's haunted?The main five-story building is 150,000 square feet wile the site contains a 19th century fire station, decommissioned power plant, and two maintenance building. Bonus, it backs up to an eighteen hole championship golf course!Here's the real estate listing."Own a former mental asylum" (MLive)"Haunted Former Mental Asylum For Sale in Michigan" (Mysterious Universe)

In 2001, the roof of a flaming building fell on volunteer firefighter Patrick Hardison, burning his firefighting mask onto his head. As a result, Hardison, now 41, has spent more than a decade without a face. Now, Hardison has the face of David Rodebaugh, a 26-year-old who died in a bicycling accident and donated much of his body for transplant. Surgeon Eduardo Rodriguez and a team at the New York University Langone Medical Center performed the facial transplant, "the most extensive" in history according to the hospital.Harrison also received a new scalp, ears, ear canals, chin and cheek bones, and Rodebaugh's nose. Previously unable to close his eyes totally, he now has eyelids and also muscles for blinking.New York University paid for the transplant, totaling $850,000 to one million dollars."Biography of a Face" (New York Magazine via CNN)

I'ma stuff my face to a funky beat!

This deforestation machine slices and plucks trees at their base and then wipes off all the branches and foliage in just a few seconds. (Thanks, Dustin Hosteler!)

Metaratr serves up the unlistened-to work of amateur and prospective musicians on Soundcloud. Who knows—maybe you'll be the one to discover the next Justin Bieber!

They're described as "anomalies," reflecting the nature of the non-invasive technology used to try and see into the stone of the Egyptian pyramids.But what exactly do the temperature differences reveal? "Unknown internal structures and cavities", reports CNN: voids that could be hidden chambers within the ancient monuments.

If you're looking to pursue a high-paying, high-reward career in coding, JavaScript is the language to learn. But it takes a lot more than basic coding know-how to rise to the top of the developer food chain. This bundle goes far beyond the basics, diving into popular frameworks, libraries, and strategies for coding efficiently and accurately. It's your career, you decide how you want to live it, and you pay what you want.

A video remix of Flock of Seagulls's I Ran and a whole bunch of NTSC-haloed TV ads, uploaded to youtube by g1MisterBo, The 80s.mp4 features much that is good and very little that is bad about that decade. [via r/videos]Previously:https://vimeo.com/55006097You'll probably be listening to vaporwave all day, now, for which I offer no apology.

Behold the Triple concerto for faucet, water pipes and fiddle, by the Altra Volta String Quartet.Jacek Dzwonowski performs both the traditional instrument and its postmodern counterpart.Here is another example, apparently shot in a Russian dormitory.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Yy831UQ5_w&list=FLkdXNvch1J69QU6jit4Y4gQ&index=74May the plumbing of the former Eastern Bloc never be repaired.

Officers reportedly shot an assault suspect who hindered EMS access to his victim in Minneapolis on Sunday, but many locals are unhappy with the force's version of events.The man was handcuffed at the time he was fired upon, according to eyewitnesses, though police chief Janeé Harteau said Sunday afternoon that the man was not handcuffed when police shot him.The Minneapolis NAACP identified the man as Jamar Clark, whose medical condition is unclear.

Experts knew there was a graveyard under Manchester's Metrolink tramline, but the sheer scale of the excavation—277 unearthed bodies—has made news worldwide.The archeological dig is a prelude to development work to Manchester's transit system, and covers generations of burials in England's third-largest city. Church officials say they are pleased with the sensitivity shown by the project, and that the remains will be relocated.Even so, the bone haul is nothing on the 3,000-corpse plague pit excavated during similar work in London earlier this year.

Going to the cookie exchange? It just got real. Head on over to Copypastry and get your face made into a cookie cutter.

Via Imgur; redditor bloominhell reports that it's the work of Glasgow artist David Shrigley. Previously.

An unarmed North Carolina man was shot dead this weekend by Sheriff’s deputies in Harnett County, who reportedly kicked in his door after misidentifying his home as that of a suspect in another crime.WNCN reports that John Livingston, 33, was shot several times during the incident. Few answers are forthcoming on the circumstances.

Magicpeacelove writes, "Shin Lim, who created the extraordinary card act that took Penn & Teller (and the magic world) by storm has just released another rather stunning card act, this one in tribute to Paris. It looks like CGI but it's not; just beautiful magic done by a young master."

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's Justice and Development party (AKP) won a majority in the parliamentary polls on November 1st, so his party will be in office for four more years. Turkey has been ruled by Erdogan's party since 2002, and newspapers like The New York Times and The Guardian have called him dictator. Recently a Finnish journalist asked Erdogan if he is a dictator. Erdogan replied: "If I was a dictator, you would not be able to ask this question."The dictator won his title with a series of tragedies and absurdities that have negatively impacted many residents of Turkey. Here are a few of them.(more…)

Charles Darwin´s first impressions, when he first saw a carnivorous plant in 1875, were the inspiration for this 1-minute animated video by Francisco Sanchez de Cañete.

The setup is pretty weird: Arnie fell through a dimensional portal behind a Chicago Burger King and found humself in a magical high-fantasy kingdom called Foon, where he has befriended a shape-shifter in the form of a talking badger called Chunt, and a shouty wizard called Usidore. Together, they record a weekly podcast with lovable Foonites, which Arnies uploads through an unreliable wifi signal from the Burger King (Usidore keeps Arnie's laptop charged with lightning spells). (more…)

Have you ever wondered why the Internet is always just a little bit too slow to support the kind of activity you're trying to undertake? My latest Locus column, The Internet Will Always Suck, hypothesizes that whenever the Internet gets a little faster or cheaper, that unlocks a bunch of applications that couldn't gain purchase at the old levels, and they rush in to fill in the new space that's been opened up. The good news is that new ways of connecting with one another are always being opened up. The bad news is that this means that the net will always be more-or-less broken for whatever we depend upon it most. (more…)

Actually it's an Octopus Stinkhorn (Clathrus archeri), a type of fungus. But a girl can dream, can't she?

Apply vibrato, bend a string, fingerpick—Jamstik feels and performs like a normal guitar, but also conveniently connects with all the Apple music apps and software you could ever need. Jamstik is perfect for all-level guitarists, and is ultra-portable to seamlessly fit your lifestyle.