Following up on their highly successful data-driven charticle about toddlers shooting people to death in America, the Washington Post publishes a new infographic about all the people being shot to death by dogs.(more…)

“Wes Anderson // Centered,” on Vimeo. Music: The New Lobby Boy by Alexandre Desplat. (more…)

The European Parliament has voted to allow the telcos who supply European Internet access to hold their customers to ransom. When Europeans request data from Web sites and services that didn't pay the ransom, EU rules will let telcos slow down the reply, while traffic between bribe-paying customers and Europeans will flow at normal speeds. (more…)

Alewis sends us the Royal Institution's video: "A scene of explosive Halloween mayhem as one Jack-o'Lantern spews molten iron into another filled with gun cotton, all in the name of science."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lebczVnFLTU&ab_channel=willmatherlyFootage of a South Carolina cop picking up and throwing an uncooperative schoolgirl galvanized the internet Monday.Videos, recorded from at least three angles, show an uncooperative student sullenly rooted in her seat as an officer, identified as Deputy Ben Fields, commands her to leave the classroom with him. She ignores him, and after a few rounds of being ignored, he moves to grab her.After she falls to the ground, he drags her, then throws her across the room as a teacher stands nervously to one side.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lebczVnFLTU&ab_channel=willmatherlyRichland County Sheriff's department's Lt. Curtis Wilson told reporters that Fields' actions were under investigation and that he had been placed on administrative leave, wrote Buzzfeed reporters Stephanie McNeal, Claudia Koerner and Tamerra Griffin. "The deputy was called to the classroom after a student was being disruptive and refused to leave after being asked to do so by a teacher and vice principal."Sheriff Leon Lott was “very disturbed” by the video, according to Wilson. The American Civil Liberties Union said there was "no justification" for the incident in a statement to the BBC.Columbia, S.C. Mayor Steve Benjamin issued a statement saying that "we cannot and will not accept this kind of behavior from a law enforcement officer" and called for an independent investigation.https://twitter.com/HIFTBABG/status/658849452552290309Neil Feit of The State reports that a female and a male student were arrested for breaching the peace, but it is not clear if these arrests included the girl in the video.The footage went viral almost immediately after the incident, and the hashtag #AssaultatSpringValleyHigh trending on Twitter.In the hours since the incident, though, Fields' history of alleged violence toward children at the school and other citizens—including an Army veteran—has come under scrutiny.Gawker's Brendan O'Connor reports that he was accused of pushing a pregnant girl against a wall in 2012

VEC9 is the first vector arcade game to be released in 30 years, the only true 3d vector arcade game to be released besides Star Wars -- and the only one to let you smash capitalist aggression for the glory or Mother Russia. (more…)

My friend Kevin Kelly wandered down the Silk Road (the one in China) and took many stupendous photos. He wrote, "Technically this region is called Xinjiang (New Province), also once known as East Turkestan. This area has more in common with the culture of Turkey than with Beijing. It's kebab with chopsticks. But this is really China. In fact it is the largest province of China. I took a bunch of photos and the usual caveat applies: this is a very selective view, and it does not represent the typical scene in the province at all. Like most of China it is rapidly urbanizing. But I think these images capture the spirit of this part of Asia, which once connected east and west."

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

A new study in Current Biology has found an inverse correlation between the volume of howler monkeys' notoriously loud hoots and the size of their testicles. (more…)

Lara writes, "Time traveling gamers, levee-breaking mermaids, and frayed sanity on the first manned mission to Europa. It's all packed between the pages of The Orange Volume. The cohesive Clarion class of 2012 is at it again. Last year they released The Red Volume and raised $1,500 for the Clarion Foundation. This year--just in time for Halloween--they're following up with The Orange Volume." (more…)

I've been known to sport a denim jacket and bluejeans with some regularity, making me the butt of my chums' "Canadian Tuxedo" barbs. Yet I never knew the origin of that phrase until now! Turns out that its origins may go much further back than the 2001 film "Super Troopers" that certainly fueled the phrase's popularity. According to Levi's:

In this video, MonotoneTim converted The Bee Gees' Stayin' Alive to MIDI: the sound of the song, rather than its individual notes.The result, an endless mash of piano noises, eerily and rather unpleasantly replicates everything in the track, right down to Barry Gibb's falsetto vocals. This is described as an "auditory illusion."

Mark Goffeney has more musical talent in his big toe than I do in my entire body. The San Diego musician was born without arms and has studied guitar since he was eleven years old. This short film, "Hands Free," was directed and produced by Ross Harris and Stanley Gonzales.And here is a 2010 profile of Goffeney in Ability magazine: "Armed with Talent"

It's that time of year, again, when eggs are sometimes used in pursuit of fun Halloween shenanigans. So, naturally, their sale is being banned by some grocers and supermarkets. If your supermarket has a sign like this, kids, you know what to do. [via Imgur and everyone on Twitter.]

I would go bonkers trying to play dominoes with these, a perfect gift for the person in your life who has a nice set of dominoes already but would like to have something fancy out.Edge Dominoes are made in the USA, come as a 28-piece set, and are "meticulously crafted from durable aluminum with no material wasted."$74.

https://vimeo.com/channels/staffpicks/142671617"Poetic Fractals," writes Julius Horsthuis. "I use fractals for developing skills – they are exercises in framing, composition, typography, color and style."In this four-minute journey through a computer-generated world, we see landscapes and massive fractal structures that seem eerily reminiscent of abandoned human places.The music is "Reaching Land" by Patrick O'Hearn; the software used to render the world is Mandelbulb3D—available free of charge!

The A3 Aluminum Wallet turns the traditional wallet concept on its head with its unique, futuristic construction. With three aluminum plates sandwiching your cards and cash, and two o-rings securing the structure, this lightweight wallet will keep all your essentials easily accessible. The A3 doesn’t just keep your valuables safe in one easy-to-reach place—but packs a highly portable and stylish design you’ll be proud to pull out!

Alex from Copy-Me writes, "We've just released its fourth episode, called 'Pirates Are The Best Customers' - which talks about piracy and artists." (more…)

Lorq writes, "This brilliant piece of investigative research shines a light on one of the mechanisms of wealth inequality -- the secretive field of wealth management for the one percent. It's one thing to hand-wave vaguely about wealth disparity; it's quite another to become a certified expert in its procedures and institutions and then report back to the rest of us -- which is what Brooke Harrington does here. An audacious study of the enablers of the rich." (more…)

People walk around they don't know what they're doing, they been lost so long they don't know what they've been looking forWell, I know what I'm a looking for but I just can't find it.I guess I gotta look inside of myself some more.

DEA agents descended on Menominee County in Wisconsin last Friday, to destroy what the tribal authorities say was an industrial hemp crop. The DEA says it was “high-grade marijuana,” and they're not apologizing. The chairman of the Menominee Indian Tribe of Wisconsin says the DEA had no right to the cannabis, and the DEA boasts of seizing some 30,000 plants in all.(more…)

https://youtu.be/ibUzDIWhsFgIt's a few years old, actually, but this video of a cute baby owl "dancing" to a fuzzy owl-shaped comforting toy that sings “Monster Mash” is well deserving of a viral revival. (more…)

So glamorous. (more…)

“Edward Snowdenhands, you guys. EDWARD SNOWDENHANDS.” (more…)

A man with physical disabilities was forced to crawled off a plane at Reagan National Airport in Arlington VA, when United Airlines failed to provide him with help disembarking.(more…)

Four women tabletop designers have put together a collection of four short pen and paper roleplaying games for $10—with a portion of the proceeds going to support the cancer treatment of a friend in the RPG community. (more…)

This week, our partnership with Critical Distance brings us the Jonathan Franzen of videogames, "girl gamers", and new books about games!Fusion's Latoya Peterson begins her series "Girl Gamers" by exploring the conditions a person has to meet to earn the label.Writing for The New Republic, Kevin Nguyen argues to grant famed Metal Gear Solid auteur Hideo Kojima the dubious honor of being the Jonathan Franzen of videogames.Teddie at the always-excellent Fem Hype expresses frustration with the limited gender options in most character creation systems. For Teddie, establishing their hero's gender outside the constraints of a binary is necessary to feeling welcome in the experience.

I was ready to love Murder from the moment the game opened on a female police lieutenant waking from a rain-soaked cyberpunk nightmare about murderous robots, and walking out on her balcony to smoke a cigarette over the light-spattered skyscrapers of Future Tokyo. "Yes," I thought, "I'm in." Sadly, I spoke a little too soon.Developed by Peter Moorhead, the creator behind the abandoned astronaut game Stranded, Murder is another brief, point-and-click adventure illustrated with beautiful pixel art. This time around, Moorehead promises players a "short story" that delves into some pretty lofty ideas: "the intersection of morality and sentience, in a future where both are commodities."The moral crux of the story revolves around the sentient service robots of Murder's near-future world, and whether humans can ethically use them for unpaid labor. If that sounds familiar, it should. It's an idea that has been explored rather extensively by some very talented science fiction writers, and even trickled far enough into the mainstream to inspire a Will Smith movie. That doesn't meant there isn't anything left to say about it, only that the notion of robot sentience and the civil rights implications around it aren't exactly fresh ideas, and the mere mention of them is not enough to carry a story, even a short one.https://youtu.be/G-bdQBUfZ3EOstensibly, the game is a murder mystery; as Lieutenant Motomeru Minori, you're tasked with investigating a brutal killing, the latest in a string of mysterious deaths. But "investigate" might be a strong word—you visit one crime scene, exchange a few one-liners with some other cops, and that's about it. I'm not even sure I'd call it a mystery, because there isn't enough time for it feel like one. Instead, the moment you start to get a foothold in the world and the crime you're supposed to solve, you're catapulted immediately to the culprit and the conclusion, leaving you no time to wonder or wander.Relatedly, Murder is only 20 to 30 minutes long, though that's not its real problem. Games don't have to be lengthy in order to be valuable, but whether they're a 20-second experience or an 80-hour one, they do need to be satisfying. What bothered me the most was that there was just enough in Murder to intrigue me, to lure me past the cliches, to get me hyped for a deeper dive into the ideas it teased. But just when it felt like the game was about to begin in earnest, the credits rolled. It's a game that feels like its own prologue, the first chapter in a book that never finishes.It's a lovely game despite it all, so lovely that it almost manages to carry its thin plot on the strength of its striking visuals. But not quite. Although the story draws heavily on the work of cyberpunk visionaries—both Neal Stephenson and Masamune Shirow are cited as inspirations—it remains content to skim a thin layer of familiar tropes off the top of their work and serve them up as an amuse-bouche mislabeled as a main course.If you're a fan of point-and-click adventures and/or cyberpunk, it's still an attractive Venn diagram of the two, albeit a brief and predictable one. It's also only $2.99 on Steam, with iPad and Android versions to follow.

Lego has refused to sell bricks in bulk to Chinese artist Ai Weiwei, lest he use them for political expression.Weiwei, among the country's most famous dissidents, wrote in an Instagram post that he considers the move an act of censorship.

They're terrible, don't buy them.If you own the new 12" Macbook, you have one USB-C port. It's also the power port, which means if you have anything plugged into that port, you're losing battery charge. To both stay plugged-in and operate a USB peripheral—a backup drive, say—you have two choices: an $80 AV adapter from Apple that does things you don't need, or an enticingly cheap $20 third-party dongle that supposedly does.These devices pass power though to the laptop while adding extra USB ports.They even come in a passably-accurate shades of the new gold and space gray colors. Any good? (more…)

This is the best price I've seen for a 15,000mAh battery pack. (Just two years ago I paid $100 for a 6000mAh Mophie Juice Pack Powerstation Duo.)If you use code RJTZMPYG you can get the Kmashi 15,000mAh battery pack for $14 on Amazon. It's got dual ports so you can share its juice with a friend or spouse who isn't as prepared as you.

https://youtu.be/X_cAzTn3c0YHere's a 2009 clip from Dish Network informing anyone watching a special channel that they are a "satellite pirate." It's not too harsh, actually, and Dish quickly goes from scolding "pirates" to pitching them with special offers.

The UK's NHS’s National Institute for Health Research announced it will embark on a 12-year study involving 11,000 patients to study the effects of aspirin on different types of cancer.From Motherboard:

Makeup artist Shonagh Scott photographed herself as dead Disney princesses. See her full Twisted Princess series here.

In August Patrick Quinn, a 27-year-old police officer in a Houston, Texas suburb, pulled over a driver and spotted marijuana paraphernalia in her car. He told her he would not arrest her if she would let him lick her feet or give him her underwear. He is no longer a police officer and was sentenced to a year in jail.

Created by Latvia's Slavatech, these glowing, copper-chased USB drives come in 8/16/32/64GB starting at $39 -- they glow LED blue when plugged in. (via M1k3y)

Dutch designer Etienne Reijnders rescues discarded shopping trolleys made by Wanzl, purveyor of the world's largest trolleys, and remakes them into beautiful, minimalist pieces of mid-century-modern-inflected furniture. (more…)

As part of the launch of Youtube Red, the company's new porny-sounding ad-free pay TV service, top creators are being told that they must allow their work into the paywalled/ad free zone, or be excluded from Youtube altogether. Noncommercial Youtube creators get a choice (for now). Apparently, the punishment for making Youtube into a success is losing the right to choose how to make money off your stuff. (more…)

James Losey's new, open access, peer-reviewed article in the Journal of International Communication analyzes how secret laws underpinning surveillance undermine democratic principles and how transparency from both companies and governments is a critical first step for supporting an informed debate.. (more…)

In Saudi Arabia, drug smugglers are routinely executed. But it's hard to imagine that the Saudi prince, who is being held in Lebanon after officials found two tons of amphetamine stuffed in his private jet bound for Saudi Arabia, will receive any punishment beyond a stern talking to.Image: Shutterstock

Yoga Joes started life as a wonderful, weird Kickstarter to produce a set of nine "Green Army Men" in yoga poses; having raised over $100K in direct sales at $20/set ($10 for military personnel) Brogamats is now selling them in retail channels at a $28 premium, for all nine: "headstand, meditation pose, cobra pose, warrior one, warrior two, child's pose, tree pose, crow pose, and downward-facing dog." (via Canopy)

See more photos at Wink Fun.Funnybone has yet another award-winning strategy game available for your enjoyment – Juxtabo. Much like a colorful, 3D version of dominoes, Juxtabo has simple rules that allow children as young as six years old to play. The strategy encourages development of quick pattern recognition, but also flexibility as you plan, since the “board” changes with every turn. Juxtabo allows up to four players to compete with one another.The playing pieces are two-sided chips, each side a different color, arranged in a 5x5 configuration. Players draw their own chips, as well as pattern cards. Players win pattern cards by creating that pattern on the board with chips in their hand. The catch? To stack a chip on the board, you must match the color facing down on your chip with the color facing up on the “board.” With a timer included, it's a fast-paced mental workout.If the description alone doesn’t intrigue you, Juxtabo is the recipient of the 2015 Academics’ Choice Brain Toy Award (among others). That means this game has been approved by parents, educators, students and children, scientists and artists alike. The game comes highly recommended, of course, but avid puzzlers beware – Juxtabo just may prove addictive!– Chloe QuimbyJuxtabo

Disney Princess Femslash by simonbaz (via BUST)

Former hedge-fund manager Martin Shkreli became a poster child for greed and sleaze when he bought the only company that was tooled up to make an off-patent drug called Daraprim that people with HIV used to control parasitic toxoplasmosis infections and jacked the price from $13.50 per tablet to $750 per tablet. (more…)

Julian Bleeker and his Near Future Laboratory have followed up on their amazing Skymall-of-the-future catalog with an imaginary near-future Ikea catalog that jam an insane amount of witty futuristic speculation into elegantly presented, arresting images. (more…)

"Please advise."A letter sent to Columbia Records art director John Berg and others by Teo Macero, producer of Miles's revolutionary 1970 jazz fusion album. Below, a live performance of the title track "Bitches Brew."(Thanks, Jordan Kurland!)https://youtu.be/YLUJZUKJ1BM

The BBC quoted an anonymous Saudi source who insisted that the arms the country imports en masse from the UK are only funnelled to the good Syrian rebels and not the Al Qaeda affiliated al-Nusra Front. (more…)

If, like me, your attempts to peel potatoes result in a tiny potato cube surrounded by gigantic coiling domes of potato skin, pain, and despair, this tip is for you. The tl;dr: gently score the circumference of the potato with a paring knife, boil it a short while, and the skin will just slip off like two leathery condoms. Delicious! (more…)

If oil stays below $50 a barrel for five years, the Saudis' cash reserve will be exhausted, and with it will also go the social stability that lavish spending for the Saudi elites brings. (more…)

Reversed video of a backwards running competition. (WerkProof)