Valhalla! They are coming!

Nathan Peterson built this fantastic "juggling" robot that can be programmed with different juggling patterns and handles five balls."I believe this is the first juggling robot to juggle more than 5 balls," Peterson says. "Yeah it's not toss juggling (into the air), but that would be my next project."Build notes and images on imgur here.Here's his full project page with previous designs.

I've always wanted a Mickey Mouse watch. This model is on sale for $18 on Amazon, and looks better than more expensive ones. Until I can afford this Masonic watch (which David and I have both been coveting for a couple of decades) this will do the job.

Ritual interviewed Bronwyn, the woman behind the [NSFW] Internet K Hole, a "deep and vast collection of found and collected photographs from the late '70s, '80s and early '90s."

The Unexpected Dimension is a 1960 paperback anthology of science fiction short stories by Algis Budrys. It only merits 3 out of 5 stars on Goodreads, and even this 5-star review on Amazon gives me pause: "Budrys is a difficult writer. It usually takes several readings before you can really understand what is going on in his stories." I'll pass, but I give the cover illustration by John Blanchard 5 stars! Check out a few of his other covers here:

Doris Prechel reads Ammi-ditāna's incredibly hot hymn to Ištar in Babylonian (MP3) as transcribed by D. O. Edzard. (more…)

Jason wrote a terrific foreword to my $3 card magic e-book, Trick Decks: How to Hack Playing Cards for Extraordinary Magic, and has kindly given me permission to reprint it here. Jason was instrumental in rekindling my interested in magic, so I was thrilled to have him write it. Thank you, Jason!

I'm not as much of an ukulele fanatic as I once was, but when my daughter and I were in Little Tokyo on Saturday and came across U-Space, a store that sells ukuleles and espresso, I had to check it out.The store has a large wall of ukuleles in all the sizes, from the itty bitty sopranos all the way up to the baritones (which are typically tuned like the four high strings on a guitar). U-Space has tables and comfy couches for drinking coffee and listening to ukulele music. There's also a counter with a couple of inexpensive ukes and instructions with simple chords so that everyone who comes in can have fun playing.The proprietor, Jason Arimoto, is a very friendly guy. We had a nice chat and I asked him if I could take his photo. He was happy to oblige. He was holding a newly-released clear plastic ukulele, which cost $50 and sounds great. The non-clear plastic ukes sell for $40. These plastic models would make excellent starter ukes. Jason said they are modeled after the plastic ukulele that Arthur Godfrey pitched on TV in the 1950s, selling millions and millions of them. I was very tempted to buy the clear one, but I have enough ukuleles at home that don't get played as it is. Instead, I ordered an espresso, and Jason pulled a perfect double shot for me.Check out the U-Space website. Besides selling ukes and coffee, they also have performances and teach ukulele lessons there. The address is 244 South San Pedro Street, Los Angeles 90012. Phone: (323) 577-5567

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DyKI6UgI1JkI tried betel nut in Singapore many years ago from an old guy in a market off Bencoolen street. He gave me a packet with some leaves, some of the nut, and some lime (calcium carbonate). I didn't feel its purported stimulant effects, but I enjoyed preparing the quid and the way my saliva turned red.Betelnut is popular throughout Asia. Oddity Central has a short item with photos about Taiwan's betel-nut kiosks and the woman work in them:

Choi + Shine, an architecture firm, has proposed modifying Iceland's existing power-transmission pylons to turn them into looming giants whose arms are poised to reflect their positions -- pylons ascending a hill will be posed as though they were scaling its slopes. (more…)

BGI, the genomics institute in Shenzhen credited with a number of breakthroughs in genomic sequencing, is applying its expertise on making tiny pigs for pets. According to Nature.com the pigs will weigh about 15 kilograms when they mature.

Sandra Mills of Spokane, Washington claims this photo depicts infamous outlaw Jesse James and Robert Ford, a member of James's gang who shot him in 1892 to score a $10,000 bounty. "This photo was taken when the two men trusted each other and the younger Robert Ford wanted a picture of himself with the man who had become a legend in his own time," says Houston Police Department Lois Gibson, who compared the photo to others of both men.Mills says that generations ago, her family welcomed the James Gang into their home when they were on the run. She received it from her grandmother in 2003 who encouraged her to sell it and buy property. She tried but nobody would bite."I'm just a farm girl, so nobody wanted to listen," Mills says. "We got no respect from anybody."(CNN)

A 23-year-old man was arrested in Cambridge, England for stealing a £23.78 engineering magnet after he went into a police station to complain that a wanted poster with his photo on it was embarrassing.

George Osborne, born to a titled millionaire, has explained that he is cutting the tax-credits that let the working poor survive, despite the Tory party's election promise not to do any such thing -- because it will reduce the deficit and therefore save them from the cuts that the country would have to pay in the future in order to pay down those debts. (more…)

SitePoint Premium is the ultimate e-learning library for web developers, designers, and digital professionals. Famous for their web development books written by industry leaders, they’ve expanded their content library to include in-depth video courses and short, handy screencasts partnering with A Book Apart and UX Mastery. Whatever you want to achieve in your web career, SitePoint Premium has the content to get you there.

Sir Simon McDonald, Permanent Secretary at the Foreign Office -- the country's most senior Foreign Office official -- told MPs that his department had sidelined human rights work in favour of global trade agreements (the same agreements that allow sovereign wealth funds from the world's most brutal, oppressive states to buy huge swathes of the UK's public institutions at knock-down prices in the Tories' great sell-off of public assets). (more…)

In 1948, the Institute of Applied Science commissioned an unknown illustrator to depict a fistful of squirming, terrified criminals caught in an authoritative fist, under the headline "CAUGHT BY THEIR FINGERTIPS" -- they were advertising a home Criminal Investigation and Identification course. (more…)

Congratulations to Boing Boing reader MarieFury who won our annual Treasure Island Music Festival haiku contest!On October 17-18, MarieFury will groove to The National, deadmau5, FKA Twigs, The War On Drugs, Chvrches, Father John Misty, Lower Dens, Jose Gonzalez, and more than a dozen other acts performing on Treasure Island in the San Francisco Bay.MarieFury scored a pair of VIP 2-Day Tickets (a $630 value), provided by our pals at Noise Pop, co-promoters of the festival with Another Planet Entertainment. Congrats MarieFury and thank you to everyone who entered! A limited number of tickets are still available for purchase here.And here's MarieFury's winning haiku:

On Friday, a visibly upset President Obama addressed the nation after yet another mass shooting.A young gunman killed his English professor and eight others at an Oregon community college, then committed suicide after a shootout with police who arrived within five minutes, and exchanged fire almost immediately. (more…)

Skip the technical jargon and get right to taking amazing, professional-quality photos with this complete training. The Hollywood Art Institute Photography Course includes 22 modules filled with tutorials on how to profit off of your photography, or simply capture your memories in the manner they deserve.Accredited by the Photography Education Accreditation Council

My daughter loves Minions and she loves Star Wars. It is no surprise she insisted on having these figures.At $33 shipped, this is the cheapest set I could find. It appears there are a bunch of knock-offs available on the interwebs. If you want a collectable set, I am fairly sure these are not they.4PCS Minions Star Wars Despicable Me Darth Vader Maul Trooper Cos Action Figure Toys via Amazon

See sample pages from this book at Wink.I love arcades, I love board games, I love pixel art. And Kemble's Cascade ties them all together beautifully with a unique game mechanic that simulates a scrolling video game playfield. Everything in the box is made with a love for classic games and it shows. From the Manual, to the Player Cards, to the fake wear of the Box, to the variety of enemies. Kemble's Cascade was my surprise board game discovery of the summer. If you die, you can just insert another quarter and play some more.The playfield is constructed from cards placed in a set of expandable, plastic troughs. Some of the cards are blank, others contain threats: asteroids, black holes, aliens. Each player gets glory points for destroying the threats on screen, and at the end of each round the board "scrolls" downward. All of the cards slide down (in their well-designed troughs). The bottom set of tiles are removed (along with any players on it) and a new set of tiles and enemies are put at the top.This game has everything a modern gamer would expect, but in board game format:• Achievements: just as in all modern video games, you can earn extra points by completing specific tasks you are assigned (destroy X asteroids, scroll off the board, upgrade weapons, etc.).• 16 Bit Pixel Art: The art feels like it was taken from an unreleased Wing Commander seuqel.• Scrolling: The scrolling gameplay mechanic really shines in the boss battle at the end, when the scrolling game field is no longer refreshed, making the game board small and smaller with each round.• Power Ups: You need to pick your Ship Upgrades: better weapons, better shields, better engines? The choice is yours.• Energy Balance: Each round, you can decide to move and/or fire, which uses more energy, or you may opt to power down, which restores your energy and allows you to upgrade your weapons and defense.• Boss Fights: Enemies fire automatically on their turn. Some of the bosses are multiple cards long and require several hits to take down.• The game features a unique mix of Co-Op and PVP moments: to defeat the bigger enemies you will need to cooperate, but you also want to take out your fellow players to make sure you keep your name on the high score board.– John E. WilliamsonKemble's Cascade

We've seen Disney princesses reinterpreted as men, as minions, and even as velociprators, but this—this is something different altogether.[Lucky Peach]

Lessig raised $1M for his amazing, unprecedented presidential bid, where he promises that, if he wins, he'll immediately pass campaign finance reform and then resign, handing over the presidency to his running-mate. (more…)

One of Princess Leia's slave bikinis she actually wore in Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi sold for $96,000 at auction yesterday. No news on who bought it. The costume came complete with the collar and several links in the chain Leia used to strangle Jabba the Hutt. A 16" model of Leia's Blockade Runner seen in Star Wars: Episode IV A New Hope went for $450,000, the highest auction price ever for Star Wars memorabilia ever.Other items sold in the same Profiles In History auction include one of Indiana Jones's bull whips ($204,000) and George Reeves's Superman costume from the 1950s TV series ($216,000).(Reuters)

Larkin Jones is a hardcore Pokemon fan who loses money every year on his annual Pokemon PAX party; he makes up the shortfall from his wages managing a cafe. This year, Pokémon Company International sued him and told him that even though he'd cancelled this year's party, they'd take everything he had unless he paid them $5,400 in a lump sum (they wouldn't let him pay it in installments). (more…)

After sending the sex-video to his entire contact list, Republican Indiana Rep Jud McMillin sent out a mass-text saying that his phone was stolen in Canada and had only just been returned; he asked recipients to "please disregard any messages you received recently. I am truly sorry for anything offensive you may have received." (more…)

Mayor Anthony R. Silva was on his way back from a mayor's conference in China when the DHS border guards confiscated his laptop and phones and detained him, telling him he would not be allowed to leave until he gave them his passwords. He has still not had his devices returned. (more…)

When your scorn cannot be contained in the anatomy of a bilaterally symmetrical life-form. Baffle your enemies! Win the admiration of your friends! Improve your manual dexterity! (via Super Punch)

Space fans, rejoice: today, just about every image captured by Apollo astronauts on lunar missions is now on the Project Apollo Archive Flickr account. There are some 8,400 photographs in all at a resolution of 1800 dpi, and they're sorted by the roll of film they were on. (more…)

Sam writes, "I've been releasing a lot of graphic design resources, turning the plants and animals I see into colour palettes and web or print design textures. (Disclaimer: no animals were harmed in the making of these pixels. I ate some of the plants afterwards. They were tasty.) (more…)

Peter from the National Coalition Against Censorship writes, "Some say book banning isn't even a problem anymore, so we should ditch Banned Books Week altogether. That's a terrible idea." (more…)

Kate in Dorchester, England makes gorgeous brass wrist-cuffs decorated with vintage literary, cartographic and scientific imagery: there's Poe's Raven; the periodic table; anatomical dentistry drawings; Newton's laws of motion; the human spine; a map of the Thames and the Tower of London; a tape-measure; the human foot's bones; and headlines from Jack the Ripper's killings and much, much more. (more…)

The PocketLab is billed as a "Swiss Army Knife of science." Launched via Kickstarter, the small device contains numerous sensors to measure acceleration, force, angular velocity, magnetic field, pressure, altitude, and temperature and send that data to smartphones or laptops. According to inventor Clifton Roozeboom, it's a tool for students and citizen scientists who can't afford to spend tens of thousands of dollars on lab equipment and will get the data they need from this $100 gadget. From IEEE Spectrum:

Louann Clem of Trenton, New Jersey, is suing her and her husband Rich's former employee, Case Pork Roll Co., claiming that he was fired for farting too much. Both the Clems complained to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), but her case was dismissed so she decided to sue while her husband's EEOC complaint is pending. According to the suit, Rich Clem had gastric bypass surgery that led to “extreme gas and uncontrollable diarrhea.” That was when the owner of the company, Thomas Dolan, began harassing them, she says. Some of Dolan's alleged comments that Louiann Clem references in the lawsuit:

Someone just pointed me to this hentai/manga porn for sale on Amazon, entitled Boing Boing.Boing Boing is a great name for a creative project!Boing Boing by Yamatogawa via Amazon.

You know, every once in a while you run into a real gem on Amazon. A self-published work by an “outsider” author who must also function as their own publisher. When you find a gem like that, you drop to your damn knees and thank Jeff Bezos for creating a space where this sort of thing can happen.It happens in this synopsis of a book published by P. Arden Corbin of Topeka, Kansas.Here is his own synopsis of his self-published novel, “Unanswered Letters,”

Ah, the comforts of home. The New York Jets football team landed in London today with their usual equipment, plus 350 rolls of good ol' 'Murican toilet paper. Apparently the toilet paper in London is too thin for them. "Some may say that’s a little over the top or whatnot, but it didn’t really cost that much, so why not?” Aaron Degerness, the team's operations manager told the New York Times. “We’re basically trying to replicate everything that we’re doing here over there.”

My latest Guardian column, "Why is it so hard to convince people to care about privacy," argues that the hard part of the privacy wars (getting people to care about privacy) is behind us, because bad privacy regulation and practices are producing wave after wave of people who really want to protect their privacy. (more…)

That weird meeting between presidential candidate Donald Trump and a number of so-called Prosperity Gospel evangelists sounds weirder the more we learn about who was there, and what they actually say they believe. (more…)

It'll go from 20 years from publication to 70 years after the photographer's death, and it's retroactive, meaning that millions of presently public domain photos reproduced online and in books will suddenly become copyright violations with gigantic penalties for all concerned. (more…)

The recent revival of all things '80s has spurred a newfound appreciation for the decade's signature sound, which was largely produced by the synthesizer. Until the late 1970s, synthesizers had been finicky and difficult instruments to play, but the Prophet-5 in 1978 and the Oberheim OB-Xa two years later changed all that. For example, the pop-synth riffs on Cars hits like "Let's Go" were produced by the Prophet-5, while everyone from Prince ("1999") to Eddie Van Halen ("Jump") ran their fingers across Oberheim keyboards.To learn more about these instruments, I visited Lance Hill at his Vintage Synthesizer Museum in Oakland, California, and interviewed Dave Smith, who not only gave the world the Prophet-5 but also co-created MIDI, a file protocol that's so durable, it's been in 1.0 since its release in 1982.

With this year's "ag-gag" law, Wyoming has made it a crime to gather evidence of agricultural wrongdoing, from illegal pollution to animal cruelty, even from public land -- and also prohibits regulators from acting on information gathered in violation of the law. (more…)

As I continue to search for a Halloween costume, I thought the kids might be more familiar with a Minecraft creeper!A couple years back, Cory shared this DIY creeper costume. I don't have that level of commitment, but for $13 this might be a lot easier to wear than the Stay Puft Marshmallow man I've been considering.My daughter finds minecraft a bit tough, I'm told its the version she is playing and I we should try another. I wonder if she'll enjoy this...Minecraft Box Heads, Creeper via Amazon

From 1920 to 1933, the only way to drink whiskey in America was to get a doctor's prescription, which would be pasted on the bottle (max one bottle/person/week) -- much like the "medical marijuana" of today. (more…)

Gus writes, "When we created The Media Show (previously) decided the best way to teach about digital and media literacy was to answer the questions people were already asking Google, we didn't anticipate how bizarre some of the questions would be." (more…)

Volkswagen's cars didn't have a fault in their diesel motors -- they were designed to lie to regulators, and that matters, because regulation is based on the idea that people lie, but things tell the truth. (more…)

The European Commission is probing whether Samsung televisions' sensed when they were being tested for energy efficiency and changed their power consumption to get better ratings than they deserved. (more…)

The winner of our annual Treasure Island Music Festival haiku ticket contest will see The National, Deadmau5, FKA Twigs, The War On Drugs, Chvrches, Father John Misty, Lower Dens, Jose Gonzalez, and many more artists at our favorite musical extravaganza taking place October 17 and 18 on the San Francisco Bay. As you'll recall, our friends at Noise Pop, co-promoters of the event with Another Planet Entertainment, gifted us a pair of VIP 2-Day Tickets (a $630 value) to share with a lucky Boing Boing reader! Last week, we launched our annual Treasure Island Music Festival Haiku contest, and now we reveal the finalists! The three happy mutants below all win Boing Boing t-shirts. We'll announce the winner of the VIP passes on Monday, October 5. Congratulations to these Haiku masters!And if you'd like to purchase tickets to Treasure Island Music Festival, click right here.Now then, here are our finalists: