With The Watchmen now on teevee, I hope that many more people will dive into the magickal brilliance of Alan Moore who co-created the original comic in 1987 along with other seminal works like V for Vendetta and Batman: The Killing Joke. Over at the Daily Grail, Greg points us to a fantastic web video series of 5-minute mind grenades with Moore. Below are two of my favorite segments in the 8-part series, titled "Inside Alan Moore's Head." You can also view them on YouTube.image: Fimb (CC BY 2.0) Read the rest

The New York Times has received a 403-page leak of internal Chinese state documents related to the ethnic cleansing effort in Xinjiang province, which has seen the creation of more than 500 concentration camps where Uyghurs, Kazakhs, and other predominantly Muslim ethnic minorities have been subjected to torture, rape and medical experimentation.Though it's not clear where the leaks originate from, the Times speculates that they were released by Chinese officials who are upset with the authoritarian measures and attendant human-rights abuses. The contents of the leaks support this theory, as much of the material deals with the microeconomics of the regional Chinese officials who implemented the ethnic cleansing program. The story begins with a wave of terrorist attacks in the region in 2014, most notably a train-station stabbing attack with more than 150 victims. This prompted an internal hard-line speech from president-for-life Xi Xinping, who argued that a virus-like contagion of Islamic extremism had infected people from the region. Xi argued that China should learn from the American hard line on terrorism and use the "organs of dictatorship" to root out Islamism, showing "absolutely no mercy."Xi compared the political currents in the region to the independence movements in the outlying regions of the USSR in its last days, when "ideological laxity" and "spineless leadership" allowed the Soviet empire to be shattered. In 2016, Xi's vision was supercharged by a change in regional government, when Chen Quanguo was put in charge of Xinjiang; Chen had previously been the hard-line official in charge of Tibet, and had been responsible for the systematic human rights abuses there. Read the rest

An anonymous source claiming to be an Iraqi patriot sent The Intercept leaks of 900 pages' worth of spy-agency cables and memos sent by Iranian spies in Iraq; James Risen (previously) reported them out in a joint project with the New York Times that reveals how the US's post-invasion nation-building failures created a political vacuum that Iran filled, allowing it to dominate the political and tactical landscape in Iraq.The leaks include a lot of juicy spy stuff -- skullduggery, spycraft and thrilling escapes -- but the main thrust of them is to show just how deeply embedded Iranian partisans are within the Iraqi state at the highest levels (and throughout the government at all levels), and how Iranian spy agencies have turned CIA informants into double agents, gaining the upper hand in the region (though that's changing somewhat as protests in southern Iraq have targeted political parties and institutions that are friendly to Iran).The leaks also reveal how the US's chaotic failures in their post-invasion "nation building" exercises created the conditions for Iranian dominance over Iraqi politics. From "de-Baathification" that saw anyone who held any role in the Saddam Hussein stripped of their jobs (but not their guns!) after the invasion -- a purge that included even the most petty of "officials" such as schoolteachers -- to the string of grifty Beltway Bandits who were contracted with to deliver key initiatives but instead disappeared, leaving nothing behind but inflated cost-plus invoices.In addition to shedding light on the way that other major powers reacted to the US failures in post-invasion Iraq, the leaks also provide a rare insight into the ultra-secretive Iranian intelligence apparatus, which has not suffered major breaches of this sort. Read the rest

Some vegans have filed a lawsuit against Burger King because they cook the Impossible Burger Whoppers on the same grill as their meat burgers. According to the suit, the Impossible Whopper is not a vegan option and the restaurant doesn't disclose the meat contamination on their menu. Of course, vegans and vegetarians have been quite vocal about this issue since the Impossible Whopper's introduction.According to TMZ, plaintiff Philip Williams "not only wants damages ... he wants the judge to order Burger King to stop cooking Impossible Burgers and the OG burgers on the same grill. Read the rest

This is the third time this season that Red Bull Racing broke the pit stop record, this time with a 1.82 second servicing of Max Verstappen's car during yesterday's Formula 1 Brazilian Grand Prix. I hope robots never take their jobs. Read the rest

Via LAD Bible Read the rest

"I have had it with these motherfucking Sith on this motherfucking train!" --GPS1138, Video Game EnthusiastStar Wars Jedi Fallen Order is the best Star Wars game I've played since Knights of the Old Republic, which is one of the best video games of all time.I did not want to buy Fallen Order. I figured that much like all the other bullshit EA opportunities to rake in cash from Star Wars fans, this game would probably suck. The trailers tempted me but the game's protagonist was yet another whiny appearing young white male with resting Sith face.Day one and two reviews were so strong I found myself watching others play on Twitch and quickly realized I wanted to play through this adventure myself. I bought the game.Meet Cal Kestis, a young man who was formerly a Jedi Padawan. Having survived Order 66, Cal starts the game with all the cringe-inducing drama and angst of a Star Wars Jedi trainee. Cal is trying to keep his force powers hidden but must use them to save a pal, thus ensuring the Inquisitors immediately arrive and he must run.BD-1 rapidly becomes Cal's droid pal and is the most useful and fun droid in a Star Wars game yet. I feel obligated to say BD BD BD often. Cere, Greez and number of other characters aid you on your mission to do what most every single non-Skywalker Star Wars story has seemed to invovle for ages: Jedi babies.THERE WAS A LASAT JEDI MASTER! Read the rest

Pablo Rochat tweeted: "I made life-size AirPod stickers and stuck them on the ground, all over the city 🤡"pic.twitter.com/d6CncPEPlI— Pablo Rochat (@PabloRochat) November 17, 2019 Read the rest

Jim Browning runs a YouTube channel dedicated to busting fake PC support scam centers. In this episode Browning shows how he and a partner managed to bring down a call center in Dehli. Read the rest

Way to go, Chicago! When you want something, make it happen! Read the rest

I mean, it’s fascinating, but it doesn’t make me loath sprinting to make my connecting flight any less. Image via Wikipedia Read the rest

Shown here is the sixteenth version of "Softbody Tetris" (also an entire genre) by C4D4U, a depiction of falling blocks made of gummi candy. It's necessary to use a powerful computer to simulate this because otherwise the tetronimoes would be eaten before settling into place.It makes me happy to create such stuff. It makes a lot of fun.ASMR for my eyes ;)I love the original Tetris game.And I love Jelly 😋 Read the rest

If it's shaped like a golden sponge snack cake, and tastes like a golden sponge snack cake, it must be a golden sponge snack cake, right? Well, not this time. Post Consumer Brands and Hostess have just announced they are introducing a frickin' Twinkies cereal to grocery stores in December. From the press release:Twinkies Cereal replicates the distinctive taste and familiar oblong shape of the golden-colored snack cake, delivering delightful sweetness in every bite..."In developing a cereal version of the iconic Twinkies, our top priority was focused on delivering the great Twinkies flavor in each bite," said Josh Jans, Brand Manager of Cereal Partnerships at Post Consumer Brands. "Knowing that taste remains the No. 1 purchase driver of cereal, we conducted multiple consumer tests, and the new Twinkies Cereal delivered. We think fans will find that it not only tastes great with milk but also outside the bowl."What did we do to deserve this?!(Neatorama)images via Post Hostess Twinkies/CNBC Read the rest

Seems like no matter what kind of wireless earbud you buy, you're sacrificing something: Sound for longevity, battery life for durability, the list goes on.Finally, it seems like the tech is starting to come together for the full package in a few newer models. Case in point: These PaMu Slide Bluetooth 5 In-Ear Headphones.If you couldn't tell from the looks, these are definite ear-huggers, with a design that ensures they won't fall out no matter how intense the workout gets. And they're rated IPX6 for water-resistance, which means the sweat won't slow them down.As for the sound, the highs and lows are well-balanced, bolstered by the solid 5.0 Bluetooth connectivity. Best of all, the battery life is long enough to outlast any workout and a marathon to boot: You've got 10 hours just on the earbuds alone, and that goes up to 60 hours if you use the accompanying wireless charger.They're already on sale for almost half off the original list price of $199.00, and you can take an extra 15% off by using the online code BFSAVE15, bringing the final price down to $84.99. Read the rest

This promotional video promotes a car door that slides under the car instead of opening outwards. The terribleness of the idea wedded to the "upper middle-class England in the 1980s" marketing gives it an almost vicious quality, as if intentionally mocking the unmoored techno-meritocratic fantasies of the Thatcher era. The car of Hyacinth Bucket's dreams.The design saw mass-production with the BMW Z1 coupe, however, and was apparently mechanically reliable enough. It appears the licensor's website at disappearing-car-door.com is now dead. Read the rest

On October 1, Minnesota Public Radio's Cody Nelson published a really important story about student debt; on October 4, I summarized the article and linked to it here, crediting Nelson and MPR.

The Art Nouveau movement was started in response to a rapidly-changing -- and in the eyes of artists, ugly -- world. So it makes sense that the San Francisco artists designing rock posters, album covers, and the like in the 1960s would crib Art Nouveau's distinct style. They were responding to their own rapidly-changing, and ugly, world. While these free-spirited designers took heavy inspiration from Art Nouveau, they made their art their own by popping the colors to be vibrant and high-contrast, according to this Vox video.(Nag on the Lake) Read the rest

Brilliant fun from Kevin Tenglin and Erik Kissack featuring Nick Offernan as a narrator with entirely too much influence over proceedings and Shawn Parsons as a hapless gunslinger. A 16:9 version is on YouTube.Filmmaker Eric Kissack tells the story of a lone gunslinger who walks into a saloon and begins to hear a voice -- the all-knowing narrator.In a small town in the Old West, a weary man enters the room. Suddenly, an omniscient voice begins to narrate the scene, revealing who the gunslinger is and what he's about to do.But the characters in the film can hear the voice, too.The narrator quickly divulges the deepest, darkest secrets of the people in the saloon. As the story unfolds, it becomes clear that the narrator wants nothing more than to see a "ballet of death."Featuring the mellifluous voice of comedian Nick Offerman. Read the rest

If you're doing any kind of data work, chances are you're working in Excel. This venerable platform has evolved beyond its roots as a workhorse spreadsheet creator into an essential tool for data analysts and other high-level number crunchers.Want to brush up on this year's version of the software? There's no quicker way than the Complete Microsoft Excel 2019 MOS Certification Exam Training Bundle.That "MOS" stands for Microsoft Office Specialist, and it's a definite standout on any resume. This 3-course bundle ensures that you'll qualify for that title in no time with plenty of hands-on preparation exercises.Beginner, intermediate and advanced courses cover all functionalities in both Excel 2019 and Excel 365. You'll go from making basic worksheet calculations to crafting complex macros in no time. By the end, you'll be any company's go-to troubleshooter for data management on one of the most widely-used platforms in the Microsoft arsenal.You can pick up all three courses now for only $25. Read the rest

Extinction Rebellion's Sinking House is a protest art-installation in the form of a suburban house drowning in the Thames. They launched it early last Sunday.The artists behind the work are Katey Burak and Rob Higgs. Scientific predictions of rising sea levels by 2100 range from less than 1 metre to as high as 5. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) suggest a rise of less than 2 metres, but past assessments have almost always underestimated the pace of climate change. The rate of melting Greenland ice sheets recorded this summer was not predicted until 2070. At its peak, this ice was melting at a rate of 140,000 tonnes per second – a total figure equivalent to 200 river Thames.When asked for his own opinion, Professor Harrison added: “My prediction is that IPCC has probably underestimated the ice sheet response and the likely rate of future sea level rise”.Katey Burak and Rob Higgs, who built ‘The Sinking House’ commented: “Sadly, climate-change is something that affects every one of us. We want to respectfully raise awareness of the severity of the impending human-made disaster. We need urgent action to address the Climate Emergency and devastation of our beautiful and precious natural world, which is being decimated at an unprecedented and tragic rate. We implore the government to act responsibly and we will continue to make our voices heard until they act.”“When I hear the facts about climate change my brain can scarcely comprehend them, they are vast and scary. Read the rest

Last June, an independent tribunal concluded that the Chinese state was nonconsensually harvesting organs from prisoners despite promises that the practice had ended in 2014.Now, a new report in BMC Medical Ethics Journal has affirmed the tribunal's conclusion, concluding that the official accounts of organ transplants in China contain a "systematic falsification and manipulation of official organ transplant datasets."The BMC researchers examined the official data and found obvious signs that it had been manipulated to hide wrongdoing -- the data was too tidy and lacked the outliers that indicate that it came from real-world activity.The conclusion was upheld by the esteemed public health statistician David Spiegelhalter (previously).The Chinese government disputes the finding. The income from organlegging to the Chinese state is estimated at $1b/year.Sources behind the forensic data analysis deployed by the report’s authors included the China Organ Transplant Response System (COTRS) and the Red Cross Society of China. Data that found mathematical patterns that defy expected statistical anomalies. In others words, the official China reports emanate from a PR spreadsheet and not from any kind of genuine on the ground analysis and genuine data.Susie Hughes from the International Coalition to End Transplant Abuse in China (ETAC) welcomed the findings, warning that the report “exposes the lies and deception that mark China’s so-called transplant ‘reforms.’ The falsification of the China Organ Transplant Response System (COTRS) data appears to be part of an elaborate coverup that disguises the state-run mass murder of innocent people for their organs in China.”China Killing Prisoners To Harvest Organs For Transplant: New Report Exposes Cover-Up [Zak Doffman/Forbes](via /. Read the rest

Last week, the National Center for Transgender Equality discharged all employees in a bargaining unit organized under the Nonprofit Professional Employees Union (NPEU); the employees were seeking recognition of a union.The NPEU has filed an unfair labor practice charge against the NCTE, alleging that NCTE drew out the union recognition process, and that these delays became untenable in August when management unjustly fired a person of color from the organization, prompting a walkout. After this, the workers say, the workplace became increasingly hostile, with union-affiliated workers facing pressure to quit.NPEU condemns the actions of NCTE leadership. By busting their staff’s union and retaliating against collective action, they have done a disservice to their organization’s own mission. According to NCTE’s own research, transgender people often lack legal protections in the workplace, which leads to high levels of unemployment and poverty. Moreover, one in six transgender workers have lost a job due to discrimination. By failing to recognize NCTE’s staff union and pushing the majority of the employees out of the organization, NCTE has not only taken away the staff’s livelihood, but has hurt the movement for transgender equality. Ironically, organizing a union and negotiating a contract that prohibits discrimination based on gender identity is the only way for transgender workers to have explicit legal protections in the workplace in over half the country.Nonprofit Professional Employees Union Files Unfair Labor Practice Against National Center for Transgender Equality Leadership For Retaliation Against Staff Organizing [Nonprofit Professional Employees Union](Thanks, Kathy Padilla! Read the rest

It started innocently enough. A single dollar bill was pinned to the ceiling of a tiki bar in California — with a tiny paper umbrella, no less. That lone bill soon inspired many more.For over 10 years now, patrons of Forbidden Island, a popular tiki lounge in the island city of Alameda, have been leaving legal tender suspended above their rum-filled cocktails. Using their drink's umbrellas, or swizzle sticks, the bar's customers stick the cash up, but not before they decorate it in some way. Some pen their name and the date, while others get more elaborate and make their offering a rectangular piece of art.It's become such a popular pastime, the bar keeps a bucket of markers and unused umbrellas for those who want to leave their mark.But it recently got out of control, at least in the eyes of my pal Michael Thanos, the bar's owner. He invited me down to get the whole story."There was simply no more room to put the money in the ceiling," Thanos told me. "So people started sticking money all over the place," motioning to the Lauhala-matted walls and tapa-covered light fixtures."It was just too much."Before (photo by Alex T./Yelp) and during (photo by Michael Thanos)So, in October, he and his staff spent an entire day carefully pulling the cash off of everything. It was a bigger job than they had first realized. As it neared opening time, they had to stuff the cash in four big garbage bags to deal with at later time. Read the rest

Rembrandt's Portrait of Jacob de Gheyn III has been stolen from the Dulwich Picture Gallery in London four times:Between 14 August 1981 and 3 September 1981 the painting was taken from Dulwich Picture Gallery and retrieved when police arrested four men in a taxi who had the painting with them. A little under two years later a burglar smashed a skylight and descended through it into the art gallery, using a crowbar to remove the painting from the wall. The police arrived within three minutes but were too late to apprehend the thief. The painting was missing for three years, eventually being found on 8 October 1986 in a luggage rack at the train station of a British army garrison in Münster, Germany.The other two times, the painting was found once underneath a bench in a graveyard in Streatham, and once on the back of a bicycle. Each time the painting has been returned anonymously with more than one person being charged for its disappearance.The gallery is currently promoting an exhibit called Rembrandt's Light, which just earned a lot of free publicity:On Wednesday, police thwarted an attempted robbery at the gallery:An intruder appears to have forced entry to the gallery and removed the two paintings, which were part of an exhibition.Officers arrived minutes later and, following the search of the area, challenged an intruder and an officer gave chase.The intruder then turned and used a canister to spray the officer in the face with an unknown substance. Read the rest

Does your computer gear need an upgrade? Don't cross your fingers and wait for Christmas. You can get 15% off the final sale price of all these essential accessories now by using the online code BFSAVE15, including gaming mice and computer desks.Wireless Charging Mouse PadTalk about a space saver. This high-quality mouse pad doubles as a wireless charger, and even works on phones without a Qi receiver.MSRP: $25.99Sale Price: $16.99With Code BFSAVE15: $14.44Offex Overlord 45" Wide PC Gamer Computer DeskWith two USB charging ports, a cable manager and headphone hook, this desk is sure to be command central for all your marathon raids. And yes, it's even got a cup holder.MSRP: $316.00Sale Price: $239.99With Code BFSAVE15: $203.99Quest 45" Wide PC Gamer Computer DeskThis slim desk is deceptively durable with a steel frame and scratch-resistant finish. And it's got everything you need to keep organized, including three grounded outlet receptors and twin USB ports.MSRP: $298.00Sale Price: $219.99With Code BFSAVE15: $186.99Azio GM2400 Gaming MouseThis unit is built for speed, with a rubberized grip and onboard buttons that can adjust the DPI settings on the fly. The LED lights allow you to find your triggers easily and add a dash of style to any rig.MSRP: $19.99Sale Price: $15.00With Code BFSAVE15: $12.75Zone 47" Wide PC Gamer Computer DeskThis mammoth desk has room for all your gear, and you can save even more space by running all your cables through the power hub. Read the rest

Attention John Waters' fans: Tickets for the filthiest weekender on the planet, Camp John Waters in Kent, Connecticut, are about to go on sale. This will be the camp's fourth year and it promises to be even "dirtier, raunchier," and "filthier" than ever. Activities include: A costume contest (judged by the "Pope of Trash" himself); themed dance parties; a film marathon (of Waters' movies, of course); a meet & greet with Waters; Hairspray karaoke, and Bloody Mary bingo. But, wait, there's more. This year's camp counselors are Kathleen Turner, Patty Hearst and Mink Stole — making for a mini-Serial Mom reunion.It's a disgrace that I have not yet made the pilgrimage to this filthy fête for grownups. But friends of mine have been and rave about it. If you want to get your trash on next September (11-14), buy your tickets to Camp John Waters now. They are already on sale and are sure to sell out. Read the rest

WordPress is a fantastic tool for building web pages - if you know how to use it. Even with all the accessibility, a lot of the deeper features of WordPress are lost in translation to the average user.Enter WP Page Builder, a tool that not only makes WordPress site design easy but also more robust.The tool comes with a pretty extensive list of templates for your budding site, all of which are fully customizable from the color scheme down to the font. Along the way, you can add not just the complete arsenal of WordPress widgets but also add-ons from WP Page Builder as well. Need things to go smoothly across platforms? You can tweak the optimization for smartphones or other devices with a few simple clicks.But the real highlight here is the interface. Just drag, drop and tweak your choice from a series of design blocks on a sidebar - all with no coding required. It's the perfect system for design beginners that don't hide the features available to professionals. It just makes them easier.Pick up a lifetime subscription to the WP Page Builder Unlimited License Plan for more than 90% off the retail price. Read the rest

SCP Foundation is an online shared world whose members create delightful fiction, movies, games and other media about. It's a sprawling, global, friendly phenomenon, licensed under Creative Commons.But its very looseness and lack of formal corporate structures also leaves it vulnerable to trademark trolling. Now, a Russian fraudster has registered trademarks for SCP within the Eurasian Customs Union and is sending legal threats to SCP members who sell SCP merchandise, as well as violating the community's Creative Commons licenses by republishing works stripped of the license.The fraudster has shut down the legitimate SCP community in Russia, and has demanded that the Russian SCP wiki be turned over to him so he can use it to advertise his own line of SCP merch. The volunteer SCP organization is now raising funds for a legal battle with the troll. They're at about $23,000 as of this writing (they've been live for 9 hours), and seeking $50,000 for what may be a very protracted battle indeed.I donated. A Russian man has illegally registered an illegitimate trademark for SCP within the Eurasian Customs Union. He has used this trademark to threaten and extort legitimate sellers of SCP merchandise. In addition, he has committed copyright infringement by violating the SCP content license: Creative Commons Share-alike 3.0. We first updated the community about this situation 6 months ago, and now it has escalated. This man has recently resumed his efforts to threaten and extort competitors, and has now begun to threaten SCP itself. He used the illegitimate trademark to shut down the official social media page of the Russian branch of the SCP Foundation Wiki, as well as a separate fan-page. Read the rest

Randall Munroe's "Good Question" column in the New York Times is in the vein of his How To and What If books, in which he answers weird science questions with equally weird thoroughness. In his inaugural column, Munroe answers: "If I Touched the Moon, What Would It Feel Like?"Touching lunar rocks inside a spacecraft, or in a museum, is one thing; removing a glove and exposing yourself to the vacuum of space is another. In science fiction, terrible things befall such astronauts: their blood boils away, their insides get sucked out.But removing a glove wouldn’t necessarily be instantly fatal. For the most part, human skin is tough enough to handle brief exposure to a vacuum. If you had a custom spacesuit with a seal around your forearm, you could probably remove your glove during a moonwalk without suffering permanent damage.It definitely wouldn’t be comfortable. In 1960, during a high-altitude balloon test, Air Force Col. Joe Kittinger’s pressure glove sprang a leak, exposing his right hand to near-vacuum conditions for several hours. His hand swelled up and went numb, but he suffered no permanent damage. If I Touched the Moon, What Would It Feel Like? [Randall Munroe/New York Times](via Kottke) Read the rest

A Pew Study found that 60% of Americans believe that they are being continuously tracked by companies and the government, 69% mistrust the companies doing the tracking, 80% believe that advertisers and social media sites are collecting worrisome data, 79% think the companies lie about breaches, and 80% believe that nothing they do will make a difference.Among Black people, the stats are (justifiably) grimmer: 73% of Black users worry about law-enforcement abuse of their data (it's only 56% of white Americans).This may seem like bad news, but there's a silver lining. For decades, privacy activists have struggled to convince people to care about online surveillance -- thanks to inaction, people can't help but care, because they are being harmed in ways large and small on the regular. This is the Peak Indifference moment, when denialism threatens to slide into nihilism ("OK, OK, I believe your story about declining rhino populations, but since there's only one left, why don't we find out what he tastes like?"). It's the moment when an activist's job changes from convincing people that there's a problem to convincing them that it's not too late to do something about it.It means that there is a public appetite for change, and that lawmakers and regulators who propose meaningful privacy rules will find support for it -- and that businesses that offer privacy-friendly tools will find markets for them.What’s next? There are some moves in the right direction. Google’s deal with Ascension has already sparked a federal probe. Read the rest

Presenting: Boris Johnson Gets Out of London and Talks to People Who Are Not Rich Remainers: The Essential Collection.Christ, what an asshole.Boris Johnson Gets Out of London and Talks to People Who Are Not Rich Remainers: The Essential Collection pic.twitter.com/hiWmevog9T— TheIainDuncanSmiths (@TheIDSmiths) November 14, 2019 Read the rest

Oh, I am seriously here for this DIY-maker-recycling project that's all about giving street kitties safe homes. Wow this is cool.Making feral cat shelters from an old cooler.Says IMGURian @petsncharge, “Cat Tested and Approved Shelters.”We designed and built these durable cat shelters-Donating to the many Rescues that need them for the Homeless Cats they care for...TomTom Tests each new DesignSo cool. Watch the whole video.Cat Tested and Approved SheltersThis is the QA tester! Read the rest

In Paris on Saturday, police fired water cannons and tear gas on protesters who gathered to mark one year since the anti-government “yellow vest” demonstrations of 2018.The gilet jaune protests got their name from the neon yellow high-visibility vests demonstrators wore, and reached a peack around November 2018 over spikes in fuel prices and the cost of living in France under President Emmanuel Macron and his economic reforms.The protests have lost strength in recent months, going from tens of thousands of participants to just a few thousand, reports Reuters, but today was a mess in Paris, with various tourist sites temporarily closed for safety.From Reuters: Demonstrators, many clad in black and hiding their faces, vandalized an HSBC bank branch at the Place d’Italie. They set trash bins on fire and hurled cobblestones and bottles at riot police while building barricades. Several cars were set ablaze. Police responded with tear gas and a water cannon.Paris police prefect Didier Lallement canceled permission for a scheduled demonstration in view of the violence. “Our response will be very firm. All those who are hiding their face, all those who are throwing stones are going to be called in for questioning,” he told a news conference. “People who came to Place d’Italie to destroy...and were stupid enough to stay, will be called in for questioning,” he added. Some 105 people had been taken in for questioning, he said.Earlier, clashes broke out between demonstrators and police near the Porte de Champerret, close to the Arc de Triomphe, as protesters were preparing to march across town toward Gare d’Austerlitz. Read the rest

Activists from the group Extinction Rebellion, which protests climate change, blocked the private jet terminal at Geneva airport on Saturday. The group says they want to draw attention to private jets as an absurd form of transport for the rich that causes massive harm to the environment.Geneva is a major private jet hub. The world's 0.001% head to Switzerland to enjoy skiing in the Alps, plus privacy-minded banking, auction houses, hospitals and United Nations offices.From Reuters:Dozens of activists sat in front of the small terminal building, linking arms in peaceful protest. Police cordoned off the area.“We have blocked the private-jet terminal to defend the principle of climate and social justice,” Extinction Rebellion’s Geneva chapter said on Facebook. “This means of transport is completely absurd.”Extinction Rebellion was founded in Britain last year, inspiring waves of disruptive actions around the world to call for rapid cuts in carbon emissions and the repair of collapsing ecosystems.Climate activists block Geneva airport's private-jet terminal [reuters.com, PHOTO SOURCE: maxpixel.net.] Read the rest

Microsoft is hiring former Obama administration Attorney General Eric Holder to provide legal window dressing for their AnyVision technology, which the company says complies with the ethical principles stipulated during the facial recognition company's Series A. Olivia Solon at NBC News reports that AnyVision's technology has powered a secret military surveillance project that has been monitoring Palestinians in the West Bank.Eric Holder will lend his name and credibility to this obvious abuse of human rights.From Olivia Solon's reporting for NBC News:Microsoft's venture capital arm, M12, invested in AnyVision as part of a $74 million Series A funding round in June. Under the terms of the deal, Microsoft stipulated that AnyVision should comply with its six ethical principles to guide its facial recognition work: fairness, transparency, accountability, nondiscrimination, notice and consent, and lawful surveillance.The last principle states, "We will advocate for safeguards for people’s democratic freedoms in law enforcement surveillance scenarios and will not deploy facial recognition technology in scenarios that we believe will put these freedoms at risk."AnyVision, headquartered in Israel, sells an "advanced tactical surveillance" software system, Better Tomorrow. It lets customers identify individuals and objects in any live camera feed, such as a security camera or smartphone, and then track targets as they move between different feeds.Axios rounds it up like this:AnyVision's "advanced tactical surveillance" software powered a project that covertly monitored Palestinians in the West Bank, for which the company won an Israeli defense prize in 2018, per NBC. Read the rest

People like to think they're objective. I get it; it's a good thing to strive to be. As a white dude, I know firsthand that it's easy to assume that you're coming from the "default" perspective, and thus, are more capable of being rationally objective than other, non-white dudes.But that's wrong. Because if you're brainwashed into seeing your popular mainstream status quo assumptions as "default," then you're actually not objectively considering every possible factor. And this tweet might be the best, most succinct example to explain this:Disclosing that a reporter has had family in prison, shows among other things how deeply "objectivity" is intertwined w/ race & class. Which reinforces lack of diversity in journalismIf not having parent in prison means you're objective & disclosure-free, guess who benefits... https://t.co/fX99ypgUNB— Eric Umansky (@ericuman) November 4, 2019In other words: we assume that someone can't be objective about prison reform if their own parent has been incarcerated. But what about the other way around? How can you be objective about prison reform if you don't have a parent that's been incarcerated? How can you rationally examine all of the evidence to form a conclusion, if you don't actually have firsthand knowledge of the social, financial, and emotional toll of incarceration? What biases might you be missing that you never even thought to consider because you assumed that your "default" position was automatically normal or correct?In both situations, your objectivity will be tainted by your emotional response; the difference is that, as a society, we've arbitrarily decided that certain emotions are either proper or negligible when it comes to attaining our idealist objectivity. Read the rest

Russell Crowe is an apt metaphor for this week’s tabloids.

It's no secret that Jason Weisberger and I have little love for the Freewrite. While it allows for distraction-free writing, it's design, build quality and software limitations make it a pain in the ass to use. Having found that the device just isn't for me, the last several years have seen me hunting for a highly portable distraction-free writing device that I can use when I'm not plugging away at my day job. The ability to constantly check in on Twitter, look at what's new on Flickr and look up random, interesting but in the end, useless facts sucks the marrow out of my creativity and robs me of the small amount of personal writing time I have at my disposal. Happily, I finally found the tool I've been longing for: the KingJim Pomera DM30.I imported mine from Japan (although you can sometimes find it on Amazon) after doing scads of research on the thing. It weighs less than a laptop and most tablets and when not in use can be folded up to around the size of a paperback novel.When you're ready to write, simply flip up its E-Ink display (which also turns boots the DM30 up in under two seconds,) unfold its near full-sized keyboard and you're good to go. The DM30 boasts a Japanese keyboard layout which, at first, is a little vexing. Keys that North American Qwerty keyboard users have come to expect are not always where you'd assume them to be. To type an apostrophe, for example, its necessary to hit Shift and the number seven. Read the rest

If any of y'all want to do this for me with Japanese stationary supplies and airline tickets, I'm fine with it. Read the rest

In this age of ever-shrinking gadgets, it bears reminding that sometimes bigger is actually better. And if you care about audio quality, we can't think of a better example of this principle than these TREBLAB Z2 Bluetooth 5.0 Noise-Cancelling Headphones.We know tiny Bluetooth earbuds are all the rage right now. But their battery life simply can't compete with the TREBLAB Z2's, which boasts an impressive 35 hours of playtime. And that's without a single recharge.As for the sound, the 40mm neodymium speakers are outfitted with Sound2.0â„¢ technology that keeps the bass kinetic and the treble crisp. The T-Quietâ„¢ active noise canceling ensures that you stay locked into that inspirational playlist for as long as your workout lasts. The fit is snug enough that you can take them securely on bike rides, trail runs or wherever else you need to rough it.Best of all, you won't have to wait until Black Friday to get them on the cheap. They're already on sale for 69% off, but you can take an extra 15% off that by using the online code BFSAVE15 and reap the final price of $67.14. Read the rest

Economist, author, podcaster and radio presenter Tim Harford (previously) has a fantastic new podcast: Cautionary Tales, which Tim describes as "Eight stories of mishaps, fiascos and disasters - served with a twist of nerdy social science."I've just listened to the second episode, The Rogue Dressed As a Captain (MP3), which uses the story of the amazing con artist Wilhelm Voigt as a jumping off point for understanding the nuance of Hannah Arendt's "Eichmann in Jerusalem," the Milgram obedience experiment, and the way that frauds and cons work. The episodes feature full-cast dramatizations bookended by Harford's explanatory interludes -- they're really well done!Cautionary Tales [Tim Harford](Thanks, Tim!) Read the rest

In this Instagram age, pictures aren't just worth a thousand words; they can be worth a pretty penny, too, which makes graphic designers a highly sought-after profession.But being a graphic artist takes more than just the ability to draw a picture, and certainly more than the ability to navigate through Photoshop. The School of Graphic Design Mastery Bundle is one of the few online courses that gives you comprehensive training on all the aspects of design - not just a walkthrough for a piece of image editing software.In this seven-course boot camp, you'll get a firm foundation in the basic principles with Basic and Intermediate design classes. These teach you how to use essential programs like Photoshop, Illustrator and InDesign, while also giving you hands-on knowledge of color theory and composition.Once you've got a handle on the core concepts, you'll get a broader view of what it takes to create big brands: Creating standards across all media, developing a color palette and the like. There are also dedicated courses in logo design using Adobe Illustrator and expert-level photo manipulation with Photoshop.The entire package gives you 40 hours of lectures and exercises, and you can get lifetime access to it for a full 97% off the cost of the individual classes. Read the rest

Earth Island News's interview with climate scientist and activist Susanne Moser is excellent, especially on how "hope literacy" (understanding different the flavors of hope) and "functional denial" ("being fully aware and conscious and not denying the gravity of what we’re creating" while still getting the work done) can allow you to retain your mental equilibrium in these difficult and often terrifying times.What's interesting is that I've come to understand uncertainty as a necessary condition for hope. If you're perfectly certain that “It’s going to be fine” or “It’s going to be hell,” you don’t need hope, because you know exactly what’s going to happen.And what people like Trump and other radical right-wingers in particular promise is a kind of certainty: “America is going to be great again, it’s going to be purely white, and we’re going to have great economy and we’re the best.” That’s all a form of certainty.Whereas, “The future is going to look very different, and I can't tell you how, but we’re going to have to go through that together and figure it out and create it — that’s uncertainty, that requires work. It’s very unpopular.Despairing about the Climate Crisis? Read This. [Laurie Mazur/Earth Island News](Image: Susanne Moser)(Thanks, Dad!) Read the rest

A sheriff's deputy in Pima, AZ was video-recorded wrestling with and screaming at a 15 year old Black teenager with no arms or legs; the cop, who was not named, was called to a group home where the teen lived, because the teen had been upset and yelling and shouting, and had knocked over a trash can.Immanuel, the child whom the policeman abused, has been in state custody since he was abandoned by his parents, and lives in the group home. A 16 year old teen who also lived in the group home, made a covert video-recording of the police violence from another room. He was also arrested by the sheriff's deputy.The video shows the officer repeatedly tackling and pinning the shirtless Immanuel, who is visibly upset and in pain. The officer screams abuse at the child, and at other children present during his assault on Immanuel.The video ends with the cop arresting the child who made the video recording (another child takes his phone and continues shooting); without warning, the cop takes the handcuffed child and smashes his head into a wall.Both children were jailed for "disorderly conduct." The officer was not wearing a bodycam. When the video surfaced, it reduced a room full of hardened public defenders to tears. After the video was aired, charges against the children were dropped.As Immanuel's public defender noted, the children in the group home have already been traumatized and have been taken from their families to protect them from further trauma. Read the rest

I interviewed the delightful John Hodgman about some of his favorite tools, and I learned many good tips from him (especially how to reverse sear a steak). As you probably know, John is a writer, performer, former PC, once the resident expert on the Daily Show, and now the author of two books of non-fake facts and true stories from his life, Vacationland and Medallion Status. You can find him at Twitter @hodgman and on Instagram @johnhodgman.Here are the links to the tools he talks about.Image: Courtesy John Hodgman Read the rest

Mitch Wagner writes, "Talented and prolific science fiction writer and editor Mike Resnick, who has written extensively over the course of a long career about colonialism and its legacies, with a particular focus and love for Africa, has had a near-death experience and started a GoFundMe to pay off his medical expenses. I'm a huge fan of Resnick, particularly his novel Santiago and African stories, and I'm saddened to learn about this." Resnick's crowdfunder is nearly at its goal -- $27k out of $30k as of this writing -- but this is an important reminder of the urgency of Medicare for All. America is a country where even very successful artists who don't start out rich can have all they've worked for stripped away in an instant by a freak medical occurrence. Resnick is just one of many beloved artists in this situation, and crowdfunding is not a sustainable solution.I chipped into Mike's fund, but I'm also continuing to give money to the two Medicare for All candidates for the Democratic party in the 2020 presidential election: Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren.Mike unfortunately spent most of the first half of 2019 in the hospital. At the start of the year he fell twice for some (then) unknown reason, the second time being unable to get up. Carol, his wife, had to call 911 and it was determined that he had pneumonia and acute idiopathic pericarditis. In three days he had 30 pounds of fluid drained from around his heart and lungs. Read the rest

A screw with a stripped head can be difficult to remove. There are a number of ways to remove screws with stripped heads. Lifehacker has a nice article on this subject.My favorite method of removing a stuck/stripped screw is with a pair of screw removal pliers. They bite into the exposed sides of the screw head and you can twist the screw loose, then finish the job with a screwdriver. It's also a nice brute-force workaround for tamper-proof screw heads. This is the kind of tool you want to have in your toolbox now, instead of having to run out and buy one when it's needed.If the screw is really stuck, you risk breaking the head off the screw. If that happens, all is not lost. You can try to drill a small hole into the center of the screw shaft and pull out the screw with a screw extractor. Read the rest

Pack rats, aka woodrats, build their nests, called middens, from plant debris, rocks, animal parts, paper, and almost any other bits of detritus nearby. Frequently, they urinate on their middens. The urine crystalizes and encases the nest material, preserving it for as long as 50,000 years by some estimates. For paleobotanists, middens are a great source of information about how flora has changed over time. Zoologists study the animal remains and poop. And climatologists analyze the material for insight into past climates, even the most recent ice age that ended more than 11,000 years ago. In Smithsonian, Sadie Witkowski digs into the topic, including a story about what historians learned excavating rats' nests in the walls of the 1808 Charleston, South Carolina home of slave trader Nathaniel Russel:Among the mass of organic matter, they found sewing pins, buttons, marbles, part of a uniform waistcoat, and even fragments of printed paper that could be dated to November 1833. The paper was darkened and curled but still legible once it was gently opened.“It was protected from rain and moisture, and even though it’s sooty, it didn’t burn,” (University of Delaware art conservator Susan) Buck says. “So we just have all these fragile materials that normally wouldn’t survive.” Among the material, the team recovered scraps of an early writing primer, suggesting some of the enslaved workers living in the kitchen house has been learning to read and write.To move beyond the written record, historians and conservators have looked for new clues in unlikely places. Read the rest

This seems like some impressive trolley problem decision-making.Image: YouTube Read the rest

People are not ready to deal with this serious issue.It's like we don't even have the language to understand yet.Seriously, though, I am trying to track down where this image first appeared and who the baby is, and who the parent is, and who the photographer is. Babby iz meme.First appearance I've found on the internet was 2017, where it made Reddit and IMGUR. I just want to know what it all means, and whether Soros and his global elites put the kid up to it, or if his libtard father is pushing this sick ideology on that babby. Read the rest