Boing Boing

Hey designers: We know you get used to the photo editing system you've toiled away at for years. But what if we told you that great images don't need to involve a ton of steps - and they certainly don't need to be expensive.Exhibit A: Fotor Online Pro, a photo editing tool that's been racking up a four-and-a-half star rating on the Mac App Store for good reason.Fotor offers all the functionality of leading photo editors in a super-intuitive package. Boring but essential tasks like cropping and resizing get done much quicker. The multiple templates and retouching tools are easily accessible and completely customizable. And portraits get a lot simpler to touch up with an interface that's set up almost like a makeup tutorial.The program's HDR technology gives it access to a range of colors and shading that will punch up even the blandest image. Then there's the ability to show your vacation snaps in a whole new way with the built in collage maker.Check it out for yourself: Right now, a lifetime subscription to Fotor Online Pro is 87% off the list price. Read the rest

George Carlin, of the so-called "silent generation" that preceded the boomers:"I'm getting tired of hearing about...whiny, narcissistic, self-indulgent people with a simple philosophy: "GIMME IT, IT'S MINE!" "GIMME THAT, IT'S MINE!" These people were given everything. Everything was handed to them. And they took it all: sex, drugs, and rock and roll, and they stayed loaded for 20 years and had a free ride. But now they're staring down the barrel of middle-age burnout, and they don't like it. So they've turned self-righteous. They want to make things harder on younger people. They tell 'em, abstain from sex, say no to drugs; as for the rock and roll, they sold that for television commercials a long time ago...so they could buy pasta machines and stairmasters and soybean futures"In Carlin tradition it ends with fuck everybody. But the bit about how political slogans transformed into advertising slogans having the exact opposite meanings is really something.Disclaimers: "Generations" is cultural astrology for pundits, Facebook must be destroyed, the purpose of polls is influence not observation, don't eat yellow snow. Read the rest

T-Mobile has a trademark on RAL 4010, a shade of magenta. Trademarks on colors (see also: UPS, John Deere) are a dangerous trend, robbing us of the spectrum one shade at a time, but T-Mobile's views on its trademark made this bad situation much worse.That's because T-Mobile says that its trademark on RAL 4010 gives it the right to force any company, in any line of business, to take down ads that use colors similar to magenta, including pink.The most recent victim of T-Mobile's trademark bullying is the NYC-based insurance startup Lemonade, whose predominantly magenta marketing campaign was shut down when a German court upheld T-Mobile's claim against the company.A spokesman for Deutsche Telekom confirmed that it “asked the insurance company Lemonade to stop using the color magenta in the German market,” while adding that the “T” in “Deutsche Telekom” is registered to the brand. “Deutsche Telekom respects everyone’s trademark rights but expects others to do the same,” the spokesman said in an emailed statement to Ad Age.T-Mobile says it owns exclusive rights to the color magenta [George P Slefo/Adage](via /.) Read the rest

Freedom House, a US-government-funded nonprofit think-tank whose mission is to spread democracy, issues an annual "internet freedom" report; this year, for the ninth consecutive year, the report says that internet freedom has declined, and it's all thanks to social media.The report surveys 65 countries (covering 87% of the world's internet users), and in 38 of them Freedom House says that social media has been used by political leaders who "employed individuals to surreptitiously shape online opinions" that mixed "authentic users'" views with "fraudulent or automated accounts."The report describes how social media has been mined by intelligence services who engaged in "the collection and analysis of vast amounts of data on entire populations," creating a "sharp global increase in the abuse of civil liberties and shrinking online space for civic activism."The report notes that while 33 countries' internet freedom has declined since last year, 16 countries have undergone net improvements. The worst declines came from "Sudan and Kazakhstan followed by Brazil, Bangladesh, and Zimbabwe." The worst country for internet freedom is China. The biggest improvement came from Ethiopia. Iceland is "the world’s best protector of internet freedom."Freedom House warns that "Emerging technologies such as advanced biometrics, artificial intelligence, and fifth-generation mobile networks will provide new opportunities for human development, but they will also undoubtedly present a new array of human rights challenges."Internet freedom declined in the United States. While the online environment remains vibrant, diverse, and free from state censorship, this report’s coverage period saw the third straight year of decline. Read the rest

Vinay Gupta (previously) is a polymath engineer/inventor, whose Buckminster Fuller-inspired "hexayurts" can be found all over Burning Man (and my novel Walkaway).In his Penny Stamps lecture at the University of Michigan ranges widely over the nature of displacement and refugee crises, how climate deepens and accelerates these crises (and makes them permanent), and how the traditional idea of a refugee camp -- never a particularly successful one -- is totally unsuited to the challenges of the climate/refugee crisis.He goes on to propose a model for a flat-pack city future, where engineered buildings and infrastructure, designed to be shipped and assembled with ease, can replace "temporary" camps (some of which have now been in existence so long that two or three generations of people have lived and died in them) with real, permanent, sustainable, high-density cities.I don't share all of Gupta's vision here -- I'm skeptical of his claim that we need capital (as opposed to material) to lift people out of poverty, and of the underlying economics of this notion -- but he's a riveting speaker and he's got fascinating ideas that always excite me.(Thanks, Vinay!) Read the rest

In 2017, Juli Briskman flipped off Trump's motorcade as she cycled past it near her northern Virginia home, and her employer, Akima LCC, fired her.Briskman had been working as Akima's social media director, and she was fired for violating the company's social media policy. This wasn't merely ridiculous because "riding a bicycle" is not "social media" activity -- but also because Briskman had -- in her capacity as social media director -- reported an Akima exec for calling a subordinate a "fucking Libtard asshole" in a public Facebook discussion of Black Lives Matter, with no meaningful consequences for the exec.The manifest injustice of her dismissal -- losing your job for flipping off the most divisive President in more than a century -- prompted an outpouring of support and more than $142,000 in donations to a Gofundme campaign.Now, Briskman has parlayed that public support into something more meaningful: a successful campaign to be elected as supervisor for the Algonkian District in Loudoun County, Virginia.Briskman ran on a platform of school funding, rules for local property development, local government transparency, and a reversal of the Republican incumbent's $14m tax cut, which deprived local government of the cash it needed to provide services.The county reliably votes for Democrats at the state and federal level, but Republicans maintain control of the board, 6 to 3, and Republicans have represented the county in Congress for nearly 40 years.Democrats hope voter hostility toward Trump, combined with a recent population boom and demographic changes, will help them oust Rep. Read the rest

There's a lot of great information out there on the bookshelves, and we're not just talking conversation fodder for the next cocktail party. If you want to succeed at business and life, there's a good chance you can find the blueprint in a book.Trouble is, life isn't exactly slowing down to let you turn those pages. Reading for pleasure is one thing. But when you're reading to get information, an app like SumizeIt can be invaluable.youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SrZ3a2lFsOkDownload SumizeIt on your phone or tablet and you've got instant access to a great library of content from thought leaders like Richard Branson, Phil Knight and Daniel Coyle on a range of topics — sales, entrepreneurship, marketing, autobiography and more.But what's really great for busy professionals is that SumizeIt "shrinks" those titles for you, summarizing them into snippets that distill the key insights and takeaways. They're perfect for absorbing in five minutes or less, which is ideal for even the shortest chunks of downtime in commutes, smoke breaks or waiting rooms.SumizeIt membership gets you access to the full library, with at least one new summary each week. Best of all, it's now on deep discount for 80% off the list price. Read the rest

The Board of County Commissioners in Citrus County, Florida opposed the renewal of the regional public library's digital subscription to the New York Times. Why? "Fake news," said the board's second vice chairman Scott Carnahan. "“I agree with President Trump. I will not be voting for this. I don’t want The New York Times in this county.” From Reuters:Carnahan was joined by Commissioners Ronald Kitchen, who balked at the annual cost of about $2,700, and Jimmie Smith, who wondered, “why the heck would we spend money on something like that?”Reading the room, First Vice Chairman Brian Coleman withdrew the motion he made to approve the funding request...The (Citrus County) Chronicle, noting that the decision would affect some 70,000 library card holders, reported that its readers “reacted strongly” to the commissioners’ decision, with “most but not all” critical of it.The county already pays about $3,000 a year to supply its four regional libraries with the print edition of The Times, Library Services Director Eric Head told the newspaper.Graphic above borrowed from this fantastic t-shirt. Read the rest

Over the summer, every weekend was a 3-day weekend for Microsoft Japan employees. The company tested a 4-day workweek without reducing salaries. According to Microsoft, the result was a productivity increase of 40%. It seems that the biggest contributor to that boost is that they cut way back on meetings which, as a rule, waste a lot of time. From National Public Radio:Because of the shorter workweek, the company also put its meetings on a diet. The standard duration for a meeting was slashed from 60 minutes to 30 — an approach that was adopted for nearly half of all meetings. In a related cut, standard attendance at those sessions was capped at five employees.Citing the need for a shift in time management, the Microsoft division also urged people to use collaborative chat channels rather than "wasteful" emails and meetings...Four-day workweeks made headlines around the world in the spring of 2018, when Perpetual Guardian, a New Zealand trust management company, announced a 20% gain in employee productivity and a 45% increase in employee work-life balance after a trial of paying people their regular salary for working four days. Last October, the company made the policy permanent. Read the rest

In Watford, England, construction workers doing demolition at a former pub and inn found a weird bottle inside the chimney. Containing human teeth, fish hooks, glass shards, and liquid, the container was apparently a 19th century "witch bottle" meant to protect against evil spells. Above, examples of such bottles. From Smithsonian:The newly discovered bottle is one of more than 100 recovered from old buildings, churchyards and riverbanks across Great Britain to date. Most specimens trace their origins to the 1600s, when continental Europe was in the grips of a major witch panic. Common contents found in witch bottles include pins, nails, thorns, urine, fingernail clippings and hair.According to BBC News, the Watford property—now a private residence but formerly known as the Star and Garter inn—is best known as the birthplace of Angeline Tubbs, a woman later nicknamed the Witch of Saratoga...The home’s current owner does not plan on displaying the bottle. Instead, the anonymous individual says they “will probably hide it away again for someone to find in another 100 years or so.”So, how exactly did witch bottles work? Per JSTOR Daily’s Allison C. Meier, practitioners filled the vessels with an assortment of items, but most commonly urine and bent pins. The urine was believed to lure witches traveling through a supernatural “otherworld” into the bottle, where they would then be trapped on the pins’ sharp points. Would-be witchcraft victims often embedded the protective bottles under hearths or near chimneys; as anthropologist Christopher C. Read the rest

Mike Christian built a rooftop animated Eye of Sauron:He was inspired by the Animated Snake Eyes Bonnet for Raspberry Pi project, and posted several progress videos:He spoke a bit more about the project here. Read the rest

Are you an AT&T customer on an unlimited data plan? Have you had the feeling that sometimes your phone carrier was deliberately slowing you down? The FCC says you aren't wrong, and that AT&T must pay $60 million in settlement for slowing cellphone data on unlimited plans.The U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) said on Tuesday it will require AT&T to pay a $60 million settlement to resolve the government's charges that the phone carrier cheated millions of American customers by charging them for “unlimited” data plans but reducing their data speeds if they used more than a certain undisclosed amount. “Scammers come in all sizes,” FTC Commissioner Rohit Chopra said in a statement. From Reuters:As part of the settlement of the 2014 complaint, AT&T is also prohibited from making any representation about the speed or amount of its mobile data without also disclosing any material restrictions on the data.AT&T issued a brief statement acknowledging that it had reached a settlement with the FTC.“Even though it has been years since we applied this network management tool in the way described by the FTC, we believe this is in the best interests of consumers,” AT&T said in an emailed statement.The company had fought the FTC in court, saying it had no jurisdiction to bring the case, but lost in 2018.The FTC alleged that AT&T would begin to slow “unlimited” customers’ data after they used as little as two gigabytes of data in a month. Netflix says that watching its shows uses about 1 gigabyte per hour of standard definition video. Read the rest

Because we live on a divergent Hellworld timeline where everything is too comically absurd to be real except for the fact that it is, the BBC published an article about the need for asthmatics like me to step up our roles in fighting climate change. This is just the very beginning of it:Many people with asthma could cut their carbon footprint and help save the environment by switching to "greener" medications, UK researchers say.Making the swap would have as big an "eco" impact as turning vegetarian or becoming an avid recycler, they say.As a lifelong asthmatic, I find it difficult to articulate the inherent bullshittery of this concept without smashing my laptop in a fit of hyperventilation. But that would require me to use my rescue inhaler to save my own life (and then I'd also be without a computer, which would make things even more difficult). But I'm going to try my best.The initial premise here is based on the fact that some aerosol sprays contribute significantly to climate change. This apparently includes metered-dose inhalers—like the rescue one I use when my lungs stop working—which rely on hydrofluoroalkane in order to release that little misting burst of asthma medicine. In the UK, this is estimated to account for about 4 percent of the total greenhouse gas emissions produced by the National Health Service and the related medical industry.On the surface, there's nothing inherently wrong with pointing this out—indeed, the medical industry should find greener ways to do things! Read the rest

Roger Stone had to leave jury selection early today because he had 'food poisoning.'Earlier, an observer was taken out of the courtroom on a stretcher after appearing to have had a seizure.From the Daily Beast:Stone abruptly got up and fled the courtroom after the first potential juror took the witness stand. Moments later, a spectator in the back of the courtroom reportedly moaned loudly and collapsed—causing the proceedings to stop as the entire courtroom was cleared. The man was later seen walking out of the courtroom with medical personnel, and a crew had to clean up the areas where the man apparently fell ill. Shortly after proceedings started back up, Stone was seen resting his head in his hand, and Judge Amy Berman Jackson called a lunch break. He was then observed entering the courthouse’s heath unit while jury selections continued in his absence. In January, he pleaded not guilty to charges that stemmed from former Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s probe into Russian interference during the 2016 election. Here's video of Roger Stone leaving court early today. A bit shaky as I dashed out behind him https://t.co/oTWPOuVXRZ pic.twitter.com/cbMwHBrjUC— Josh Gerstein (@joshgerstein) November 5, 2019Roger Stone leaves jury selection for his trial due to food poisoning; earlier, an observer was taken out of the courtroom on a stretcher after appearing to have a seizure. https://t.co/sQ33YIhNKS— MSNBC (@MSNBC) November 5, 2019Jury selection in the Roger Stone trial off to a bizarre start.Stone left the proceedings after he said he got food poisoning. Read the rest

This is a great clip. If you're into jugglers doing funny things or 500-volt stun guns, you're in for a treat.Jon and Owen of the wonderful performance group 'The Passing Zone' joined Penn & Teller on their TV show "Penn & Teller: Fool Us!" recently to perform a dangerous magic and juggling trick involving electricity. Watch the magic, and check out Teller almost getting shocked!Jon Wee and Owen Morse are friends of mine, and as crazy as they are in this video, they are in person. They're delightful humans with insanely curious intelligent minds and a wonderful knack for pulling off the impossible.If you ever have a chance to see The Passing Zone perform live on stage in person (they also do trade shows and corporate events) go do it.Their 'America's Got Talent' clip with Howie Mandel is also a thing of greatness, and legendary. Read the rest

In Indianapolis, a confused deer crashed through a glass window into a suburban school, sending teachers and students into security lockdown mode.Hinkle Creek Elementary School Principal Jack Lawrence told a reporter the deer smashed through a window Monday afternoon and entered the Noblesville school’s main hallway.Students and staff at Hinkle Creek Elementary School in Noblesville are all okay. The windows were shattered. No word on the deer.From indystar.com:Principal Jack Lawrence told parents in an email that a deer jumped through a window, shattering it, in the school's main hallway at 1 p.m. Monday. The school immediately called for a lockdown to make sure students and staff remained inside their classrooms.The deer eventually pushed its way out of the building's main entrance and ran through a parking lot into nearby woods, Lawrence said in the email.No students or staff were hurt, and normal school operations resumed after a few minutes, he said.[indystar.com via Associated Press, image: Indiana Department of Fish and Wildlife, in.gov/dnr/fishwild/ ] Read the rest

This is the easiest way to weigh your luggage at home, before you get to the airport and find out your bag is too heavy and have to pay a hefty overweight fee. To use it, you place the strap around a handle on your luggage and lift. The weight is displayed on an illuminated readout (you can switch it between lbs and kgs). I've had one since 2015 and it's much better than trying to weigh your luggage on a bathroom scale. Amazon sells them for Read the rest

Man used electric shopping cart to get from one bar to another

The 2019 LEGO Harry Potter advent calendar is here!This years set includes Harry and Hedqig, Hermione, Ron, Dumbledore, Professor Flitwick, and a "Hogwarts Architect" and a micro Hogwarts Express train amongst the many treats.I wonder what the Jewish wizards and witches do for Hannukah? My daughter likes the Star Wars advent set.LEGO Harry Potter Advent Calendar 75964 Building Kit, New 2019 (305 Pieces) via Amazon Read the rest

Last month, the "Wizard Rock," an iconic 1-ton boulder, mysteriously vanished without a trace from Arizona's Prescott National Forest. It was the third boulder disappearance in the region over the last few months. Now, Prescott National Forest officials report that the Wizard Rock has mysteriously returned. From CNN:The slab of black rock with streaks of white quartz holds special meaning to local geology enthusiasts, forest officials said. It's greeted passing motorists along scenic Highway 89 for years and makes for a strong selfie setting.Its disappearance confounded rangers. The stunning chunk of stone weighs about the same as a small car, so discreetly lifting it would've required some extreme effort.Seems to me they should check with the local interdimensional Bigfoot. Read the rest

A clip from director Hugues Nancy's "Paris 1900, the City of Lights," featuring restored and colorized film footage from the fin de siècle. From C21Media:Thanks to incredible archives restored and fully colorized, this film presents a previously unseen journey through time and space. Discover, Paris in 1900 at the time of the Exposition Universelle and the very beginning of modern art and cinema. The City of Lights became a showcase city, displaying the latest technical and scientific inventions, and also boasting avant-garde art galleries, lively cabarets, the ultimate in high fashion, and… the Parisiennes. The myth of “La Belle Epoque” reigned supreme. Read the rest

There are near misses and then there's this guy in Oakland, California who got saved just before a subway train creamed him. Wow! BART's humble hero saves a passenger from fast approaching train. On Sunday, November 3, 2019, transportation supervisor, John O'Connor was working crowd control at the Coliseum Station after the Raiders game when an intoxicated passengers miss-stepped and fell into the trackway. John sprang into action and pulled him to safety.Tonight we are thankful for John. He’s a former Train Operator who was promoted to Transportation Supervisor. He was working the Coliseum Station for the Raiders game and saw someone on the platform who needed help. He saved a life tonight. Thank you John. Show him some love. https://t.co/BIb5NMdZFj— SFBART (@SFBART) November 4, 2019(KQED) Read the rest

Neal Agarwal made this website about the size of space. You click through it one page at a time, starting with a single astronaut and ending with the observable universe. Read the rest

The fact that Trumped hired his spiritual advisor Paula White to come to work for him tells you everything you need to know about her. This video will add no new information. It's for entertainment purposes only. Skip to :47 if you want to see her speaking in High Valyrian.How totally not shocking that Paula White, Trump's official spiritual advisor, is just like him: a lying, narcissistic shakedown charlatan who uses radical, right-wing, fake Christianity to con gullible people to get attention, money, and power. pic.twitter.com/9naBxUmJK7— Mrs. Betty Bowers (@BettyBowers) November 5, 2019Image: Twitter Read the rest

Our pal Andy Baio has been experimenting with an audio separation library called spleeter "that uses machine learning to quickly and freely separate music into stems." It does a surprisingly good job, and he is using it to make funny mashups:nobody should have this kind of power pic.twitter.com/4vbl2MGK4Z— Andy Baio (@waxpancake) November 5, 2019 Read the rest

Pokémon Sword and Shield comes out later this month. If a recent leak of the Pokemon included in the game is to be believed (and people are certainly acting like the leak is reliable), then the game will include what looks like bleached coral Pokemon. Ghost type Galarian Corsola and Cursola:They certainly won't be the only pollution-related characters. Here are poison gas Pokemon:For more grim Pokemon, check out this article on "The extremely dark, disturbing origins of 25 Pokémon."(Bleached coral via Wikipedia.) Read the rest

Abbie Hoffman and Martin Carey arrive at The Pentagon to do a literal hand-count on how many protestors will be needed to encircle the building for a protest. On the way out they apply for, and receive, a permit to initiate an Exorcism to rid the base of its evil demons. Part one of "LEVITATION OF THE PENTAGON" — Continued Next WeekFrom John Wilcock, New York Years, by Ethan Persoff and Scott Marshall.(See all Boing Boing installments) Read the rest

A teacher, mercifully left anonymous, was filmed rapping in blackface on Halloween. Chris Norwood, the MUSD school board president, called the teacher's actions "inappropriate, unprofessional and insensitive," according to an online statement."As an African American man, the history of Blackface reminds me of the cruelty, hatred and fear my parents and people of African Ancestry have dealt with in the past and still experience today around the world," Norwood said.Imagine: it's 2019, you're a history teacher, you ain't black, but your school board president is. The thought comes to you: I know, I'll black up and rap for the kids. 🤷 🤷 🤷 Sooooooooo... one of our WHITE teachers at mhs yesterday decided to paint his face so look like common the rapper yesterday. pic.twitter.com/1WudSddCLZ— karrington (@karrington_kk) November 1, 2019 Read the rest

Bryan Berg builds elaborate houses of cards. He's so good that he gets paid to do it. According to Guy Georgeson, the creator of the Coolest Thing I've Ever Made YouTube channel, Berg "holds 4 Guinness World Records including world's largest card tower (4000 decks) and world's tallest tower at 26 feet tall." In this video we learn about Berg, get his tips for stacking them, and watch him attempt to build a card tower outdoors, where a light breeze can be devastating.Image: YouTube Read the rest

The Verge's Dieter Bohn reviews Microsoft's Surface Pro X laptop. It's pretty and it's small, but it's slow.... the core of Windows 10 runs just fine for me [but] there are still occasional, confounding slowdowns, especially when waking from sleep. In general, I just didn’t have as strong a feel for what would and would not bog down this computer — with an Intel chip, I know what to expect.But it wasn’t fast, certainly not as fast as an equivalently priced Intel device would be. Still, the main problem with this ARM chip doesn’t come from slowness with Windows itself, but with many of the apps. Here's a serious problem for anyone doing anything more than basic productivity: "64-bit x86 apps won’t run at all on the Surface Pro X. ... even Microsoft’s own app store doesn’t properly filter out incompatible apps when you visit it from this computer. You can (and I did!) buy apps in the Microsoft Store and only find out after the fact that they’re incompatible."The Verge also notes that setting it up presents the user with a baker's dozen of clickwrap contracts, including Windows itself, "Activity History", OneDrive, Office 365, Cortana, and a Microsoft account that can only be skipped if you remember not to connect it to the internet. You apparently cannot get into this laptop without allowing "Microsoft to access your location, location history, contacts, voice input, speech and handwriting patterns, typing history, search history, calendar details, messages, apps, and Edge browsing history."All that said, it's very light, has fast LTE and a solid workday's battery life. Read the rest

If you want to start cooking like a grown-up, the clock is ticking. Thanksgiving is coming soon, and one of these years that cheap set of kitchenware that you bought for the college dorm is not going to cut it anymore.If that's your situation, might we suggest the Grown-Up Home Chef Starter Kit — better known as the Inspired Home 5-Piece Enameled Cast Iron Cookware + Bakeware Set.If your parents have a set they've been faithfully using for decades, chances are it's made of the same durable stuff. The cast iron core of these pots and pans makes sure everything from soups to steaks heats evenly and quickly. The enamel protects and against stains or abrasion and makes the whole set much easier to clean than naked cast iron.No matter what the meal, they make sure all the flavor stays locked in. And best of all, they'll likely keep that quality through decades of use.Snap up the whole five-piece set today so you can start giving it a test run before turkey day. The Inspired Home Set is now 66% off the retail price. Read the rest

I've been a fan of cartoonist, novelist and memoirist Lynda Barry for decades, long before she was declared a certified genius; Barry's latest book, Making Comics is an intensely practical, incredibly inspiring curriculum for finding, honing and realizing your creativity through drawing and writing.

My latest Locus Magazine column is Jeannette Ng Was Right: John W. Campbell Was a Fascist, which revisits Jeannette Ng's Campbell Awards speech from this summer's World Science Fiction convention.As far as I know, I'm the only person to have won both awards named for Campbell, which, I think, gives me license to speak on the subject. I think that Ng was absolutely right about Campbell and his legacy, and I think that understanding that the good that people do doesn't erase the harms they cause (and vice-versa) is critical to navigating a world of flawed people.Here’s the thing: neither one of those facets of Campbell cancels the other one out. Just as it’s not true that any amount of good deeds done for some people can repair the harms he visited on others, it’s also true that none of those harms can­cel out the kindnesses he did for the people he was kind to.Life is not a ledger. Your sins can’t be paid off through good deeds. Your good deeds are not cancelled by your sins. Your sins and your good deeds live alongside one another. They coexist in superposition.You (and I) can (and should) atone for our misdeeds. We can (and should) apologize for them to the people we’ve wronged. We should do those things, not because they will erase our misdeeds, but because the only thing worse than being really wrong is not learning to be better.People are flawed vessels. The circumstances around us – our social norms and institutions – can be structured to bring out our worst natures or our best. Read the rest

Lauren Bard works as a nurse at Dignity Health, a "Christian hospital" (motto: Hello humankindness). In 2018, Bard went to UC Irvine hospital to deliver her very premature (21 week) baby.Bard's employer provides coverage through Anthem Blue Cross, but requires parents of newborns to register their children within 31 days. Bard missed this deadline because she was distracted by having a preemie in the NICU, so Dignity Health refused to cover the bill for her baby's care, which came to $898,984.Dignity Health's position is that Bard was informed of the paperwork requirement when she got her job, six years prior to giving birth to a premature baby that needed sustained, intense, emergency medical care to survive, and if she couldn't remember on her own to fill in the paperwork, then she was going to have to pay the nearly $1 million in medical expenses on her own (Dignity also blamed the IRS for this).Bard exhausted every avenue of appeal within her employer's bureaucracy, and was repeatedly told that there was no possible way that her employer's insurance would pay for it. She was going to have to go on a $100/month repayment plan, which would see her in debt for the next 748 years.Then Propublica contacted Dignity Health, and they reversed their decision. They attribute the reversal to "additional information" they received about Bard's case, but could not say what that new information was. It appears the "new information" was that they were about to be pilloried in a national press outlet for bankrupting an employee whose only fault was failing to complete a paperwork requirement while in extreme emotional and physical distress, despite having been notified of it six years before. Read the rest

Erin Ehm's insurance company will buy her a new set of prosthetic feet every three years, but her $6,000/foot Echelon VT hydraulic prosthetics break down every 10 months. Erin's feet are now out of warranty, but she doesn't yet qualify for a new insurance-funded replacement, and one of them has broken down. She contacted the manufacturer, Blatchford UA (formerly Endolite) and asked them if she could pay for a repair, but Blatchford "would not repair them for any cost. Full stop." But they did offer to sell her a new one.Erin depends on her prosthetic feet for everything (as you might imagine!): both the physical activities that keep her fit, healthy and happy, as well as everyday necessities like driving her car, which has not been fitted with hand-controls. Last week I “blew out” the hydraulics on one of my feet. It was a foot that had been repaired under warranty in 2017, then stored in my closet until just a couple weeks ago as a backup emergency pair. I need emergency feet, because if I can't walk, I can't really do much. I can't take my son to school or make him meals. I can't drive to work. Not to mention the fact that I can’t leave the house to do any of the things I enjoy. I don't own a wheelchair and wouldn't know the first thing about navigating the world in one. My cars don't have hand controls. Let it be known that I acknowledge that I am extremely privileged in disabled society for the record. Read the rest

Pete Tridish and pals made a hell of a Hallowe'en haunt this year: on their "porch of doom," trick-or-treaters were sent to a Mars colonized by billionaires where they were expected to mine Mars rocks and put them in Amazon Mars boxes at a sweatshop Amazon Mars warehouse; Pete notes that the haunt was partly inspired by my 2011 young adult novella Martian Chronicles, which was recently podcast in two parts by the excellent Escape Pod podcast!Billionaires talk about going to Mars. They paint a picture of the utopia they will build there. But a utopia for billionaires is where we work as slaves in their labor camps. This years Halloween Porch of Doom gives you an opportunity to visit this glorious future of “progress,“ as defined by Jeff Bezos, and Elon Musk. Capitalism gives ridiculous rewards to people on top, and pays little to people who do the actual physical work. Entrepreneurs don’t come up with ideas on their own… school, reading works of others, talking with peers, and the labor to bring it to reality. So how come one person gets to decide what to do with all the profit that the idea creates? It was expensive when NASA built rockets, because as part of the government, their first priority was safety. Even so, space travel was dangerous. The biggest innovation by these entrepreneurs is cost cutting by tolerating more risk. Billionaires must be taxed sensibly to give society a return on the investments in education, roads, social services and other things that made their businesses successful. Read the rest

In 2016, Cloudflare was targeted by a notorious patent troll called Blackbird Technologies; rather than capitulate, the company set up a fund called "Project Jengo" to pay bounties to researchers who documented prior art that could be used to invalidate the patent in question -- and all of Blackbird's patents, and began to file to have additional patents invalidated based on that crowdsourced research.Not only did Cloudflare prevail in its litigation, it also seems to have taken a serious bite out of Blackbird, whose headcount has dropped precipitously, along with the number of lawsuits the company has filed. And to add insult to injury, the Cloudflare filed ethics complaints against the company's founder (who are both lawyers) with their individual bar associations.I proposed a variation on this in 2013. It's great to see it in action now! Sic semper tyrannis!As promised, Cloudflare distributed more than $50,000 in cash awards to eighteen people who submitted prior art as part of the crowdsourced effort. We gave out more than $25,000 to people in support of their submissions related to the ’335 patent asserted against Cloudflare. Additionally we awarded more than $30,000 to submitters in support of our efforts to invalidate the other patents in Blackbird’s portfolio.In general, we awarded bounties based on whether we incorporated the art found by the community into our legal filings, the analysis of the art as provided in the submission, whether someone else had previously submitted the art, and the strength and number of claims the art challenged in the specified Blackbird patent. Read the rest

Venezuela, one the wealthiest countries in Latin America, has collapsed. The economy is in shambles and people are starving. What happened? I watched this 7-minute explainer by Vox and feel much less ignorant than I did. I also see many parallels between what happened in there and what is starting to happen in the United States. Venezuela's problem doesn't have anything to do with it being an ostensibly socialist government. It has to do with the rise of authoritarianism.[via Doobybrain]Image: YouTube/Vox Read the rest

For a long time, meal prep was a binary choice: Slow and healthy in the oven, or quick and dirty in the microwave. Then people started to realize their pressure cookers actually had a lot to offer.Now, it looks like air fryers might be getting their due. Or at least, they will be if they all start offering the functionality of a Chefman 6L Digital Multi-Functional Air Fryer.If you've never used an air fryer, let us clear one thing up right away: This unit does a lot more than fry food. Feel like pizza? Make enough for everybody on the dual airflow racks. Chicken dinner? Do it the right way with a rotisserie function that incorporates the real-deal turning spit for an evenly roasting bird. It can bake cookies or pies, and its dehydrating function can turn fruits and veggies into a fun, long-lasting snack.And yes, by the way, it also fries, using its well-designed convection to crisp up food with a minimum amount of oil.What's more, it can do all this without preheating. And with a generous six-liter capacity, it might just replace both that oven and microwave as the cooker of choice.Right now, you can pick up the Chefman for 15% off the list price. Read the rest

Amazon has this Arduino UNO clone starter kit on sale for just . It's got the following components:What is Arduino? It's a credit card size microcontroller that lets artist, designers, and others add interactivity to their projects. My book Maker Dad, has a useful Arduino tutorial. Read the rest

Japan has a wild boar problem. According to this 2015 Tofugu article, inoshishi (the Japanese word for wild boar) attacks are on the rise:Kobe, January, 2011: An elderly woman attempted to feed a boar, which bit off her finger. Feeding boars was actually made illegal nine years prior, but the penalties are minor and not well enforced.Taishi, Hyogo Prefecture, April 6, 2013: Eight people, mostly senior citizens, were injured by a single, large boar. According to local police the animal first bit a woman in her yard, then headed east. Tada Miyuki, 68, was talking with a friend on the street, when she was bowled over by the boar and broke two ribs. “The boar came almost out of nowhere, and before I knew it, it rushed toward me,” she said. Local authorities issued a warning to local residents, and later that day a boar suspected of being the culprit was found as roadkill nearby.Kobe, June, 2014: Local media responded to sightings of a wild boar that attacked a teenage girl and an elderly man. After knocking down a young woman, the boar then charges the cameraman. He does his best to avoid and fend off the boar, but sustains bites on both legs, requiring stitches. It was later found that the boar had four offspring, and the attacks were probably caused by motherly defensiveness. Authorities later disposed of the mother, with no word on what happened to the young.In the video below, an inoshishi decides to attack a Japanese businessman for no discernable reason. Read the rest

It's important for kids to learn that the world is replete with charlatans, mountebanks, rascals, rogues, hustlers, flim-flammers, tricksters, and con artists.Disney is doing its part by selling a kit of "1001 Stickers" of famous Disney princesses like Ariel, Jasmine, etc. But when kids open the package, they'll see that 768 of the stickers are, as one disappointed Reddit user put it, "useless fucking squares. Thanks Disney."Thanks, indeed! It's a cheap way to learn a valuable lesson.1001 stickers and 768 of them are useless fucking squares. Thanks Disney. from r/assholedesignImage: r/assholedesign Read the rest

On Halloween, a child at Creekside Elementary School in Kaysville, Utah wore a Nazi uniform as his costume for a parade at school. After some people complained online, the school principal and a teacher were suspended with pay for allowing such a thing. I wish they could suspend the boy's parents from being parents. According to the Salt Lake Tribune, "others (on social media) supported the boy." From the Salt Lake Tribune:In a statement, the Davis County School District apologized for the costume.“[The district] does not tolerate speech, images or conduct that portray or promote hate in any form,” the statement read. “The district is taking the matter very seriously and is investigating every aspect of the situation.”School district spokesman Chris Williams declined to name the faculty members who were placed on paid leave, but the elementary school’s website lists Steve B. Hammer as the principal. Read the rest

A ruling by the 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals ordered Trump's accounting firm to hand over his tax returns to Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr today. From to Business Insider:The three-judge panel on the 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals in New York rejected Trump's argument that he is immune from criminal investigation and prosecution while he is the president.The Manhattan District Attorney's Office subpoenaed eight years of Trump's corporate and personal taxes as part of an investigation into whether the Trump Organization violated New York laws by fabricating business records connected to hush-money payments made to women who said they had affairs with Trump.Of course this doesn't mean he will – in fact, we all know he won't. He'll instead "appeal the ruling to the Supreme Court" says one of his attorneys, Jay Sekulow. According to NPR:"The decision of the Second Circuit will be taken to the Supreme Court. The issue raised in this case goes to the heart of our Republic. The constitutional issues are significant," said Sekulow in a statement.Vance has sought the records as part of an investigation into whether two women who said they had affairs with Trump were paid for their silence before the 2016 election....Trump's attorneys claim that as president, he is immune from criminal investigation. A lower court found that argument "repugnant to the nation's fundamental structure and constitutional values."The appeals court did not rule on the merits of that claim but said that because Vance's office was seeking the records from Trump's accounting firm, and not the president, the question of immunity was not a factor. Read the rest

For a while, I blamed myself. I had that noticed my paltry Bitcoin investment was doing well, so I threw some extra cash in, just to say what it would do. That was just this past July. Days later, the value tanked. By September, I was down nearly 25 percent. Things have started to settle, but it's seemed so unpredictable that I've been hesitant to celebrate.Now I know the truth. It wasn't my fault. It was the avocados—those same god damn avocados that ruined everything for millennials like me. But at least I got to enjoy them for cheaper while I stuffed my face to escape the pain of my crashing investment.*BITCOIN DROPS TO LOWEST LEVEL SINCE JUNEThe avocados told me this would happen. pic.twitter.com/5rOyE3Ohak— Tracy Alloway (@tracyalloway) October 24, 2019This isn't the first time someone has noticed the correlation, either. Back in April, the price of both jumped 35 percent. The avocados made sense—at the time, Trump had threatened to completely close the US-Mexico border, which would have seriously diminished our access to those delicious Aztesticles. Of course, we can always grow more avocados, whereas there will only ever be a finite 21 million theoretical Bitcoins in the world.Clearly, there's a deeper meaning here. Correlation is not necessarily causation, it's true. But it's hard to deny the synchronicity, so weighted as it is with meaning. Perhaps the answer lies in the last untried home investment for millennials: Bitcoin Toast.Think about it. Read the rest

It's hard to find someone who doesn't love Dolly Parton. Now, a recently-launched podcast goes deep into the beloved country legend's life and times to examine why she appeals to the masses. Dolly Parton's America follows her journey through her early scrappy days surviving on mustard-and-ketchup "soup," to being discovered, to creating Dollywood and that's just in the first three episodes (there will be a total of nine). Good stuff!It's hosted by Jad Abumrad, creator of Radiolab and More Perfect, who interviews Dolly herself.Everything's coming up Dolly: This podcast isn't the only thing happening in the Dollyverse. Over on Netflix, a new series called Dolly Parton's Heartstrings begins airing November 22. Plus, she's got a new Christmas ornament. Read the rest

I imagine that many of these videos were originally filmed by parents disappointed in the outcome, only to be rescued by teens who realized their failures could be spun into gold:There's more sports bloopers under #highlightreel at Tiktok. Read the rest

Boris Karloff and Vincent Price are perhaps the two most well-known horror movie actors in history. But that's not all they had in common—they were, apparently, both fans of homemade guacamole.Karloff's recipe was originally published in a newspaper (I couldn't track the original source, but the earliest date the image appears online is from November 2013). I personally prefer a squeeze of lime, rather than lemon juice, in my guacamole, but otherwise this is pretty straight-forward—except for that little touch of sherry. I've never tried that myself, but I bet it's worth a shot.(The newspaper article also refers to this as a "sauce," which is…not how I tend to think of my guac?)• 2 avocados• 1 med. tomato, chopped fine• 1 small onion, minced• 1 tbsp. chopped canned green chiles• 1 tbsp. lemon juice• 1 tsp sherry• Dash cayenne, optional• Salt, pepperPeel and mash avocados. Add onion, tomato and chiles, then stir in lemon juice, sherry and seasonings to taste, blending well. Serve as a dip for tortilla pieces or corn chips or as a canape spread. Makes 10 to 12 appetizer servings.Peel and mash avocados. Add onion, tomato and chiles, then stir in lemon juice, sherry and seasonings to taste, blending well. Serve as a dip for tortilla pieces or corn chips or as a canape spread. Makes 10 to 12 appetizer servings.It was much easier to trace the source for Vincent Price's recipe, which was published in a cookbook that he and his wife put out in 1965. Read the rest

Every city needs an "Honest Guide" YouTube channel, which helps visitors from getting ripped off by hustlers, con artists, and shady businesses. But for now Honest Guide exposes rip-offs in Prague only. In this episode your host shows how currency exchange offices rip off tourists and refuse to obey the law that says they have to refund a customer's money if they come back within three hours. Read the rest