Can you explain what happened in this accident caught on video surveillance in Atlanta? WSB-TV explains:a driver in northwest Atlanta drive off Marietta Street and speed through a parking lot before crashing onto the roof of a chiropractic office.A second video shows the car falling off the roof and onto a driveway below. ... Chappelear also told Channel 2's Justin Wilfon that [driver Stanley] Clarke’s foot became stuck between the gas and brake pedals, causing him to lose control.Mr Clarke was unharmed. Read the rest

Police in Colerain Township, Ohio, were summoned to a nature reserve after a dead body was spotted at the side of the road. Eventually, specialized personnel turned up who were able to determine that it was in fact a sex doll. WLWT:When Colerain police officers arrived and saw the body for themselves, they called the coroner.As the coroner went to pick up the body, they realized it wasn't human.What they had found was a sex doll, Colerain Police Chief Mark Denney said.Actually, I'm pretty sure that's just a mannequin. But you do you, Ohio.Photo courtesy of WLWT5 Read the rest

The weed killer glyphosate, better known as Monsanto's RoundUp, is touted by the manufacturer as a perfectly harmless herbicide. But a study led by bee experts at the University of Texas, Austin found that RoundUp leads to disruptions in the gut biome of honeybees and is responsible for the colony collapse disorder that's plagued bees for the last decade.From Chemical and Engineering News:The team, led by Nancy Moran, an expert in bee biology at the University of Texas, Austin, treated hundreds of worker bees with glyphosate at concentrations they might encounter while foraging near agricultural fields, reintroduced them into their hive, and then analyzed the gut bacteria of treated and untreated bees in the hive. After three days, the researchers found that the abundance of some of the eight predominant species fell in treated bees compared with untreated ones, suggesting that exposure to glyphosate changed the composition of the bees’ guts. When challenged with a common bee pathogen, the worker bees exposed to glyphosate died at higher rates than unexposed bees, suggesting that the bacterial shake-up made the insects more vulnerable.Image: Shutterstock/Simun Ascic Read the rest

It's true. Belly rubs are the best.Australian Shepherds. Such smart doggos. Such good doggos!This is the face of pure contentment and joy.Video, below.Belly rubs are the BEST[Source] Read the rest

Wait for the serious boop."Nice to meet you"......"NO. IT. IS. NOT" "Nice to meet you"......"NO. IT. IS. NOT" [source] Read the rest

What a well-timed tweet this one was, from Sony Pictures today during the worst day on Capitol Hill ever. “Tom Hanks is Mister Rogers, coming to a neighborhood near you October 2019.”Here's the “first look” image of Hanks as Fred Rogers, publicly released for the first time today with that tweet:Variety first reported in January that Hanks would play Rogers in TriStar Pictures’ biographical drama, with production starting this month. The film is based on the true story of the friendship between the “Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood” host and journalist Tom Junod. In the movie, Matthew Rhys (“The Americans”) plays Junod, a jaded magazine writer who is reluctantly assigned to profile Rogers. He ends up being so moved by Rogers’ kindness and empathy that he overcomes his skepticism and has a renewed look on life.The movie is the second in recent months to focus on Rogers, with the hit documentary “Won’t You Be My Neighbor?” released in June. Read the rest

“Lying Skanks.” That is what radio host and Fox News pundit Kevin Jackson (screengrabbed above) called Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh's alleged sexual assault victims, in a series of tweets today. "#ChristineBlaseyFord academic problems came from her PROMISCUITY!" he wrote on Twitter during Ford's Senate testimony. "Dang girl, stop opening your legs and OPEN A BOOK!"On Thursday morning while the testimony was taking place, he tweeted, "TO HELL with the notion that women must be believed no matter what. Lying skanks is what these 3 women are, and we ALL know more."Jackson also said on Twitter Christine Blasey Ford "looks rode hard and put up wet, as we say in the country."Fox News fired him, which is kind of a big deal, considering -- you know. Fox News.From the Hollywood Reporter:On Thursday evening, Fox News said it has cut ties with Jackson. "Kevin Jackson has been terminated as a contributor," a spokesperson said. "His comments on today’s hearings were reprehensible and do not reflect the values of FOX News.”Speaking generally about liberal women, Jackson had said that "leftist women are skanky for the most part."Back in December, Jackson had his wrist slapped when he suggested on Fox News that FBI agents who disliked President Donald Trump might have pondered "an assassination attempt."At the time, a network spokesperson told The Hollywood Reporter that Jackson's comment "was addressed with him." Read the rest

Senator Lindsey Graham was in a foul mood today when speaking to reporters during a break in the Kavanaugh-Ford hearing. “To my Republican colleagues,” he said, “if you can ignore everything in this record, looking at an allegation that’s 35 years old, that’s uncertain for time, place, date and no corroboration, if that’s enough for you, god help us all as Republicans. Because this happens to us, it never happens to them.” He then threatened Democrats: “Let me tell you, my Democratic friends. If this is the new norm, you better watch out for your nominees.” Hmm, like Merrick Garland? Read the rest

The Securities and Exchange Commission filed a lawsuit against entrepreneur Elon Musk alleging securities fraud. The complaint hasn't yet been made publicly available, but likely centers on his harebrained tweeting about taking the company private with foreign money.Am considering taking Tesla private at $420. Funding secured.— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 7, 2018Tesla shares are down 5.7%, reports Reuters. That's about $307, as of 4:20 p.m. Eastern time today.AMAZING UPDATE: Read the rest

The Kiyotsu Gorge lookout tunnel is a huge engineering marvel amidst spectacular beauty. Artists and architects recently repurposed it as an art installation replete with reflective surfaces, colored lights and sculptures.MAD Architects, led by Ma Yansong, has completed the restoration of the Kiyotsu Gorge Tunnel in Japan’s Niigata prefecture. The revitalization project sees the installation of several permanent artistic spaces along the historic lookout tunnel, with the intention of bringing back the cultural energy that once empowered the region. The “Tunnel of Light” opened on the occasion of the 2018 Echigo-Tsumari Triennale.• "Tunnel of Light" by MAD Architects at the 2018 Echigo-Tsumari Triennale (YouTube / MAD architects) Read the rest

How this video manages to make root canals seem like a straightforward and rather painless procedure is beyond me, but if I were to get another root canal, I'd want to watch this video first for some handholding reassurance. Read the rest

Above is a "Zebrafish embryo growing its elaborate sensory nervous system (visualized over 16 hours of development)" captured by Elizabeth Haynes of the University of Wisconsin - Madison, and colleagues. This wondrous clip is the winning entry of Nikon's "Small World in Motion" microscopic video contest revealing dynamic weirdness and beauty at the tiniest scales. Below, second place, Dr. Miguel Bandres and Anatoly Patsyk (Technion - Israel Institute of Technology), "Laser propagating inside a soap membrane;" and third place, "Polychaete worm of the Syllidae family," by Rafael Martín-Ledo of the Conserjería Educación Gobierno de Cantabria.See more: Small World 2018 World In Motion Competition Read the rest

I enjoyed the first two movies from the current round of X-Men flicks. Mutants causing the Cuban Missile Crisis? Love it. Wolverine traveling back to the 1970s to try and stop a future holocaust AND contend with a waterbed? Totally enjoyable--although I far preferred Chris Claremont and John Byrne's Days of Future Past over what the film had to offer.X-Men: Apocalypse? Eh, not so much. The pacing was weird as hell and I can't help but feel that Oscar Issac was wasted under way too much makeup. I'm hoping that the latest installment in the series will be a return to form. For better or worse, this'll be the last X-Men movie we'll be able to lay our eyeballs on before Marvel Studios has a chance to bring their spin to the franchise. Who's in? Read the rest

Just when you thought that Facebook couldn't get any more greasy, they have outdone themselves in a manner that places them well beyond even the most succulent of French Chef finger-kisses: the phone numbers that many folks gave them in order to activate the service's two-factor authentication protection? Zuckerberg and his crew are using it to serve up advertisements to unsuspecting users.From TechCrunch:Facebook’s confession follows a story Gizmodo ran a story yesterday, related to research work carried out by academics at two U.S. universities who ran a study in which they say they were able to demonstrate the company uses pieces of personal information that individuals did not explicitly provide it to, nonetheless, target them with ads.While it’s been — if not clear, then at least evident — for a number of years that Facebook uses contact details of individuals who never personally provided their information for ad targeting purposes (harvesting people’s personal data by other means, such as other users’ mobile phone contact books which the Facebook app uploads), the revelation that numbers provided to Facebook by users in good faith, for the purpose of 2FA, are also, in its view, fair game for ads has not been so explicitly ‘fessed up to before.The best part of all of this is that, according to TechCrunch, Facebook had the chance to confess to their shitty behavior some time ago when it was revealed that users who submitted a phone number for 2FA purposes were being spammed with texts ads sent to their smartphones. Read the rest

Nearly 200 personal letters by Hunter S. Thompson to a lifelong friend are up for auction today. Bidding ends today (9/27) at 5pm PDT. The minimum bid is $110,000 and there are no bids as of this writing. From Nate D. Sanders Auctions:Archive includes Thompson's famous letter written the day of JFK's assassination (the complete letter, which was only partially published in "Proud Highway"), and other extremely controversial letters, such as brutal and unpublished details of his time at the Slates Hot Springs in Big Sur, where he patrolled the grounds, including the baths, when he served as its caretaker. Many letters deal with writing "The Rum Diary", his time with (and beating by) the Hell's Angels and the book about them that made him famous, and trying to get published in the early 1960s when he was a struggling author...On 22 June 1965, Thompson gets a check to write "on Cycle gangs", in part, "you are thinking in terms of 40 years from now, while I hesitate to think beyond 40 days. Or -- at the moment -- six months, due to the contract I just signed: $6000 guarantee against royalties for a paperback on Cycle gangs…Things are hopping and I shouldn't be writing letters. I have to whip up an outline for the Cycle book and right now I don't have the vaguest idea what I'll write…Incredible. I've been drunk for two weeks." He continues on 6 July, "I warn you that you are going to find me a much tougher and shittier person than the one you left in Louisville 2 years go…It has finally come home to me that I am not going to be either the Fitzgerald or the Hemingway of this generation…I am going to be the Thompson of this generation, and that makes me more nervous than anything else I can think of… Read the rest

Jay Harrison shared this delightful lithophone cover of Vulfpeck's "It Gets Funkier III" at the Parabola Arts Centre as part of Cheltenham Music Festival.Lithophones are at least as old as their wood counterpart the xylophone. I was reminded of their lovely sound after reading about how mysterious tools found in the Colorado desert ten years ago have just been correctly identified as lithophones:The ancient people who lived near the Great Sand Dunes crafted their lithophones out of dense, often volcanic, rock to get the best sound. The stones have different sizes, which gives them different tones and pitches. Each one has a pair of dead spots where you can hold them so they resonate. One of the most exciting things about the discovery for Martorano is what these stones tell us about the lives of ancient people. We often see evidence of where Native Americans lived centuries ago, or how they hunted or ate. We know far less about their music.“To me, at least today, things that make life meaningful include the arts, include music,” she said. “And so it makes sense to me that that was important in the past as well.”Back to Jay's more modern version, here's a Paul Simon cover:And a short snippet of Radiohead:• VULFPECK /// It Gets Funkier III /// Electromechanical Lithophone (YouTube / Jay Harrison) Read the rest

Punk historian and music journalist Jon Savage has assembled an oral history of Joy Division to be published in March 2019. "This Searing Light, the Sun and Everything Else: Joy Division" features interviews with all the surviving members of the pioneering band -- Bernard Sumner, Peter Hook, and Stephen Morris -- along with Deborah Curtis, Peter Saville, Tony Wilson, Anik Honore, and others. It sounds to be a compelling companion to the 2007 documentary Joy Division, written by Savage and directed by Grant Gee. Read the rest

This quick trailer from Epic sets up Season 6, darkness may rise but silliness will reign.The Battle Pass looks great. Little Red Riding Hood, the gliders and pets will be fun to earn!I haven't been able to play, my little Xbox is struggling to download the giant 10GB update and I understand there are crashing issues. Life on the Island, I guess.If you would like to play Fortnite with folks who will get your A-Team jokes, there is Fortnite Over Forty, a discord set up for aging FPS enthusiasts. Read the rest

Like many young (and old) people, John Lennon had a stamp collecting phase. His collection is now on view at the Smithsonian's National Post Museum in honor of the US Postal Service's new John Lennon stamp (above). From Smithsonian magazine: Lennon’s stamp collecting was inspired by his late cousin Stanley Parkes, who gave him the classic Mercury album (with a picture of the god Mercury on the cover) when John was 10 years old. The album’s new owner wrote his name on the title page, after erasing Stanley’s, and beneath it his address at the time: 451 Menlove Ave., Woolton, Liverpool. (The house of his aunt Mimi, later bought by Yoko Ono and given to the National Trust.) As a boy, Lennon prefigured his future of counter culture cheekiness by sketching moustaches and beards on the book’s images of Queen Victoria and King George VI.John Lennon: The Lost Album (Smithosnian) Read the rest

Jim Mortleman & Stuart Houghton write, "We're two UK tech journalists who also write comedy. This is our (UK-based) scripted comi-documentary podcast explaining the weird, wacky and potentially world-changing field of quantum computing to a curious but confused general audience. With laughs. In episode one we answer the question 'What the photonic muck is a quantum computer?' with the help of some of the world's leading quantum physicists and, er, Al Murray The Pub Landlord." Read the rest

Here is the livestream. It began at 7am PST, this morning. I hope our Senators can treat her with respect. Read the rest

A reminder that I'm wrapping up my Columbia University lecture series tonight at 5PM, when I'm appearing onstage with Radiolab's Jad Abumrad at the lecture theater in Pulitzer Hall (RSVP here); and then I'm heading to Swarthmore tomorrow, to give a talk at the Lang Performing Arts Center Room (LPAC) 101 Cinema from 7-9PM. Both talks are free. Read the rest

Solid objects turn out to be mostly made of empty space and whirling particles, but we act as though they're solid, because we rarely have to interact with them in such a granular way that involves their underlying complexity.In the same way, solid iron-clad concepts turn out to be riddled with exceptions that we generally ignore because they're easy to deal with on a case-by-case basis. But when a programmer has to create a system that everyone can use, suddenly these "edge cases" grow to devour the project.For example: human names are (really) weird. Building a system that can accept all the names people have is really hard. There's actually a giant list of human concepts that are hard to capture in software design.A worthy addition to that list: Dave Delong's Calendrical Fallacies, AKA lies programmers believe about dates.An hour will never occur twice in a single dayFalse. On days when we “leap back” for the Daylight Saving Time shift, one hour occurs twice. For example, in the United States, the hour that occurs twice is the 1 AM hour. This means that on these “fall back” days, correctly-implemented clocks will go from 1:58 … 1:59 … 1:00 … 1:01 … … 1:59 … 2:00 … 2:01 …This leads to some interesting questions: If a user has set an alarm to wake up at 1 AM on that day, what happens? Does the alarm go off the hour after the midnight hour? Read the rest

Jack Poulson is one of several googlers to quit the company over Project Dragonfly, the company's secret plan to launch a Chinese search tool that will incorporate state surveillance and censorship on behalf of China's authoritarian government.Now, Poulson has sent a letter to the US Senate detailing the internal workings of Project Dragonfly, confirming that the tool is designed to block such queries as "student protest" and "Nobel prize," and to facilitate tracking users whose search history reveals an interest in politically sensitive topics.Google confirmed that this product has been developed, but insisted that the product is "not close to launch."The letter alleges Google is working on:* A prototype interface designed to allow a Chinese joint venture company to search for a given user's search queries based on their phone number* An extensive censorship blacklist developed in accordance with Chinese government demands. Among others, it contained the English term "human rights", the Mandarin terms for 'student protest' and 'Nobel prize', and very large numbers of phrases involving 'Xi Jinping' and other members of the CCP* Explicit code to ensure only Chinese government-approved air quality data would be returned in response to Chinese users' searchEx-Google employee warns of ‘disturbing’ China plans [Dave Lee/BBC] Read the rest

As the tide of public opinion turns against monopolism, Amazon has become the poster child for irredeemable, late-stage capitalism; the company's ham-fisted attempts to burnish its reputation have not stemmed the tide.As a result, union drives among Amazon workers -- including those at Amazon subsidiaries like Whole Foods -- have gained steam.Like other giants -- McDonald's, Walmart, etc -- Amazon is staunchly opposed to unionization by its workforce. In a 45-minute video aimed at Amazon managers and leaked to Gizmodo, the company sets out a playbook for suppressing unionization drives. Gizmodo did not release the video in order to protect its source, but it does describe each of the video's six sections in detail, and supplements it with screenshots (Amazon accused Gizmodo of "cherry-picking" in its characterization of the video, but declined to release the video in full, or clarify what the video's actual message was).Here are a few of the (extensive) examples “that can indicate associate disengagement, vulnerability to organizing, or early organizing activity,” according to the video:* Use of words like “living wage” and “steward”* Distribution of petitions and fliers* Associates raising concerns on behalf of their coworkers* Wearing union t-shirts, hats, or jackets* Workers “who normally aren’t connected to each other suddenly hanging out together”* Workers showing an “unusual interest in policies, benefits, employee lists, or other company information”* Increased negativity in the workplace* “[A]ny other associate behavior that is out of character”The training video then asks managers to listen to 10 hypothetical employees and select whether their remarks constitute a “warning sign” or “innocent interaction.” Workers loitering in the break room after their shift, asking for a list of the site’s roster, or complaining about the absence of a living wage fall into the “warning sign” category. Read the rest

Do your college essays still give you nightmares? You're not alone. A blank page or screen can be a terrifying sight, but a University of Cambridge tutor's new course can help you hit that keyboard with confidence.Dr. Clare Lynch has de-mystified academic writing and communication for students, business executives and government officials worldwide, and that experience is packed into her comprehensive course Writing With Impact: Writing That Persuades. Whether you're looking to present your best self in a business proposal, cover letter or blog, Lynch's examples will clear the path to winning prose. Over 4 hours of training, you'll develop your voice and confidence as a writer and learn valuable persuasion techniques that professional writers use. Whether you're writing outreach emails or commerce posts, you'll be able to improve your writing skills and get better results.This course is only $9.99 when you enroll today. Read the rest

Team Coco has announced that Conan O'Brien is going on an 18-U.S.-city stand-up comedy tour with his "funniest friends."Info below (links mine):Tickets Go on Sale Friday, September 28Featuring Rory Scovel, James Veitch, Marina Franklin, and Flula Borg.Fri, Nov 2 - Washington, D.C. (Warner Theatre)Sat, Nov 3 - Atlantic City (The Music Box)Sun, Nov 4 - Detroit, MI (The Fillmore)Tue, Nov 6 - Boston, MA (Wilbur Theatre)Wed, Nov 7 - Port Chester, NY (Capitol Theatre)Thu, Nov 8 - New York City, NY (Beacon Theatre)Featuring Ron Funches, James Veitch, Taylor Tomlinson, and Flula Borg.Thu, Nov 15 – Atlanta, GA (The Tabernacle)Fri, Nov 16 - Houston, TX (Revention Center)Sat, Nov 17 - Austin, TX (ACL Moody Theatre)Sun, Nov 18 - Nashville, TN (War Memorial Auditorium)Wed, Nov 28 - Chicago, IL (Chicago Theatre)Thu, Nov 29 - Minneapolis, MN (The Orpheum Theatre)Fri, Nov 30 - Milwaukee, WI (Riverside Theatre)Featuring Deon Cole, Ron Funches, James Veitch and Flula Borg.Sun, Dec 9 - Los Angeles, CA (The Wiltern)Featuring Ron Funches, Laurie Kilmartin, Moses Storm, and Flula Borg.Tue, Dec 11- Seattle, WA (Moore Theatre)Wed, Dec 12 - Denver, CO (Paramount Theatre)Fri, Dec 14 - Vancouver, BC (Queen Elizabeth Theatre)Sat, Dec 15 - San Francisco, CA (The Masonic) Read the rest

In All You Need is “Love”: Evading Hate Speech Detection, a Finnish-Italian computer science research team describe their research on evading hate-speech detection algorithms; their work will be presented next month in Toronto at the ACM Workshop on Artificial Intelligence and Security.As Big Tech has gotten bigger and taken on an outsized role in some of the most toxic and dangerous trends in world affairs -- from institutional misogyny to acts of genocide -- there have been louder and louder calls for the platforms to police their users' conduct and speech. The platforms have responded by promising a mix of algorithmic systems and human moderation, and have fielded some of these algorithms and even made them available for testing by the likes of the team behind this research.Their findings replicate the filter-evasion findings from other domains, where even the most sophisticated systems can be beaten with trivial countermeasures (for example, Chinese image censorship can be defeated by simply flipping a banned image). This team discuss several tactics of varying efficiency, but the most promising and easiest to implement was simply adding the word "love" to a hateful message, while running the "hate" words together in camel-case (e.g. "MartiansAreDisgustingAndShouldBeKilled love."Yesterday, I wrote about Corynne McSherry's "five lessons from the copyright wars" for people who want the platforms to take a more active role in policing user speech. This paper raises a sixth lesson: "The filters are unlikely to prevent the kind of activity you're worried about." In the same way that Youtube's Content ID filters are routinely subverted by copyright infringers, so too should we expect any kind of hate-speech filter to be easy for dedicated harassers to evade, meaning that the people they'll be most effective against are those who are caught accidentally -- say, because their discussion of how traumatic it was to be subjected to harassment is algorithmically mistaken for harassment itself. Read the rest

Australia's marvelous television is exemplified by A Current Affair, a current affairs programme specializing in filmed confrontations with ne'erdowells such as this shirtless pastor, described (perhaps accurately) by the reporter as Serial Pervert Con Man in a prelude to a low-quality public fistfight. See also the excellent Australian highway patrol show, Highway Patrol Australia. Read the rest

In 2014, Facebook bought the messaging system Whatsapp for $22B; it was a weird fit, because Whatsapp founders had decried Facebook's surveillance-based business model and targeted advertising, and had promised its users "No ads, no games, no gimmicks."Late last year, the cofounders of Whatsapp left Facebook, saying little at the time -- but then, in the midst of the Cambridge Analytica scandal, Brian Acton, one of the founders, tweeted "It is time. #deletefacebook."Acton has said little in public since, but in a long, revealing interview with Forbes's Parmy Olson, he frankly discusses the bad decision he made to trade his vision for the company he'd built for billions, and how he should have understood that Facebook would never keep its promises to preserve Whatsapp's autonomy and privacy protections. He also reveals that when he left the company, he declined an offere of $850,000,000 in unvested stock in exchange for signing a nondisclosure agreement that would have kept him from discussing any of this.The interview is a revealing look at the internal culture of Facebook, particularly how the company's senior management kids itself -- and the employees -- that taking actions that make its products simultaneously worse and more profitable is actually good for the company's users.It's really clear from the interview that Whatsapp users should expect to have their activity tracked and used as part of Facebook's overall, creepy surveillance. I stopped using all Facebook products a few years ago. I don't visit Facebook pages, I block its beacons, and I migrated my family off of Whatsapp for group messaging. Read the rest

"It's horrible!" declares mum, who nonetheless sticks with the virtual reality game, comforted by the warmth and affection of her animal companion. Read the rest

For two years, a group of die-hard Star Trek fans labored to create Stage 9, a totally noncommercial virtual replica of the USS Enterprise built with Unreal Engine; they assumed that when CBS Vice President for Product Development John Van Citters was serious in 2016, when he publicly acknowledged the debt that Star Trek owes to its fans and assured people creating fan media that "They’re not going to hear from us. They’re not going to get a phone call, they’re not going to get an email. They’re not going to get anything that’s going to ruin their day one way or another and make them feel bad, like they’ve done something wrong."But then the fans got a cease and desist from CBS, ordering them to shut down Stage 9.They tried to talk to the lawyer who sent the letter (that person left for vacation right after sending it); they tried to talk to Van Citters. No one would return their calls. Finally, they got in touch with the lawyer who sent the letter, offering to make any changes that would put CBS at ease. The lawyer told them they had to take their project down -- or else.CBS and Paramount publish fan art guidelines that Stage 9 seems to have adhered to. When CBS/Paramount sued the team behind the crowdfunded Star Trek fan-film Axanar (previously) the company pointed to these guidelines as evidence of their good faith. Star Trek was famously saved from cancellation by fans who had kept the story alive through unauthorized fiction and art, and who rallied to keep the show on the air. Read the rest

Most aquatic animals propel themselves with a tail or fluke, so roboticists have long been interested in the remarkable speeds possible by mimicking sea lion propulsion with front flippers. Don’t be fooled by a sea lion’s big, sweet eyes and playful demeanor—these guys move through water like a torpedo. While most animals swim using a tail or fluke, sea lions clap their fore flippers into their bodies to propel themselves to incredible speeds. It’s an elegant, efficient movement that land-dweller Megan Leftwich, an associate professor of mechanical engineering at George Washington University, wants to reproduce in robotic form. • How Sea Lions Are Inspiring the Future of Underwater Transport (YouTube / Great Big Story) Read the rest

Gritty was unveiled lately to the dismay of children, the ironic apprecation of a few adults, and the abject horror of everyone else. Benstonium, a Pittsburgh virality node, photoshopped the Flyers' new mascot into the background of a series of stock photos. Read the rest

Brian McManus looks at the engineering challenges behind the Curiosity's thin aluminum wheels, which are sustaining significant damage on the Martian surface.The damage has prompted NASA to commission new wheel options. One of the most promising is a spring tire made of nitinol, similar to the ones Goodyear developed for the lunr rover, but much more lightweight despite better load-bearing properties.• How NASA Reinvented The Wheel - Shape Memory Alloys (YouTube / Real Engineering) Read the rest

Executives from Google, Twitter, AT&T, Amazon, Apple, and other big tech companies told a U.S. Senate panel today they support updating federal law to protect data privacy, but they want Congress to block California's tough new privacy rules.The U.S. Commerce Department said earlier this week it is seeking comments on how to set nationwide data privacy rules, after The European Union General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) took effect in May, and California adopted stringent new rules the following month.From Reuters:In June California Governor Jerry Brown signed data privacy legislation aimed at giving consumers more control over how companies collect and manage their personal information, which Alphabet Inc’s Google and other big companies had opposed as too burdensome. The rules take effect in 2020.Amazon vice president Andrew DeVore said at the hearing that California’s law was hastily written and the law’s definition of “personal information” goes beyond information that actually identifies a person. “The result is a law that is not only confusing and difficult to comply with, but that may actually undermine important privacy-protective practices,” he said.Massive breaches of data privacy have compromised personal information of millions of U.S. internet and social media users, including notable breaches at large retailers and credit reporting agency Equifax Inc (EFX.N).“The Holy Grail is preemption” of state rules,” Schatz said. “You are only going to get there if this is meaningfully done.” He said Democrats would not replace a “progressive California law with a non-progressive federal law.”One possibility: The FTC could be given new authority to write federal privacy rules. Read the rest

There is now a fourth allegation, and it involves physical assault. NBC News reports that the Senate Judiciary Committee is inquiring about at least one additional allegation of misconduct against Judge Brett Kavanaugh.Republican Senate investigators are reported to have asked Kavanaugh about the new complaint during a phone call Tuesday with Kavanaugh and Republican staff. On that call, Kavanaugh denied the allegation in the letter, and a spokesman for the committee would not comment to reporters.According to an anonymous complaint sent to Republican Sen. Cory Gardner of Colorado, Kavanaugh physically assaulted a woman he socialized with in the Washington, D.C., area in 1998 while he was inebriated.The sender of the complaint described an evening involving her own daughter, Kavanaugh and several friends in 1998.“When they left the bar (under the influence of alcohol) they were all shocked when Brett Kavanaugh, shoved her friend up against the wall very aggressively and sexually.”“There were at least four witnesses including my daughter.” The writer of the letter provided no names but said the alleged victim was still traumatized and had decided to remain anonymous herself.A Democratic source said the minority wasn’t satisfied by the Republicans’ questions about the incident during the call, calling them cursory, and believed it should be investigated more deeply.NBC News reached out to the White House for comment, and received none.When the first claim of sexual assault against Donald Trump's Supreme Court nominee came out, many of us said there would likely be more than one Kavanaugh victim. Read the rest

Is there any doubt he is the goodest of boys?From 3puppy Stylish Pet Salon, in Japan.OMG that side-eye! The way he shakes his little butt! View this post on Instagram #포메 짜짱이 짜장~짜장 볼륨🎵을 높여!!ㅋㄱㅋ♥️ . . 춤추는강아지🎶 귀여웡.ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ . . 펫스타일리스트 @sunwoo_89 신들린 가위손 선우쌤 ㅋㅋㅋ✂️✂️ ✔ (For licensing or usage, contact licensing@viralhog.com) #강아지삼총사#강남애견미용 #포메미용잘하는곳 #포메곰돌이컷#스트레스없는강아지미용실 #강아지미용 #ポメ#ポメラニアン#子犬#博美犬 #小狗#puppy#pomeranian#pome #불금A post shared by 강아지삼총사(Stylish Pet Salon) (@3puppy) on Jun 28, 2018 at 4:52am PDT There's a 'Night at the Roxbury' version.Also, Ducktales.[Reddit, and Original Source] Read the rest

Luke aka Sadface is a pixel artist who also creates these fun and informative videos that show you how to make pixel art animations.They're all available for free on YouTube, and there's a cool thread of excerpts on IMGUR. You can support Sadface_RL on Patreon, and check out how every time there's a new video, there's a corresponding image (GIF) based demonstration over at the Patreon.Below: “Making an Archway,” and “Pixel Art Tutorial / Walkthrough on Trees without Leaves.” And a fun bonus, below: “Self-Assembling Pixel Art.” Read the rest

Oh my.......🐱🐱“NSFW.” Video and low-rez GIF follow.🐱🐱🐱🐱🐱NSFW🐱🐱🐱🐱🐱🐱🐱🐱🐱🐱[via] Read the rest

Fellow Californian and apparent rap sensation Lil Xan has eaten too many hot cheetos.Apparently the flaming hot cheetos caused him to both bleed internally, and to vomit blood. Having had these cheetos, I do not understand the attraction.Via the BBC:On Tuesday, the 22-year-old alarmed fans by posting a photo of himself in the back seat of an ambulance on his Instagram story.He quickly posted a new clip revealing: "I was in the hospital not due to any drugs but I guess I ate too many Hot Cheetos and it ripped something in my stomach open so I puked a little blood".It's not the first time the snacks have been in the news because of health concerns.In July, a mother said snacks, including Hot Cheetos, may have been partially to blame for her daughter's gallbladder surgery.She said the teen regularly ate bags of corn snacks before stomach pains led to the operation. Read the rest

There are lots of calls for the platforms to police the bad speech on their platform -- disinformation and fake news; hate speech and harassment, extremist content and so on -- and while that would represent a major shift in how Big Tech relates to the materials generated and shared by its users, it's not without precedent.For more than 20 years, online platforms have had a legal duty to police their users' copyright enforcements, responding to unproved accusations of copyright infringements by (usually) removing materials, generally without a moment's thought.Everybody hates this: users, copyright holders, the platforms themselves. Now, maybe it doesn't have to be this way, but if we're going to ask the platforms to expand their policing duties without turning into (more of) a shitshow, it's worth considering the lessons we've learned from decades of copyright enforcement.EFF's Legal Director Corynne McSherry offers five lessons to keep in mind: 1. (Lots of) mistakes will be made: copyright takedowns result in the removal of tons of legitimate content.2. Robots won't help: automated filtering tools like Content ID have been a disaster, and policing copyright with algorithms is a lot easier than policing "bad speech."3. These systems need to be transparent and have due process. A system that allows for automated instant censorship and slow, manual review of censorship gives a huge advantage to people who want to abuse the system.4. Punish abuse. The ability to censor other peoples' speech is no joke. If you're careless or malicious in your takedown requests, you should pay a consequence: maybe a fine, maybe being barred form using the takedown system. Read the rest

Anything Star Wars gets my attention, but today's stage of VR doesn't excite me. Maybe this will be the thing...I dunno what a VR series is either. TV you virtually live?Via Venture Beat:Vader Immortal: Episode I — the first in a three-part series — was written and executive produced by David S. Goyer, and it takes place between Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope (a period the excellent Darth Vader comics tackle as well). Players trek to Vader’s castle (it first “new canon” appearance is in Rogue One: A Star Wars Story) on the volcanic world of Mustafar in a “yet untold” story in the Star Wars universe.“Whether it’s hearing Darth Vader’s breathing behind you and physically turning to face him in person or wielding a lightsaber with your own hands, Vader Immortal captures the ultimate wish fulfillment,” Oculus head of experience Colum Slevin said in a statement. “Untethered VR immerses you in this universe and places you at the center of this amazing story.” Read the rest

"Everything’s fine the way it is. Trump…that was us. He’s our guy. Tax cuts for the rich? Hell yeah, I’m rich as fuck. Climate change? That’s a “you problem”…I’ll be dead soon. Sure, school shootings are sad, but I haven’t been in a school for 50 years." Voter registrations close soon in many key states. Register here. (via Kottke) Read the rest

Audio-Technica's Sound Burger was a weird record player that sounded ok to me, if memory serves. Crosley makes a USB version.Around 10 years ago Crossley brought it back, but at $150 it was too expensive for my tastes! Now you may own a USB "Sound Burger" for a mere $50.I do not own a record player. I own very few vinyl LPs, but I wanted to make a recording of one. I borrowed this USB turn-table from a pal and it worked, I have absolutely no complaints! If I wanted a record player that took up very little space and can output USB, this would be the one.Crosley CR6020A-BL Revolution Portable USB Turntable with Software for Ripping & Editing Audio via Amazon Read the rest

"Something about the pen and paper / I can look at all my ideas / And I can see them"(Super Deluxe, thanks UPSO!) Read the rest

Veterinarians at the Maryland Zoo outfitted an injured Eastern turtle with a wheelchair built from Lego. An employee of the zoo found the turtle whose shell had been injured in a nearby park. “He had multiple fractures on his plastron, the bottom part of his shell. Because of the unique placement of the fractures, we faced a difficult challenge with maintaining the turtle’s mobility while allowing him to heal properly,” said Ellen Bronson, the zoo's sensior director of animal health. From Local21News:Zoo officials say there aren’t devices small enough for turtles to use so they got creative and drew sketches of a customized wheelchair. The sketches were then sent to a friend, who is also a LEGO enthusiast.“The sketches proved to be a success and the turtle received his very own multi-colored LEGO brick wheelchair just a few weeks after surgery. The turtle is roughly the size of a grapefruit. The small LEGO frame surrounds his shell and sits on four LEGO wheels,” said Garrett Fraess, veterinary extern at the zoo. Read the rest

You can own the reception desk from Dunder Mifflin's Scranton branch! Hundreds of props from The Office are now up for auction. Items include the likes of Angela's stuffed cat, Dwight's wolf art, and myriad desk items like calculators, computer screens, desk lamps, files, keyboards, beets, bears, Battlestar Galactica. The Office auction (Screenbid) Read the rest

Continuing to be blind to their own contradictions, Melania is off to visit Africa.Via Talking Points Memo:Mrs. Trump will travel next month without President Donald Trump, who raised ire across Africa this year after his private complaint about the continent’s “s-hole countries” was leaked to journalists. He said earlier Wednesday that he and his wife “love Africa.”Trump later offered a partial denial in public but privately defended his remarks, The Associated Press reported in January. Trump also didn’t deny the comment when he was asked about it while hosting Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari at the White House in April.While the first lady tours the vast African continent, the president is expected to be in the midst of aggressive campaigning for November elections in which his Republican Party’s control of both houses of Congress is at stake. Read the rest

Giving medicine to one of my cats – or any pet I've ever had – has always been a source of anxiety, for me as well as them. With their frantic squirming, strange cries, frightened glares, and ultimately letting the medicine fall out of their mouths, it's never pretty. I at first thought that maybe the cat in the top video was just an abnormally people-pleasing feline, but then I found this other video (below) with more examples of cats taking their pill as if it were a piece of candy. Apparently there's a simple process to giving a cat a pill that I have never mastered, but I'll make sure to watch these videos again the next time I return from the vet's office with a sick cat. Read the rest