Cubicall, makers of contemporary telephone booths like those you might see in the offices of momentarily flush startups, have created an official replica of the time machine phone booth from Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure (1989). It is $8,495. For that price, perhaps it provides the same functionality as the one in the film. From Cubicall:The limited-run phone booth features a design inspired by the original film, including an authentic payphone retrofitted for VOIP/landline service, an umbrella antenna, and all of the same stellar features of Cubicall phone booths. Made in USA. Excellent! Read the rest

Last night, Trump snubbed Nancy Pelosi by ignoring her gesture to shake his hand before his State of the Union address. At the end of the address, she snubbed him back by ripping up her copy of the speech. "It was the courteous thing to do considering the alternative," she later told reporters. And then later added, “It was a manifesto of mistruths.” Read the rest

CesarMP is a commercial pilot from Colombia who posted a recent video about a UFO he saw while flying a plane. Is it a weather balloon?Image: YouTube Read the rest

A Michigan State University gift shop displayed a collection of miniature dolls of black leaders like Michelle Obama and Harriet Tubman by hanging them from a small tree. Upset by this extreme insensitivity, grad student Krystal Rose Davis-Dunn says she asked the staff if they noticed anything wrong with the display but they apparently did not. After Davis-Dunn posted a photo of the display to Facebook, the university apologized. From CNN:"We were made aware of an inappropriate and insensitive display at the Wharton Center gift shop which used a tree-like rack to hold historical black figures," Michigan State University spokeswoman Emily Gerkin Guerrant said. "Regardless of the intent of the display, its impact cannot be ignored -- people were hurt and offended."Davis-Dunn told CNN she had initially asked the gift shop's employees if they thought anything was wrong with them, but they said no. "They're black people hanging from trees," she said. "I mean, lynching? It was just not registering with them."The incident is the latest in a string of racial insensitivities on Michigan State University's campus in the 2019-2020 school year. Read the rest

I recently needed to glue wood together in a real hurry and tried a product called RapidFuse that didn't do too well. Annoyed, I decided to look for tests of the zillion wood glues now available so I could find something with a 15-minute set that works. It turns out I'm asking too much, really, but I did find Wood by Wright's incredibly exhaustive series of tests on dozens of different products. The overview video is embedded above; with more details for the thirsty and the 64-brand follow-up.The data collected is presented in a single enormous spreadsheet at Google Docs.The absolute best product depends on grain and exposure to the elements, but Elmer's Wood Glue Max [Amazon] is a clear winner for standard indoor woodworking projects with DAP Plastic Resin Glue [Amazon] winning if you're outdoors. Read the rest

We may never know the truth about the border crisis, writes Matthew Connelly, because the National Archives is letting millions of documents be destroyed.President Trump has long made it a practice to tear up his papers and throw them away. It is a clear violation of the Presidential Records Act, which is supposed to prevent another Watergate-style cover-up. When the National Archives sent staff members to tape these records together, the White House fired them.In 2017, a normally routine document released by the archives, a records retention schedule, revealed that archivists had agreed that officials from Immigration and Customs Enforcement could delete or destroy documents detailing the sexual abuse and death of undocumented immigrants. Tens of thousands of people posted critical comments, and dozens of senators and representatives objected. The National Archives made some changes to the plan, but last month it announced that ICE could go ahead and start destroying records from Mr. Trump’s first year, including detainees’ complaints about civil rights violations and shoddy medical care. These documents include reports of detainee deaths and sexual abuse. "Wherever books burn, human beings will also burn." – Heinrich Heine Read the rest

I took a Shared Lyft home the other night, rather than waiting for the bus. There were two other passengers in the car when I got in — a woman in the backseat, and a man in the front. The man was dropped off first, about a mile from my own place. And as soon as he got out of the car, the inside filled up with one of the worst-smelling farts I've ever experienced in my life. I looked around the car, but neither the woman, nor the man driving, seemed to respond to this wretched scent.So I tweeted about it.Hi @Lyft how do I report the shared passenger on this ride who just let rip the hugest grossest fart right as he got out of the car— This Is Not A Thom Dunn T-Shirt (@thomdunn) January 31, 2020To be clear, I wasn't trying to be a narc; I was just a little buzzed, and I thought it was funny. But as the saying goes, "The road to Hell is paved with jokes on Twitter."To their credit, Lyft responded. And to my surprise, they were surprisingly helpful.Thank you for letting us know. We're still happy to look into this with the date and time of the ride and a description of the other rider. Please send us a DM with the phone number, email address, and full name associated with your Lyft account. We're happy to help! https://t.co/SXpdictw1A— Ask Lyft (@AskLyft) January 31, 2020We moved the conversation to DMs, and I shared some details on the ride. Read the rest

Ever wondered where tartan comes from? Now you know: the tartan sheep of Auchingarrich. Glenn Check:A Scottish farmer at Auchingarrich Wildlife Centre fools tourists into believing that her flock produce tartan wool with the help of some harmless sheep marking spray. The visiting Americans were told that the animals were being raised on a diet of Irn Bru and shortbread"More from The Scotsman:Maxine Scott, 62, used her skills with a spray-can to brighten up ewes April and Daisy. She puts up a sign pretending the sheep turn that colour naturally and the wool then used to make tartan wool for kilts and blankets. Maxine said: “When we got the park, they always had tartan sheep. It was just for the tourists. “We just continued the tradition. The public do like it - Americans are really impressed by them. Read the rest

The Thin Blue Line Pint Glass [Benshot] and the .308 Authentic Solid Copper Projectile Whiskey Rocks Glass Engraved with Blue Line American Flag [Amazon] are items apparently intended to support the authoritarian mode of policing that imagines itself part of the U.S. flag while dividing it in two. But the addition of a bullet embedded into the design looks more like a violent suggestion than -- whatever it is they think it's saying. It works so well as a sharp anti-police statement that it's the perfect gift for the most adamant antifascist in your love circle. Read the rest

With more and more people working at the office, at home, and on the go, virtually everyone needs a laptop these days. But the truth is that most of us simply don't require the type of processing power that the incredibly awesome but super-expensive Apple laptops have to offer when it comes to making it through the day.The best-selling laptops below allow you to browse, email, and even game for a tiny fraction of what you'd pay for a MacBook, and each one is available at an additional discount right now.Under $1001. Samsung Chromebook 11.6" 16GB (Refurbished)MSRP: $599 | Sale Price: $99.99 (83% off)Perfect for students or commuters who mostly need to browse the web and respond to emails, this super-compact Chromebook sports 16GB of storage space and boots up in seconds. You also get the full Chrome OS, along with your favorite Chrome apps and utilities for added convenience.2. Dell Chromebook 11-3120 2.16GHz Intel Celeron 16GB SSD - Black (Refurbished)MSRP: $250 | Sale Price: $84.99 (66% off)Dell makes some of the most popular and powerful Chromebooks around, and this 16GB SSD laptop lives up to the hype by offering a 2.16GHz Intel processor along with a crystal-clear 11.6” display and 10 hours of battery life.3. Lenovo N21 11" Chromebook 2.1GHz, 4GB RAM, 16GB Drive (Refurbished)MSRP: $599 | Sale Price: $89.99 (84% off)If you’re looking for a powerful Chromebook that’s extra compact and lightweight, look no further than this best-selling Lenovo laptop, which comes loaded with a 2.1GHz Read the rest

Is it real, or is it Memorex?screengrabs via CuteVN Animals Read the rest

GANField is the result (nightmarish, grotesque, occasionally comical) of a generative adversarial network trying to find its way through a corpus of Garfield strips.Watch as an AI struggles to seam together hundreds of Garfield comics.Created by Daniel Hanley. https://twitter.com/calamardhMusic is '4 All Hail the Fishmen' from LISA: The PainfulYou have no idea how ... unlonely you are, Garfield! See also: Will Burke's creepy Garfield drawings. Read the rest

I've linked to Michael Gardi's retrocomputing replicas and recreations quite a few times. Here's a list:How to make a "computer on a card" from the 1960sHow to make a replica of the GENIAC Electric Brain from 1955Complete instructions for making a replica of the Minivac 601 educational computer kit3D printed replica of the Digi-Comp II marble computerMake this scale model of the Dr. Nim digital gameMichael just finished a new project! He wrote to me and said:Well it's a new year and I have a new project to share, something a little different. Rather than a straight replica, this time I have created a version of the computer described in the book How to Build a Working Digital Computer, by Edward Alcosser, James P. Phillips, and Allen M. Wolk, and published in 1967. In it they show how to construct such a computer using "simple inexpensive components usually found around the house or in a neighborhood electrical parts store." A very cool book.Now completed, my version is one of only a few known implementations. I tried to limit myself to technologies that would have been available in the late '60s, but used modern fabrication techniques like 3D printing and cheap PCB manufacturing to build it.Details are posted on Hackaday Read the rest

We all have at least one in our homes. We spend an inordinate amount of time with it. And we’d be lost without it. Yet the less we think about it, the better.Yes, we’re talking about your toilet. And while you’d rather just ignore it, give it a moment of your time right now. And maybe even throw a dollar or two it's way. Because seriously...your throne needs some love.Below, you’ll find 10 different items designed to make your time in the WC a little more pleasant. Just consider it for a second. It’s the least you can do for the porcelain god that does so much for you.GlowBowl Motion Activated Toilet Nightlight: 2-Pack - $23.99 (Originally $32.50)The GlowBowl helps you avoid the shock of turning on bathroom lights in the middle of the night. In addition to a rainbow of color options, this motion-activated LED light that hooks just inside your bowl also has 5 different dimmer settings, so you’ll never end up blinded by your 2 a.m. bathroom excursions. And since most houses have at least two bathrooms, this 2-pack means you’re set.Original IllumiBowl Toilet Night Light - $10.99 (Originally $15)If dimmer settings don’t matter, but size does, the illumniBowl might be your toilet nightlight of choice. As seen on Shark Tank, this bowl light clocks in about half the size of the GlowBowl has eight different light colors and an improved motion sensor.Motion-Activated LED Toilet Light - $10.99 (Originally $19.99) Read the rest

There are some genuine LOL moments on this Late Show with Stephen Colbert segment where he dispatches Triumph the Insult Comic Dog to the Senate to find out what the hell is going on with the impeachment trial.Image: YouTube Read the rest

With only 62% of precincts reporting in, Bernie Sanders has 28,220 votes in the Iowa Democratic Party caucus, followed closely by Pete Buttigieg on 27,030 and then Elizabeth Warren with 22,254. Joe Biden trails a distant fourth on 14,176 votes, only a little ahead of Amy Klobuchar.Buttigieg, however, has more delegates pledged in the complicated and suddenly very controversial caucus, according to CNN.After a long night and full day of rancor, confusion and anger over delayed caucus results, the Iowa Democratic Party offered the first round of official results at 5 p.m. EST. With more than a third of precincts still to report in, the winner is still anyone's guess. But Sanders and especially Buttigieg can be happy with the result. With the vote so divided, Warren's strong third will be a relief to her supporters.Biden's dismal fourth, however, is the first real sign of trouble for his campaign, otherwise atop opinion polls nationwide in the race to become the Democratic challenger to Trump in the 2020 general election.Most of the problems stemmed from a caucus reporting app that failed catastrophically on the night. Read the rest

I have an earlier version of this Anker PowerCore charger and it's the one I use most frequently. It's small and light and will charge my Nintendo Switch as well as my iPhone. Amazon has it on sale right now. Read the rest

Content creator and filmmaker Ani Acopian says: "I wasn’t having much luck with dating apps so I partnered with @amazon to make a better one."This is Amazon Dating!(No, it isn't real. Yet.)(Thanks, UPSO!) Read the rest

“The blessing of military weapons is not reflected in the tradition of the Orthodox Church and does not correspond to the content of the Rite,” reads a new document on the website of the Moscow patriarchate of the the Russian Orthodox Church.Russian priests should stop blessing nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction that can inflict indiscriminate loss of life, according to new guidelines being discussed. It's an unusual display of independence by the church.From Reuters:During two decades in power, President Vladimir Putin has aligned himself with the Orthodox Church, which has also developed closer ties with the ministry of defense. Russian priests have long appeared in images sprinkling holy water on submarines, ballistic missiles, Soyuz space rockets and other pieces of hardware as part of rituals to bless them. But some of that is set to stop if the church approves a document drawn up by an Orthodox Church commission.“The blessing of military weapons is not reflected in the tradition of the Orthodox Church and does not correspond to the content of the Rite,” the document, on the Moscow patriarchate’s website, says.Blessing or sanctifying weapons that can kill an “indefinite number of people” must be excluded from pastoral practice, it says. The proposals will be discussed until June 1 and the public should also take part in the debate, the church’s Moscow branch said. Read more:Russian priests should stop blessing nukes: church proposal[Tom Balmforth, reuters.com/]IMAGE: mospat.ru. “On 1st February 2020, the 11th anniversary of his enthronement, His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia officiated at the Divine Liturgy in the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour in Moscow. Read the rest

Until the latter part of the 1900s, vibrators were big industrial-looking objects that might have scared off many a humans back in the day. Sexologist and curator of the Good Vibrations Antique Vibrator Museum Dr. Carol Queen shows us some of these beauties as she answers questions from Atlas Obscura about vibrators of the late 1800s to the 1970s. Read the rest

In Connecticut, police are trying to identify a man captured on surveillance camera stealing about $17,000 worth of merchandise from a gas station. Cops say the guy got a job there, then proceeded to steal tens of thousands of dollars worth of stolen lottery tickets, cigarettes, and cash on his very first, and only, solo overnight shift. Then, the suspect disappeared.From AP:The man also stole his employment folder, which contained his personal information, so the store’s owner does not even know the worker’s name, Hamden police said in a statement Tuesday.Police responded to the Go On Gas store late last month.The owner told investigators he used an app on his cellphone to view the store security cameras and noticed that the new employee had left.MORE: Hamden Gas Station Employee Accused of Stealing Items Worth $17k on First Day [nbcconnecticut.com —PHOTO: Hamden, CT police] Read the rest

Reporter Natalie Allison, who covers state politics for The Tennessean in Nashville, tweeted a photo Monday (the photo was shot by photojournalist George Walker IV) of TN state Rep. Kent Calfee drinking from a Hershey’s chocolate syrup bottle.Weird. Or -- not weird, if you ask TN state Rep. Kent Calfee, and others who've observed him doing this before.Allison tweeted that Calfee “often does” this during the legislative session.But not so fast, reports the Tennessean! The rep says it's water, not syrup or alcohol.“It’s a repurposed syrup bottle that I drink my water out of,” Calfee said Tuesday, according to the newspaper. “I’m not going to buy a $25 or $35 or $45 water bottle that’s not worth what it costs because I’ll probably put it down and leave it somewhere.”He added that he and his wife “recycle everything,” per The Tennessean, saying “I was fixing to put it in the plastic recycling one day at home, and I thought, shoot, I can put water in that.” Read more:‘It happens a lot:’ Tennessee lawmaker sipping chocolate syrup bottle makes waves [sacbee.com]As he waits for the State of the State to begin, Rep. Kent Calfee takes a swig of from his Hershey’s chocolate syrup bottle, as he often does during #tnleg session. Photo by @Tennessean’s @GeorgeWalkerIV. pic.twitter.com/TWPZ8yxbM9— Natalie Allison (@natalie_allison) February 3, 2020Whiskey flask, most likely— Kᴇᴠɪɴ Bᴀɪʀᴅ ᶠʳⁱᴺᵍᴵⁿᵉᴱʳ 🌚🌞 (@KevinBaird) February 4, 2020 Read the rest

I first learned of Philadelphia Printworks because of a sweatshirt they designed for the Brooklyn Museum's showing of Soul of a Nation: Art in the Age of Black Power 1963–1983, an absolutely essential exhibition of black artists' work at the intersection of activism, empowerment, and cultural pride. (The exhibition is currently on view at San Francisco's de Young Museum.) Philadelphia Printworks describes itself as "a social justice heritage brand and screen printing workshop." I've bought two of their hoodies -- the "Soul of a Nation" design and also their "People's Free Food Program design" celebrating the Black Panthers' influential community program launched in 1969 that fed thousands of children every day."Soul of a Nation""Octavia Butler" by Nick James"Freedom Trail/Freedom Summer" Read the rest

A college student loan processing company sent thousands of copies of the same statement to an Ohio family. An estimated 55,000 copies, to be precise.Dan Cain said he was suspicious when a postal worker in Twinsburg, Ohio said he couldn't retrieve his mail the normal way, and soon he saw two USPS workers wheeling out two huge bins of mail, all addressed to his Twinsburg address.“I was shocked, are you kidding me, who makes that kind of mistake,” Cain told local TV newsThe College Avenue Student Loan Company made a mistake, and says they used the wrong interest rate to calculate the payment. So, all 55,000 of them were incorrect. Excerpt from cleveland19.com:Cain counted 79 plastic bins of mail each containing roughly 700 letters, all exactly the same, a statement for the student loan, he and his wife Dee, had taken for his daughters college tuition.Thinking he was out of options, it took 2 trips in his truck to get all the letters to his home where they are now sitting in his garage.The student loan company apologized for the mistake, blaming a glitch in a new outgoing mail system, and his postal carrier later told him he may have been able to tell the clerk at the post office to return the mail.“I just may start a fire, a bonfire, and burn it all,” Cain said with a chuckle.“We are working with Dan directly on a remedy, including picking up the mail from him if possible and a statement credit for the inconvenience,” the company’s chief operating officer, Tim Staley, said in an email sent to reporters today. Read the rest

Update: Nevada Dem. Party abandons the app, 1025AM Pacific time/125PM Eastern.An Iowa Caucus disaster in 3 bullets:• Precinct captains were first allowed to test the app 16 days before the caucus• And they only got detailed instructions at 1pm yesterday,• Then the two-factor verification broke.“We have the name and screenshots of the Shadow Inc. app that failed in Iowa last night, it is worse than you could possibly imagine,” tweets Jason Koebler of VICE News. Get a load of this:Wow. "On the ground, it went great," Green, the chair of the Democractic presidential primary caucuses in Iowa's Fremont Township and Lone Tree precincts and an IT systems administrator for a financial services firm, told Vice News:"I got pissed off four years ago at how my precinct was run, which is why I volunteered to do it this time around," he said. "We had 113 people and everyone was pleasant. I had to recruit a secretary once we were going—I couldn't find one ahead of time. Everyone was patient and in good cheer. I know that's not likely the case today. My girlfriend, especially, is distraught. She has poured her life and soul into this thing, and for naught."Green, like many other precinct chairs, faced problems reporting the results of the caucus to Iowa's Democratic Party using the app. Due to a coding error, the app, created by a company called Shadow Inc., wasn't reporting the correct data, according to the Iowa Democratic Party. Read the rest

Today, Twitter released a statement that says the platform has suspended “a large network of fake accounts,” as well as many others “located in a wide range of countries,” for abusing an API feature that allowed them to match phone numbers to usernames.Here's the official tweet.We recently discovered an issue that allowed bad actors to match a specific phone number with the corresponding accounts on Twitter. We quickly corrected this issue and are sorry this happened. You can learn more about our investigation here: https://t.co/Z6Q4geQ8jo— Twitter Support (@TwitterSupport) February 3, 2020“We observed a particularly high volume of requests coming from individual IP addresses located within Iran, Israel, and Malaysia,” the Twitter security bulletin says. “It is possible that some of these IP addresses may have ties to state-sponsored actors,” the post continued.TechCrunch previously reported this same issue on December 24, which is also the day Twitter says that it “became aware” that the abuse was taking place, writes Devin Coldewey at TechCrunch. Security researcher Ibrahim Balic found that a bug in Twitter’s Android app let him submit millions of phone numbers through an official API, which returned any associated user account.Excerpt from today's TechCrunch report:The feature is intended, if you have enabled it, to let friends who have your number look up your Twitter handle. But obviously submitting millions of numbers goes “beyond its intended use case.”If you had turned this feature off, you weren’t affected by this bug. Fortunately for users in the EU this was opt-in there. Read the rest

I've watched Quentin Tarantino's Once Upon a Time In Hollywood twice, and I appreciated more even the second time. So I enjoyed this "making of" documentary that Sony released to YouTube last week. It has interviews with all the principle actors and Tarantino himself, along with behind-the-scenes footage.<em>Image: YouTube</em> Read the rest

If you use Google Photos, and you used the Google Takeout data download/backup service, you may want to pay attention closely to this warning sent by email today from Google to users.Whoa, what? @googlephotos? pic.twitter.com/2cZsABz1xb— Jon Oberheide (@jonoberheide) February 4, 2020From 9to5google.com:With Google Takeout, you can download your data from Google apps as a backup or for use with another service. Unfortunately, a brief issue with the tool last November saw your videos in Google Photos possibly get exported to strangers’ archives.Google this evening began alerting Takeout users about the “technical issue.” From November 21-25, 2019, those that requested backups could have had videos in Google Photos “incorrectly exported to unrelated users’ archives.”In requesting a backup, some of your videos — but not pictures — might be visible to random users that were also downloading their data through Google Takeout. The company did not specify what media was affected beyond “one or more videos in your Google Photos account was affected by this issue.”Read more:Some Google Photos videos in ‘Takeout’ backups were sent to strangers last November[Abner Li, 9to5google.com, via techmeme.com] Still think that dumb Google superbowl ad is great? The company sent private videos stored in Google Photos to strangers. https://t.co/h2DIvseyFs— Ian Miles Cheong (@stillgray) February 4, 2020This seems wildly insufficient, Google. At minimum, people should be informed exactly what videos of theirs were accidently provided to other users. https://t.co/wuDrsSJDrB— Dieter Bohn (@backlon) February 4, 2020Google has revealed it accidentally sent private videos in Google Photos to strangers. Read the rest

"Rubik Mona Lisa" (2005) by legendary French street artist Invader, is expected to sell for around $166,000 at a forthcoming auction. Made from more than 300 Rubik's Cubes, it's the centerpiece of Artcurial's "Urban Art" sale taking place on February 23. Invader first experimented with what he calls Rubikcubism in 2004 and has since created many other works including iconic videogame characters and representations of classical paintings by Alain Jacquet and Gustave Courbet. Invader writes:Rubikcubism is similar to Op Art. To view a piece, you have to stand back from it. Close up, the image is nothing but a mass of cubes and colours, it’s only when you stand back that the face emerges. The further away you stand, the clearer it becomes. Two years ago, I displayed a Mona Lisa in the window of a gallery in Lyon. From the gallery entrance, the image was invisible. Overly pixelated. It was only when you stood on the pavement opposite that Mona Lisa’s features appeared. Faces become recognisable or amorphous, depending on the position of the viewer. Read the rest

“In this day and age, you can trace everyone’s movements with big data,” Li Lanjuan, an adviser to the National Health Commission, said in an interview with state television.Government officials in China are using big data to track the location and movement of people who are known to be infected with the Wuhan coronavirus, officially known as Novel coronavirus 2019-nCoV. The Wall Street Journal reports on the Chinese government's “unprecedented effort to track the fast-spreading virus, which has infected more than 20,000 people and killed at least 425 around the world” as of today:China has built a formidable digital-surveillance system in recent years, linking facial recognition, security cameras and social-media monitoring with regular human surveillance. The aim is to keep tabs on its 1.4 billion citizens, chiefly to identify and prevent threats to social order and Communist Party control.The country’s state-run media has celebrated the application of the authorities’ big-data tracking abilities in the campaign to control the disease outbreak, touting it as an example of the social benefits of technology.Shizhu county in Chongqing, in southwestern China, said it used unspecified data to track more than 5,500 people arriving for the Lunar New Year holiday from Hubei province. Roughly half were placed under home quarantine, according to a report in the Communist Party-run Chongqing Daily newspaper.In Zhejiang province, not far from Nanjing, authorities dealing with one patient who denied having contact with anyone in Wuhan were able to use data analysis to show he had interacted with three others from the city, China Central Television reported last week. Read the rest

It's almost as if the mirrors aren't even real!The act appeared on Nippon TV's Masquerade entertainment contest.(r/videos) Read the rest

Robotic employees such as hotel concierges and English teachers are nothing new in Japan, but here is its first robotic bartender. QBIT Robotics created this chatty robot that works in one of Tokyo's Yoronotaki izakaya restaurants. According to Reuters, "it uses four cameras to monitor customers to analyze their expressions with artificial intelligence (AI) software." It can pour a beer in 40 seconds and "mix a cocktail in a minute"--although in this video it's closer to two minutes.From Reuters:Japan’s first robot bartender has begun serving up drinks in a Tokyo pub in a test that could usher in a wave of automation in restaurants and shops struggling to hire staff in an aging society...Finding workers, especially in Japan’s service sector, is set to get even more difficult.Japan wants to use the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games beginning on July 27 to showcase service robot technology, with organizers planning to use robots built by Toyota Motor and Panasonic Corp to help visitors, workers and athletes.The robot bartender trial at the pub, which employs about 30 people, will last two months after which Yoronotaki will assess the results. Read the rest

I'd never thought about the character limit on domain names — but apparently, they cut off at 255. I found a handy Microsoft blog that goes into a bit more depth about it, citing RFC 1035 section 2.3.4.Someone who clearly knows more about this than me already had the clever idea to max it out by registering. http://a.b.c.d.e.f.g.h.i.j.k.l.m.n.oo.pp.qqq.rrrr.ssssss.tttttttt.uuuuuuuuuuu.vvvvvvvvvvvvvvv.wwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww.xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx.yyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy.zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz. This fun little experiment has some intrinsic added value, too, as explained on the site:The domain is created to reach the maximum number of allowed characters (255 (really 253)) with an exponential curve in the length of the letters as you proceed through the alphabet. The formula used is "1 + 62 * (10/7)^(x-26)". To help illustrate this curve, reference the distribution on this spreadsheet. It's colorful because I like colors and wanted to do a progressive "rainbow" animation in CSS3.Who.is couldn't give me any information on the name of the owner/creator of this site. But I commend them nonetheless.Image: Kulandru mor / Wikimedia Commons (CC 1.0) Read the rest

Songwriter Tom Rosenthal had a tweet go viral last week, featuring a short song he'd written in a few takes with his 4-year-old daughter Fenn:Fenn, my nearly 4 year old daughter, recorded her first ever solo song today. She came up with all the words herself and I helped her a little bit with the tune. It’s called ‘Dinosaurs in Love’. 🦕❤️🦕 pic.twitter.com/erCgG0sUvP— Tom Rosenthal (@tomrosenthal) January 28, 2020Dinosaurs eating peopleDinosaurs in loveDinosaurs having a partyThey eat fruit and cucumberThey fell in loveThey say "Thank you"A Big Bang came and they diedDinosaurs, dinosaurs fell in loveBut they didn't say "goodbye"But they didn't say "goodbye"The song exploded so quickly that even Spotify asked for an official release date. Which shouldn't be surprising, because it's obviously brilliant."I genuinely couldn't tell you why she wanted to do a song about dinosaurs," Rosenthal told Buzzfeed. "She's got no particular affiliation with dinosaurs at all. They're not something she particularly cares about or not, this is just what was in her head at the time."He went to explain the father-daughter creative process: "In terms of her singing and her timing, nothing's altered, but it's done in a couple of sections. … She's by the microphone, she's got the headphones on, she starts singing, and she does as much as she can. … And then eventually after she's done enough little bits of it, it kind of all fits together. Read the rest

Google and Microsoft keep attacking, but when you’re talking cloud-based computer systems, you’re still really only talking about one name: Amazon.Amazon Web Services (AWS) is still the 800-pound gorilla of the cloud market, and getting accredited as an AWS Certified Solutions Architect is a big deal for hiring managers and those getting hired. You can learn exactly what it takes to pass that CSAP exam on your first shot with the training included in the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Professional Practice Tests + Courses Bundle ($14.99, 88 percent off).This training is a full download for working in the AWS environment. Once you’ve gone through these courses, you’ll understand how to navigate the AWS Management Console as well as how to design, implement, and scale up web operations for an organization of any size, no matter its budget or timeframe.You’ll also learn how to craft stable architecture, put together security with potential for growth, and how to study data flowing in and out of your system for top optimization of resources.With five full-length mock exams packed with over 400 unique AWS CSAP certification exam practice questions, there isn’t an element of AWS you won’t know like the back of your hand.Typically a $130 training package, the complete AWS Certified Solutions Architect Professional course is priced at just $14.99 right now. Read the rest

The Iowa caucuses are a mess, with no precinct results declared, Pete Buttigieg claiming victory despite being fourth in most polls, and conspiracy theories spreading online, especially about the app used to tally counts and its Shadow-y connections to party elites. The problems were predicted.On the ground, more confusion: here's a video of a woman who did vote for Pete, but changed her mind after learning something new about him. [via Public Freakout]It's not clear if she was able to change her pick. But it is a clear reminder of the distance between media and reality. Read the rest

I have a weird confession to make. I have highly unorthodox "retirement home" fantasies. Every time I see a castle, a tree HOUSE, a decommissioned missile silo, an abandoned French villa, I start fantasizing about spending my twilight years building an artist colony/goth retirement home with family and friends there.So, imagine how my neurons were tickled when I saw this video of a guy and his wife who bought a long-abandoned Medieval Italian village and are turning it into a small neighborhood and teaching center for "rural stone architecture." They claim there are dozens of these little ruined stone villages all over Italy and they want to encourage others to follow in their footsteps. Called “The Village Laboratory”, Ghesc is part-owned by the Canova Association and hosts workshops so college students worldwide can come learn historical stone construction techniques. The public half of the village includes a communal kitchen, pizza oven and concert spaces. Right now Ghesc (in local dialect; “Ghesio” in Italian) in the commune of Montecrestese near the Swiss border has just 3 inhabitants (Maurizio, Paola and their son Emil), but the four homes that comprise the private side of town are at various stages of being rebuilt. Read the rest

A Texas police officer convicted of rape was sentenced to 10 years probation by a jury, reports The El Paso Times. He will serve 0 days in prison. It was an emotional day in court, as the woman cried as she testified about the impact the incident has had on her life, while Alexander began crying when his children came into the courtroom.The woman testified that she will forever be haunted by the sexual assault and that she is no longer the woman she once was.El Paso Police Department Officer William Ollie Alexander was convited of sexually assaulting a woman after responding to a domestic violence call in West El Paso. According to reports, he dropped the woman off at a friend's house, began texting her, left work early to pick her up, took her to a dark area and raped her.His defense lawyers, Dolph Quijano and Omar Carmona, argued that the woman was "mentally disraught due to fighting with her ex-boyfriend", that the text messages showed "she was willing to meet with the officer, including asking him for a ride," and that law enforcement officers face "the death sentence" in prison.They didn't get him off the conviction, but they did get him lenient treatment: prosecutors had asked for 15 years' imprisonment. In addition to serving probation, Alexander will also pay a $10,000 fine and register as a sex offender.“It doesn’t matter how many years,” attorney Omar Carmona said. “He will go to the penitentiary as [a] former police officer. Read the rest

The 1896 film "Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat" was not shot in 4k at 60 frames per second, but it gets there in this remastering using neural networks. The result has some uncanny, distracting warping going on, but it's nonetheless detailed and transporting.Denis Shiryaev:Upscaled and resounded version of a classic B&W movie: Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat, The Lumière Brothers, 1896For reference, here's the original:And here's a 2012 "Remake": Read the rest

This Useless Machine (previously) has a series of strategies to confound and distract the enemy, but knows when it's time to give up. Jeffrey Kohler:Useless Box with several additions: buzzer, audio output, motors and wheels, sonar, and a surrender flag. Read the rest

In Cincinnati, Harves Gardner, 32, was arrested after allegedly calling police 25 times asking for help finding his lost hoodie. From Cincinnati.com:“When police arrived (the) defendant only wanted rides around town to find his hoodie that he lost," officers reported.Police said Gardner was highly intoxicated and officers told him to go back to bed, but he continued calling and gave different locations for the police to respond.(Thanks, Charles Pescovitz!)image for illustrative purpose only: "Missing Hoodie" available from Superteeshops Read the rest

Over at The Startup on Medium, David Laws, semiconductor curator at the wonderful Computer History Museum, has prepared a fascinating guide to Silicon Valley's "high-tech heritage trail exploring places that housed the early stirrings of the digital revolution." Covering the "30-mile corridor from Stanford University to the former IBM disk-drive campus," Laws visits dozens of historical locations in the area including the spot where in 1908 Cyril Elwell demonstrated wireless telephony, the Stanford Research Park where Russel and Sigurd Varian invented the klystron microwave tube in 1937, and the location of Fairchild Semiconductor, fabricators of the first "monolithic integrated circuit (computer chip)" in 1960. Here are a few other great stops on the tour:Apple and Steve Jobs, the most famous beneficiaries of Xerox innovations, borrowed the Alto’s GUI, mouse, and other features to differentiate the Macintosh from the rest of the early PC pack. Together with Steve Wozniak, Jobs co-founded Apple Computer and built the Apple 1 in his parents’ suburban tract home... at 2066 Crist Drive, Los Altos. Private residence, do not disturb...Mountain ViewScientists and engineers fabricated the first silicon devices in the Valley at the Shockley Semiconductor Laboratory in a former apricot packing shed at 391 San Antonio Road, Mountain View in 1956. Razed in 2014 for a multi-use commercial development, the lab site is commemorated with an IEEE Milestone plaque, an interpretive panel, and towering semiconductor device sculptures mounted in the sidewalk. (photo above)... South ValleyKnown as Andy Capp’s Tavern in 1972, Rooster T. Read the rest

43-year-old Shakira and 50-year-old Jennifer Lopez at the Super Bowl from r/CelebhubI learned that an important sportsball event took place in the United States yesterday. Apparently the game was interrupted with a song-and-dance routine that many people found pleasant. However, some people took umbrage at the choice of entertainment, including William Franklin Graham III, the Christian evangelist, missionary and trufan of the pussy-grabber in chief. Graham posted the following statement on Facebook:In response, a mother of a 13-year-old boy shared Graham's sentiments: Then another person weighed in: When Graham's and the others' comments were posted to Twitter, several people commiserated with the mother. Read the rest

I'm really loving these old clips from The Dick Cavett Show on YouTube. Here's a 5-minute clip of Paul Simon telling Cavett about his music making process, his involvement in The Graduate, and how he wrote "Mrs. Robinson."This is as good a time as any to share a theory about The Graduate that my late friend Mike Vodneck told me his high school teacher had about why Mrs. Robinson was willing to destroy her marriage to keep Ben from dating her daughter, Elaine. It's because Ben and Elaine were half-siblings. Try watching the movie with that in mind and see how it holds up. Read the rest

This undated photo provided by the Wilson Country Sheriff’s Office shows Spencer Alan Boston. Authorities in Tennessee say Boston lit a cannabis cigarette in court while expressing his views on marijuana legalization. News outlets report Boston, 20, was arrested Monday, Jan. 27, 2020, and charged with disorderly conduct and simple possession after blazing a fattie in the courtroom. (Wilson Country Sheriff’s Office)A gentleman in Lebanon, Tennessee man fired up a marijuana cigarette in the courtroom, authorities said, and for some reason, his situation did not improve.From apnews.com:Spencer Alan Boston, 20, was arrested Monday and charged with disorderly conduct and simple possession after sparking up in the courtroom, news outlets reported.Wilson County Sheriff Robert Bryan said Boston was in court Monday on a simple drug possession charge. Boston approached the bench to discuss his sentence but instead expressed his views on legalizing marijuana.Boston reached in his pocket, pulled out a marijuana cigarette, lit it, smoked it and was immediately taken into custody, Bryan said. No word on whether the dude was smoking just weed, or weed mixed with tobacco, but we can all agree on one thing: poor guy is not smoking with a full pipe, if you catch my drift.More:Sheriff: Man stirs the pot by lighting joint in court [apnews.com] Read the rest

At at least 20 worshippers were killed in a stampede at a prosperity gospel church service in Tanzania on Sunday when the pastor told the thousands in attendance to come forward to get anointed with blessed miracle oil that solves all problems, reports The Telegraph. After the deadly incident, the pastor attempted to flee the country but was arrested before he could escape.Pastor Boniface Mwamposa had been drawing huge crowds by promising prosperity and cures for diseases to worshippers who step in what he calls "blessed oil" during his services.He was arrested on Sunday in Tanzania's commercial capital, Dar es Salaam, as he attempted to flee the country, home affairs minister George Simbachawene said on Sunday."Mwamposa tried to flee after this incident, but we arrested him in Dar es Salaam ... he will be held accountable for causing this tragedy," the minister said.According to the minister, the stampede took place after the pastor instructed worshippers, who numbered some 10,000, to rush to one side of the stadium all at once to get anointed.Who else thinks that Pastor Mwamposa will say the people died because they lacked faith?Image: YouTube/Kenya Citizen TV Read the rest

Researchers identified a phytocannabinoid in Cannabis sativa that they say could be 30 times more powerful than THC, at least in their lab results. The scientists from Italy's University of Modena and Reggio Emilia and their colleagues found that in their in vitro tests, tetrahydrocannabiphorol (THCP) showed an attraction to the nervous system's cannabinoid (CB1) receptor that's more than thirty times higher than good ol' THC. From CNN:CBD has mostly been the focus of studies on the health benefits of cannabis, but because THCP appears to show stronger binding abilities and potency, the authors think there is potential for health benefits.The findings could enable the production of cannabis extracts for targeted physical effects; more testing with the study's methods could further the discovery and identification of new compounds, the authors said."There are other minor cannabinoids and traces in the plant that can be hard to study, but by isolation we can continue to assess the effects they might offer," (said Jane Ishmael, associate professor in Oregon State University's College of Pharmacy, who was not involved in the research."Historically, many of our medicines have been derived by or inspired by natural products. By having new compounds that bind with very high affinity, that will give scientists a new probe into biological sciences."Read the scientific paper: "A novel phytocannabinoid isolated from Cannabis sativa L. with an in vivo cannabimimetic activity higher than Δ9-tetrahydrocannabinol: Δ9-Tetrahydrocannabiphorol" (Nature Scientific Reports)image: Thayne Tuason (CC BY-SA 4.0 Read the rest

State Rep. Rodney Garcia is concerned about the rise of socialists Montana. But he says there's something people can do about them - kill and imprison them.“So actually in the Constitution of the United States (if) they are found guilty of being a socialist member you either go to prison or are shot,” Garcia told The Billings Gazette.From the article:Garcia said he views what he sees as an influx of socialism in Montana as a “very dangerous” situation and that socialism has destroyed countries like Venezuela.“They’re teaching that to kids. Thank God my grandkids know it’s wrong because I teach them. And it’s a very dangerous situation," Garcia said.Garcia added he believes socialism is growing, citing advertising he says is done by socialists on Facebook.Photo of Billings, Montana by Steve Halama on Unsplash Read the rest

This is the best part of the movie.Sammy should have beaten Burt down tho. Read the rest

Last week, Bradenton, Florida brewery Motorworks Brewing made headlines with their idea to put local animal shelter dogs' photos on their beer cans to help with pet adoption. Monica Mathis saw the story and recognized her dog Day Day who went missing three years ago from her Idaho home. So she called. From WFTS:(Manatee County Animal Services's Hans) Wohlgefahrt said they checked and Day Day did have a microchip with Monica's first name, but her last name had changed and the information on it was outdated. (She had since moved to Minnesota.)Mathis was able to provide paperwork to prove to Manatee County Animal Services that Day Day was actually her dog, Hazel."Once I got the confirmation I just couldn’t believe that this was actually my dog," said Mathis.How Hazel got from Iowa to Florida is unknown.(Thanks to our Florida bureau chief, Charles Pescovitz!) Read the rest