ArtDaily: Treasure hunter Greg Brooks of Sub Sea Research says he found $3B WWII wreck.
Nations seem to temporarily misplace their ships ...
NY Times: Javits Center Plans Are Deflating for Architects.
“The Javits Center had been considered ripe for renovation almost since it opened in 1986 because it was too small for large trade shows and conventions ...” You’d better believe it. Of all the dimbulb designs. It could have been great, we would have used it regularly. Note, they work on the aesthetics, access ... but it’s the loading docks that also need fixing. If it takes forever to get equipment in and out, it costs production outfits gobs of cash.
Sprinkle Bakes: Red Wine Lollipops.
Recipe’s at the bottom; scroll down.
CNN: Concrete balls thwart roof-riding commuters.
Okay, ouch. If riding on train roofs was slightly fatal before, it surely is completely fatal now.
SOPA/PIPA Blackout day.
You do realize, I hope, that I would not be able to stand the legal/financial risk of writing this blog if SOPA/PIPA passed, don’t you? That I would not, as a small business, be able to resell hosting to my clients, because I would be liable for whatever materials they might post? I hope you do. Those who say “oh, we can just trust the government on SOPA/PIPA” should look again at what’s happened with the Patriot Act. Look at how little children and grannies are stripsearched at airports.
No, SOPA/PIPA need to be bodily thrown out of Congress. There are plenty of laws to deal with the problems it purports to cover - the issue is, the laws have not been fully tested in court, and the entertainment industry wants a ‘sure thing.’ They will destroy the internet in their zeal for every last penny of profit.
Don’t let them.
I suspect going black today is preaching to the choir (while fervently hoping it is not) ... I have been taking the step of educating my clients and friends about the issue over the past month. I would suggest that is a better use of today - talking to those who are not reached by internet means, letting them know this legislation stinks to high heaven, and carefully explaining to them why they should care.
You’ll see everyone doing *something* for SOPA/PIPA. I saw the widely-distributed video on rc3.org first. Fark has gone white - see why. Wired has cleverly self-censored. BoingBoing’s 503. Of course you know Wikipedia is black, except for the SOPA/PIPA entry. Even internet giant Google chimes in.
This entry sat at the top of DM! throughout the 18th. Back to normal programming flow.
NY Times: Should The Times Be a Truth Vigilante?
“Throughout the 2012 presidential campaign debates, The Times has employed a separate fact-check sidebar to assess the validity of the candidates’ statements. Do you like this feature, or would you rather it be incorporated into regular reporting?” The Times is asking for input on this. I say, incorporate into the reporting, so I don’t have to click and winnow again.
Tasteologie: Videos, making Christmas Ginger Jam Sponge Cake.
Eyebombing.
Type “Let It Snow” on Google.
And wait.
The Art of Manliness: A Beginner’s Guide to Whittling.
Lost art. Time was, you’d see a kid or a man leaned up against a storefront waiting for someone, knife out, whittling on a stick to pass the time. Often just carving it down to nothing, but sometimes crafting something beautiful. Now all I see in Santa Fe are bored husbands waiting outside the tourist bling stores frowning and squinting at their smartphones.
And yet, could we ever go back? Having a knife out in public would be considered outrageous behavior now, reason to call the cops, I suspect. We’ve become a very fearful culture, in many ways.
Valet.: School of Watches: Buyer’s Guide
Alas, I see fewer and fewer people wearing watches. The number of us who prefer to say “half-past” or “quarter-til” is diminishing rapidly. Responding by saying “10:45” is so dull.
Metafilter: Twenty-Five Semi-Obscure Traditional Christmas Songs.
Nice. Everyone here knows of my mild Jeff Beck obsession, so I’ll add Greensleeves, Amazing Grace and Corpus Christi Carol.
Felted Star Wars items on Etsy.
How you keep these intact in a dryer, I’ll never figure out.
Washington Post: The Romney camp’s indifference to the truth.
“Truth, facts, evidence, reason, decency, fairness — for Romney and his team, none of this matters. It’s not that they’re considering whether to be honorable; they’ve convinced themselves that the question itself is irrelevant.” Did you not know? Politics is not about justice or truth. It’s about inventing a narrative compelling enough to gain traction. The narrative now is a Frankenstein’s monster, each piece devoid of context, verbally and textually ‘Photoshopped’ into horrifying life.
This is Central Station: Mysterious paper sculptures.
Mysterious paper sculptures are being left in Edinburgh’s libraries, museums and other literary venues. I hope the creator stays anonymous - the mystery puts a spark on each and every sculpture.
Mashable: 10 Essential Tips for Planning the Perfect Industry Event.
Ugh. Voice of experience: #1 - have processes in place to poll and listen to your audience. #2 - Be flexible enough to respond to your audience on-site, throughout the event.
Almost nothing’s worse than opening a huge event with a big production piece and finding (usually during the first coffee break) that the overarching theme was a big mistake - except for doggedly continuing down the disastrous theme/marketing strategy through a multi-day event. It’s like lying down and building a coffin around yourself.
LRB: Jenny Diski reviews ‘The Myth and Mystery of UFOs’.
“However, it is Bullard’s account of the myth, rather than the mystery, that offers the most acceptable account of alien sightings and abductions. Or at any rate the most familiar and easiest to take. Aliens who whisk innocent sleepers off to their spaceships and give them medical examinations or impregnate them are only doing what fairies and hobgoblins have been doing since long ago and far away.” Ms Diski, this is a paraphrase of Carl Sagan’s longstanding contentions - I believe from “Demon-Haunted World.” And those may not be original to Carl.
Gizmodo: Watch this 230-ton Airbus A330 Stopping In Midair for a Few Seconds.
If you didn’t realize, flight has almost nothing to do with groundspeed. Airspeed is the key to safety.
Guardian.UK: Why creative writing is better with a pen.
“Writing on the page stays on the page, with its scribbles and rewrites and long arrows suggesting a sentence or paragraph be moved, and can be looked over and reconsidered. Writing on the screen is far more ephemeral — a sentence deleted can’t be reconsidered.” The illustrations and directions I add to my past writings are, actually, hilarious. Good point.
Obit-Mag.com: Bound for Glory - Obit’s Report from the 2011 NFDA Convention.
“Virtual tombs will become a natural complement to traditional gravestones, creating a space where basically you can bring back to you, on your computer or your iPad, the memory of the deceased, and share it for future generations.” I’ve had an idea about how to crush this market. One o’ these days ...
The Guardian.UK: Population growth: the baby bomb.
“… it is only 12 years since the birth of the six billionth person was announced and, for a majority of the world’s population, more things have got better than worse. But in an era so shaped by the burden of human activity that scientists are calling it the anthropocene age, the explosive near-trebling of the world’s population from just 2.5bn in 1950 demands at least an equal focus on reducing our environmental impact.” Just driving into Santa Fe these days, the traffic seems to have doubled since last year. Infrastructure improvements are just keeping pace.
NY Times: Lost in Paris.
Lord …
... save me from humorless literalists. Esp. when they’re telemarketers.
Youtube: The Quick Brown Fox …
As when typing this phrase, it takes a few tries to get it right.
Gawker: Starbucks Wants You Laptop Hobos Out!
“A Starbucks tipster tells him that some NYC Starbucks locations are now covering up their electrical outlets to discourage laptop hobos, because ‘some people just cannot be reasoned with.’” Oh, I love that. “Laptop hobos.” I’m going to use that. Thanks, Roger!
