Brace yourself Hawaii

"Mock it Like it's hot"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2L253VLwH3w&feature=video_response


Actually the funniest damn thing I've seen in months. Basically just this kid reading and summarizing the first Twilight book chapter by chapter... absolutely hysterical

"First thing I notice is that there is actually no explanation at all for why Bella moves to Forks. She starts off by describing Forks and saying its a really really horrible place it has gloomy omnipresent shade, detested Forks she says and shes going there... but bella just goes, there's no reason why....

We get a description of Bella's mum incidentally. Bella says 'My mum looks like me except for short hair and laugh lines,' we don't know what Bella looks like, what a pointless description...

So now it's Bella's first day in school still chapter one. 'It wasn't obvious it was school only the sign which declared it to be Forks High School made me stop,' what would be more obivous than a sign saying it was Forks High School, aaw stupid girl."

Quantum.....

anything with the word 'quantum' used as a quantifier scares me... http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/science/article7026255.ece

WIsh I could find prints of some of these

http://www.mymodernmet.com/profiles/blogs/august-bradley-is-a-beautiful

missin the good ole days

http://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2009/12/vintage-magazine-covers-with-a-wow-factor/

Back in the day, it was considered to be very prestigious to have your artwork or photograph featured on a magazine cover, and some of the greatest artists of our time designed magazine covers.

really fantastic.

What is France up to?

http://www.economist.com/blogs/charlemagne/2010/02/french_arms_sales_russia

Selling amphibious vehicles that Putin says will be used whenever and where ever they are deemed necessary... hmm hmm hmm

so weird

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/02/obscene-us-manga-collector-jailed-6-months

A very odd article about a man being jailed for 6 months for owning Japanese Manga depicting child pornography, abuse and bestiality. I mean it's obviously sick. But jailed for owning cartoons about it. No one is being actually harmed by this.

outlaws cartoons, drawings, sculptures or paintings depicting minors engaging in sexually explicit conduct, and which lack “serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value.”

It seems right but it's also a little extreme. I suppose it's maybe construed as encouraging the practice in life. But like can you really convict someone for this type of thing. All he's really done when you boil it down is think about these acts. Should really be jailed for thinking about doing something awful, or I suppose in this case, imagining it. You can of course be arrested or charged for conspiring, but this isn't even really 'conspiring to...' do it. I dunno, an interesting question though.

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2009/05/manga-porn/
more full version of the article.

Nodar Kumaritashvili

Wondering who that is? Yeah, it's the luge racer who died several days ago in a horrific accident. I merely bring it up because I generally have CNN or MSNBC on next to me as I do homework or whatever, and I have never heard his name. He's 'the athlete,' 'that athlete,' 'the Georgian athlete.' Never have I heard, Nodar Kumaritashvili, or Mr. Kumaritshavilli, or just Karitshavilli. Just odd is all. I don't really understand why the name is being left out of the story.

Norway is by far the strangest place

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/02/09/people-in-scuba-gear-chas_n_455787.html

Watson Fellowship

sooo cool

http://www.watsonfellowship.org/

A $25,000 one year grant for independent study and travel outside the United States awarded to graduating college seniors. awesomeness essentially.

Jon Stewart in france

I find it interesting that Jon Stewart's reputation—though he insists that he is simply a comedian—isn't just in the US.

La ligue antidiffamation l'a accusé de "diaboliser Obama et de promouvoir des théories conspirationnistes sur son administration". Son dernier ouvrage, Le Bon Sens de Glenn Beck, s'est vendu à un million d'exemplaires. L'écrivain Stephen King l'a surnommé "le jeune frère un peu débile de Satan". De lui, Jon Stewart, l'agitateur de la gauche sur la chaîne Comedy Central, a dit : "c'est le type qui dit tout haut ce que pensent les gens qui ne pensent pas"... Il a gagné 23 millions de dollars en 2009 et ses émissions radiophoniques sont diffusées sur 400 stations FM.

And that in France he is seen as an left-wing agitator. Kind of interesting, because I feel that in America he's held to a very odd standard. Because he has so much influence he should be tougher and less funny, yet at the same time he is fairly hard hitting, AND at the same time he's a nobody because he's just a comedian. In the article there's no mention of him being a comedian or anything. That could just be me reading to deeply into a one sentence mention of a comment he made, but still.

Megatrends author interview

Author of the book "Megatrends" discusses Chinese ideology and western misconceptions of the so called communist state.

25 reasons to be cheerful in the UK

my personal favorite

A 76-year-old Polish beekeeper, Jozef Guzy, collapsed while working, stopped breathing, went cold and was pronounced dead by a doctor, but just as they were sealing him in his coffin someone noticed he had a pulse. He was then rushed to hospital where ­doctors couldn't find anything wrong with him. Obviously, there's something terribly wrong with him, but it's still a nice story.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2010/jan/26/oh-happy-days

the life of a chicken, the life of a human

This article, a little overly wordy but entertaining nonetheless—and interesting if you have any interest in the average life of a chicken.

Reward and risk go hand in hand. The top cockerel has to take the biggest share of both. A flock can manage without a cockerel, but a cockerel without a flock is nothing.

A flock can keep you warm, inform you about dangers and advantages, and provide you with companionship; but you have to work at it.

Everyone should have a place in the pecking order. Strive for your place in life, not someone else's. Someone else's bread isn't necessarily tastier than your own. Envy will cost you dearly.

Don't let "flock-think" smother your own opinions; give yourself space to be an individual. Common sense is useful, but it's not always right. The society you're in may prompt you to behave badly, but only you can change that.

One could spend years on a moral philosophical quest, or keep chickens and treat them with courtesy and common sense. One doesn't just keep chickens, one lives with them. All chickens are not born equal, but they deserve equal respect.

I am generally confused about what the main argument is. Something about society being like a flock of chickens. Or maybe that they aren't at all the same and chicken society is somehow better than human society. Or maybe just that keeping chickens is a very positive experience... but yeah.

a continuation: chat roullette

This article easily much better written and as such emotionally moving where the other was merely interesting. This article, truly fascinating. Basically any article that involves analyzing psychologies behind online movements are pretty interesting. This particular articles takes a very different stance, or at least one I've never read before. He argues that twitter, facebook, chatroulette provide a distinctly human experience. I believe the more prevalent argument offered is that these sites take away from the human self by providing fake worlds where you can create a separate online persona.

I entered the fray on a bright Wednesday afternoon, with an open mind and an eager soul, ready to sound my barbaric yawp through the webcams of the world. I left absolutely crushed. It turns out that ChatRoulette, in practice, is brutal. The first eighteen people who saw me disconnected immediately. They appeared, one by one, in a box at the top of my screen—a young Asian man, a high-school-age girl, a guy lying on his side in bed—and, every time, I’d feel a little flare of excitement. Every time, they’d leave without saying a word. Sometimes I could even watch them reach down, in horrifying real-time, and click “next.” It was devastating.

This, to me, doesn't seem any less real than any other experience just, like he said, more efficient. Enough rejection to fill your entire High School experience in 30 seconds.

As Internet culture has grown, we’ve come to romanticize certain kinds of unmediated, old-fashioned “human” interactions. But this fantasy ignores how much of normal social interaction is fleeting, bite-size, instant, tweetlike. Humans have always talked to each other via a kind of analog Twitter. These new technologies just get us there with maximum efficiency.

Sam Anderson provides a perceptive and seemingly loving account for the oddity and realness of these fake worlds, arguing that they are no different than any other interaction just more efficient.

Facebook: Development, class conciousness, privacy, and the 'second internet'

The most in depth article about facebook I've ever seen. From its development, to the psychology behind joining, to what it has done for the internet and online privacy, both destroying it and rebuilding it.


excellent excellent excellent

changing tenure

An interesting article about the pros and cons of the tenure system in academia. Is it time for a change? What would it mean for professors and scholarship if it was?

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35247268/ns/us_news-education//

cool kind of hipster site

Has gear, clothes, cars, and tech pretty cool stuff.

http://limitedhype.com/

Just about the coolest thing I've seen

This is a portable record player It's not yet being sold and I can't imagine what the price tag would be on it. But I desperately want this to come out soon!

Party misrust

This article comes out of the LA Times. Not something I read on a regular basis, but I found this article really interesting. There is a growing trend in America of truly mistrusting all political authority. I personally don't think that either Democrats or Republicans really care about the American people. Sure it's something they think about and it's something they say but I think it's more of a front to support their political drive.

When people's mistrust of their elected officials and the parties reaches these levels, there is little for political leaders to do but take counsel from their own anger and anxieties -- and, these days, the popular mood fairly seethes with both those things. Discontent with the present and apprehension about the future have become the background noise of our politics, yet both sides of the congressional aisle seem deaf to the din.

In one of his magisterial explorations of German politics between the wars, the historian Ian Kershaw mused that "there are times -- they mark the danger point for a political system -- when politicians can no longer communicate, when they stop understanding the language of the people they are supposed to be representing."

It would be reckless not to insist that this country and its politics remain, in crucial ways, far distant from Weimar. It would be rash, though, to pretend that the distance remains as great as it once was.

yesss

commercializing nasa

Yes! I'm so excited. I have this gut feeling that the next 30 years are going to be years of incredible technological advancement. I really don't have any evidence to base that on it's just a sense I have. This is exactly what the space industry needs.

I read a book about a year ago whose main thesis was that with the right budget—right being, MASSIVE– we could have humans living on Mars in 30 years. And full out colonies in a hundred or so. Now this is probably a bit exaggerated, but still.

ipad

this is what the ipad is for.

It's not supposed to be super complicated. It's a simple interface for people who don't want, need, or don't have the ability to handle multiple windows, programs, jargon etc. etc.

It's like people who finally get a twitter to see what it is and are so confused that it's just statuses...

I'd buy it

bamboo laptop

looks like a good idea to me...

Palin... Again

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35238034/ns/politics//

What?

It's unclear really what stance Dedman is trying to take in this article. I think mostly that Todd Palin had a lot of influence in the Alaskan government. I'm not at all aware of how much power and duties the "first dude" is allowed to have. According to his article it seems to suggest that he was doing most of the running of the state...

Have to wait and see what else comes out about this.

Worried about the new Facebook set up?

Don't be!

It doesn't look to be that different than the current format. I remember the last change took a little bit to get used to. Not that much, but this update seems to be on a much smaller scale. Looks like it's going to be a little more consolidated and with all the different features more accessible.

short film skizein

http://shortsbay.com/film/skhizein

I really enjoy french animations. There is a certain character to them, to be cliché a certain je ne sais quoi. They have this kind of simplicity of depth. There is not a lot of extra, no flash or anything. But the drawings have this muted complexity. I always just find it really memorizing to watch.

This particular film is about a man who lives permanently 91 centimeters to his right. Amusing but very sad at the same time because it's something I think we can all relate to to a certain extent, feeling like we're grasping at air just trying to do the simplest things in life.

Palin again

I really don't understand how Palin can continuously make the weird decisions she does. You would think that as someone in the public eye she would realize that you can't just not pay taxes on cabins on your land, you would think. Yet there she goes. In an aerial fly over surveyors discovered two structures on her property that were not accounted for on her property tax.

Now admittedly, it's not her fault...

"It is the borough's job," he said in an e-mail. "The property taxes on this parcel are fully paid and have never been delinquent."

Dunivan, however, said owners are required by state law to report any omissions or errors in their tax assessments. Often, the borough learns of new structures in remote areas when neighbors report them. Dunivan said no one has called the borough on the Palin lots, among many in the region to add structures, the flyover survey found."

This story seems more like something we should see out of some socialite rather than Sarah Palin, a political and moral upstanding figure. You would think she would report the omission out of, at least, her own self interest.

Unemployment dropped to 9.7% in January

Seems to me this isn't any tell tale sign of the economy getting better. It seems with every small gain there are several steps back. It will be interesting though to see whether Obama's tax cuts get passed and whether the republicans will support them or not. I'll be so frustrated if they decide to not support it even though that's a huge part of their platform.

The unemployment rate fell to its lowest level since August. John Silvia, chief economist at Wells Fargo, said the decline wasn't a result of a shrinking labor force, which has held the rate down in previous months.

"It simply was, people found jobs," he said. The report is "consistent with continued improvement in the labor market."

The department also revised its past employment estimates to show that job losses from the Great Recession have been much worse than previously stated. The economy has shed 8.4 million jobs since the downturn began in December 2007, up from a previous figure of 7.2 million.

Another interesting question is asking how many college graduates are finding jobs out of college, this type of figure is left out of the discussion.

Article here

Ever wonder what it's like going on the Daily Show?

Ever wonder what it's like?

1. Don't expect any warm up. Jon Stewart comes into the green room before the show and chats with you for about 3 minutes. The conversation in my case focused exclusively on the contents of my Daily Show gift bag.*

2. You'll have about an hour to hang out and get nervous before you go on. A staff member on the show is there to distract you. In my case she told me the story of one former interviewee who sweated so profusely that he nearly shorted out the lavalier microphone. (To be fair to the staffer, the context of the story was - "that rarely happens.")

I think my favorite is that the gift basket includes two bottles of liquor, one being cherry flavored vodka.

Project Implicit

Study is here

I'm going to have to do this a couple more times to really learn something from it. It's a combined study being done by Harvard and Yale. I believe it's meant to determine how you subconsciously feel about different subjects.

There are dozens of different ones and you are assigned it randomly. Mine happened to be young vs old, which do I prefer. I apparently prefer younger people. I'm not sure this one worked very well for me which is why I think I might need to try some of the other subjects. However, the whole process just wore me out. If you do it you'll see what I mean. You're shown an image and are meant to determine which category it goes in as fast as you can.

Maybe over the weekend I will post new results.

Shadow Art

I've seen this a couple times before and every time I do, I'll just sit for hours looking at it. I wish I could see some of this live.


http://www.mymodernmet.com/

It just blows my mind how you could possibly create it. It's just so complex. I can't even begin to imagine the precision and patience it takes.

one of those things 60 second stories

http://www.oneword.com/

One word stories, you have 60 seconds.

This is more of a time waster than anything. In fact not even that good of a time waster considering it's in one minute increments. However, you feel so accomplished when you write out a decent story in the 60 seconds provided. And then you realize how it's not that incredible and then you realize that you didn't even procrastinate that much and now you have to find something else. too bad.

Dumbfoundead virtual jam session

This is possibly one of my greatest discoveries in the last month.

It's an excellent idea, gorgeous instrumentation. It's too bad they aren't an actual band because I would pick up their album in a heartbeat. It wasn't apparent whether any of them are part of band. I'm not sure whether they'd be able to replicate this sound even if they were. Definitely worth the listen though.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1oU0I8APK-o

Gorgeous

I discovered this artist a month or so ago. I absolutely love the paintings. Just gorgeous, kind of reminds me of Edward Harper in terms of style.

http://www.kimcogan.com/

Free books

So there are a ton of these types of sites online but this one is one of my favorites. No reason really. It's just the easiest to use. Easy being subjective.

http://www.readprint.com/

I am so disturbed

I'm not sure whether to be impressed or freaked out something can isolate personal information so well.

http://whoozy.com/

The people search engine...

I was mostly expecting it to ask for money like a general PI help source would. But no. Not only that but when I did searches of some friends, expecting it come back with thousands if not hundreds of thousands of hits, it came back with only several. Over a quarter of the hits that came back were relevant. And that's just for someone who has not spent lots of time publishing papers or working. Admittedly, teenagers these days are a little more linked into the internet using social networking and whatever other site they have accounts with. But even still.

The Beginning

So this is my first post. I've tried doing this whole blog thing a couple times but I just haven't had the focus or interest to maintain. However, this semester I’ve overloaded my schedule to the point that I need to plan breaks or I could go mad. So I’ve decided to give blogging a shot again. Though counterintuitive I think this will actually be excellent given my breaks usually consist of browsing the Internet and forwarding whatever I find to random people or whoever is online. Now I can share it with the world hah.

I also apologize in advance. I’m sure it will get better over time but when I type quick bursts like I feel I am likely to do on this blog I tend to leave out articles—a, the, etc—thinking they’re in there and I will even go so far as to reread my post or email and I just plain old won’t see them. Which is of course highly frustrating when I am forced to send emails to teachers and I need to send it quick and I end up sending something that just makes me look like a fool. I will of course try not to do this, as it’s embarrassing for me and difficult for you.

And so it begins.

-Colin