magpie's shiny things

Transportation News — a lit­tle moto

Boeing has a new best sell­ing plane. The Scan Eagle UAV.
http://www.wired.com/autopia/2009/08/boeing-uav/

The 3‑point seat belt is 50 years old. Invented by Volvo and now
uni­ver­sal­ly installed. The top pho­to in the arti­cle is too retro cute
for words.
http://www.wired.com/autopia/2009/08/strapping-success-the-3-point-seatbelt-turns-50/

Telsa goes drag rac­ing at Pacific Raceways. I find drags without
thun­der­ous engine noise, or in this case noise from only one lane,
unsat­is­fy­ing. The cost of a run’s worth of fuel is giv­en as 8 — 16
cents, vs. 5 — 26 dol­lars for a gas fueled car. I got­ta ask. This is
drag rac­ing who cares about  the cost of fuel? (Yes, I’ve been racing.
Yes, I know that the cost of fuel counts.)
http://www.wired.com/autopia/2009/08/teslas-look-sexy-in-drag/

The web­site for the (soon to be) revi­tal­ized Brough-Superior is short
on infor­ma­tion. But it has this slide show of the SS101K engine. Dead
sexy.
http://www.brough-superior.com/ws/frontend/seite/SeiteCms.php?coId=259&coType=navigation1

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WTF

A well designed heav­i­ly researched com­plete­ly bug nutz conspiracy
web­site. You’ll love the series called Sinister Sites, detail­ing the
satan­ic, mason­ic, and occult read­ings of the var­i­ous build­ings and
locales. Try the Cathedral of St, John the Divine for what has to be
the best 9–11, satanism, neo-pagan, envi­ron­men­tal­ist threat to
human­i­ty mash-up ever. Tons more where that came from.

http://vigilantcitizen.com/

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Design

Clever busi­ness card for a house painter. Probably a lit­tle expensive
to leave a stack lay­ing on the paint counter at the Home Depot though.
http://glossyinc.com/agriecard.html

Alex Andreyev’s port­fo­lio is a stun­ning col­lec­tion of surrealist
illus­tra­tion. I sug­gest you start with the exhib­it he calls A Separate
Reality Part 2. The unteth­ered, frag­men­tary world he draws is eerie
and rich.
http://www.behance.net/Gallery/A‑Separate-Reality-02/278736

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Literary News

Back in April (20th)I point­ed to Neil Gaiman’s Blueberry Girl, a
poem/prayer for his god-daughter.
Now he and Charles Vess are team­ing up to do a book for Gaiman’s poem
instructions.

Neil announces and pro­vides a sam­ple here:
http://journal.neilgaiman.com/2009/08/your-instructions-should-you-choose-to.html

Tor art direc­tor Irene Gallo gives us a cou­ple more here:
http://igallo.blogspot.com/2009/08/charles-vess-at-work-on-neil-gaimans.html

Charles Vess him­self gives us a few more and dis­cuss­es some of the
design process here:
http://greenmanpress.com/news/archives/447

Full text of the poem here:
http://www.endicott-studio.com/cofhs/cofinstr.html

Have as best a Monday as you can,

Transportation

Some peo­ple are lament­ing the loss of pos­si­ble future clas­sic cars to
the cash for clunk­ers pro­gram. The NYT Week in Review pon­ders the
ques­tion and comes up with 4 pos­si­ble clas­sics cur­rent­ly eli­gi­ble for
crush­ing. The 88 Jag maybe. The oth­er three, I rather have a Pacer.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/09/weekinreview/09mayersohn.html?_r=2&hp

OTOH so many of us have fond mem­o­ries of car camp­ing in the old family
sta­tion wag­on. Here’s a peek at a 1957 book on the subject.
http://daddytypes.com/2009/08/09/nomadic_car_furniture_ford_treasury_of_station_wagon_living.php

and a link to the full text of the book from the Internet Archive.
http://www.archive.org/details/fordtreasuryofst00reckrich

I had a (most­ly non-running) Vespa in col­lege and still think the
lit­tle scoot­ers are the epit­o­me of small trans­port design. Here’s a
chance to get one for your­self and match­ing mini for your fav sprog.
Very Pretty™
http://www.crunchgear.com/2009/08/10/everyone-needs-a-vespa-even-the-kiddies/

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Science

Highly effi­cient LEDs may be get­ting close. Good for flash­lights, bad
for atmos­pher­ic room light­ing (IMO).
http://www.core77.com/blog/object_culture/new_energyboosting_led_tech_the_breakthrough_weve_been_waiting_for_14272.asp

Ever won­der why your top­py sadist friends have thing for redheads?
Turns out car­rot tops real­ly are more sensitive.
http://www.boingboing.net/2009/08/10/are-red-headed-peopl.html

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Design

I have a ter­ri­ble time with those lit­tle flash dri­ves. They don’t have
enough bulk to pre­vent them hid­ing in the dark­est recess­es of my
purse, and the exposed con­nec­tors either get stepped on and mangled,
or so full of purse dust that they don’t plug in. If there’s a cover
for the con­nec­tor it gets lost… etc. This may be the solu­tion. Ugly
but nice­ly functional.
http://www.verbatim.com/products/detail.cfm?product_id=54232290–1143-3415–5F762303CCD7756E&cat_id=8263FD89-1143–3415-5F27986110DFB583

Frank Plant is an American Sculpture liv­ing in Spain. He builds
pic­tures from heavy gauge wire and small bits of the real world.  His
blog posts show fin­ished works, work in progress, and details of
build­ing sev­er­al of his pieces. Everyone who writes about him points
to his big red Kalashnikov hang­ing over a sofa but I like his smaller
scenes from every­day life things. Particularly Taking in the Laundry
and the series Sketches of mun­dane chores like vacuuming.
http://www.hierroglyphic.blogspot.com/

From Portugal a white stuc­co build­ing cov­ered with raised text blocks.
The typog­ra­phy and lay­out is wonderful.
http://www.the-refined.com/2009/08/typography-refinado/

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Bonus

This sort of belongs in Science but it’s here at the end so that I can
jus­ti­fy includ­ing this awe­some  I don’t get teenagers quote.
http://www.newscientist.com/special/ten-mysteries-of-you

“Even our clos­est rel­a­tives, the great apes, move smooth­ly from their
juve­nile to adult life phas­es – so why do humans spend an agonising
decade skulk­ing around in hoodies?”

Because it was Gather week­end. First up — a lit­tle Jack Daniels history.
http://www.mentalfloss.com/blogs/archives/31151

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Some sci­ence — there was  lot to choose from this morning.

Crows use rocks to raise the water lev­el in a con­tain­er, prov­ing that
Aesop knew what he was talk­ing about and that crows real­ly are the
coolest birds
http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/08/aesopscrows/

Looking like the floor plans for one of those accret­ed french
man­sions, a more spa­tial­ly accu­rate view of the HIV genome may provide
new clues to how to defeat the virus.
http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/08/hivtopograph/

I’m not sure I need a wal­let sized LED resis­tance cal­cu­la­tor but this
print, cut, and paste ver­sion may be use­ful to some of you. That this
is a home made spe­cial­ty slide rule is beyond awe­some. I miss my slide
rule.
http://www.evilmadscientist.com/article.php/ledcalc

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Art and Photography

A very nice inter­pre­ta­tion of the indus­tri­al meme in jew­el­ry by “Junior ASJ”
http://www.coroflot.com/public/individual_file.asp?individual_id=250153&portfolio_id=2061149&

Darren Rees cre­ates the pho­tographs for many of the BMW ads. Here’s a
nice round up some of the pho­tos. No Flash. (link to port­fo­lio below)
http://www.presidiacreative.com/18-cool-and-creative-photographs-by-darran-rees/

Here’s Darren Rees port­fo­lio web­site — flash 5 required.
http://www.darranrees.com/

A rem­i­nis­cence of Mary Poppins as cre­at­ed by the Russian illustrator
Gennady Kalinovsky. This is not your par­en­t’s (or Julie Andrews) Mary
Poppins. I love her too.
http://coilhouse.net/2009/08/06/mary-poppins-is-my-co-pilot/

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Time Wasting Goodness

More musi­cians on the Muppet Show. Highlights include Los Lobos and Yo Yo Ma.
http://www.mentalfloss.com/blogs/archives/30898

more tomor­row

Let’s see if I can remem­ber to spellcheck before send­ing this
morn­ing, shall we?

Photography

We think of wild fires as being a phe­nom­e­na of the forest­ed west of
the USA and Canada. Mediterranean coun­tries face their own fire
sea­son. The Big Picture has images.
http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2009/08/fires_around_the_mediterranean.html

More from Europe. An all com­ers heavy met­al fes­ti­val in Germany. (folk metal?)
http://designyoutrust.com/2009/08/04/wacken-open-air-2009/

Clearly some of those met­al heads have been cruis­ing the ‘net and seen
this love­ly tiki head carved out of a water­mel­on centerpiece.
http://www.watermelon.org/recipe_detail.asp?recipeDisp=183

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The Future…

…of edu­ca­tion. Nathan Shedroff pro­vides the curic­u­la for three of
hos design cours­es, along with the pre­sen­ta­tion mate­ri­als and links to
many of the arti­cles to be dis­cussed. Anyone one study and because
it’s all CC licensed any­one can nuse his mate­ri­als as a start­ing point
for thi­er own teaching.
http://www.nathan.com/thoughts/

…of fab­ri­ca­tion. Printing stain­less steel. If you can draw it in a
CAD sys­tem you can make a replace­ment part for any­thing. (Or a stupid
look­ing fig­urine with its hand up its nose.)
http://www.crunchgear.com/2009/08/04/the-future-of-fabrication-is-here-shapeways-announces-stainless-steel-printing/

…of den­tistry. Successful regrowth of a tooth in situ. Dentures may
end up as an item in one of those ‘can you believe they put those
things in their mouth’ exhibits in 2050.
http://www.pinktentacle.com/2009/08/bioengineered-mouse-tooth/

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Technology

New chips com­ing for net­books,. More name con­fu­sion com­ing to the
mar­ket space. Smartbooks? — and some peo­ple need to get a grip with
the URL makers -
http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/news/2009/08/arm-based-netbooks-set-to-arrive-on-us-shores-by-year-end.arshttp://arstechnica.com/gadgets/news/2009/08/arm-based-netbooks-set-to-arrive-on-us-shores-by-year-end.ars

Remote read­ing of RFID chips in cards is a favorite bug­bear of the
tin­foil hat crowd. Oh and the feds at DefCon. I find the last
para­graph to be espe­cial­ly inter­est­ing. I won­der how many of the
lit­tle blighters I’m unknow­ing­ly carrying.
http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2009/08/fed-rfid/

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Architecture

A remod­el of a lake­side house. I like it but the feel is very 50s
SoCal for some­thing so new and in TX.
http://sweetbakerygoods.com/architecture/architecture-the-peninsula-residence/

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Art

Two illus­tra­tors both doing work on graph­ic nov­els. They have a
sim­i­lar feel but very dif­fer­ent sub­ject matter.

Star St.Germain has a flickr stream of her work. Her work is personal
and young. Her per­son­al blog has a great deign and lay­out. Very
con­sist with and com­pli­men­ta­ry of her work.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/thisisstar/
http://thisisstar.com/

Steiner from Mars (aka Emma Rios) draws much dark­er more masculine
mate­r­i­al. (If Warren Ellis had­n’t men­tioned her name I would­n’t have
thought she was a she.)
http://www.flickr.com/photos/steinerfrommars/

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Games

Slate want you to choose the American Apocalypse. The choic­es are
inter­est­ing and occa­sion­al­ly just plain weird. American ends in a hail
of Rods from God? (bot­tom row) It’s a poll dis­guised as a game.
http://sdn.slate.com/features/endofamerica/default.htm

More lit­er­ary games. Where was that books set?
(6 out of 10 which is sad con­sid­er­ing I’ve read all of the books.)
http://www.mentalfloss.com/quiz/quiz.php?q=705&p=1

Stills and the trail­er from the upcom­ing Fabuous Mr.Fox. Another
adap­ta­tion of a chil­dren’s books clear­ly aimed at attract­ing as many
grown-ups as sprogs. Count me in,
http://www.cpluv.com/www/feeditem/7941

tak­ing a break for the gath­er. see you all next monday.

The world of bits and pol­i­tics is get­ting all het up again.

First there’s this lit­tle mat­ter of AT&T, Apple, GoogleVoice, and the
FCC. The fences around the play­grounds are com­ing down and the
prop­er­ty own­ers are not happy.
http://www.mobilecrunch.com/2009/08/01/att-responds-to-fcc-letter-re-google-voice-mobile-iphone-app/

Rep. Ed Markey (D‑MA) is try­ing for net neu­tral­i­ty leg­is­la­tion again.
A much more pro-neutrality admin­is­tra­tion might make a dif­fer­ence. PDF
link to the text includ­ed. At 13 pages this bill is considerably
eas­i­er to grasp than most.
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2009/08/the-war-over-network-neutrality.ars

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It’s DefCon time and every­one is punditing.

More hack­ing of high secu­ri­ty locks and access sys­tems. I think these
guys are doing an impor­tant job but Bluzmanis’ grand­stand­ing egoism
and bul­ly­ing of the mak­ers of these sys­tems is quick­ly under­min­ing his
credibility.
http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2009/08/electronic-locks-defeated/

Schneier mounts the bul­ly pul­pit and decries China’s Green Dam Youth
Escort filter/spyware pack­age and then reminds us how much of that
tech­nol­o­gy we’ve allowed into our own net­works int he west.
http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2009/08/building_in_sur.html

One the oth­er hand you could get one of these and pre­tend you’re
secu­ri­ty con­scious. I think I’ve found a new desk lamp.
http://www.a2591.com/2009/08/im-not-security-camera.html

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Real Science is odd­er than sci­ence fic­tion. Welcome to the northern
most sci­en­tif­ic out­post. Be nice to the bar ten­ders, beware of the
birds.
http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/07/svalbard/

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Photography

Jakov Cordina takes great pic­tures. And he’s show cas­ing a, new to me,
wid­get that makes a flickr pho­to­stream embed­d­a­ble slide show. (cau­tion
there are a cou­ple of videos with music included)
http://www.jakovcordina.com/post/86633471/photostream-slide-show

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Architecture

Three entries today. First the “ledges” are Sears tow­er are open. So
you can now stand on a piece of glass 1300+ feet up in the air over
Chicago.  No way in hell you’re get­ting me up there but the sprogs
seem to like the float­ing over the city feeling.
http://sweetbakerygoods.com/architecture/architecture-sear-towers-1353-ft-high-glass-balconies/

Train cars are con­vert­ed into church­es in Russia. Some of these are
touch­ing­ly naive and some are small works of art. (The pho­tos rock
too.)
http://englishrussia.com/?p=2248

The exam­ples are of paint­ings and illus­tra­tion but the Bauhaus
move­ment pro­duced some Very Important Architecture. Never mind, just
read the sto­ry and look at the paintings.
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2009/08/02/bauhaus-ninety-years-of-inspiration/

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Entertainment
Pop out and grab a cof­fee. You’ll about 10 min­utes for today’s video selections.

Amy Crehore is a blue grass fiend and puts up some fab­u­louslinks. This
one is  Josephine Baker and Thompson Jazz Orchestra from 1927. Can you
imag­ine watch­ing this woman in per­son? Electrifying. The accompanying
music is Ahmad Jamal.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MsXyDrf9HO0

Cab Calloway and Bettie Boop. This can not go wrong. There’s tons more
trea­sure in the Internet Archive’s col­lec­tion of vin­tage cartoons
includ­ing a whole lot of BB.
http://www.archive.org/details/bb_old_man_of_the_mountain

That’s it for today, enjoy.