Tom Wolfe (author of space program biography The Right Stuff (which incidentally was the movie I took my first-ever date to see back in 1983) ) describes how the Cold War derailed the grand adventure of space exploration. Shockingly, the decay started while the Apollo program was still underway. [I]n October 1969, I began to…
This tutorial shows how to rig the fingers in a very clever way. I’d seen this technique described in a text tutorial somewhere, but after seeing it here, I understand it. I also appreciated seeing how to adjust b-bones so that they only rotate, without bending (which results in noodly-looking joints). I really love Blender,…
The first man on the moon doesn’t feel his life is defined by being the first man on the moon? As if the world would remember much more than Armstrong’s “one piece of fireworks”? Would his name belong beside Magellan’s or Marco Polo’s if not for Armstrong’s singular achievement? —Paul Farhi, Washington Post Similar:Ground-nesting Yellowjacket…
This morning, hundreds of Amazon Kindle owners awoke to discover that books by a certain famous author had mysteriously disappeared from their e-book readers. These were books that they had bought and paid for–thought they owned.–David Pogue, NYT The citizens whose Kindles needed rectification had purchased unauthorized George Orwell books. So 1984 disappeared down the…
It might sound like a logical extension from the likes of Buzz and You Don’t Know Jack, but you’ll have to believe that this [Xbox Live] game is ringing the death knell for game shows as loudly and vigorously as it possibly can. Why watch a game show, when you can participate? Why shout at the TV,…
Walter Cronkite, the CBS News anchor who famously became the most trusted man in America, died Friday at the age of 92.–NPR Similar:Vanessa Otero's Complex vs. Clickbait, Liberal vs. Conservative Media ChartUpdate, June 2020: See Vanessa Otero Ad …CultureAP reporter’s mistake: Did the punishment fit the crime? Reporters have been sometimes fired …EthicsIn Changing News…
The HD version actually came out better than I thought it would. More photos after the jump… Similar:When the art director was too cheap to buy the graphic designer a protractor.AestheticsAnother 10sq cm of a beautiful #steampunk control panel for a personal #neovictorian #blen…AestheticsTo meme, or not to meme.AestheticsHexagons Are the Bestagonshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=thOifuHs…AmusingYork Corpus Christi Pageant,…
The LA Times technology blog critiques the new Google Reader interface. For example, let’s say we have a news article that we like. Well, might as well click the “like” button, right? OK, now we’ve told the Internet that we think it’s cool, and we can see a list of strangers who also think it’s…
Talk about penny wise and pound foolish! NASA admitted in 2006 that no one could find the original video recordings of the July 20, 1969, landing. Since then, Richard Nafzger, an engineer at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Centre in Maryland, who oversaw television processing at the ground-tracking sites during the Apollo 11 mission, has been…
Amazing! Similar:#setonhill remembers 9/11/2001.AcademiaActors Fail to Distract Audience from Prop Newspaper HeadlinesMy daughter and I were talking about pro…AmusingBuzz Aldrin: It’s Time to Put a Man on Mars There are eight U.S. astronauts left o…CultureInside Voices — A Weekend MusicalCarolyn was in this short movie, conceiv…AestheticsShakespeare's Globe Theatre, Minecraft Stylehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?time_conti…AestheticsThe crying Honduran girl on the…
A great interview, on Adventure Classic Gaming. Was something like Adventure inevitable? That’s a tough question, but I think probably so. I’d say that the real wild-card here is not Adventure but rather Adventure‘s inspiration, Dungeons and Dragons. You just can’t exaggerate the importance of D&D to all of the many storygames that have followed it.…
A bit predictable, but still enjoyable. Similar:I worked in a video store for 25 years. Here’s what I learned as my industry died.If you’re actually in a video store, the…CultureFlorida Woman Bites CamelIdentifying her as a “Florida woman,” as…AestheticsGenesis (#StarTrek #TNG Rewatch, Season 7, Episode 19) The crew de-evolve into hominids, a… Rewatching ST:TNG After…
Wired has a good piece about the value of local reporting. “In every town in America, almost, you have reporters going out and doing humble jobs and turning over rocks every day and seeing what’s under them,” says John Carroll, the former editor-in-chief of The Los Angeles Times, a man who led his newsroom to…
And you thought the secrets to academic success would involve sensible stuff like “Study for two to three hours for every hour of class” or “Keep up with the readings” and “Meet all the deadlines your prof sets.” But those won’t help you game the system, which is the strategy Don Asher presents as the…
Clearly by “Them” the sign means “dogs,” but the since the sign refers instead to “Your Dog,” so it was already in need of some attention even before this alteration took place. Via Bryan Alexander. Similar:Fake News Remains Top Industry Concern in 2017“In the past, people fabricated content….CultureIt’s alive! What NPR learned from turning its…
The following started out as routine e-mail feedback on a freshman essay, but I thought it came out well enough that I might want to use it again. I don’t want this to get buried in my existing handout on thesis statements, so I figured I’d just post the good bits here. A good academic…
I missed this when it came out a few weeks ago. At Hopkins, Knudson uses Twitter as an extension of the classroom, asking students to raise questions, hold discussions online, keep up with breaking news and share links to interesting stories. She believes the limited number of characters allowed is a useful way to remember…
A website will re-create the 1969 moon mission in real time (allowing for the 40-year time lag). http://wechoosethemoon.org/ Similar:Internet Archive puts classic 70s and 80s games onlineClassic video games from the 1970s and 1…CultureChatGPT Can't Kill Anything Worth PreservingMany are wailing that this technology sp…AcademiaBing’s A.I. Chat Reveals Its Feelings: ‘I Want to Be Alive.…
First, there is a general increase in use of Facebook and a general decline in use of MySpace across the board. In 2007, 79% of the study participants were using Facebook while in 2009, 87% of the sample reports doing so. In contrast, while in 2007, 55% of the group reported using MySpace, in 2009,…
She said the manhole she fell in to was left open and unattended with no warning signs or orange cones. She said two workers with the New York City Department of Environmental Protection failed to secure the area as they prepared to flush the sewer. “It was just really gross and it was shocking and…