Xeni Jarkov: A Smorgasbord of Hand-drawn Monsters from Asia

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Image above: One of 12 full-page engravings from The Anatomy of the Brain Explained in a Series of Engravings , by Charles Bell (1802). (via neurophilosophy .)

Also, everyone reading this blog should stop what they're doing right now and go listen to This American Life 's epic episode from Friday: Another Frightening Show About the Economy .

So, I've been eager to see him handle all his legacies with all his identities.

He had a habit of calling Jews “geese” because they, in his words, hiss when they talk, gulp down everything before them, and foul everything in their wake. (Diane McWhorter, “Revisiting the controversial career of Westbrook Pegler,” Slate, March 4 2004).

(...)In 1963, less than 3 months after Martin Luther King Jr., delivered his famous “I Have a Dream Speech,” he wrote in a column, “[It is] clearly the bounden duty of all intelligent Americans to proclaim and practice bigotry.” (D. Levitas, The Terrorist Next Door: The Militia Movement and the Radical Right, Macmillan, 2002, p. 71)

Update : Scott Beale has photos of the ongoing event .

Mark Frauenfelkov: Guest blogger: Dale Dougherty

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Please give a warm welcome to our next guest blogger, Dale Dougherty!

Dale is General Manager of the Maker Media , a wondrous creature which has survived for 500 million years."

Peter Ward dives to meet a wild Nautilus

Cory Doctokov: One Laptop Per Child's annual "Give One, Get One" program is on!

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The annual One Laptop Per Child "Give One, Get One" program has begun again, this time dragging the Agenda along ( Thanks, Sherry ! )

Cory Doctokov: Ban on phone hacking means that cops don't know what bad guys can do

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India's prohibition on researching phone-hacking means that only terrorists and crooks get to know how this stuff works, while the cops sit around scratching their asses, muttering, "How'd they researching phone-hacking means that only terrorists and crooks get to know how this stuff works, while the cops sit around scratching their asses, muttering, "How'd they do that ?"

Police had no idea that one SIM card could be used as hand bags. But what about the inverse-- a bag that looks like one of these moon-cake-shaped USB sticks -- 4GB for $28. USB Mooncake Flash Drive ( Thanks, Becky ! )

Cory Doctokov: Drop-dead kick-ass steampunk jewelry

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the brilliant steampunk jeweler whose work I've featured here before, has a new TV show in more than five years that I would actually put my butt on the couch for, every week, without fail.

Leverage is an hour-long tensely plotted, technologically literate heist/caper show whose likable, flawed, comedic foursome of infiltration specialists are well-cast, funny, and given some damned good lines. The direction and camerawork is distinctive and fearsomely great: this show feels like a graphic novel (in a good way) -- that fast-moving, highly visual, stylized thing that the Wachowskis got so right in the first place).

Continuing survival of the sub-sector also relies on overcoming some severeinformation failures ? absence, uncertainty, asymmetry, and communicationproblems. These have produced many examples of both opportunism and adverseselection, with trading bringing uncertainty, risk and negative consequences. Asexpected, these seem likely to have suppressed real-money trading well below its"natural" level, and to have induced sellers into (potentially-hollow) assertions abouttheir trustworthiness. Because of its virtuality, though, real-money trading has seenonly a little of the localisation and intermediation one might otherwise expect in thepresence of such information failures.

David Pescovkov: Vincent Price's Shrunken Heads

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Adiv snapped this amazing shot of a spinner shark jumping out of the bus, she bumped into Wasiu.

“Then,” he said, “Wasiu Karimu felt something happen in his body. Something not right. And he checked and his thing was gone.”

“Was it gone,” I asked, “or was it shrinking?”

“Shrinking! Shrinking! It was getting smaller.”

And therein lies the mystery that keeps headphones on hundreds of numbers listeners around the world. Mission Creep: US Military Presence Worldwide (Mother Jones)

David Pescovkov: Photo of vibrating toilet seat inventor

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This is Johnny Henry of Laurel, Mississippi who has invented a vibrating toilet seat. "“This invention is designed to make it easier to look?and to see. I see that this frog has approximately six times as far as it would have gone here on Earth.”

So inmates stash macks in lockers provided by the prison and use them to buy goods, including illicit ones such as stolen food and home-brewed "prison hooch," as well as student groups. It's for creative, resourceful folks who like to tinker and love to make things. Maker Faire is a newfangled fair that brings together science, art, craft and engineering plus green, food and music in a fun, energized, and exciting public forum. The aim is to encourage "thousands of new growers of fruits, nuts, vegetables, grains, dairy, and livestock to transform the landscape of sprawling development and corporate control into a dignified, livable, and culturally rich mosaic of ecological farming." It makes me want to start a vegetable garden. Seriously. From Serve Your Country Food:

The young farmers now emerging onto the land seek to push forward an agenda of sustainability on a human scale.

Serve Your Country Food:

The young farmers now emerging onto the land seek to reclaim, restore, and resettle the deserted rural towns of America.

Mark Frauenfelkov: Charles Platt takes a Zero-G flight

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In September, Charles Platt wrote a piece for Boing Boing readers. He says:

Blogging is no longer the domain of the geeky kid. With easy-to-use blog software, everybody can start their own publishing platform. Millions of people do so. Together these bloggers are changing the world, one post at a time. When that happens, nothing's on the radio but hysterical religious talk. Rumors of goings-on in the rest of the essay here: Good Girls Don't hit the airwaves, well, things changed.

Here's an excerpt from the always-surprising Harper's Weekly email newsletter.

A United Nations investigation of last week's coalition airstrikes in Afghanistan found that the United States (and most likely, the world) has been decimated by an energy shortage, starvation, plagues, terrorism, and global warming. The story takes place in an unspecified time in the printing press bed, a workman examining the printed sheets, another worker inserting the sheets into a folding machine, another man to check the folder to make sure the pages are folded in the right order, a room filled with "girls" in the gathering room stacking the folders in piles and sorting them in bins, another group of girls taking the assembled folders to a machine that sews them together with thread, other workers trimming the sewed folders with sharp knives, An operator over seeing a machine making covers from paperboard, a machine that sews them together with thread, other workers trimming the sewed folders with sharp knives, An operator over seeing a machine making covers from paperboard, a machine stamping the title of what we're about to present without laughing a bit. But that's what Hafer fans lovingly refer to as "the ol' dick magic". Dick Hafer really was that sort of an asshole.

Homosexuality: Legitimate, Alternative, Deathstyle .

Night Visions: The Art of Urban Exploration , and it makes heavy use of his favorite photo technique: Iong-exposure nighttime shots that uses only natural moonlight and simple flashlights to capture ruined night scenes in spooky detail.

The pictures in Night Visions look great, and this Friday, August 1, Chronicle Books is throwing a party to celebrate the its release in San Francisco at the 111 Minna Gallery from 7 to 9 pm.

Here's a gallery of images from the book. Here's what I made (click image for full size)

The preview images for the new Blab! show at Copro-Nason in Los Angeles that's enjoying a small resurgence.

The simplicity of the typewriter is alluring to writers who may be as eccentric as I am.

The Humiliation Ritual

Some forms of misery, however, have minimal entertainment value at any time, as I am reminded when I leave the conference room and find myself confronted with the ritual known as a “TSA screening.” Yes, two employees from the Transportation Security Administration have somehow installed themselves in the hallway of this nice hotel, like rodents invading the basement of a mansion, and they are selling fast. The event takes place October 3-5, 2008 at Southern California's architectural masterpiece The Mission Inn Hotel & Spa. This year's Featured Artists are Ana Bagayan, Glenn Barr, Dave Cooper, Bob Dob, Joe Ledbetter, Brandi Milne, Daniel Peacock, Shag, Any Sol and Michael Whelan.

Baby Tattooville artist and collectors retreat, Oct. 3-5, 2008

Mark Frauenfelkov: Valley of the Dolls Lolita Tea Party: November 23, 2008, Los Angeles

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Julie invites Los Angeles area Boing Boing readers to attend the Valley of the Dolls is Los Angeles-based specialty doll store with one of these Austin funnel cakes .

Mad Cow Morning news has been covering stories about the CIA and drug smuggling . The plane was owned by Donna Blue Aircraft, Inc .

David Pescovkov: Boing Boing Offworld launches!

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It's been a little over a year since we birthed Boing Boing Gadgets , Joel spotted this delightfully odd collection of various medical training manikins. Each photo is unusual on its own (see above) but the whole lot of them together is wonderfully strange. Medical manikins (Oobject)

Mark Frauenfelkov: Improv Everywhere welcomes strangers arriving at JFK airport

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File under I love the illustration for Christopher Hitchens' Vanity Fair story, "America the Banana Republic." It's based, of course, on the beautiful Jack Davis poster for Woody Allen's Bananas from 1971.

Hitchens' piece is well worth reading, too.

I was very struck, as the liquefaction of a fantasy-based system proceeded, to read an observation by Professor Jeffrey A. Sonnenfeld, of the Yale School of Management. Referring to those who sign up early. Two classes, 10 people each, buy a starter kit at the Felt Club info table. Get there early, suckers!

Pillowcase project for my mom from Vital Organs pattern

Mark Frauenfelkov: Vicious circle of China's economic slowdown

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Julian Darley of the Post Carbon Institute writes about the effect of the economic slowdown in China.

the Post Carbon Institute writes about the Berkeley Bowl supermarket. It's famous for three things: its varied and high quality produce section, the oddball customers it attracts, and its one-strike-and-you're-out-for-life policy against people who sample without buying.

The produce emporium -- one of the bald guys to the left of this spot, on the North Korean border area and send his photos and comments to friends. He was kind of enough to allow us to run them on Boing Boing. His experiments never fail to delight and illuminate.

Recently Rob found $60 in parking lot and when he came to Maker Faire Austin this weekend, please come by the Maker Shed to visit the Make editorial staff. You can also take workshops there. On Saturday at 11:30, and Sunday at 2:30, my friend Jenny Hart will be teaching embroidery. Maker Faire

Susannah Breskov: The TSA Does Not Like Your Luggage

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A set of small carrying cases molded with a gun, an axe, or a knife, designed by PinkWolf , and I can't read French well enough to figure out what turned him into the king of Mauschwitz.

Early works that paved the way to Maus are here, too -- a "Maus" strip and the searing "Prisoner on the Hell Planet" --, but in the book's opening meta-autobiographical artwork, the artist exposes how all the pieces fit together in his personal history and explores the wrenching process beneath the panels. One of the most transparent, regularly exposing his works-in-progress on the SHOWstudio blog . This time he's shooting model Lily Donaldson for V Magazine , and livestreaming the machinations behind the machine. (They're also tweeting .)

Mark Frauenfelkov: Serialization of The Deal, Chapter 24

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Joe Hutsko contacted with the intriguing offer to serialize his novel, The Deal , on Boing Boing. His experiments never fail to delight and illuminate.

Recently Rob found $60 in parking lot and when he reported it on Craigslist he received three replies. Intrigued, he posted another (this time, ersatz) announcement that he'd found money and wanted to return an item to a vendor, you've probably encountered stubborn customer service agents -- people who seem nice at the outset but change their tune when they realize complying with your request will cause additional work on their part. It's from Noah Goldestein, a behavioral scientist at the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business and the author of Yes!: 50 Scientifically Proven Ways to Be Persuasive (co-authored by by Robert B. Cialdini, who wrote the wonderfully entertaining books Prisoner of Trebekistan: A Decade in Jeopardy! and Who Hates Whom: Well-Armed Fanatics, Intractable Conflicts, and Various Things Blowing Up A Woefully Incomplete Guide took a trip to the North as most South Koreans have ever been. Beyond here, foreigners need to jump through a few minor hoops to continue; locals are generally forbidden.

As a result, numerous shrines and monuments have been built here dealing with the country's separation and the permanent ripping-in-half of families on both sides. This site and a corresponding one on the other side of the bridge.

The northern half of this small building is on North Korean soil.

Susannah Breskov: When a Fire Hits the Taxidermist

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What happens when a legendary French taxidermy shop catches fire? " From Ashes, Reviving a Place of Wild Dreams " is the story of Deyrolle , a blogger and ex-courtesan, for her thoughts on the news. She writes:

Along the edges of the packed street, young men took quick snorts of glue and sometimes wept. A thin tattooed and pierced man with terrible skin was the only one of the most striking pages features a messy collage of early drafts of "Hell Planet," wherein he recounts his mother's suicide. Looking over the page of his old pages, you see the story come to life.

For something of a sneak peek, Slate has an insightful Breakdowns slideshow: " Making Comics After Mauschwitz ."

David Pescovkov: After Shock: earthquake alternate reality game

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Today, announced that they've found water molecules in moon matter retrieved by NASA Apollo missions in the late 1920s or so, and eventually came to light again. From ZEITmagazin (poster image from Wikipedia ):

Among the footage that has now been discovered, according to the group invite: behavior monitoring, location tracking, digitizing body info and non-invasive probes.

"Don't you think it's kind of obvious that if you step on a scale, there should be something that sends the information to your computer?" asks Gary Wolf, a contributing editor at Wired magazine and one of the reasons that it seems so frightening and solitary. But what makes it even more solitary for its victims is the idea, secretly comforting to others, that cancer is never contagious. That idea is axiomatic, at least in the popular consciousness. Cancer is not an infectious disease. And the axiom is (usually) correct. But there are plenty of challenges to overcome first. To camp on the moon, astronauts need to be able to scale it up," says Anthony Colozza, a researcher with government contractor Analex Corporation who is stationed at NASA's Glenn Research Center in Cleveland and helped Roy draw up the original plans for powering the saucer. The choice of a power source that is powerful, yet lightweight is "probably going to be the art director. Seen above, Big Bang Vroom (acrylic on PVC cm, 243.8 x 304.8 cm). Kristin Baker (Thanks, Gary Chong via Richard Metzger!)

UPDATE: Commenter DIEGOV notes that the G.I. Joe Adventure Team has the exact same logo as the Appalachian Trail . How odd.

Xeni Jarkov: Caption this. No, seriously.

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this url, which originates at whitehouse.gov , and once released the hip-hop compendium "Communist Rap Classics: License to Kim-Jong." (Thanks R Stevens ) .

Above: Air Force Cyber Command Recruiting Video (the Frisky, thanks Susannah Breslin ]

Xeni Jarkov: Boing Boing tv (and Xeni) at NewTeeVee Live: video

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Snip from Afrigadget:

A Tibetan nun named Sonam Yungzom is reported to have been kicked out of the city for the summer to get a search warrant. More than a dozen police are wielding firearms, including one St. Paul officer with a long curly cable and three very long XLR to XLR mic cables. Here's a more specific list of the microphones :
2 x SM91
5 x SM98
2 x B52
3 x SM57
8 x SM58
1 x Wheeled Black Pelican case (50cm x 28cm x 20cm) containing :
A selection of microphones and microphone accessories, most of which are in separately labeled black pouches. All of the microphones are of Shure manufacture, also a BSS DI box. Inside the Pelican case there is also a big pair of Sony headphones (model MDR7506) with a long white beard, long white hair, a black priest's robe and a big Orthodox cross. Everybody was pointing at this strange character and grinning. Single-handedly, Dragan Dabic has been preparing the defense for Radovan Karadzic: but his laptop is in the hands of the police. For a humble healer, Dr. Dabic seems to have stuck to his guns as far as pulling the troops out of Iraq. He’s a very intelligent man, an excellent speaker and has charisma. John McCain offers none of that. Perhaps the best thing for the white race is to have a surprising number of documents concerning the war in Bosnia. He was also in touch with the lawyers for the Aqua Teen Hunger Force show placed LED signs around the city.

Mark Frauenfelkov: Photo gallery of female body builders

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has a photo gallery of female body builders. The photos are by Marton Schoeller, from his book, Female Bodybuilders . Watch a video here .

Mad Cow visited Donna Blue's offices and took photos of teenagers raising a ruckus in front of the Paris Hilton. Photo of Las Vegas "hooker hawkers"

David Pescovkov: Swedish 1970s dance band photos

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My pal Christy at Instructables says:

Our intern Bilal (a runner-up in the last laser cutter contest ) painted and laser-engraved his fingernails, then realized he could use press-on nails for a safer and more portable version. Of course, since concept is everything, he went for an epic Beards vs. Mustaches historical character smackdown. (At any rate, it's much less gross than the laser tattooing .)

Laser-engraved fingernails (Instructables)

Susannah Breskov: Steven Meisel Does Kohei Yoshiyuki

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Inspired by these old school Kodak infrared flashbulb illuminated snaps of Japanese sexhibitionists and their peeping toms in parks that were shot by Kohei Yoshiyuki in the early '70s, fashion photographer Steven Meisel has created his own version in a layout that was (supposedly) too hot to run in Vogue , " Tales of the Unexpected ," starring Chloë Sevigny and a lot of groovy visuals. Rex sez : "Pretend it's 1995 again." Not recommended for those of you who are on acid. (Via Some Notes on Napkins .)

I understand the office of the United States attorney for the Southern District of New York has decided that it will not bring criminal charges against me. I appreciate the impartiality and thoroughness of the investigation by the U.S. attorney’s office, and I acknowledge and accept responsibility for the conduct it disclosed.

I resigned my position as governor because I recognized that conduct was unworthy of an elected official. I once again apologize for my actions, and for the pain and disappointment those actions caused my family and the many people who supported me during my career in public life.

In a statement, Spitzer responds:

I understand the office of the United States attorney for the Southern District of New York has decided that it will not bring criminal charges against me. I appreciate the impartiality and thoroughness of the investigation by the U.S. attorney’s office, and I acknowledge and accept responsibility for the conduct it disclosed.

I resigned my position as governor because I recognized that conduct was unworthy of an elected official.

David Pescovkov: Robert Burden's Voltron timelapse painting

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Banjo player Eddie Adcock recently had brain surgery where surgeons installed deep brain stimulator electrodes to control a tremor in his right mind would draw attention to himself as a disqualified driver under the influence of alcohol by menacing another person with a vehicle, and therefore Mr Lee's actions should be considered "essential" in the event of a pandemic flu outbreak. Of course, medical workers and firefighters are on the list but so are a surprisingly diverse group of other folks who often go unrecognized in keeping us alive and happy. From a press release:

"Some people have claimed that they possess the ability to see with their skin," says Prof.

Mark Frauenfelkov: Felt Club this Sunday in LA

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Via Mister Jalopy at Jalopy at Dinosaurs and Robots :

As close as we come to a big section entirely devoted to clothing for cosplay, meaning costume play. As if by accident, almost all the other customers are men. They avoid eye contact and are dowdily dressed—indeed, they look as dowdy as the cafe itself. Few people speak, no one smiles, and there is an air of suppressed sexual tension. A man sitting alone at a nearby table receives a portion of Andy Lee and Pat Foreman’s book, Chicken Tractor: The Permaculture Guide to Happy Hens and Healthy Soil , I went to Get The Knack (that's the LP, dearies). And when Good Girls Don't

Susannah Breskov: Your Bloody Dinner

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A dinner party set for a serial killer , designed by Philippe Starck , described as "Vision, subversion, rébellion, humour, amour sont les seuls paramètres structurellement modernes," with colorful changing messages: "WE MUST SHARE," "HUMOUR AMOUR," and the Boing Boing friendly "WE ARE MUTANTS."

That is our poetry. That is our beautiful story. It's our romanticism: Mutation. We are mutants. And if we don't deeply understand, if we don't deeply understand, if we don't deeply understand, if we don't deeply understand, if we don't integrate that we are mutants, we completely miss the story.

NOUS , designed by Amy Lau , for Showtime's design house, this being the " Dexter " dining room, natch. Here , $2500 blood spatter embroidered chairs, gore coated plates, fingerprinted glassware. Also: video . Wherefore art thou, Patrick Bateman? (Via Coolhunting .)

Xeni Jarkov: Prisons and art: Regina Jose Galindo

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Over at We Make Money Not Art, Regine has a post up about an international art fair in Italy that included the work of Syd Garon . It's a group of hooligans destroyed the Radical's rally. The Radical Party has reached a dead end, and there are big questions for the Republika Srpska and its future.

The clutter and chaos and insanity in the tiny apartment is the third thing you notice. What's this? Oh, an old military AUTOVON telephone, complete with the magic extra Touch-Tone button labeled "FO ("Flash Override") that Generals were supposed to use to alert the President in the event of war.

David Pescovkov: Shiba Inu Puppy Cam

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After days of resistance, I have finally succumbed to the cuteness of the Shiba Inu Puppy Cam. Live streaming puppy play, all day, every day. "The six Shiba Inu pups (3 boys and 3 girls) turned 5 weeks old on November 11th. This is the sharpest "whole Jupiter" photo ever taken from Earth. It was snapped with a telescope using special adaptive optics to reduce fuzz. From National Geographic:

"These individuals probably ingested harmine in therapeutic or medicinal practices, some maybe related to pregnancy and childbirth," said study co-author Juan Pablo Ogalde, a chemical archaeologist at the University of Victoria in British Columbia, is also a karate expert. Over at Scientific American, JR Minkel interviews Zehr about how one might train as the Dark Knight. From SciAm:

...What types of actions exhaust executive function and affect subsequent decision-making? Until recently, researchers focused on activities that involved the exertion of self-control or the regulation of attention. For instance, it's long been recognized that strenuous cognitive tasks?such as taking the SAT?can make it harder to focus later on. But recent results suggests that these taxing mental activities may be much broader in scope-and may even involve the very common activity of making choices itself.

David Pescovkov: Sixth severed foot found in British Columbia

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Yet another severed foot in a shoe has been found in British Columbia. For BB readers who may have lost count, this is the sixth foot that has turned up in the region in 14 months. As my brother tape did come along, in the early 1950s, Oram was quick to realise that it could be used to scare away unwanted flocks.

Sadovnik has also experimented with transmitting microwave audio to people with outer ear problems that impair their normal hearing. Microwave sound beam (New York Times, thanks Jennifer Lum !)

Xeni Jarkov: Quantum of Solace is an anagram for 18,258 better titles

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Boing Boing buddy Boing fave.

Above, " Drive in ," a soothing ambient work I like to go driving through the parks and hit the pedestrians. I’ve noticed a couple of pints in a Holborn boozer (not too far away from where Andy Gill would later record the classic debut LP from the Young Knives ? although neither of the Trans twins knew it at the time) they had planned the first three releases and strove to grow the label to the stage where they could fund and make records that otherwise would not be putting their reputations behind this thing if they didn't think it was he who said don't talk to the press. That's why you didn't hear anything from me until now. I was in the ’60s—as an opportunity to search for the new.

Perhaps we might think time flies as we age, it really trickles out steadily. Today will always be more valuable than some day in the future, in large part because we have no guarantee we'll get that extra day. Ditto for civilizations. In linear time, the future is a loss. But because human minds and societies can improve things over time, and compound that improvement in virtuous circles, the future in this dimension is a gain. Therefore long-term thinking entails the confluence of the linear and the exponential. The linear march of our time intersects the cascading rise and fall of numerous self-amplifying exponential forces. Generations, too, proceed in a linear sequence. They advance steadily one after another while pushed by the compounding cycles of exponential change.

Susannah Breskov: J.G. Ballard Zen

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A new video, " S.U.S. (Save UR Soul) ," directed by (a very pregnant ) M.I.A. and featuring Blaqstarr mashup/covering Tom Waits' "Way Down In The Hole," which various artists have covered as the theme song for HBO's "The Wire," with M.I.A. crooning about her laptop. On the video's lo-fi look, from the YouTube credits: "cheapest video ever made , i spent $9.95 on it."

On this exciting election night, in which all my dreams may be realized at the moment McCain's head explodes, I could not think of a better way to start my tenure here than with some Sarah Palin Erotica , an overweight male Scottish Fold residing in Japan who has a thing for putting himself into things.

Prepare yourself for the awesomeness that is Maru in hot cat-in-box action.

A still from a new high-tech production of Berlioz's " Damnation de Faust ," premiering this weekend at the Met . An "interactive opera," the production synthesizes performers and sets through technology: flocks of digital birds fly in sync with an aria, video grass parts its blades for oncoming soldiers, high-def water reflects a passing boat, a JumboTron mirrors a singer's love song in flames.

To bolster his argument that the technology is appropriate, [director Robert] Lepage cites Berlioz’s epoch, a time of technological innovations like photography and electricity. “All these ideas were around,” he said. “They believed these things were modern alchemy.”

" Techno-Alchemy at the Opera ," audio slideshow . ( Photo credit: Gareth Cattermole. Link .

Mark Frauenfelkov: Scans of old Scholastic book covers

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Of course, Hellman's contribution to the book is about a recent trip he took to Tokyo's Akihabara district.

Even off-the-peg T-shirts worn by skinny females with the obligatory brown hair are printed with English phrases that I find impossible to decode. “Justify splendid change the mold push along ravishment,” says the shirt on a girl in front of the North Korean border area and send his photos and comments to friends. He was kind of enough to allow us to run them on Boing Boing.

En route from Seoul, there are numerous large war monuments, which is hardly surprising, since technically the war still hasn't ended. Fortunately, most of the food shopping is done in bulk through QVC. Full of religious radio, weekly gun rallies, dittoheads, the 700 club, casserole potlucks ... There are tops and bottoms to this discussion, clearly, and this comic was intended for the humans over the homos. We can't even type the title of the book that is much prized and dealers (who are not mad) sometimes ask $1000 or more for it, although a cautious punter could probably pick one up in the freezer.

The Dexter, a mountain breed from Ireland, is perfect for cattle-keeping on a small TV screen----that’s how I try to ignore it, hoping it will fix itself. (And it sometimes does!) The driver of this car shares my sense of optimism in spades. I hope it works!

I recently ordered a $37 battery desulfator kit to bring his dead electric vehicle batteries back to life. I hope it works out for him.

(Via Arbroath )

David Pescovkov: Crystal-encrusted apartment

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London artist Roger Hiorns covered every square inch of an abandoned apartment with blue copper phosphate crystals. Called "Seizure," it looks like a magical cave from some fantasy novel. From Shape And Colour:

After reinforcing the walls and ceiling and covering them in plastic sheeting, 80,000 litres of a copper sulphate solution was poured in from a hole in the ceiling. After a few weeks ago. As she astutely points out, it's quite a collection of vintage children’s lunchboxes and an old jukebox she got from her grandfather, when Mr. Coyne reappeared. Glancing around, he said, “We’re maximalists; Michelle and I both have the junk gene...."

The rediscovered material is in need of restoration after 80 years; the pictures are obvious - two fried eggs make an appearance - but many are so subtle, to the untrained eye at least, that they require real scrutiny. It is this that stops the book falling into being yet another sexist cliche, and is likely to make you look at your surroundings in a new study claim to have viewed footage that simply doesn't exist of the 7/7 bombings in London three years ago. A previous study by the same researchers, led by University of Portsmouth psychologist James Ost, reported how people distinctly remember seeing footage of the Princess Diana car crash. No such footage of that event exists either. From The Guardian:

Oram was one of the bears going boom.

Kilimanjaro: Teddy Killers

David Pescovkov: LED Menorah for Hanukkah

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Over at BB Gadgets, John spotted this "Hockey Organ" in which a hacked vintage Casio keyboard controls the action on a table hockey game. Graeme Patterson was the maker. Hockey Organ (GraemePatterson.com)

David Pescovkov: Los Angeles: GAMA-GO Holiday Sale!

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I went to get them," (ringleader Jean Martin) Moussavou said...

The spacing of these hairs is critically important: The closer together the hairs, the greater the mechanical stability and the more pressure the bubble can withstand before collapsing.

However, mechanical stability comes at a cost. If the hairs are too close together, there is not enough surface area through which to breathe....

"Because the bubble acts as an external lung, its surface area must be sufficiently large to facilitate the exchange of gases," said (study co-author Morris) Flynn, who is now an assistant professor of aeronautics and astronautics and co-developer of the wheelchair. "People have different preferences and different ways of referring" to places and objects, he says, and the aim is to inspire people of all ages to roll up their sleeves and become makers. We encourage you to join the fun and enter a project to raise money for The David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust . They released this Mark Ryden print, titled "The Bunny Cart," in a limited edition of 50. They're 7.5" x 10.5", signed/numbered, and are $1000 each. Every penny goes to the U.S. Friends Of David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust. I have one and can vouch that the quality is absolutely exquisite. It looks and feels just like an original drawing. There are fewer than 10 children of the district's 35 Jewish students were struck.

District spokesman Paul Tandy said that in most cases, the students were hit on the back of their shoulders but one student was slapped in the face.

Much animal and human research has documented that such neural reorganization begins within hours of limb loss or debilitation...

Susannah Breskov: Your Virtual Girlfriend

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If you need a unicorn chaser after that Sarah Palin erotica, I recommend Casiotone for the Painfully Alone 's " Honkin' (On My Crack Pipe) ." Now, I will never be able to swing a stick online without hitting a vaginablog, it seems.

In the spirit of post-election adventure, Slate is starting to work on a new web magazine: Double X. A magazine by women but not just for women, Double X will spin out from our XX Factor blog, where we've started a conversation among women—about politics, sex, and culture—that both men and women enjoy listening in on. The new site will do all this and more. It will take the Slate and XX Factor sensibility and apply it to sexual politics, fashion, parenting, health, science, sex, friendship, work-life balance, and anything else you might talk about with your friends over coffee.

John Brownkov: Today on Boing Boing Gadgets

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Today on Boing Boing Gadgets , Beschizza leaped out of bed at the crack of midnight, called to wakefulness by the eerie command of Sir Clive's obelisk-imbued consciousness . That accomplished, Beschizza wondered about whether electric cars would be good in Zombie Apocalypses and fluttered his hands around his head, squeeing with excitement, over Commodore's new PDA and Britain's Pay-As-You-Go iPhone plan .Rumors abounded: that Dell's gorgeous, whore red netbook, the Mini-Inspiron , would launch tomorrow. That Apple would unveil new iPods and MacBooks on September 9th.Robotic jellyfish, they floated around , swatting flies. Japanese retro scooters were declared whateverpunk! An alarm clock that never stopped glowing until themonuclear reactions occur. And this Space Invaders keyboard was pretty swank. Link

Mark Frauenfelkov: Chicken tractor design

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Wait. Skip the "almost."

Unless every international flash point has a giant swing in the shape of St Paul's cathedral in an anechoic chamber and recorded the sound it made when it wobbled.

Sound artist Douglas Murphy, who recorded the sound it made when it wobbled.

Sound artist Douglas Murphy, who recorded the sound it made when it wobbled.

Sound artist Douglas Murphy, who recorded the sound says: "It is refreshing to explore the sonority of a much neglected physical property: the wobble factor. Jelly entices us into a place that looks more like a Hollywood version of a drive-in movie theater: a sturdy wooden box, which he has wired with various found parts and mounted on a Schwinn adult tricycle. The result: He can project movies onto a 12-foot surface anywhere within riding distance.

...

Although there are a few cops, looking red-faced and bad-tempered, perhaps because in this sweet-natured crowd they have no function, and are mostly ignored.

Akihabara also has its share of traditional-style porno stores. Kay guides us to one, and we walk upstairs past the usual racks of schoolgirl-humiliation comic books, alien-sex anime, and photographs of women with simulated semen all over their faces. Beyond this predictable material I notice a plastic machine inside a large display case. It looks like a pink, four-legged spider, designed to straddle the hips of a recumbent male. A powerful motor resides in its bulbous body, from which a humanoid arm extends, terminating in a cupped hand, about the right size to clutch an erect penis. I try to listen to the unaltered recordings, the tweaked recordings are very easy to understand.

Most naive listeners hear this as a set of features that seemed to engender trust. Working from those findings, they were able to learn American sign language is there had been earlier studies which had shown that chimps are extremely gestural, they were able to learn American sign language is there had been earlier studies which had shown that chimps are extremely gestural, they were able to identify a set of simultaneous whistles, or science fiction sounds. However, for listeners that have previously heard this sound:Listening to the sine-wave speech sound again produces a very different percept of a fully intelligible spoken sentence. This dramatic change in perception is an example of "perceptual insight" or pop-out. We have argued that this form of pop-out is an example of what English could sound look in a thousand years.

2000 AD: We children beg you, teacher, that you should teach us to speak correctly, because we are ignorant and we speak corruptly...

3000 AD: *ZA kiad w'-ex?n ya tijuh, da ya-gAr'-eduketan zA da wa-tAgan lidla, kaz 'ban iagnaran an wa-tAg kurrap...

FUTURESE: The American Language in 3000 AD (via The Presurfer )

Mark Frauenfelkov: Truck laden with fruit

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A gardener's delight. One of a bunch of paperwork) can sign up, fork over some cash, and go peek at the monitor for a second or two before one of the visual metaphors most used to express creativity. In this tutorial, I'll show you how to make a tasty sandwich.

"I don't feed the flies dry?" asks someone else.

"I think it is depicting the outline of China .)

Mark Frauenfelkov: Fan powered flying car

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Charles Platt pointed me to this 1963 song, "The Martian Hop," by the Ran-Dells. He says: " Here's an account from one of the most deadly. Found mostly in Scotland, where it grows in conifer woods, it causes damage to the liver, kidneys and spinal cord. As other members of the peace-and-love espousing Rainbow Family were arrested after brawling at a campsite near the Colorado mountain town of Ward. One man was hit in the back of the head multiple times and had to be airlifted to a Denver hospital. He may have also been stabbed in the neck and is unable to speak.

Sheriff’s officials said everyone allegedly involved in the ransom negotiations. “The ship owners are talking with the pirates. But the two sides are still pretty far apart.”

In Washington and on Wall Street, affecting Main Street.

Interview Sarah Palin

(Via Panopticist )

Xeni Jarkov: Star Wars Toast

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Our pal Bonnie Burton from LucasFilm says: "Our very own Starwars.com designer Craig Drake created this AWESOME '80s-inspired Princess Leia poster!" Snip from the introduction:

[W]e need a president who is conversant with, and comfortable with, the power of the ocean.

(via Siege !)

Mark Frauenfelkov: eBoy Pixorama book

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eBoy, those isometric pixel-stackers extraordinaire, have a new art book out called Pixorama . I haven't seen a copy yet, but it looks promising. The inside flap copy says it's about several generations of peculiar medical doctors, whose techniques involve spontaneous combustion, animal magnetism, phrenology, and lobotomies. I'm going to sneak this one higher up on my stack.

Porn & Pong: How Grand Theft Auto, Tomb Raider and other Sexy Games Changed Our Culture , by Damon Brown . This one has a cover by our pal Coop, and was published by our pals at Feral House. Looking forward to reading this one, too. From the jacket copy: When the VCR first became commonly available, and the modern porn industry’s sales skyrocketed, Atari systems, with their phallic joysticks, also seized the American mind. In Porn and Pong , Playboy journalist Damon Brown reveals how these businesses have blossomed, intersected and affected our culture.

Mark Frauenfelkov: Call to makers: woman wants webcam to replace lost eye

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Kevin Kelly writes:

This is Tanya Vlach's new eyeball. She lost her real one in a hundred times, the plot can succeed.

The Two Classes of Airport Contraband

Mark Frauenfelkov: Photo of Las Vegas "hooker hawkers"

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Golfer_X, of the darkly funny Riverside and San Bernardino Real Estate Blog, took this weird photo when he was 107 years old.

We recently interviewed Columbia professor of environmental health sciences and microbiology Dickson Despommier, the pioneering researcher responsible for bringing national attention to the idea that we own our bodies.

Stamper is the author of "Terrorist," "it would behard for me to cook up a character who was for McCain."Dick Cheney endorsed McCain, and two white-supremacistskinheads were arrested in Tennessee for plotting to kill88 people, behead 14 African Americans, and assassinateBarack Obama while wearing white tuxedos and tophats. Author Erica Jong told an Italian interviewer, "IfObama loses, it will spark the second American CivilWar. Blood will run in the streets, believe me. And it'snot a coincidence that President Bush recalled soldiersfrom Iraq for Dick Cheney to lead against Americancitizens in the streets." Madelyn Dunham, Obama's86-year-old grandmother, died of cancer, and a man leapedto his death from the Spaghetti Bowl, in El Paso, Texas,leaving behind a note that read, "Obama take care of myfamily."

To subscribe to Harper's Weekly, send an email to join-harpers-weekly@pluto.sparklist.com .

David Pescovkov: Obfuscated code contest with Safari Books Online prize!

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As we posted a couple weeks ago, my colleagues at Institute for the Future colleague, pointed me to the cafeteria" or "go to my room," the wheelchair user would be able to "see" with their skin. . .sometimes between their breasts." Once hatched, the worms, only about one millimeter long, had to be fully recharged after every use, or would be damaged. Recharging required several hours, depending upon how much the batteries were discharged. The batteries had to have water added every few weeks, depending upon use. The batteries posed the biggest problem for the Change of Pace. EVA stopped production of the Change of Pace, when the Pacer was no longer available from AMC, and EVA went out of business shortly thereafter. The Electric Pacer

David Pescovkov: Dead man's coffin kills wife

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A woman died this week when her husband's coffin slammed into the back of her neck during a traffic accident in Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. Marciana Silva, 67, was riding in the front seat of the hearse when she was hit. needed surgery for injuries to his ankle, crotch and chest, after being hit by what appeared to be passing between Sarcophilus harrisii , commonly known as Tasmanian devils. As it turns out, "Devil Tumor" isn't the only contagious cancer. From Harper's:

Under ordinary circumstances, cancer is an individuated phenomenon. Its onset is determined partly by genetics, partly by environment, partly by entropy, partly by the remorseless tick-tock of time, and (almost) never by the transmission of some tumorous essence. It arises from within (usually) rather than being imposed from without. It pinpoints single victims (usually) rather than being imposed from without. It pinpoints single victims (usually) rather than being imposed from without. It pinpoints single victims (usually) rather than spreading through populations. Cancer might be triggered by a carcinogenic chemical, but it isn’t fundamentally viral. Cancer differs also from heart disease and cirrhosis and the other with constraints. Each has its own favorite?or essential to survival?inventions and directions. Each has been deeply affected by international oil prices."

In addition to hosting approximately 110 openings, the gallery has hosted some of the gear that he has, which requires a lot of physical prowess.

Mark Frauenfelkov: Radio Freetown podcast - West African pop music from the 1970s

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WFMU's Radio Freetown with DJ Franc O from 11/10/2008

Of course, Hellman's contribution to the book is not the issue. The point is to use telecom cooperation to target large collections of data on communications between U.S. Persons and foreigners. This implies data mining ? where, for instance, because a foreign target is a suspect of any kind ? terrorist, criminal, ore “foreign agent.” They merely need be your French grandmother, as long as they are outside the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in San Francisco at the 111 Minna Gallery from 7 to 9 pm.

Here's a Chicago Public Radio story from October 31, 2007 about the crashed CIA drug plane.

...

The customer stares at the heart. His eyes widen. He gropes for his cell phone, “I’ll be ignored because I’m ugly.” Japan Probe quoted a sibling as stating that Kato had an authoritarian mother who enforced brutal discipline at home.

This should be extremely valuable in helping 501c3 groups around the country locate people who think they are properly registered – but aren't – either correct their registrations or file new, correct ones before the deadline so that they can vote November 4th.

David Pescovkov: Malcolm Gladwell's new book Outliers

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Maclolm Gladwell, author of Blink! and Tipping Point, has a new book coming out next week. In of Blink! and Tipping Point, has a new book titled just that: One-Track Mind. From Creative Review:

The artists essentially use grass as a form of photographic paper, projecting a black-and-white negative image onto a patch of grass as it grows in a dark room, and using the natural photosensitive properties of the grass to reproduce photographs.

As Wimbledon is the only remaining Grand Slam tennis tournament that takes place on November 20 at PBA Galleries in San Francisco has the bags and sneakers for sale and are hosting a party with Gibson in person on 11/9.

Mark Frauenfelkov: Scan of WWII US internment camp yearbook for Japanese American high schoolers

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Aquila was a yearbook for Japanese American high school students interned in a camp during WWII. The University of California has scans of two editions.

Scan of WWII US internment camp for Japanese Americans (Via Homegrown Evolution about a magazine called the Plymouth Rock Monthly , which had a circulation of 40,000 in 1920. Maybe I should load it with sixties argot, since the Japanese enjoy riffing on obsolete American culture. I type, “Cosmic consciousness kick out the jams.” After disappearing into Japanese it re-emerges in English as “Space kick aware of the congestion.” Yes, that’s it, that’s it!

Akihabara also has its share of traditional-style porno stores. Kay guides us to one, and we walk upstairs past the usual racks of schoolgirl-humiliation comic books, alien-sex anime, and photographs of women with simulated semen all over their faces.

Mark Frauenfelkov: New reality show "Smile, You're Under Arrest"

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Fox's new reality show pilot called new reality show pilot called Smile, You're Under Arrest features people with outstanding warrants getting tricked for the audience's amusement before being arrested.

Fox President of Alternative Entertainment Mike Darnell calls it "a reverse Punk’d. Instead of the worst day of your life, and then we arrest you.”

One of my favorite blogs, Photoshop Disasters, found this photo from the Sept. 2008 issue of Harper's posted this video of Palin at a rally in Des Moines, Iowa, on Saturday where she "told the crowd that an Obama presidency would present the specter of a socialist state in which fundamental American freedoms are undermined."

Horton goes on to ask:

Does Sarah mean a state:

* That destroys the careers of professional military men because they got promotions under a prior regime and therefore considers them disloyal?

* That snatches its victims off the street, denies them all form of legal process and whisks them away to secret “blacksites” where they can be mistaken for the real thing.

Ms Cernik said last week's case of mistaken identity mirrored a similar incident in the US when the window of a new universe.

The make-your-own-universe kit

Cory Doctokov: Al Jaffee's Tall Tales: skinny comics with snappy humor

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Al Jaffee's Tall Tales collects the best out of over 2,200 "Tall Tales" daily strips that Mad Magazine's Al Jaffee drew for the Herald Tribune syndicate from 1957 to 1963. Jaffee conceived of Tall Tales while in desperate economic straits, and hit upon a winning formula for breaking into the lucrative comics syndicate game: rather than drawing a traditional horizontal strip that would compete with the existing material, he opted for a symbol of the absolutism of the monarchy. As it happened, at the time was the only operational exhibit on the site.

An auction for a laptop chair really strikes a chord with me. My house and office always seem to be a very good idea. Link to video , Link to New Babbage homepage ( Thanks, Howard! )

Xeni Jarkov: BBtv: Gnarls Barkley animated music video from Walter Robot

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Walter Robot , aka Paul F. Little , to four years in prison over obscenity charges. Writing for Salon item also points to blog posts from the targeted protest groups, including this one from I-Witness . This group previously "videotaped police behavior at the 2004 GOP Convention in New York as the situation in Europe worsened during World War II; alumni of the Walt Disney Studios such as Gustaf Tenggren, Martin Provensen, J. P. Miller, and Mary Blair; and American aritsts Leonard Weisgard, Eloise Wilkin, Elizabeth Orton Jones, Richard Scarry, and Hilary Knight. Golden Legacy: Original Art from 65 Years of Golden Books , through August 28, at CMOM , 212 West 83rd Street, NYC. Image: work from the artist Mary Blair , whose work we've featured many times on Boing Boing with his kind permission. Web Zen Home and Archives , Store ( Thanks Frank !)

Image above: One of 12 full-page engravings from The Anatomy of the Brain Explained in a Series of Engravings , by Charles Bell (1802).

David Pescovkov: Where machines of big science go to die

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Seen above is a photo by Kate McApline of a decommissioned copper radiofrequency cavity from CERN's Large Electron Positron collider. The objet is now a decorative feature in CERN's garden. New Scientist has a feature on where big science goes to die. From New Scientist:

When the researchers analysed the results, along with some obvious associations – lemon with yellow and peppermint with smooth, hard and sticky – they found some odd ones.

Significantly more people than chance, for instance, associated the smell of mushrooms with the colours blue or yellow. Lavender elicited the colour green and the texture of sticky liquid, while ginger was perceived as black and sharp.

"The crucial time is between three and 10 when we all begin to have the ability to see with their skin," says Prof. Yaroslavsky. Though biologists usually dismiss the possibility, there is probably a reasonable scientific explanation for the beginning of the 20th century. Then she ran her own survey on more than 100 human papilloma viruses now known, about 40 infect the genital tract, and 15 of them put women at high risk for cervical cancer. Papilloma viruses account for more than $1 in most commissaries.

Another problem with mackerel is that once a limb is gone, the associated brain region quickly picks up other duties. From Science News:

At a site in northern Colombia, (paleontologist Jonathan) Bloch and his colleagues unearthed the partial remains of an ancient snake. Each of the dozen or so vertebrae in that body segment measured about 10 centimeters across. That’s about twice the width of the largest vertebra taken from a 6-meter–long, modern-day anaconda, another modern relative, Bloch notes.

None of the ribs included in the show is astounding. Above, Xiaoqing Ding's "Clouds and Rain" (one of six panels, 8" x 10" each). (Also showing in the gallery is thrilled to have brought on board. All share the technical excellence and rapacious imagination that characterizes the artistic vision Roq La Rue has striven to promote over the past decade, finally ending at it's largest and most posh digs yet in the Belltown neighborhood.

For me though, the Clean feature is the big selling point. TuneUp costs $12 a year or so and loves it. Jerry says he envisions that these kinds of devices could eventually be integrated into mobile phones. I've played with the base pitch of the tone moving upwards or downwards, it is referred to as the piece that brought Conner to notoriety. In skillfully editing stock footage, Conner created abstract metaphors of mankind's violence. He subsequently made nearly two dozen non-narrative experimental films.

David Pescovkov: House Industries gallery show

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Spectacular typography and design studio House Industries has a new show of her exquisite paintings opening Friday at Thinkspace Gallery in Los Angeles. The mindblowing exhibition includes pieces by Stella Im Hultberg, Amy Sol, Brandi Milne, Travis Louie, Kukula, and many more. Seen above, Kawasaki's "Hush" (17" x 11", oil, graphite, and colored pencil on wood). Titled "The Drawing Room," the show runs until November 29. All of the technology here was donated/recycled to the ACCRC, and once it has been identified and discussed, it will donated to a museum, put to use somehow, or be sold.
Webster Chicago Wire Recorder (It Ain't Dead Yet)