boingboing_net

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/hoB3CVnobYA/arrr-this-be-pleasin.html

apod

http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap091116.html

What's happening at the center of spiral galaxy M83?

chr0me_kitten

• 08:54 RT @FakeAPStylebook: Never reveal that the true identity of Batman is Bruce Wayne. #
• 09:02 It's Monday again. Also, there's a letter press in this video. Cool. Not sure why the crescent moon is there, t... ♫ blip.fm/~gf77j #
• 09:03 @FakeAPStylebook you could just as easily say never reveal that the true identity of Bruce Wayne is Batman. #
• 13:19 RT @trochee: The "Mandelbulb" is higher-order extensions of the equation, in Gigeresque 3D form bit.ly/2awYUa #
• 15:09 I've come to realize that I've gone from wanting a cranial jack interface to wanting integrated wearable computing w/augmented reality 'ware #
• 20:21 #Avatar already pinged my "what these people need is a white guy" red flag. extended preview on #House now pings disability portrayals flag. #
• 20:23 Looks like both #Avatar movies are going to get the fuck on my nerves. I'll see Cameron's, but I'm still boycotting Shyamalan's. #
• 22:31 [ain't that the truth] RT @racialicious: Starting to wonder why ensemble shows always revolve around the least interesting character. #
• 22:42 @sasha_feather when Lost comes back, you will see me complaining *a lot* about Jack. #
• 22:45 Oh, buy stuff for winter holidays commercials. How I loathe you (especially the ones for jewelery). #
• 22:46 [giant telescope story] RT @duncank: Imagine a mirror the size of a ten story building. j.mp/1wF467 #

boingboing_net

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/ErRE_3JsNzo/karen-armstrongs-ted.html

Bonnoe says: "The folks at the TED Prize have been working with partners around the world to fulfill the wish of best-selling author and former nun, Karen Armstrong – the Charter for Compassion. The Charter is a document collaboratively written with contributions from thousands of people from more than 100 countries. With a sense of urgency, the Charter is a call to action for all of us to live more compassionately with each other in the hopes of ending global suffering. People from every corner of the world – including Oslo, Buenos Aires, Vancouver, Tehran, Capetown, Sydney, San Francisco, Mumbai and more - have embraced the Charter’s inclusive message by affirming the Charter at the Charter for Compassion website and posting the official widget on their blogs in a show of solidarity (see below). It’s a powerful message and one that we wanted to share."

Charter for Compassion

boingboing_net

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/I85ftrZZHbY/100-word-fiction-com.html

jwz

Drilling for Scotch whiskey on frozen continent

A beverage company has asked a team to drill through Antarctica's ice for a lost cache of some vintage Scotch whiskey that has been on the rocks since a century ago. The drillers will be trying to reach two crates of McKinlay and Co. whiskey that were shipped to the Antarctic by British polar explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton as part of his abandoned 1909 expedition.

Workers from New Zealand's Antarctic Heritage Trust will use special drills to reach the crates, frozen in Antarctic ice under the Nimrod Expedition hut near Cape Royds. Al Fastier, who will lead the expedition in January, said restoration workers found the crates of whiskey under the hut's floorboards in 2006. At the time, the crates and bottles were too deeply embedded in ice to be dislodged. The New Zealanders have agreed to try to retrieve some bottles, although the rest must stay under conservation guidelines agreed by 12 Antarctic Treaty nations. [...]

Richard Paterson, Whyte & Mackay's master blender, said the Shackleton expedition's whiskey could still be drinkable and taste exactly as it did 100 years ago. If he can get a sample, he intends to replicate the old Scotch and put McKinlay whiskey back on sale. "I really hope we can get some back here," he was quoted as telling London's Telegraph newspaper. "It's been laying there lonely and neglected. It should come back to Scotland where it was born.

Previously, previously, previously.

newtrailers

http://www.apple.com/trailers/fox_searchlight/crazyheart/

Crazy Heart - Trailer Four-time Academy Award® nominee JEFF BRIDGES stars as the richly comic, semi-tragic romantic anti-hero Bad Blake in the debut feature film CRAZY HEART from writer-director Scott Cooper. Bad Blake is a broken-down, hard-living country music singer who’s had way too many marriages, far too many years on the road and one too many drinks way too many times. And yet, Bad can’t help but reach for salvation with the help of Jean (Golden Globe® Nominee MAGGIE GYLLENHAAL), a journalist who discovers the real man behind the musician. As he struggles down the road of redemption, Bad learns the hard way just how tough life can be on one man’s crazy heart. Directed by: Scott Cooper Starring: Jeff Bridges, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Robert Duvall

wiredculture

http://feeds.wired.com/~r/wired/culture/~3/SV8WBqTItPc/Read_a_Barcode

http://howto.wired.com/wiki/Read_a_Barcode

gamesetwatch

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/gamesetwatch/~3/85inL7ZQbNg/nyt_can_indie_games_supplant_t.php

http://www.gamesetwatch.com/2009/11/nyt_can_indie_games_supplant_t.php

The New York Times published a rare mainstream article on the state of indie games last Friday, highlighting games like Jonathan Blow's Braid and Thatgamecompany's Flower while also dropping names for several IGF 2009 finalists (Coil, Blueberry Garden, Osmos).

Titled "Can D.I.Y. Supplant the First-Person Shooter?", the piece follows indie developer Jason Rohrer (Passage, Between) as he discusses video games following in the footsteps of other mediums and eventually producing its own Guernica, Blue Velvet, or Lolita. He point out that developers won't reach that milestone by copying other mediums:

'... according to Rohrer and others, video games fall into the trap of using the wizardry and craft of those big teams to emulate movies — bad movies at that. The narrative elements in today’s big games tend to be retreads of film-genre clichés. Or they’re extensions of actual film brands, like The Godfather.

Rohrer calls this cinematic approach to video games 'asymptotic': in his view there’s no point in making video games as good as movies, because we already have movies. 'Just as early film production copied the stage,' he said, video games have yet to escape the influence of film.

'Eventually film figured out editing, camera movement — the tools that made movies movies. Video games need to discover what’s special and different about their own medium to break out of their cultural ghetto.'"

You can read the full article by Joshuah Bearman on the New York Times's site.

boingboing_net

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/ScBdKhrc_PI/silly-udder-pitcher.html

I got all the enjoyment I can get from this picther by looking at the photo. No need to spend $22, as the milk I buy already comes in a carton. Heffer pitcher

hackaday

http://hackaday.com/2009/11/16/rotating-radar-visualization/

http://hackaday.com/?p=18444

We ask, who wouldn’t want a rotating motion and distance tracking radar? Sure in today’s day and age anyone could purchase a wide-angle sonar or IR solution that achieves the same goal, but [LuckyLarry] took it old school and made his own rotating radar. He used an Arduino, servo, and ultrasonic sensor as a base to gather data, and the open source programming language Processing to draw the data on the screen. He says it’s a little inaccurate currently, but will try out some other sensors in the future.