May 2008
77 posts
Amazon Adds Another 5,000 Titles To Kindle (AMZN) →
Amazon’s vision for its Kindle e-reader is making “any book, ever printed, in any language available in less than 60 seconds.” While still not quite cataloguing the Library of Alexandria, the…
“If it flies, floats, or fornicates, rent it. It’s cheaper.”
– Felix Dennis, bad-boy publishing mogul in BusinessWeek
Placebo pills made for kids →
The Placebo Store sells cherry-flavored chewable tablets called Obecalp (get it?) for parents to administer when they don’t think their kid is really sick. Hi. Welcome to the Placebo Store….
Netflix Rerun →
By virtue of mathematical coincidence, every million dollars that Netflix C.E.O. Reed Hastings spends to build a digital download service for his DVD-by-mail company sucks away roughly one penny…
The Consultants Handbook - Chapter 12 →
Unbelievable photo of one of the world's last... →
If you’ve seen Wade Davis’s unforgettable 2004 TED Talk — where he evokes the magic of the world’s cultural diversity, and speaks so eloquently about the alarming rate with which cultures and…
European airlines test spycams in every seat that... →
European airlines are prototyping a Panopticon-in-the-sky: cameras trained on every passenger in flight, married to some kind of snake-oil “terrorism detection” software that will be able to tell if…
The Guinness Book of World Records Editor Answers... →
Craig Glenday with Lucky Diamond Rich, the most tattooed person. (c) Guinness World Records.
Last week we solicited your questions for Guinness Book of World Records editor Craig Glenday.
Among other…
Is YouTube Building Market Dominance At The... →
If you look at YouTube’s numbers, one thing is clear: It completely dominates online video. YouTube accounts for 37 percent of all videos watched on the Internet and attracts about half of the…
"Inconvenient Truth" to become an opera →
The Huffington Post reports that Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth will be made into an opera for the 2011 season at La Scala in Milan. Composer Giorgio Battistelli has been…
This 20 Volume Print Edition of Oxford English... →
Call it the end of an era. The NYT says that Oxford University Press has no official plans to publish a new print edition of the multi-volume Oxford English Dictionary often…
Tumblr's David Karp: 300,000 Users, Pro Features... →
How’s microblogging startup Tumblr doing? Doing well, founder/karaoke star David Karp tells Wallstrip’s Julia Alexandria.
The site is up to 300,000 users as of this month, and growth has…
Photos of chicken forming in egg →
Here’s one photo of a series of about 20 photos showing a chicken developing in an egg. Before I saw these photos I had always thought that the yolk turned into a chicken, but it looks like…
WatchMust see: Alisa Miller explains why Americans know less than ever about the world outside of the United States.
New York Times API Coming →
As print circulation continues its slide at most newspapers, one of the United States’ most respect the New York Times is taking steps to boost online readership. The paper is already the…
The Multitasking Virus and the End of Learning?... →
Josh Waitzkin’s learning abilities—and principles—extend far beyond chess.
Some of you might be familiar with Josh Waitzkin.
He was the subject of the book and movie, Searching for…
Demo of iPhone Earth →
Want to see what the earth would look like in your iPhone? Watch the video below, which was shot by Frank Taylor of the Google Earth Blog. It shows a demo of the “coolest thing” he saw at…
Photo →
Shared by Robert Scoble
Funny graphics: an effective Google Reader shared item?
To-Do List temporary tatts →
Shared by Robert Scoble
Bill Gates writes stuff on his hands. So do I. It’s a great place to keep notes of stuff you need to know in the next hour or two.
To-Do Tattoos are skin-safe…
Beautiful photos of bankrupt offices →
Photographer Phillip Toledano’s shoots of bankrupt offices were meant to be archaeological exercises, but the signs of life interrupted make them as ghostly as the frozen statues of Pompeii. …
Bad Timing →
Apple Logo
Apple Es Ee Ooh Test
Hundreds lining up for 24/7 Fifth Ave. Apple store... →
Technologies That Connect →
Originally posted in The Technium
Every month the Long Now foundation hosts its Seminar on Long-Term Thinking. I serve as a sort of co-host, winnowing questions from the audience to the…
$1,500 flat pack house →
Gary Peare says: “Award-winning small space design: Abod, envisioned as a low-cost, prefabricated solution to South Africa’s housing shortage. Packs flat; is assembled by 4 people with a…
Test reveals: highest IQs use Firefox on MacPPC,... →
Alexander Uslontsev says: IQLeague guys have some kind of online IQ test on their site and they group IQ scores of all visitors by different geographical locations (city, country, etc.) …
Cisco internal memo: Chinese censorship and... →
Wired’s Threat Level has a leaked Cisco document discussing the great “opportunities” inherent in supplying censorship and surveillance technology to China.
The 90-page document is an internal…
Bribe Your New Employees To Quit →
Originally posted in ct2
This is one of the coolest counterintuitive ideas I’ve heard in a long time. It’s gotten some play in the blogomedia, but it’s still worth pointing out. The advice for…
Alice, a song and video composed from the Disney... →
Remixed into being by 19-year old Nick Bertke, who is based in Australia. Link to video on YT, found on Kottke, with this link to audio download. What a sweet little unicorn chaser of…
Why Parisians behave as they do →
Scientifically speaking, exactly what makes April in Paris delightful? A computer scientist of my acquaintance, a Paris native now living abroad, analysed the question and wrote up a study…
Create a Spectacular Grass Text Effect in... →
Ever wanted to make text out of grass? Well with Photoshop you can. In this tutorial we’ll create a rather cool looking grass-text effect using a photo of grass, the pen tool and a bit of patience. …
“God gave me a tail to keep off the flies. But I’d rather have had no tail...”
– Benjamin the Donkey in Animal Farm by George Orwell (via James Simons in Seed Magazine)
“The successful person makes a habit of doing what the failing person doesn’t do.”
– Thomas Edison
Orphan Works Update: Is the Legislation Fair to... →
As we pointed out in our deeplink and podcast on the issue, the Orphan Works legislation currently before Congress is stirring up all sorts of passions (and plenty of FUD). The debate continues…
New Orphaned Works Act Would Limit Copyright... →
ars technica:
Here’s the problem that Congress is trying to solve: imagine that you are a well-known graphic artist who gains huge popularity from the funny videos you routinely post to…
Microsoft Cashback Test Drive: Slick! (But Still... →
After a brief test-drive of Microsoft Live Search cashback (and a scan of the lengthy press release), our thoughts are below. The product execution is strong and answers some of our…
Urine-collecting briefs for pilots →
Seen here is the “Advanced Mission Extender Device.” No, no, no. It’s not what the name makes you think. It’s actually a garment that allows pilots to pee during long flights. Joel has more…
New York Times announces Times Machine →
Yesterday I got a great tour with my cell phone of the new New York Times building. While there I met some of the top geeks behind the New York Times and they told me a few things and…
Almost a Duet →
“And now it’s all over. This July, Jonathan Schaeffer, a computer scientist at...”
– Death of Checkers in The New York Times
TechMeme Finally Adds Search →
Tech news site TechMeme launched on September 12, 2005. It was an immediate hit and remains the most important blog news aggregator: Dan Farber wrote perhaps the best description of the site…
Ztail Wants To Be The Kelley Blue Book For... →
We all have one: It’s that thing that’s been collecting dust in your closet since the mid 90’s. You know it has to be worth something, but you’re worried that posting it on eBay will garner a…
NYU student shares his "virtual girlfriend" with... →
NYU Interactive Telecommunications Program student Drew Burrows, 28, engineered a “virtual girlfriend,” and showed her off at a recent Tisch School of the Arts show:
It’s simple to behold — a…
20+ Ways to Learn a Language Online →
Earlier today we mentioned a plugin for AIM that would translate what you type on the fly into another language. That’s an exceptionally useful tool, but the far more fluid and accurate way…
America's Priciest Highway →
The governor of Pennsylvania might celebrate this evening by adding a little manchego cheese to his Philly cheesesteak. The reason? Citigroup and the Barcelona-based infrastructure firm Abertis won…
Twitter: Now As Powerful as “The Clapper” →
Control Lights with Twitter from Justin on Vimeo.
If you can’t get enough of Twitter why not try Twitter-enabling your home? By connecting his cellphone with his Twitter account,…
Much love, Joe Doe →
Who’s Joe Doe? I have no idea. But he’s the dude who made the other Microhoo animation for us, and now he’s made this one. I love it. Namaste, Joe Doe.
Netflix Roku: Free Is Such A Beautiful Word →
Netflix made a big splash today with their announcement of a $100 set top box, built by a California startup called Roku, that streams free movies (for Netflix subscribers) to the living room.…
The Fast and the Curious →
Three weeks before it embarked on its blundering attempt to acquire Yahoo, a Google-obsessed Microsoft agreed to pay a juicy $1.23 billion for a Norwegian tech company mired in enough accounting…