March 2008
48 posts
Urban Collectibles: Hand-burnt toy cars
“Rather than give your son false hopes of one day being able to drive a luxury sports car or shiny speed demon with a set of Hot Wheels toy cars, give him a harsh dose of the real world with a $50 Urban Collectable instead.” Urban Collectables hand-burnt toy cars
Gawker on Apple Fetishists: Grow Up →
BRAINWAVE: Common Senses at EXIT ART →
Muxtape →
139 Norfolk: Cars Under the Stars
“Drive-ins have been disappearing for decades, declining to about 400 today from a peak of more than 4,000 in 1958, largely because of rising property prices and changing movie-going habits. After today, there will be 30 or so scattered across New York State, two in Connecticut, and just one, the Delsea in Vineland, in all of New Jersey, the state where drive-ins were born in 1933.” —The New...
NetGranny →
The Musician's Brain
“Limb and Margulis — a saxophonist and a pianist, respectively, who both segued into science — have just published separate studies of music and the brain. Margulis’ paper suggests that the intense training musicians receive literally changes the way their brains function. Limb’s work examines how jazz players get into a trance-like state of pure inventiveness as they improvise.” ...
Smart Car's 'Sideways' Art Project
“It’s official that the eco-chic Smart Car is coming to the USA in 2008, and to add to this momentum, Smart is releasing a gorgeous creative anthology, “Sideways: A Smart Art Project”, as a means to highlight’s Smart’s goals of greening urban transportation and our contemporary motoring lifestyle. The project combines the diverse work of 100 international contributors in collaboration with...
The Rise of American Incompetence
“Americans’ ability to manage complex systems has been the ultimate competitive advantage. It has allowed the United States to enjoy high growth and low inflation—a record we haven’t hesitated to lord over our foreign friends. The shelves in the business section of a bookstore in a mall in Johannesburg, South Africa, are stocked with the same volumes you’ll find in a...
BBC: America's new subprime shanty-towns →
I believe this was the opening setting for They Live. Who knew a Roddy Piper film would be so prescient.
How does Terry Richardson keep getting work? →
Viner Studio →
R.I.P. Arthur C. Clarke →
Roll-to-Roll” Processed OLEDs
“Since the early days of OLED research, people have said that OLEDs could potentially be made at very low cost because they don’t require expensive semiconductor manufacturing techniques. The ultimate low cost fabrication method would be a continuous “roll-to-roll” process like what is done in newspaper printing.” World’s first demonstration of “Roll-to-Roll” Processed OLEDs at...
Pull Back The Shade →
The Endless City →
Buy me this and I’ll be your best friend forever.
Why Won't Second Life Just Go Away, Already?
I’m not entirely clear that Au answers his own question, but this does give a nice middlground to the SL euphoria/backlash binary. (Full disclosure: I think that SL will forever be niche, until more immersive physical interfaces are developed. Also, no one who is hot in SL is hot in real life). W. James Au at etech08: Why Won’t Second Life Just Go Away, Already? - we make money not...
generativesocialnetworking.com
“What if you could make your contacts work for you? “I know…” you’re probably saying, “I try to keep in good standing with everyone I know. I try to make the connections that will be beneficial to me. But it’s just so time consuming.” What if you could make your contacts really work for you? What if there were a way to automate the process?...
Grazing on Data
“In other words, coming across what Dr. Biederman calls new and richly interpretable information triggers a chemical reaction that makes us feel good, which in turn causes us to seek out even more of it. The reverse is true as well: We want to avoid not getting those hits because, for one, we are so averse to boredom.” http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120527756506928579.html
Robin Williams (the painter, not the actor)
http://jackthepelicanpresents.com/williams.html
ColourLovers →
Survival Mosque →
The Atlantic: Say Goodbye to the Suburbs
”A structural change is under way in the housing market—a major shift in the way many Americans want to live and work. It has shaped the current downturn, steering some of the worst problems away from the cities and toward the suburban fringes. And its effects will be felt more strongly, and more broadly, as the years pass. Its ultimate impact on the suburbs, and the cities, will be...
Charlie Hall's Balloon Graph
“With the current boom in biofuels, wind, and solar, and even a revival in nuclear power, many people believe that a smooth transition to a post-fossil fuel economy is already a foregone conclusion. But a careful look at Charlie Hall’s balloon graph tells a different and much more disconcerting story.” Charlie Hall’s Balloon Graph - Scitizen
Required Reading: Dam Nation: Dispatches from the... →
End Times: Svalbard Global Seed Vault
“The vault holds over 1.5 million distinct seed samples of agricultural crops, with the capacity to conserve over 4.5 million.” Inhabitat » Svalbard Global Seed Vault Opens in Norway
BA Terminal 5 →
Ruby Pseudo Wants a Word: Teens and Tribe... →
RIP, Gary Gygax →
THE Mag
The Future Laboratory’s new magazine looks slick
Grobal: ‘Techno-Organic’ Self-Watering Planters
fuseproject -- Y Water bottle →
“Behar’s innovation was to give the bottle two lives: its first is as a vessel for the product, and when empty, it gains a second life as a toy. The sturdy 9-ouncers “can be linked with other bottles through biodegradable rubber ‘Y Knots,’ connectors that help to create spaceships, animals, robots, or whatever else a creative child can imagine.”“
Street Fighter Tribute book
“Street Fighter is one of the most influential video game franchises of all time. It launched the head-to-head fighting game genre and brought together millions of players around the globe to do battle, first at arcades and later, across a variety of home consoles. 2008 is the 20th anniversary of the franchise and to celebrate the property’s rich ...