shinyslingback:

roger hiorns - 

seizure.

British artist Roger Hiorns has turned the idea of sculpture inside out. Rather than present a sculpture inside an architectural space, he’s turned every surface of the architectural space into sculpture. Mixing installation art and chemistry, he’s taken an entire abandoned apartment near London’s Elephant & Castle and transformed it into a gemstone. Covering the inside with blue copper sulphate crystals, he’s created an other-worldly, mineralized, glinting mirror of an everyday apartment. Jewels literally glowing from the ceiling and lining the floors.The scale and production of “Seizure” is ambitious. 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 the temperature of the solution fell and the crystals began to grow. The remaining liquid was pumped back out and sent for special chemical recycling.

Honda has officially begun testing it's "Stride Management Assist," a battery-powered device worn on the legs designed to help stroke survivors walk.

Read more...

Looks like I’m not the only one posing with cute lil’ animals…

My reaction:

Thanks to Lauren O’Neill/Nizzle for the photo!

Jason McKittrick writes, "A Cthulhu Christmas ornament for those who wish to celebrate the solstice in a more eldritch fashion! This cyclopean adornment depicts Great Cthulhu squeezing his massive tentacled form through the hieroglyphic covered door of his ancient stone tomb in R'lyeh and will add the necessary touch of madness to your holiday tree. Each Cthulhu Yuletide Ornament is hand cast in solid resin and comes ready to hang with a black satin ribbon. Signed and numbered by artist Jason McKittrick."

Cthulhu Yuletide Ornament (Thanks, Jason!)

It’s bunnies! Bunnies are back. Hooray!

Oh man, bunnies.

Jen Palmer's husband bought her some Christmas gifts in 2009 from a site called Kleargear. The gifts didn't arrive, so they got a PayPal refund and posted a negative review to Ripoffreport.com. Three years later, Kleargear contacted the Palmers and told them that they were billing them $3,500 as a fine for violating their terms of service (which prohibit publicly discussing bad experiences with the business) and when the Palmers wouldn't pay it, Kleargear reported them to a credit-bureau for having unpaid bills.

It's a pretty ugly ripoff, and it just gets uglier. The stupid terms of service that prohibit publicly criticizing Kleargear didn't appear on their until several years after the purchase was made -- meaning that even if the terms are legally valid (they aren't), they don't apply to the Palmers. And when the desperate Palmers tried to give into Kleargear's blackmail by withdrawing their Ripoffreport post, Ripoffreport told them they charge $2,000 to take posts down. And the credit bureaus are refusing to remove the black mark from the Palmers' credit reports, which means they're getting turned down for credit.

Naturally, Palmer refused to pay the fee. Then, she found out that not only had Klear Gear imposed its arbitrary fine, but they had reported the “failure to pay” status to the major credit bureaus.

And the credit bureaus haven’t been helpful either, refusing to remove the mark from her husband's credit score. Jen Palmer says that she and her husband are now receiving rejection letters from lenders as a result of the negative mark on their credit score.

So, the Palmers now find themselves at the mercy of three unresponsive entities: the website that fined them for exercising their First Amendment rights, the review site that refuses to remove her post and the credit bureaus, which are taking the side of the website over a customer who may be the victim of corporate fraud. In the meantime, KUTV has put the Palmers in contact with a media relations representative at Experian, in an attempt to resolve the situation.

"I have the right to tell somebody else these guys ripped me off," Palmer said.

Woman gets $3,500 fine and bad credit score for writing negative review of business [Eric Pfeiffer/Yahoo News]

Chopping Block comic for Monday, November 11, 2013

Chopping Block comic for Wednesday, November 6, 2013

omame:

「海苔に巻かれた寿司宇宙」が渋谷でも | アツコ・バルーのブログ | L’AMUSEE

Matthew says: "Evan Booth builds weapons with materials purchased in an airport terminal, past the security screening. Here's a frag grenade built with a coffee mug, batteries, and a condom."

Pioneering fashion design house Alexander McQueen has teamed up with Damien Hirst on a collection of skull scarfs. Alexander McQueen has been creating beautiful skull scarves for ten years and this new series of 30 designs draws from Hirst's "Entomology" artworks. Above, photographer Sølve Sundsbø's short video celebrating the collaboration. "Alexander McQueen & Damien Hirst Scarf Collaboration"

Every mobile phone runs two operating systems; the one you interact with (like Android or Ios), and the one that controls the radio hardware. This second OS is ancient, creaking, and wildly insecure. Security researcher Ralf-Philipp Weinmann of the University of Luxembourg presented work on reverse-engineering the most popular "baseband" OSes from Qualcomm and Infineon and the horrifying security vulnerabilities he found. Anyone operating a cellular base-station (you can buy 'em on Ebay or build them from open source hardware specs) can send a 73-byte message that lets them run raw code on the processor; can silently activate auto-answer, crash the device, brick devices, install rootkits, send SMSes to premium numbers, and more.

You can do some crazy things with these exploits. For instance, you can turn on auto-answer, using the Hayes command set. This is a command language for modems designed in 1981, and it still works on modern baseband processors found in smartphones today (!). The auto-answer can be made silent and invisible, too.

While we can sort-of assume that the base stations in cell towers operated by large carriers are "safe", the fact of the matter is that base stations are becoming a lot cheaper, and are being sold on eBay - and there are even open source base station software packages. Such base stations can be used to target phones. Put a compromised base station in a crowded area - or even a financial district or some other sensitive area - and you can remotely turn on microphones, cameras, place rootkits, place calls/send SMS messages to expensive numbers, and so on. Yes, you can even brick phones permanently.

* The second operating system hiding in every mobile phone [Thom Holwerda/OS News]

(Thanks, Kyle!)

Wikileaks has published the Internet Chapter of the secretive Trans-Pacific Partnership, a global trade-deal negotiated between corporate leaders and government reps without any democratic oversight (the US Trade Rep wouldn't share TPP drafts with Congress, and now it is headed for fast-tracking into law). TorrentFreak has parsed out the text, and compares it to SOPA, the brutal US copyright law that collapsed in the face of massive public protest. The treaty is reportedly at a "negotiated stalemate" thanks to the US Trade Rep, who has refused to bend on treaty provisions that other nations objected to.

Many topics are covered in the chapter including DRM and other ‘technical measures’, extended copyright terms, increased penalties for infringement and ISP liability, the latter with a proposal for “adopting and reasonably implementing a policy that provides for termination in appropriate circumstances of the accounts of repeat infringers.”

Reception to the leaked agreement has so far been highly critical. Knowledge Ecology International notes that the TPP IPR chapter not only proposes the granting of more patents, expansion of rightsholder privileges and increased penalties for infringement, but also plans the creation of intellectual property rights on data.

“The TPP text shrinks the space for exceptions in all types of intellectual property rights. Negotiated in secret, the proposed text is bad for access to knowledge, bad for access to medicine, and profoundly bad for innovation,” KEI concludes.

Burcu Kilic, an intellectual property lawyer with Public Citizen, says that some of the proposals in the text evoke memories of the controversial SOPA legislation in the United States.

“The WikiLeaks text also features Hollywood and recording industry inspired proposals – think about the SOPA debacle – to limit Internet freedom and access to educational materials, to force Internet providers to act as copyright enforcers and to cut off people’s Internet access,” Kilic says.

Secret Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPP) [Wikileaks]

First Leaked TPP Chapter Evokes Memories of SOPA [Andy/TorrentFreak]

Let me know if you have any other good ideas.  Conversation here.

 

Links to items (Prices as of November 11, 2013):  1. Slinkies 2. Bouncy balls 3. Parachute men 4. Five pound Gummy Bear 5. Regular Gummy Bears 6. Ladybugs 7. Astronaut ice cream 8. Complete Star Wars Saga 9. Grappling hook 10. Batman costume 11. Marshmellow bazooka

 

(via Retronaut)

The aloha state just said "I do" to marriage between same-sex partners. Above, a photo from Tim Sakahara of Hawaii News Now: Marriage equality supporters rejoice as the Senate passes SB1HD1. Said US President Barack Obama, "I’ve always been proud to have been born in Hawaii, and today’s vote makes me even prouder."

#BREAKING: Hawaii State Senate passes same-sex marriage bill. Now heads to Governor for signature. #HINews #SB1

— Hawaii News Now (@HawaiiNewsNow) November 12, 2013

Hawaii just became the next state to embrace marriage equality. Congratulations to the Aloha State. #LoveIsLove pic.twitter.com/diHuGXCCsK

— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) November 12, 2013

Together, we have finally secured marriage for all of #Hawaii's `ohana! #HI4M #lgbt #SB1 pic.twitter.com/G5ZLfKznuS

— Hawaii United (@HI4Marriage) November 12, 2013

POTUS statement on Hawaii passage of #SB1: "I’ve always been proud to have been born in Hawaii, and today’s vote makes me even prouder."

— Star-Adv Politics (@starpolitics) November 12, 2013

How Hawaii's Senate voted on gay marriage #SB1. (h/t to @jkalanienglish) #HI4M pic.twitter.com/aRCTtA2tdH

— Honolulu Civil Beat (@CivilBeat) November 12, 2013

The marriage equality bill now moves to Gov. @neilabercrombie, who will sign it into law! #HI4M #lgbt #SB1

— Hawaii United (@HI4Marriage) November 12, 2013

The Sunday Assembly is a 501(c)3 charity that is creating massive Sunday events that are similar to church services, though they are atheist in approach (they don't insist that you be atheist in order to attend, but there are no supernatural beliefs espoused at the event). Atheists gather to sing, hear speeches about ethics, make friends, and organize community work. They call themselves "A godless congregation," and they've launched a 40 city roadshow along with a crowdfunding campaign to spread the non-gospel. There are already Assemblies in London, Bristol, Brighton, Melbourne, New York and many other cities, and there's instructions for starting your own..

The Sunday Assembly is a godless congregation that celebrate life. Our motto: live better, help often, wonder more. Our mission: to help everyone find and fulfill their full potential. Our vision: a godless congregation in every town, city and village that wants one.

We are here for everyone who wants to:

* Live Better. We aim to provide inspiring, thought-provoking and practical ideas that help people to live the lives they want to lead and be the people they want to be

* Help Often. Assemblies are communities of action building lives of purpose, encouraging us all to help anyone who needs it to support each other

* Wonder More. Hearing talks, singing as one, listening to readings and even playing games helps us to connect with each other and the awesome world we live in.

Sunday Assembly

Today we are exiting the ‘beta’ status phase and providing the CyanogenMod Installer for general release. The Play store application is now available, and the PC client component will be available shortly is now available.

A special “Thank You” to all of the beta testers, which at current count, is a community with over 7000 members. The reception and demand we’ve received for the installer shows the value in breaking down the barrier to entry that we sought to address. We will continue to work on supporting additional devices beyond the initial set, but we are proud to say that we are supporting the majority of flagship models currently on the market. For a list of currently supported models, please see our Installer wiki page.

After this release, we will also refresh the layout and design of our Download Portal, making it easier to find the builds for your devices. By visiting download.cyanogenmod.org, you will be able to intuitively filter and search for your device, and select whether you would like the latest stable or nightly build. Gone are the days of having to memorize your device’s code-name. Keep an eye out for that update.

Update: A forum and JIRA project are now available as well. Check out the introduction post.

 

SFGate: "A San Mateo County judge allowed a wealthy oceanfront property owner to block public access to a beach that has been enjoyed for at least a century by fishermen, tourists, sunbathers, families and surfers. Superior Court Judge Gerald Buchwald ruled Thursday that a billionaire landowner can legally block the only road into the sandy Half Moon Bay haven known as Martins Beach." (Thanks, Matthew!)

Since last Hallowe'en, a woman in Oregon has been circulating a letter she found in a box of decorative tombstones she bought at Kmart. The letter was written by a prisoner in a forced labor camp in China's Masanjia camp; he was imprisoned for practicing Falun Gong, a banned religion whose members have long been targetted for brutal suppression by the Chinese state. CNN located the ex-prisoner and interviewed him as he narrated a story of "inhumane torture" at the camp.

Their staff in Beijing spent months searching for the man. Finally, they found him and confirmed his identity, but didn’t reveal it to the public. He is a follower of Falun Gong, which most of the world calls a Buddhist-Taoist spiritual movement but the Chinese government considers a dangerous cult. He was sentenced to two and a half years in the Masanjia labor camp.

He reports sleep deprivation, beatings, and other misery in the labor camp. Making Halloween decorations for no pay was actually a reprieve for the inmates. Still, he decided to send a total of six letters, somehow procuring two items that inmates weren’t supposed to have: paper (taken from a re-education workbook) and a pen. He wrote the letter in bed, in the dark, avoiding the gaze of the guard who watched everyone while they slept. You know, to make sure they weren’t doing anything subversive like sending letters to the West in the products they were packaging.

Inside The Chinese Labor Camp That Made Halloween Decorations Sold At Kmart [Laura Northrup/Consumerist]

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awkwardasfuck:

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Wolfgang Matzl (creator of 2011's Inception-as-Victorian woodcut video) writes, "This time I made something a little bit different - a stop motion animation with puppets made out of meat."

(Thanks Wolfgang!)

FireStarter turned into dubstep and I went into old person tourette’s.

Gwinnett officials estimate that the new three-year SPLOST could bring in as much as $498 million.

Original article from: TheKneeslider.com -

Original article from: TheKneeslider.com - When's the last time you heard the name Harley Davidson associated with anything other than heavyweight motorcycles? Well, get used to it, because they're introducing two new models, the Street 750 and Street 500 based on a whole new platform powered by a liquid cooled Revolution X™ powertrain. Looks like […]

Maggie has shared a couple (here, here) articles on Thorium as a super-fuel. This sounds like a fantastic implementation!

Via IndustryTap:

Laser Power Systems (LPS) from Connecticut, USA, is developing a new method of automotive propulsion with one of the most dense materials known in nature: thorium. Because thorium is so dense it has the potential to produce tremendous amounts of heat. The company has been experimenting with small bits of thorium, creating a laser that heats water, produces steam and powers a mini turbine.

Current models of the engine weigh 500 pounds, easily fitting into the engine area of a conventionally-designed vehicle. According to CEO Charles Stevens, just one gram of the substance yields more energy than 7,396 gallons (28,000 L) of gasoline and 8 grams would power the typical car for a century.

I’m literally gonna go make a sandwich now.

In honour of all the evidence coming out about Toronto’s Peter Griffin-esque mayor, Rob Ford, I’m compiling a list of songs about drugs — and especially crack — and putting them in this post for your listening enjoyment. I’ll keep adding to the post as the day goes on, so if you have any suggestions, put them in the comments, and I’ll add them to the post!

The Rolling Stones: Mother’s Little Helper (1966)

Velvet Underground: I’m Waiting for the Man (1967)

William Shatner: Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds (1968)

Steppenwolf: The Pusher (1968)

Johnny Cash: Cocaine Blues (1968)

Lou Reed: Perfect Day (1972)

Very fitting, and posted in honour of Lou Reed’s recent passing. Thanks to Meryle for the suggestion!

Curtis Mayfield: Pusherman (1972)

Thanks to Colin Climie for the suggestion!

The Monks: Drugs in My Pocket (1979)

Eric Clapton: Cocaine (1980)

The Stranglers: Golden Brown (1982)

We don’t have enough songs about drugs in 3/4 time.

Grandmaster Melle Mel: White Lines (1983)

Freeze! Rock! Everybody thinks Grandmaster Flash did this, but it was actually Grandmaster Melle Mel. Thanks to Paul Frankenstein for the suggestion!

Specimen: The Beauty of Poison (1984)

A goth classic.

Forgotten Rebels: Surfin’ on Heroin (1984)

NWA: Dope Man (1987)

Guns ‘N’ Roses: Mr. Brownstone (1987)

From the film Red Heat: “Cocainum!” (1988)

Not a song, but it still fits the theme.

Shinehead: Gimme No Crack (1988)

Ice-T: I’m Your Pusher (1988)

“Out here on the street, he don’ even know what time it is!”

Public Enemy: Night of the Living Baseheads (1988)

1000 Homo DJs: Supernaut (1990)

The La’s: There She Goes (1990)

You thought this was about a girl, didn’t you?

GWAR: Crack in the Egg (1992)

First saw this back in the summer of 1992, in the movie that changed my life: Phallus in Wonderland.

Lemonheads: My Drug Buddy (1992)

Another tune from my university years. Thanks to Jennifer Woltemade for the suggestion!

Cypress Hill: Insane in the Brain (1993)

Thanks to my ol’ pal, George “Hotchner” Scriban, who also suggests any Cypress Hill tune is appropriate.

Revolting Cocks: Crackin’ Up (1993)

How’d I forget this one? Thanks, Tela Rood-Korditsch!

Bomb the Bass: Bug Powder Dust (1994)

Thanks to Chris for the suggestion!

Pulp: Sorted for E’s and Wizz (1995)

Elliott Smith: Needle in the Hay (1995)

Blur: Beetlebum (1997)

Another Jennifer Woltemade suggestion!

Dayglo Abortions: Homophobic Sexist Cokeheads (1998)

A great suggestion from Michael Jones, and oh-so-fitting.

Afroman: Because I Got High (2000)

Weezer: Hash Pipe (2001)

MGMT: Time to Pretend (2005)

Kanye West featuring The Game: Crack Music (2005)

Amy Winehouse: Back to Black (2006)

Clipse: Nightmares (2006)

Jay-Z: Roc Boys (2007)

GWAR: Crack for the Holidays (2009)

Not a music video, but hey, I can’t resist GWAR, and hey, it’s topical!

The “Heisenberg” Narcocorrido from Breaking Bad (2009)

A narcocorrido is a Mexican drug ballad whose style is derived from norteno folk corridos. Someone need to write one about El Cabron Grande Rob Ford.

C90s: Shine a Light – Flight Facilities Remix (2010)

In the game Grand Theft Auto V, this is the theme music for the mission in which the character you play, Michael (voiced by Ray Liotta), is dosed with acid by his no-good son Jimmy.

Frank Ocean: Crack Rock (2012)

Geez, how’d I forget this? Thanks to Ian Tuck for the suggestion!

COCAINUM! (2012)

Arnie quotes make this awesome.