Every once in awhile a LEGO model comes along that makes you pause, a little slack-jawed, and then scramble for your soon-to-be-empty wallet. There are a lot of cool sets in the LEGO lineup, but a rare few are targeted at adult builders with a larger budget and a thirst for a premium experience and finished product that serves as an office-decor talking piece. These are sets that aren’t just large and complex, but sets that can be called a work of art; an ABS sculpture. Few sets that I’ve encountered fit this bill better than the new Technic 42056 Porsche 911 GT3 RS. It has 2,704 pieces, and it’s available beginning June 1 online as well as in select markets. It will hit store shelves in the USA in August, where it will retail for $299 USD.

The LEGO Technic Porsche 911 GT3 RS is truly a premium product through and through, beginning with the box it’s packaged in. The first thing I noticed upon picking up the box is how incredibly heavy it is. As you may imagine, I’ve hefted a lot of LEGO boxes over the years, and have a feel for how heavy they generally are. The Porsche box tips the scales at a whopping 11 pounds. For comparison, 10224 Town Hall, which has roughly the same number of pieces, weighs only 8.4 pounds. The box itself is quite special, with a gorgeous glamour shot of the 911 against a black backdrop, with minimal text.

The real fun begins when the box is opened, which has a fully removable lid instead of the hinged top that most large sets provide. The inside of the lid—yes, even the inside of the lid is special here—features silhouettes of the Porsche 911 lineage back to the original 1963 version, and embossed gloss black Porsche 911 graphics adorn the outer walls of the lower box. Even the most space-starved collector will want to hang on to this box.

Pulling off the lid is no letdown, though. The interior contents of this set are as carefully crafted as an Apple product’s packaging. The four unique rims are nestled into cavities along the left side, with suave black sub-assembly boxes around the other three edges. The manual lies in the center, a coffee table-worthy tome in stark orange with the Porsche crest, a lovely contrast against the other black contents. The manual is a mind-boggling 578 pages in length. The first 38 pages are filled with world-class photographs from Porsche’s history, as well as images of the Porsche factory, and both the real and LEGO 911s’ development. The accompanying text is in both German and English, and gives more background for the model and its real-life counterpart than any other LEGO manual; even the UCS and Ideas sets have only a page or two.

Each of the sub-assembly boxes is matte black with fine-art shot of a portion of the sub-assembly on the front. These boxes have tabbed flaps on the ends, so that they can be reseated in the main box. Turn to page 39 in the manual, and prepare to dig into Step 1. But first, the manual has a paragraph of text, outlining what you build in this sub-assembly: “The first step in the construction of your 911 GT3 RS is to build the drivetrain, complete with dual clutch gearbox (PDK), paddle shifters, suspension and the heart of the 911 GT3 RS, the 4.0 flat 6 engine. When you have completed all the steps in box 1 you will be able to test out all the functions and see how they work.” From there, the construction flows as any large Technic set does. Now, there are no numbered bags inside the sub-assembly boxes, so essentially all the pieces in this 2,704-part behemoth come in only four installments. If you don’t want to spend time sorting, I recommend that you open each bag in its own pile, since the parts are roughly sorted by size and type. If you’ve built any of LEGO’s recent top Technic models, you’ll be familiar with the build process, consisting of intricate gearing, an abundance of Technic liftarms, and the myriad different Technic pins used with abandon throughout. Even if this will be your first Technic model, you’ll be fine if you take your time and set out the parts called for at the beginning of each step. With 856 total steps in the instruction manual though, this will not be a short build. Expect to spend a minimum of four hours building, and likely much more, unless you’re a Technic guru.

The first two boxes build the chassis, engine, gearbox and interior. In a neat bit of engineering, a large portion of the second sub-assembly’s frame nests over the undercarriage and bolts on with a few Technic pins. The third and fourth boxes finish the car out with the body panels and wheels, and a few other details. There are a few new pieces worth noting in the model. Firstly, there’s a new three stud-long version of the Technic with stop. It’s appeared in a few other sets this year, but you’ll get 18 of them in this set (not that you’re likely to part this set out). The two other new molds in this set are exclusive to the Porsche: the hubs and the wheel arches. Obviously four hubs are provided, but you get six of the wheel arches, since four are used on the front. The two front outer-facing wheel arches each have printing for the vents. Each wheel hub has a center stud, where a 1×1 round tile emblazoned with the RS logo sits. Oddly, while these are printed, the 1×1 round tile in the center of the steering wheel has a sticker for the Porsche crest. However, this does mean that this is the first set to contain unprinted 1×1 round tiles in black (and an extra is provided), and there are a number of elements appearing in orange for the first time. The passenger side dash has a 1×4 white tile laser-etched with a unique serial number for each kit. All the rest of the decorated elements on the set are stickered, though the number is minimal.

The finished set is a masterpiece. The car is huge; it’s 1:8 scale, which puts it at almost two feet long. The functioning features all work excellently, with opening doors, front cargo space and engine lid, plus mechanical functions like steering and shifting. There’s even a piece of Porsche-branded luggage which nestles into the front cargo area. The functioning paddle shifters are a mind-boggling feat of LEGO engineering. A simple finger pull on the either paddle shifts the car up or down with a satisfying ratchet. It is a bit odd that no Power Functions motor is included, since it’s a bit hard to tell what the shifter is doing without having power to the wheels. I’m not a Technic expert, but I believe there’s a space left where a motor could fit between the front axles, though the manual makes no mention of Power Functions compatibility. On that note, Eurobricks has reported that following the instructional manual causes the shifting to function out of order. LEGO has confirmed that this is intentional, and has issued a statement which we’ve reproduced at the end of the review.

This set has raised the bar not just for LEGO Technic models, but for LEGO models as a whole. The presentation is superb, making every step of the process actually feel like you’re handling a premium product, and the end price of $299 actually feels like a steal. This is a model you’ll want to display on your solid oak desk while you glance out of your corner office from the top story; if you don’t have an oak desk or a corner office, you just may feel as though you did after building this.

Update June 01: LEGO has issued an official statement regarding the gearbox issue that some fans have reported, which we referenced in our review.

Thank you to all our dedicated fans for the comments regarding the GT3 RS by LEGO Technic.
It is correct that the gears in this model are not sequential as in the real Porsche PDK. This is however, a deliberate decision taken to ensure that we make the best possible LEGO version of this amazing car that both meets our design requirements and gives everyone a great building and product experience.
It was a considered decision taken during development that the gears running in the correct order meant that it did not result in a great experience when driving the car. Too many gears are engaged at the same time and smooth running with all those tolerances is just not possible.
If you switch the build in steps 267 and 269 the gears will run sequentially, and everyone who feels that this is the better solution should feel encouraged to do so.
LEGO Technic really is the ultimate open source design product and now that it is finally available, we look forward to seeing all the ‘improved’ models our fans create. After all, that is what LEGO building is all about.
We hope everyone will have a great building experience and feel a strong sense of pride from creating both our version and their very own LEGO Technic representation of a Porsche GT3 RS. We are very fortunate to have such skilled and dedicated fans that can spot this small deviation from reality and would like to thank everyone for sharing their ideas and expert knowledge.

LEGO sent The Brothers Brick an early copy of this set to review. Providing TBB with products for review does not guarantee coverage or a positive review.

Hovertext: Somehow, I feel like this comic says something deep about my generation.

the-future-now:

Watch: 12-year-old Arturo also explains to anti-vaxxers why it’s not “my child, my choice.”

Follow @the-future-now

Always reblog forever.

As you may have heard, actress Amber Heard recently filed for divorce from almost-Reason Rally speaker & dear friend of Lawrence Krauss, Johnny Depp. Since news of the divorce hit, a litany of character smears have come out against Heard, in an attempt to paint Heard as a gold digger, greedy bisexual, and uncaring harpy.

In response, Heard’s legal team has released the following statement about her ongoing legal battles and divorce from Johnny Depp:

“As the result of Amber’s decision to decline giving an initial statement to the LAPD, her silence has been used against her by Johnny’s team. Amber did not provide a statement to the LAPD in an attempt to protect her privacy and Johnny’s career. Johnny’s team has forced Amber to give a statement to the LAPD to set the record straight as to the true facts, as she cannot continue to leave herself open to the vicious false and malicious allegations that have infected the media. Amber has suffered through years of physical and psychological abuse at the hands of Johnny.”

“In domestic violence cases, it is not unusual for the perpetrator’s playbook to include miscasting the victim as the villain. In reality, Amber acted no differently than many victims of domestic violence, who think first of the harm that might come to the abuser, rather than the abuse they have already suffered. Amber can no longer endure the relentless attacks and outright lies launched against her character in the Court of Public Opinion since the tragic events of May 21st. With her statement Amber hopes to give the LAPD the opportunity to conduct an accurate and complete investigation into the events of that evening and before. If that occurs, and the truth is revealed, there is no doubt that Amber’s claims will be substantiated beyond any doubt, and hopefully Johnny will get the help that he so desperately needs.”

“From the beginning it has been Amber’s desire to keep this matter as private as possible, even though LAPD officers responded to a 911 call made by a third-party. The LAPD officers viewed not only the disarray that Johnny had caused in the apartment but also the physical injuries to Amber’s face. We filed the Petition for Dissolution of Marriage at the very end of the day on Monday May 23rd and we did not serve Johnny with the Petition at the premiere of Alice Through the Looking Glass that evening. We sent a letter to Johnny’s counsel team the next morning making it clear we wanted to keep this matter out of the media. We then held off requesting a domestic violence restraining order as we knew that Johnny was out of the country.”

“We took the high road. Unfortunately, Johnny’s team immediately went to the press and began viciously attacking Amber’s character. Amber is simply a victim of domestic violence, and none of her actions are motivated by money. Amber is a brave and financially independent woman who is showing the courage of her convictions by doing the right thing against Johnny’s relentless army of lawyers and surrogates.”

“The Family Law Court is not going to be influenced by misinformation placed in the social media based on anonymous sources. Amber is the victim. Amber is a hero.”

Featured Image by Kamillo Kluth

Space is pretty fantastic. Right now, we space fans have a lot to be excited about with SpaceX’s reusable, landing first stage rocket; Blue Origin’s reusable, landing rocket for space tourism; and the recent achievement on the International Space Station with Bigelow Aerospace’s Bigelow Expandable Activity Module, an experimental expandable space station module.

Lia Chan gives a glorious look into the past at Kennedy Space Center Launch Complex 39A. This beautiful, beautiful build features the launch platform, crawler transport system, and NASA’s retired workhorse, Space Shuttle Atlantis.

While private companies are working on making space travel safe, efficient, and routine, NASA is setting its sights on exploration once again with the Space Launch System. Because building one launch pad, crawler, support system, and launch vehicle isn’t impressive enough, Lia Chan gives us a brick-built look at NASA’s giant leap forward:

softwaring:

look at this pretty abandoned hotel in colombia

Polish builder Rafal P has perfectly captured the largest landmark in Warsaw in microscale, and he managed to incorparate almost every little detail in this relatively small creation. The building is question is the Palace of Culture and Science and it was built in 1955 in a Stalinist manner. Today it is still the tallest building in Poland and the seventh tallest in the European Union at 237 meters (778 feet).

Rafal’s perfect photography creates an atmospheric look, but bright trees and colorful vehicles cheer up the gloomy ambience. The rounded conference room is perfectly represented despite the difficulty of building curved objects with LEGO parts. The clock tower, antenna and rooftop details are amazing. Soviet remnants in architecture have always amazed me and it’s a joy to see them built with LEGO parts.

mostlysignssomeportents:

Jedediah Voltzby’s Somewhere Small sculpture series is composed of 25 tiny treehouses painstakingly built around houseplants, drawing on Voltzby’s extensive experience as a props-master for films.

Voltzby’s houses are made from wood, silk and other materials, with tiny gemstones and paintings hidden within. They’ll be displayed at LA’s Vigil Normal starting April 23.

https://boingboing.net/2016/05/30/sculptor-builds-tiny-elaborat.html

Whilst we all love a spaceship or a castle, sometimes LEGO building is at its very best when it’s used for scale modelling. This fabulous Volkswagen delivery truck in ESSO livery from Andrea Lattanzio is a great example. The shaping on this is excellent and I love the canvas over the truck bed.

The killer detail on this model has to be the stitching around the unrolled canvas. Brilliant stuff.

The shiny "mirror cakes" of Olga Noskova have been going viral the past few weeks, and today I am jumping on that shiny, shiny bandwagon, you guys, because LOOKIE:

When I first saw this cake my jaw literally dropped. And that's coming from someone whose JOB is to look at the world's most beautiful cakes.

I thought I'd seen it all.

I WAS WRONG.

Check out this marbling:

And this funky-cool fluting:

Incredibly, Noskova's cakes even look as beautiful inside as they do out:

So how does she do it?

Here's a short video from Noskova's brand new Youtube channel to illustrate:

The "mirror glaze" is a poured on gelatin mixture, and is apparently an old French technique that just isn't used very often. (Although I bet it's about to get a LOT more popular. Ha!)

And while everyone is focusing on that incredible shine, it turns out Nokova has perfected another incredible cake texture:

A velvety matte speckle, which she achieves with a powered sprayer.

Both of her signature textures together:

This is cake art in every sense of the word, but as John pointed out to me, it's cake art that you still want to eat. Somehow Noskova has managed to make her cakes look as delicious as they are beautiful - and we all know that's no small task in the modern cake world.

Head over to Olga's Instagram for sooo much more (it wasn't easy to narrow down my favs!), and then watch her new Youtube channel for hopefully more instructional vids to come.

Happy Sunday, everyone!

*****

Thank you for using our Amazon links to shop! USA, UK, Canada.

The LEGO Ideas Maze continues to inspire builders to construct their very own LEGO mazes. IamKritch steps into the fray with this Aztec-themed beauty. In order to make it out alive, you must delicately and precisely guide a ball from the very top of the pyramid to the lone ship anchored along the shore. Along the way you must avoid pit traps filled with spikes, and cross narrow bridges.

The jungle and temples look great at this tiny scale and I particularly like the decorative skulls and scrolling patterns along the frame of the maze. Be sure to watch Kritch’s video to see all this build has to offer.

Aaron Fiskum brings us a Hiigaran Destroyer from the Homeworld universe. This is a lovely example of what’s called a SHIP in the LEGO spacer community — a “Supremely Huge Investment in Parts”, a spaceship model which usually exceeds 100 studs in length.

Aside from the impressive scale, it’s the lines and details of this model which make it interesting. I’m particularly impressed with that brick-built winged insignia and the gun turrets. And if the shaping around the bow isn’t enough awesomeness for you, check out the stern. Beautiful stuff.

This week, Marvel Comics published the first issue of Captain America: Steve Rogers in which it's revealed that since his earliest days, Captain America has been a double agent for Hydra, the thinly veiled allegory for the Nazis; in an epic Twitter rant, Livejournal alumnus and Dreamwidth cofounder Denise Paolucci explains the way that perpetual copyright and business concentration has neutralized the ancient custom of collective storytelling of epic narratives, magnifying the harm from bad corporate decisions. (more…)

Hovertext: Once you realize there is no hope, you can relax and just enjoy the progress in machine learning.

micdotcom:

Mom shuts down stranger who shamed her son

On May 20, U.K. mom Haylee Brazen posted a response to a woman who made derogatory comments toward her son Zackary. The woman had a problem with his dress and their conversation. Brazen is not here for her gender stereotypes — and has some firm advice for the next time they meet.

When your 5 year old son asks you to build a Ninjago city, you only say yes. But Ben Pitchford took things a little bit more seriously and ended up with a massive diorama nearly 4 feet (or 121 cms) high! The building process took almost 9 months, which is way over the attention span of a 5 year old. I guess Ben just needed an excuse to build something large. Luckily he had 100,000 LEGO parts laying around so this fortress was no big deal for him. He sculpted the big mountain with absolute attention and mastered the art of rock building. Ben also hid small LEDs behind transparent parts, so it makes a great scene once illuminated after dark.

The rice field, dojo, shinto shrines, cherry blossom trees, numerous caves, flowing lava, amazing waterfalls, grand stairs, mountain zipline and original Japanese characters make up a most amazing diorama. It will take you some time to absorb all the details, but you can see more photographs below.

You can also check out Ben’s Flickr album and the next issue of Bricks magazine to see more pictures. And if photographs aren’t enough for you, go see it at the Brickworld Chicago in June!

ProPublica came out with an excellent piece this week by Julia Angwin, Jeff Larson, Surya Mattu and Lauren Kircher looking at the algorithms used by the US justice system to predict the recidivism rate of people at different stages within the justice system. These predictive scores, called risk assessment scores, are then used to determine things like sentencing and bail amounts, with those who have a high probability of committing future crimes getting higher sentences than those with lower scores. Low and behold, these scores are also correlated with race, so if a black man and white man commit the same crime, the black man is more likely to have a higher risk assessment score which could result in a tougher prison sentence or a higher bail.

As someone who builds predictive models for a living, I am dismayed at the misuse of predictive algorithms for the purposes of discrimination, though I don’t think it’s the algorithm itself that is the problem, or at least not for the reasons that others seem to think.

Why do some predictive models give racist results?

In 2016 in the United States we are living under a white supremacist society where black men and women face institutionalized racism that leads to less opportunities for jobs and credit and greater risk of arrest and violence. Because of institutionalized racism, there are many undesirable things that correlate with being black, such as lower income, likelihood of participating in certain types of crimes, increased likelihood of being arrested for said crimes, and increased recidivism rates for those who have served their term and are released from jail. This is a classic case of causation does not equal correlation. Being black is correlated with these things not because there is something innate about black people that causes them to commit crimes but because we live in a society where external hardships are imposed on black people because they are black and those hardships themselves are correlated with crime.

Since being black is correlated with higher recidivism, if we build a predictive model it will likely result in higher risk assessment scores for people who are black. It’s not so much that the model is being racist but that it is reflecting the reality of racism. In fact, if black people have higher rates of recidivism and the model scores didn’t reflect that, then the model wouldn’t be considered very accurate.

The problem with the actual risk assessment model that ProPublica looked into, created by the company Northpointe, isn’t just that it gives higher scores to people who are black. In fact, the model overestimates the recidivism rate of black individuals and underestimates it for white individuals. The model results don’t match reality in ways that really are racist against black people.

The fact that the model is overestimating recidivism of black people means that if you have a group of black people and a group of white people with the exact same external characteristics (or at least the exact same characteristics that are inputted into the model), the individuals who are black are less likely to commit future crimes than otherwise equal individuals who happen to be white. Ironically, the way to make the model more accurate and less racist would be to include race as a factor in the model. This would control for race by lowering the scores of black people slightly to reflect their lower chance of committing future crimes and the accuracy of scores for both black and white people would go up.

Saying all of that, we can’t really know what “all else being equal” means because the algorithm itself is secret.

We need to be extra careful when working with proprietary algorithms because they are surrounded by secrecy.

“Proprietary algorithm” is a term used by companies who sell their algorithm results while keeping the algorithm itself secret. They are often sold with big promises to companies and governments that this algorithm is the best around and will predict all the things, natural variation and complexity be damned. In a way, their secretness is part of their allure, as if a company came across some piece of ancient magic that only they can wield and they will wield it for you if you pay them a hefty price.

The truth is that most proprietary algorithms are just simple regressions based on some simple data that could certainly be done easily by any statistician or data scientist for likely less than what is being paid for access to these algorithms. The very fact that they are secret is likely to mean that they are doing the minimum needed to get some sort of algorithm that maybe sort of works. Certainly not all proprietary algorithms are bullshit, but the fact that you can never really know what is in them and are difficult to test on your own means that companies could get away with selling a pseudo-random number generator in the place of an actual algorithm and most clients would never know the difference. Certainly most companies selling proprietary algorithms are probably not putting forward actual random numbers and their models might be slightly predictive or perhaps even very good, but it’s impossible for anyone outside of the company to really know and that’s the problem. There’s not any good way to tell the good proprietary algorithms from the bad unless the veil of secrecy is lifted.

In the case of these risk assessment scores, they are created using a proprietary algorithm by the company Northpointe. They then sell this algorithm to prisons and courts all over the United States, even though there is little to no openness about what is in the model, how the scores are calculated, or how accurate it really is. It’s frankly criminal that a proprietary algorithm surrounded by secrecy and created by a for-profit company is being used to determine things like sentence length. We have no idea what is in the algorithm or how predictive it really is. We are putting all our trust in something that we don’t know anything about.

You have to be careful with predictive models because they can feed on themselves and exacerbate differences between different types of people.

Even if there was complete openness and the model was well-made and pretty good at predicting future crime, it still wouldn’t be right to use it to determine things like sentencing or setting bail amounts. We know that when people cannot afford their bail they end up having to spend some time in jail, which leads to future hardships like losing their job or even losing custody of their children. If we use the risk assessment model to help decide on the bail amount and one of the predictive elements in the model gives higher scores to people who live in certain zip codes, then the people who live in the high-scoring zip codes will be less likely to post bail and more likely to spend some time in jail. That time in jail and the hardships it presents can in turn lead them to be more likely to commit a future crime. If we then refresh the model by feeding more recent data into it, the model will see that people in that zip code have an even higher recidivism rate and will adjust their scores upward at an even higher rate than before, leading to more people from those zip codes not being able to post bail and even higher future crime rates for those people.

These score increases won’t be due to anything about individuals but because those with high scores are treated in such a way that increases their future likelihood of committing crimes, each year when we refresh the model those differences with get exacerbated. In other words, high scores themselves when used in this manner lead directly to higher bail amounts which leads to higher recidivism which in turn leads to higher scores. Any biases that exist in the original algorithm will widen over time as the algorithm feeds on itself. 

Algorithms aren’t magic balls and we should never use them to punish.

Lastly, I just want to add that even if this algorithm was open and accurate and we could somehow find a way around the issue of the model feeding on itself, it would still not be right under any circumstances to use in determining things like prison sentences or bail amounts. Algorithms like this give a likelihood of a future action, but a likelihood is never 100%. Even if someone scores a 90% on our open and accurate version of the model, it would still mean that one in ten people with that score will not commit a future crime. We should not be punishing people for a probability or for a hypothetical future crime.

That said, there are legitimate ways an algorithm like this one could be used. For example, inmates who fall into high-risk recidivism groups may be put in special programs that have been shown to reduce recidivism rates. Instead of punishing them with longer sentences, they would be given some extra attention along the way in order to help them cope better when later released from prison. In fact, according to the ProPublica piece, even the creator of the Northpointe risk assessment algorithm says that the original purpose of the algorithm was to be used to determine who might be good candidates for treatment programs not to determine things like sentencing, although that hasn’t stopped him and his company from knowingly marketing the algorithm to the justice department for those uses.

In other words, the problem with this algorithm isn’t so much that its underlying equation is racist but that using secretive algorithms to predict future crimes and then punishing people for those hypothetical crimes does not accomplish anything other than add to the institutionalized racism that already exists within the criminal justice system.

A recent study from the University of Canterbury proclaims that depictions of violence in LEGO set catalogs and the number of weapons in LEGO products has increased significantly as the result of a metaphorical “arms race” between toy manufacturers. The article’s authors include Qi Min Ser, Elena Moltchanova, James Smithies, Erin Harrington, and Christoph Bartneck, builder of the life-sized Unikitty and author of The Ideal Order.

The study looked at LEGO sets produced between 1978 and 2014 (excluding Duplo and Junior lines) and found that nearly 30% of today’s LEGO sets contain at least one weapon brick. It also explained that the chances of observing violence in LEGO catalog pages has increased steadily by 19% each year. Currently, around 40% of all catalog pages have some type of violence. “In particular, scenarios involving shooting and threatening behaviour have increased over the years. The perception of nonverbal psychological aggression increased at a similar rate. The atmosphere of the violent acts is predominately perceived as exciting.” The study concludes that “violence in LEGO products seems to have gone beyond just enriching game play” in attempt to attract more customers.

Turning to the online LEGO community, both the photo above by Brick Police and the one below by Hammerstein NWC use LEGO minifigures and weapons to create graphic, violent scenes that may be considered offensive or unsafe for children. But these images highlight a huge oversight in the University of Canterbury’s study: builders, many of whom are adults, who want to incorporate realistic weapons into their builds cannot get them from LEGO directly. The Danish company refuses to sell such weapons even though there is a high demand for them. Instead, builders must turn to third-party companies like BrickArms, BrickWarriors, Citizen Brick, or Modern Brick Warfare to get their fix of tiny, plastic violence.

If a metaphorical “arms race” among toy manufactures truly exists, LEGO is finishing dead last. As the Canterbury study pointed out, LEGO competitor Megablocks offers sets based off violent games and films like Terminator, Call of Duty, Halo, and Assassin’s Creed, while LEGO refuses to partner with such franchises. And there are no plans for LEGO to overtake their competitors in the arms race. Mads Nipper, LEGO’s former Senior Vice President in Global Innovation in Marketing declared that “We will never produce realistic toys for playing war.”

There’s no denying the facts of the study. LEGO has included more and more weapons and scenes of violence on their products over the years, starting with the introduction the very first LEGO weapons in the 1978 Castle theme (sword, halberd, and lance) and obviously continuing with trademarked themes like Marvel and DC. But the study leaves several important questions unanswered. Should we shield children from violent toys? Is there a causation between violent toys and games during childhood and actual violent tendencies in adulthood? Should LEGO reduce the number of weapons and scenes of violence in their products? And would such a change impact customer satisfaction positively or negatively overall?

What do you think about all of this? Let us know in the comments!

New comic!

I don’t even know how to communicate this clearly. I feel like I get reminded of the inconvenience and visibility of my gender pretty much all day. Pronouns, terms of address, bathrooms, shopping, interacting, corresponding – these are the tiny little things that make up day to day life, and they’re all super gendered. I don’t think that’s as apparent if you’re in a normative gender space, but when you’re navigating a transition, or hold a non binary/gender queer identity, they all become little decisions and catches. How do I represent myself authentically here? Where do I fit? How can I be visible? Is this safe?

Honestly, I’m often tired of thinking about gender. I would love to not think about it. I wish that existing in social spaces didn’t make me have to think about it all the time. I really, really do have other things to think about. Oh, but here’s an email for a survey for a service I use and enjoy. The second field? ‘Sex: m/f’. Great.

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Since rainbows are caused by the refraction of the sunlight by tiny droplets of rainwater, what would rainbow look like on Earth if we had two suns like Tatooine?

—Raga

A planet with double suns would have double rainbows.

Or rather, quadruple rainbows. Our rainbows here on Earth are already double rainbows—there's a second, fainter bow above the main one. You can't always see this second rainbow, since the clouds need to be just right, so people get excited when they see one.

The area between the two rainbows is darker than the area outside because raindrops reflect light more strongly in certain directions. That region has a name, by the way—it's called Alexander's dark band.

The first and second rainbows are the only ones you can see easily, but there are actually many more bows beyond those two, each one fainter than the last. Rainbows are formed by light bouncing around in raindrops, and the different bows are formed by different paths the light can take. The main rainbow is formed by the most common paths through the droplet, and other paths—where some of the light bounces around in more unusual ways—make the fainter second, third, fourth, and even fifth rainbows.

Usually, only the first and second rainbows are bright enough to see; it was only in the last five years that anyone took pictures of the third, fourth, and fifth rainbows.

Rainbows appear on the other side of the sky from the Sun, so to figure out what a double rainbow would look like on a planet with two suns, we need to figure out where the suns usually appear in the sky on that kind of planet.

There are planets with two suns out there, although we didn't know that for sure until recently. Double-star planets come in two main varieties:

In the first kind of system, the two stars are close together and the planet goes around them far away. This kind of planet is called a circumbinary planet. In the second kind of system, the two stars are farther apart, and the planet orbits one of them[1]Not necessarily the bigger one. while the other stays far away. This kind of planet is called [the other kind of planet].[2]I'm sorry, I've just never learned a good word for these.

If you lived on [the other kind of planet],[3]Sorry. the two Suns would spend most of the year in different parts of the sky. Depending on how big they were, they may also be very different in brightness. If you were orbiting the larger star, the smaller one might be no brighter than the Moon,[4]Which would still be bright enough to cast a rainbow! or even look like an ordinary planet or star.

Tatooine, in Star Wars, looks like it's probably a circumbinary planet. The two stars appear pretty close together in the sky and similar in color and size, so it seems reasonable to guess they're actually near one another, with Tatooine orbiting both of them. Two suns would create two overlapping rainbows. The main bow of the rainbow is a circle about 84 degrees across, centered in the sky exactly opposite the Sun.[5]This is why you never see more than half of a rainbow above the horizon. If the center of the rainbow were above the horizon, it would mean the Sun was below it behind you, so there wouldn't be sunlight to make a rainbow in the first place. The farther apart the two suns were, the farther apart the rainbows would be. If the two suns were 84 degrees apart, the main bows of the two rainbows would barely touch.

A pair of suns 84 degrees apart would be possible around [the other kind of planet], but not around Tatooine-type[6]If Star Wars had just used the other kind of planet, we could use its name for them and solve this problem. circumbinary planets. The reason is simple: A planet orbiting two stars can't get too close to them or its orbit becomes unstable. If it gets too close, the irregular tugging from the gravity of the two stars as they orbit will eventually cause the planet to crash into one of them or get flung out of the system.

For a system with two similar-sized stars, this "critical radius" is around six times the distance between the two stars.[7]This is a very rough number; it can range from four to eight depending on the exact arrangement. We've found a lot of planets close to that critical radius, which suggests that maybe they slowly migrate inward until they reach it and are ejected or destroyed. Strangely, we haven't found many big Jupiter-sized planets around binary stars in general; we should be seeing them if they're there, so the lack of them is a mystery. This means that the two suns would never get more than about 20 degrees apart in the sky:

This tells us that the two rainbows in a Tatooine-like system would always overlap.[8]Assuming the raindrops are made of water, or something with similar refractive properties. The colors would blend together where the bows crossed, and the dark bands would too.

I suppose doubling all the rainbows would also double the number of pots of gold at the end of each rainbow.[9]Come to think of it, do our rainbows have one pot of gold or two? I've never really thought about it. And it's not just pots of gold; I guess we'd need to rethink all kinds of rainbow references.

Overlapping rainbows would be beautiful, but definitely a lot more complicated.

Sometimes a LEGO model is so incredible you stop and wonder if the builder is using the same catalog of bricks as the rest of us, because the finished model doesn’t even look like LEGO. Hoang H Dang is a masterful ship builder (we previously featured his incredible fishing vessel) and he’s turned his hand to building a two-masted schooner. The finished model has some of the best shaping I’ve ever seen on a LEGO ship, making this gorgeous sailing vessel sleek and elegant.

The immense scale of the model is hard to comprehend on its own, but when viewed next to the builder, it becomes obvious that at close to four feet in length and nearly as tall, this is no mere weekend project.

And for those curious how Hoang has constructed such an elegant hull from angular bricks, you can check out this work-in-progress photo to see some of the interior construction.

Earlier this year Paramount Pictures and CBS Studios filed a lawsuit against the makers of a Star Trek inspired fan film, accusing them of copyright infringement.

The dispute centers around the well-received short film Star Trek: Prelude to Axanar and the planned follow-up feature film Axanar.

Among other things, the Star Trek rightsholders claim ownership over various Star Trek related settings, characters, species, clothing, colors, shapes, words, short phrases and even the Klingon language.

While the legal battle has barely got going it now appears it will soon end. During a Star Trek fan event on Friday, director J.J. Abrams announced that the case will be over soon, thanks to Star Trek Beyond director Justin Lin.

“We started talking about this realizing that this is not an appropriate way to deal with the fans. The fans should be celebrating this thing,” Abrams said.

“Fans of Star Trek are part of this world. So Justin went to the studio and pushed them to stop this lawsuit and now, within the next few weeks, it will be announced this is going away, and the fans will be able to work on their project,” he adds.

The news is welcomed by Axanar director Alec Peters, who posted a short message on Facebook a few hours ago.

“A huge THANK YOU to JJ Abrams and Justin Lin for their announcement last night that Paramount is dropping the suit against Axanar,” he writes.

However, the case isn’t completely over yet. The parties are still working on finalizing a settlement agreement and no official paperwork has yet been filed in court.

A settlement means that the case won’t be dismissed outright, but that the parties are coming to an agreement they are all satisfied with. Whether they intend to release any details on the nature of their agreement remains unclear at this point.

When Paramount and CBS filed the lawsuit earlier this year they accused the makers of exploiting the Star Trek franchise, so it’s likely that they are looking for financial compensation.

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and ANONYMOUS VPN services.

In recent years Internet provider Bahnhof has fought hard to protect the privacy of its subscribers.

The company has been a major opponent of extensive data retention requirements, launched a free VPN to its users, and recently vowed to protect subscribers from a looming copyright troll invasion.

This week Bahnhof reiterated its pro-privacy stance by stressing that it doesn’t hand over personal details of alleged pirates, not even to the police.

For the first time in history the company published details on the nature of police data requests. Interestingly, this reveals that file-sharing ‘crime’ is the largest category by far.

Of all requests received by the ISP well over a quarter, 27.5%, were for cases related to online file-sharing. This trumps other crimes such as grooming minors, forgery and fraud.

“We want to publish these figures to show that police are violating people’s privacy and putting resources into meaningless trifles,” Bahnhof CEO Jon Karlung says, commenting on the release.

While the total number of 40 requests is relatively modest the data shows that file-sharing is high on the agenda for the Swedish police. However, from Bahnhof they shouldn’t expect any cooperation.

Citing European privacy regulations the Internet provider says that it will only hand over data to the police if the complaint applies to a serious crime, which doesn’t apply to piracy according to the company.

The ISP’s decision goes against the recommendation of the Swedish Telecoms Authority as well as the police, and a future court ruling is expected to provide more clarity on the issue.

Until then, Bahnhof will continue to shield alleged file-sharers from police requests for their personal data.

“The IP address is your fingerprint on the web,” Karlung says, noting that it’s tied to people’s browsing habits and all sorts of private data. “It shall not be disclosed without strong reasons.”

The recent comments fall in line with the ISP’s critique on the ongoing push to criminalize file-sharing in Sweden. Just a few weeks ago Karlung dismissed calls for harsher punishments for online piracy, noting that rightsholders should concentrate on developing better legal options instead.

For their part, the police note that the high number of file-sharing related requests are the result of increased enforcement efforts from copyright holders. When these report criminal activity, police are obliged to investigate the matter.

—

Credit: Translated chart by Rick Falkvinge

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and ANONYMOUS VPN services.

thehotgirlproject:

Defeated

and that was all she wrote.

Luca Di Lazzaro and the Italian LEGO club ItLUG have built a minifig-scale model of San Giacomo square in Udine, in northeastern Italy. Featuring over a dozen buildings surrounding the square and populated by numerous minifigs, the model even includes a row of Italian supercars for the minifigs to drive away in.

The model was on display in Udine at an event last month, where the mayor of Udine posed with Luca and the LEGO version of their home town.

A large city square is always at risk of being fairly plain and uninteresting as a LEGO model, but Luca has built a number of fun scenes in the square itself, including a team of construction workers repairing the paving stones.

Complete with ornate street lights, a fountain, and statue, the square looks just like the real thing.

You can see over a hundred detailed photos (including photos of the real square for comparison) in Luca’s photoset on Flickr.