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After completing a ship in a bottle kit, screenprinter Jake Sadovich of Garden City, Idaho decided to make a LEGO one. Soon after, he submitted his model to LEGO Ideas where it quickly gained the community support it needed to be reviewed to put it into production and sold around the globe.

In an interview with LEGO Ideas, he was asked how he felt about getting the "magic 10,000 votes" from the community, "Awesome and kind of strange. Excitement at reaching the 10K mark, and in just 48 days! A great feeling of satisfaction that so many people liked my creation and gratitude that they took the time to support it and make this happen."

The 962-piece Leviathan will hit stores on February 1 for $69.99.

Continue a nautical tradition when you build this LEGO® Ideas 21313 Ship in a Bottle, featuring a highly detailed ship with the captain’s quarters, cannons, masts, crow’s nest, flag and printed sail elements. Place the ship inside the LEGO brick-built bottle with a buildable cork, wax seal element and water-style elements inside, then showcase it on the display stand featuring the ship’s ‘Leviathan’ nameplate, globe elements and a built-in ‘compass’ (non-functioning) with compass rose and spinning needle. This wonderfully nostalgic construction toy also includes a booklet about the set’s fan creator and LEGO designers.

Photos of Sadovich's original design can be seen at his Facebook page.

(The Awesomer)

Since the 1970s, spy agencies have been feeding police forces tips about who to arrest and where to look for evidence, despite the illegality of their practicing surveillance within the USA. (more…)

Some years ago, in the dark ages of Android, Motorola released a phone called the Atrix 4G. Moto created an accessory for that phone called the Lapdock, which was a laptop-like device powered by the phone. It was not a smashing success. They say those who do not learn from the past are doomed to repeat it, and apparently, Razer was not paying attention. At CES, it has unveiled Project Linda, a prototype laptop dock for the Razer Phone.

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Razer unveils 'Project Linda' laptop dock for Razer Phone was written by the awesome team at Android Police.

Welcome to the roundup of the best new Android games that went live in the Play Store or were spotted by us in the previous week or so.

Games

Uciana

Uciana is a 4X strategy mobile game with a clear sci-fi theme.

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15 new and notable Android games from the last week (1/3/18 - 1/9/18) was written by the awesome team at Android Police.

Last winter, Dante de Kort -- an eight-year-old boy who lives in central Arizona -- found a dead collared peccary, a wild pig-like animal, near his house. He set up a motion-controlled camera nearby, and over the next ten days, was surprised to discover footage of the peccary's herd returning to visit their dead herd-member, over and over.

When he wrote up his findings in a school science-fair presentation, it caught the attention of local biologist Mariana Altricher. It looked like the wild pecarries were in mourning, which was surprising: Scientists have seen grief-like behavior in animals like elephants, dolphins and primates, which are known for their high level of intelligence. But never in these creatures, as National Geographic reports:

Having studied the social, pig-like mammals for years, Altrichter knew how tightly bonded peccaries could be. But she'd never witnessed herd members return to a body repeatedly ... “It was pretty amazing because it wasn’t just an immediate reaction and then they moved on—it went on for 10 days,” says Altrichter, chair of the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s Peccary Specialist Group. [snip] In the videos, the peccaries pay close attention to the body, nuzzling, biting, sniffing, and staring at it. They slept next to the carcass, and even tried to lift it by wedging their snouts under the body and pushing upward. And when a pack of coyotes approached their fallen peer, the herd chased them away. “It really surprised me that they would stand up to the coyotes,” says de Kort, noting the peccaries were outnumbered.

Altricher used the video evidence to write a scientific paper -- "Collared peccary (Pecari tajacu) behavioral reactions toward a dead member of the herd" -- that lists de Kort as its lead author. Picture via Wikimedia

https://youtu.be/j_pM3nAxgi8

These videos show rare views of the ocean over the weekend from Old Silver Beach in Cape Cod. Rare because, well, the ocean is frozen enough for people to walk on, and the sea of ice seems to go on forever.

Welcome to the roundup of the best new Android applications and live wallpapers that went live in the Play Store or were spotted by us in the previous week or so.

Featured App

Paralign - Aligning Thoughts

Today's roundup is presented by Paralign - Aligning Thoughts from Paralign.me.

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15 new and notable Android apps and live wallpapers from the last week (1/2/18 - 1/8/18) was written by the awesome team at Android Police.

David Chapman writes about how he's spent the last year "navigating the medical maze on behalf of my mother, who has dementia." His key observation? The American health-care system isn't a system at all.

Or to put it another way, US health-care no longer demonstrates systematicity. If want to send a package with Fedex, they have an excellent system in place that ferries your parcel from point A to point B. They know what's going on inside their complex system of many moving parts. Fedex also has a simple user interface, which is another crucial property of good systems: To use Fedex, you don't need to call your friend with clout who can "get you in". You just call Fedex.

The health-care system displays none of these properties. It may possess formidable amounts of medical tech, but there's almost no formal information flow, so access to anything requires a doctor wielding mafia-like connections. As Chapman notes ...

It’s like one those post-apocalyptic science fiction novels whose characters hunt wild boars with spears in the ruins of a modern city. Surrounded by machines no one understands any longer, they have reverted to primitive technology. Except it’s in reverse. Hospitals can still operate modern material technologies (like an MRI) just fine. It’s social technologies that have broken down and reverted to a medieval level. Systematic social relationships involve formally-defined roles and responsibilities. That is, “professionalism.” But across medical organizations, there are none. Who do you call at Anthem to find out if they’ll cover an out-of-state SNF stay? No one knows. What do you do when systematicity breaks down? You revert to what I’ve described as the “communal mode” or “choiceless mode.” That is, “pre-modern,” or “traditional” ways of being. Working in a medical office is like living in a pre-modern town. It’s all about knowing someone who knows someone who knows someone who can get something done. Several times, I’ve taken my mother to a doctor who said something like: “She needs lymphedema treatment, and the only lymphedema clinic around here is booked months in advance, but I know someone there, and I think I can get her in next week.” Or, “The pathology report on this biopsy is only one sentence, and it’s unsigned. The hospital that faxed it to me doesn’t know who did it. I need details, so I called all the pathologists I know, and none of them admit to writing it, so we are going to need to do a new biopsy.”

(Illustration via the CC-licensed stream of Hucky)

Cats like to sit in taped circles and hexagons on the floor. It's been recently discovered that they can be trapped in squares, too. https://youtu.be/Zhlvm0w_Dr8

[via Neatorama]

Alan McSmith has been a safari guide for 30 years. In that time, he's learned a thing or two about elephants, including how not to get killed by one. Here we see him calmly encourage an elephant to seek a nonviolent approach.

[via Twisted Sifter]

Every Hevesh5 creation is a delight, but this compilation of some of the best recent moments from the domino toppling channel is concentrated delight of the highest order. (more…)

This interesting morph is a whirlwind tour through the careers of each member of The Beatles, while together as a group and beyond. (more…)

In the film The Mess, Ellice Stevens presents a compelling look at what it's like to live with a bipolar diagnosis: the dizzying highs and the staggering lows. (more…)

UK-based artisan Omid Asadi traded in his boxing gloves and engineering career to focus on his craft since leaving his native Iran: turning large leaves into beautiful carved sculptures. (more…)

Montreal-based clothing designer and artist Raku Inoue has been populating his Instagram with plants and flowers crafted into colorful insects. (more…)

Spotify could be in some trouble. $1.6 billion worth of trouble, to be exact. Variety reports that the music streaming giant is being sued by the Wixen Publishing Company for allegedly using thousands of popular songs by major artists without permission or proper compensation.

To understand Wixen's grievance, it's important to distinguish between the music labels (the record companies) and the music publishers. Generally, the labels recruit artists, market their music and videos, and may also handle recording, distribution, and myriad other aspects of music production.

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Spotify sued for $1.6 billion by publisher for Tom Petty, Neil Young, other major artists was written by the awesome team at Android Police.

Welcome to the roundup of the best new Android games that went live in the Play Store or were spotted by us in the previous two weeks or so.

Game

Bridge Constructor Portal

Android Police coverage: It's hard to overstate my satisfaction—Bridge Constructor Portal is now available in the Play Store

Bridge Constructor Portal is certainly the most notable Android game released in the last two weeks.

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31 new and notable (and 1 WTF) Android games from the last week (12/20/17 - 1/2/18) was written by the awesome team at Android Police.

Filmmaker Adrien Mauduit collected his favorite timelapse shots of 2017 into a contemplative piece that is a lovely way to look back at 2017 and ahead to 2018. (more…)

Looking for a monumental tree for a photo or just to enjoy in person? Check out Monumental Trees, a compendium of over 31,000 impressive trees, like this live oak in Virginia. (more…)

Bobby Duke makes all kinds of cool woodworking projects in his inimitable video style. This floating cup pencil carving is especially impressive. (more…)

Inspired by Kubrick and Nolan, designer Thomas Vanz set out to create cool effects depicting massive phenomena from our universe: (more…)

"Cryptojacking" is the latest trend in malware; by some estimates, there are at least 2,500 sites that illicitly run Javascript in your browser to secretly mine cryptocurrency.

So the browser pushback has begun. Opera just announced its latest release includes anti-mining measures:

Bitcoins are really hot right now, but did you know that they might actually be making your computer hotter? Your CPU suddenly working at 100 percent capacity, the fan is going crazy for seemingly no reason and your battery quickly depleting might all be signs that someone is using your computer to mine for cryptocurrency.

Brave, Brendan Eich's new startup browser, also implemented this type of blocking earlier this year. I hope this trend continues; there are lots of plugins that block cryptocurrency mining, but it'll only become mainstream if it's built as a default into mainstream browsers.

Welcome to the roundup of the best new Android applications that went live in the Play Store or were spotted by us in the previous two weeks or so.

Featured App

Paralign - Aligning Thoughts

Today's roundup is presented by Paralign - Aligning Thoughts from Paralign.me.

Read More

18 new and notable Android apps from the last two weeks (12/19/17 - 1/1/18) was written by the awesome team at Android Police.

Chrome OS is picking up steam when it comes to hardware, and one of the manufacturers driving that progress is Samsung. Now, an upcoming Chrome OS device known as “Nautilus” has been confirmed to be coming from the company, and packs some interesting specs…

more…

When the USA decided to retroactively extend the term of copyright, it deprived itself of free, open access to important cultural treasures that new creators could build upon as creators have done since time immemorial. (more…)

There is no denying that Amazon's Echo devices and Alexa voice assistant are a huge success at this point. What started out as a weird little cylinder you can command to play music and ask a few questions has now become an entire line-up of devices, an ecosystem that has engendered many integrations from thousands of companies worldwide, and has kickstarted an entire product category and tech section that was nearly non-existent before it.

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Amazon's Alexa Android app just reached 10 million installs on the Play Store was written by the awesome team at Android Police.

Wired UK created a beautiful chart to illustrate the miseries of Britain's current occupants. Debt, divorce, welfare cuts and housing prevail, but further down the threads become more tangled. Parking fines?