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Precisely Stacked Coin Towers That Defy Gravity
Using common household props, Twitter user @thumb_tani stacks gravity-defying towers that rely on precise and calculated balance. Coins, toothpicks, and silverware are positioned to play off of each others’ weight in ways that might crumble with the slightest of touch. The sculptures go beyond experiments many might have seen before, ranging in shape from thick twirling cylinders to horizontal pieces that balance coins at the very edge of a knife’s blade. You can see more of his feats of balance, and incredible patience, posted to his Twitter. (via My Modern Met)
Gremlins Ceramic Tiki Mugs From Mondo
Mondo has released a rad collection of Gremlins ceramic tiki mugs for their new and ongoing series of pop culture inspired tiki mugs, titled Tee-Kis. The Gremlins themed mugs were designed by Michael Bonanno and sculpted by Ramirez Studios. The green, candy cane, and microwave melt glaze gremlins mugs are available to pre-order from the Mondo shop and are expected to ship during the first quarter of 2017. A brown version is available exclusively at Alamo Drafthouse theaters.
Mondo will be releasing Aliens and Iron Giant mugs for their Tee-Kis series in the near future.
images via Mondo
via Inside the Magic, That’s Nerdalicious!
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The Fondoodler, A Reloadable Hot Gun That Lets You Doodle, Draw, Decorate and Design With Cheese
Jessethis is awesome dumb and I've seen it before, but as I still have not gotten one I'm putting it on the list a second time. Yes I will cheese doodle on everything.
The Fondoodler by the newly established BuzzFeed Product Labs, is a super fun food-safe reloadable hot gun that melts most types of string, shredded, block or sheet-style cheese in a cylindrical canister, just like a hot glue gun. From there it’s easy to draw, decorate, doodle or design with cheese.
BIND, BUILD, BITE – It’s hot cheese. Do with it whatever you please.
READY TO CHEESE IN 3-2-1 – Start doodling in less than 3 minutes out of the box.
CHEESE PROPULSION VALVE – A proprietary cheese propulsion valve allows complete control of cheese-flow with minimal tasty mess.
NO CHEESE LEFT BEHIND – All three parts exposed to cheese are removable & dishwasher safe.
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A Simple and Totally Redundant Wall Clock
JesseAaaahhahah. This is awesome.
New York graphic designer Ji Lee has created the Redundant Clock, a “simple and totally redundant” wall clock that comes equipped with redundant instructions on how to read the Redundant Clock. Lee is currently raising funds on Kickstarter for manufacturing costs.
This is a redundant clock, and this is a redundant description.
images via Ji Lee
via The Awesomer
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Bertrand Russell
JesseThis is sort of my personal philosophy
15 Thanksgiving Salad Recipes to Brighten Up Your Meal
JesseAnother collection of great recipes. I can't wait to 'em
Thanksgiving is a holiday for heavy dishes—a little extra butter in the mashed potatoes never hurt anyone, right? But with so many rich dishes on the table, salad is crucial. It refreshes everyone's palates with bright flavors and crisp textures, balances out all that richness, and makes a pretty and colorful presentation. From winter greens with sliced beets to warm Brussels sprouts with bacon, we've rounded up 15 recipes in an effort to convince you to take salad seriously come Thanksgiving. Read More
The Food Lab: 18 Comfort Foods, in Case You Need Comforting Now
JesseGreat collection of recipes here. Excellent for those cold fall and winter nights!
You don't ever really need an excuse to want to feel comforted, so go ahead and indulge in these cheesy, creamy, carb-filled, fat-packed comfort classics, and take a break from the real world for a little while. Read More
Layers of Flavor: 8 Thanksgiving Onion, Leek, and Shallot Recipes
Even though I don't think anyone in the family especially loved them, my childhood Thanksgivings always featured a bowl of greasy creamed pearl onions. I'm all for making onions a part of Thanksgiving—I love their combination of sweet and pungent flavors—but this year, my plan is to try something besides the same ol', same ol'. If you're also jonesing for a new treatment for onions, these eight recipes, from Vidalia onion–studded mashed potatoes to sweet-tart roasted shallots, are a great way to get started. Read More
Golden Cheddar Cheese Crisps
These lacy little crisps are just what you need for an easy and stress-free holiday party.
Serve them as an appetizer with a glass of wine or at the table alongside a bowl of soup. Or just snack on them all by themselves.
Be warned, however: It’s impossible to eat just one.
Breathe. Exhale. Repeat.
I have been doing a lot of controlled breathing exercises in the past 48h.
How to Turn Coconut Husk Fibers Into Rope Without Any Tools
Grant Thompson (a.k.a. “The King of Random“) has shared a simple life hack for turning coconut husk fibers into rope without any tools.
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Clickclickclick.click, A Site That Humorously Awards Achievements for Interacting With It in Various Ways
Clickclickclick.click is a site created by the Amsterdam design studio Moniker, in collaboration with Studio Puckey and VPRO Medialab, that humorously awards achievements for interacting with it in various different ways like scrolling, mouse clicks, and time spent both on and away from the site.
via Waxy.org
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The Advantages and Disadvantages of Building Taller Buildings
The Real Engineering video “Why Build Higher?” explains the advantages and disadvantages of building taller buildings. The video argues that financial and technical challenges of building super tall buildings like the Burj Khalifa and Taipei 101 are offset by more efficient use of water, energy, and other social and environmental impacts.
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Stair Design Idea – 9 Examples Of Built-In Handrails
Synchronized Cat Jumping
JesseOMG this cracks me up so much
The takeoff gets an 8/10, but the awkward landing was something they'd never prepared for. It takes this team a minute to analyze the situation and devise a workaround. The judges might give them points for their poker faces, or even for not falling under the circumstances.
Not exactly a champion performance, but an entertaining one. The cats might eventually get over the embarrassment if they don't find out that their performance was being recorded. Don't tell them. -via Metafilter
An Adorable One-Year-Old Snowboarder
JesseI want my kids on the slopes this early!
The simple act of sliding around atop the snow on a board, also known as snowboarding, isn't all that difficult in itself, so it's not that surprising to see a little kid on a snowboard.
But Sloan isn't technically a kid in this video- she's a 14-month-old who started snowboarding around the same time she started walking.
Sloan's dad Zach Henderson took her out to Park City Mountain Resort in Utah for the first time earlier this year, where she proved age ain't nothin' but a number when it comes to snowboarding.
Sloan will be just over two years old in January 2017, so hopefully her dad will take her out again and shoot another vid so we can see if she's gotten any better in the last year!
-Via CountryLiving
10 Places You Can Visit for Under $25 a Day
Traveling is great, but it's also expensive -at least, most of the time. If you don't have a big budget though, you can still visit nice places. In fact, this Travel and Leisure article has 10 different places that will cost you under $25 a day to visit. Of course, you have to pay to get to the destinations, but the site was even kind enough to include an average cost to fly to the locales from either Los Angeles or New York City.
This Solemn Forest Chapel in Japan Imitates Two Hands Clasped in Prayer
Located in a forest just beyond a nondenominational cemetery sits the Sayama Forest Chapel, a three-year-old building designed by Hiroshi Nakamura & NAP (previously). From a bird’s eye view the chapel appears to form both a star and two hands pressed together in prayer, which is a traditional Japanese structural form called “Gassho-zukuri.”
“For those who are in deep grief and inconsolable, how can architecture nurture them? With this in mind, I designed buildings that gently surround them and support their intentions,” explained Nakamura to Yellowtrace.
The building was also built in a way to promote growth around its exterior, with walls tilted inward to leave room for the forest to grow around its shape. The chapel’s floor and patterns of its slate also lean toward the forest, subtly asking visitors to concentrate their mind on the surrounding elements of nature.
The chapel was named as a winner in the religious buildings and memorials category in this year’s Architizer A+Awards, an awards program that celebrates the year’s best in architecture and products. (via Yellowtrace)
Egg Love and Other Felted Food Friends by Hanna Dovhan
Ukrainian crafter Hanna Dovhan (previously) continues to produce squeal-inducing felt sculptures of foodie friends like this new egg design as well as pairs of cherries, bananas, and pears. She shares new designs on her Tumblr and occasionally sells new designs on Etsy.
Polygons: A Versatile Measuring Spoon Inspired by Origami Folds
Instead of juggling a ring of measuring spoons while cooking in the kitchen, what if standard measurements were combined into a single flat tool that adjusted at the pinch of your fingers. Is this a problem that needs a solution? Perhaps. Currently funding on Kickstarter, Polygons is a rather ingenious looking measuring spoon tool that combines four fractional measurements (in teaspoon and tablespoon models) into a flat tool that folds like a piece of origami paper. The gadget is made from recyclable plastic and the designers claim it can “flex for 100,000 cycles without failure.” Learn more here. (via Twisted Sifter)
Cute Animation Imagines How Day Turns into Night
JesseCute!
Here’s a fun short from Lithuanian animator Ignas Meilunas who imagines nighttime as a giant character who moves around the world turning things from light to dark in Mr. Night Has a Day Off. (via Sploid)
Artist Vincent Bal Turns the Shadows of Everyday Objects into Ingenious Illustrations
Belgian filmmaker and illustrator Vincent Bal works within the confines of long shadows of everyday objects resting in the sunlight to create a wide range of whimsical doodles. The shadow of a film canister becomes a forbidding tower, or the filaments of a lightbulb cast a dramatic backdrop as a staircase for a daring escape. Bal makes many of his images available as prints over on Etsy, and if you liked this, also check out the works of Christoph Neimann and Thomas Lamadieu. (thnx, David!)
Folded Aluminum Lamps Project Feathers and Antlers When Illuminated
When Tel Aviv-based designer Chen Bikovski was growing up she was fascinated by pop-up books, especially engaged with the immersive experience that came with the turn of each page. Interested in transforming this idea to work with her design practice, Bikovski founded Popup Lighting, a series of lamps that turn into magical creatures like deer and peacocks when illuminated.
“The idea behind Popup Lighting was to create a permanent light fixture that would bring a magical ambiance to any space,” said Bikovski on her website. “A multi-dimensional light that would inspire the senses and ignite the imagination.”
Bikovski’s fixtures seem like minimal aluminum sculptures until their light is switched on—the origami-like works suddenly appearing as deer or peacocks. Streams of light behind the lamps create the effect of horns and feathers, subtly casting patterns that make each work come alive.
Both of her designs can be found on the Popup Lighting shop in an array of colors. You can see more on her Instagram, while also taking a look at some light experiments with cacti that may soon join the shop! (via My Modern Met)
Teriyaki Chicken Lettuce Wraps
Proposed Rules Would Take Away Banks’ “Get Out Of Jail Free” Card
Many bank accounts, and almost all credit cards, wireless services, private student loans, and payday loans contain clauses in their contracts that strip consumers of their right to sue these companies, and their right to join others in a class action, effectively allowing businesses to sidestep the legal system. While lawmakers in Congress debate the issue, and the U.S. Supreme Court has repeatedly given its approval to these practices, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is making good on its pledge to restore consumers’ constitutional right to having their day in court.
Yes, we know that your eyes glaze over when you read the words “mandatory binding arbitration,” and that’s exactly what companies that use these clauses want — for consumers to be so bored by legalese and fine print that they just shrug and sign away their rights without knowing it.
In fact, when the CFPB released its report on arbitration in March 2015, it found that even though virtually all Americans are directly affected by at least one forced arbitration clause, that a stunning 75% of consumers don’t know whether or not they have the right to sue their banks or credit card companies, and that fewer than 7% of those with arbitration clauses could even understand the clauses that they had unwittingly agreed to.
Not only do arbitration clauses strip of your right to a jury trial if you have a legal dispute with these companies, most of them include a ban on class actions, even in arbitration. So if several customers are all wronged by a bank in the same way, they must each go through the arbitration process individually. Additionally, arbitration rulings set no precedent and rulings are often nothing more than a check mark in a box declaring which side won. Thus, the fact that one customer might be successful in arbitrating their claim does not guarantee that others would get the same result using the exact same evidence.
Aside from the annoyance of having to go the arbitration route solo when there is a class of similarly affected consumers, some cases are simply too expensive to mount on an individual basis.
Look at the case of American Express v. Italian Colors Restaurant. In that lawsuit, merchants who accepted American Express were trying to bring an antitrust lawsuit against the credit card network. They argued that, in spite of a ban on class actions in their merchant agreements, the only way they could possibly afford to put together a complaint of such a massive scope was as a group. Individually, the costs would outweigh any resulting damages awarded.
However, in 2013 a slim majority of the Supreme Court ruled that AmEx’s ban on class actions was legal. Writing for the dissenting minority in that ruling, Justice Elena Kagan summarized the majority’s opinion in three words: “Too darn bad,” and called it a “betrayal of our precedents, and of federal statutes like the antitrust laws.”
Many consumer advocates argued that with this ruling SCOTUS gave companies a free pass to commit abuses that are too expensive for a single party to prove on their own.
“Forced arbitration is a get-out-of-jail-free card that lets banks, payday lenders, and debt relief scammers avoid accountability when they violate the law,” explains Lauren Saunders, associate director of the National Consumer Law Center. “Forced arbitration and class action bans force consumers into a biased, secretive, and lawless forum, preventing either a court or an arbitrator from ordering a lawbreaker to repay all of its victims.”
The same holds true for cases where the dollar amount of any damages would be too low to merit an individual complaint. According to the CFPB report, fewer than 2% of credit card customers said they would even consider consulting an attorney over a small-dollar legal dispute with their card company, and so only a very few would ever think to enter into arbitration, meaning the company can continue its bad actions unchecked.
But a class action only needs a small number of plaintiffs and evidence showing widespread malfeasance, meaning that not only could more consumers get their money back, but that the company will be held to account for its bad behavior.
At the same time as the nation’s highest court was repeatedly affirming its anti-consumer view of arbitration agreements, the Dodd-Frank financial reforms of 2010, which created the CFPB, also directed the Bureau to look into the use of arbitration in financial services, and to draft regulations in the public interest that are consistent with the results of that study.
And so this morning the CFPB is releasing its proposal for public comment. As expected, it’s not an outright ban on the use of arbitration agreements. Instead, affected companies — in the financial and credit fields — would only be able to use arbitration clauses if they do not also include a ban on class actions. And rather than leave it up to lawyers for these companies to determine how to word this particular clause, the CFPB will provide specific language to be used.
And since companies claim that arbitration actually benefits consumers, these businesses will be required to provide information to the CFPB regarding the number of arbitration claims that are filed against it and details on the awards provided to consumers who arbitrate.
“Signing up for a credit card or opening a bank account can often mean signing away your right to take the company to court if things go wrong,” said CFPB Director Richard Cordray. “Many banks and financial companies avoid accountability by putting arbitration clauses in their contracts that block groups of their customers from suing them. Our proposal seeks comment on whether to ban this contract gotcha that effectively denies groups of consumers the right to seek justice and relief for wrongdoing.”
Since the CFPB began the rulemaking process in 2015, the banking industry has made several attempts to scuttle the CFPB’s efforts to rein in arbitration.
The Womack-Graves Amendment — named for Reps. Steve Womack (AR) and Tom Graves (GA) — to the Financial Services and General Government Appropriations Act sought to compel the CFPB to effectively redo its entire three-year arbitration study before moving forward with any regulations. That rider ultimately got the axe, but its supporters have vowed to continue fighting against restrictions on the practice.
Last week, Rep. Sean Duffy of Wisconsin — whose campaign has received more than $300,000 from the financial, credit, banking, and investment industries thus far in the 2016 election cycle and who received more than $350,000 from these same industries only two years ago — wrote a letter to CFPB Director Cordray, informing him of a pending investigation into the arbitration rule by the House Financial Services Committee, and demanding that the Bureau produce information regarding any communication between CFPB officials, consumer advocacy groups, and organizations representing trial attorneys.
Jeph Jacques
How to Make a Beautiful Space Themed Black Velvet Nebula Cake
Jessesomeone make this for me please
Heather Baird of Sprinkle Bakes demonstrates how to make a beautiful, space themed “Black Nebula Cake” in her most recent culinary tutorial. She pulled her inspiration for the nebula cake from a “couple of Hubble Space Telescope picture books” that she was looking through.
The cake recipe makes a standard 9-inch double layer cake, but I used three 6-inch pans and had enough batter left over for 6 cupcakes. The cake is almost completely black on its own, thanks to dark cocoa powder, but I added an additional teaspoon of Americolor Super Black gel food color to make it even darker.
To get started, you’ll need to cover the cake with black ready-made fondant according to these directions. Don’t worry if your fondant work doesn’t turn out perfectly because the paint will disguise many flaws. You’ll need pink, blue and violet gel food color and most importantly white food color. (read more)
images via Sprinkle Bakes
via Fubiz Media