Cooper Griggs

astronomicalwonders:

“Every one of us is, in the cosmic perspective, precious. If a human disagrees with you, let them live. In a hundred billion galaxies, you will not find another.”  
~ Carl Sagan, Cosmos

FACT CHECK: Video shows a ball girl making an outstanding catch at a major league baseball game.

Powdered alcohol has faced an uphill battle for legitimacy in the US, with 20 states having banned it up until now... and a new, 21st ban could represent its biggest defeat to date. New York Governor Cuomo has signed legislation banning the sale of...

It's no secret that telecoms have cooperated with the US' surveillance efforts, but at least one was unusually eager to help out. Thanks to Edward Snowden leaks, both the New York Times and ProPublica have discovered that AT&T not only agreed t...

Two-factor can keep your Gmail, iCloud and other accounts from getting hacked, but it's unfortunately rather tedious to use. That's why a team of researchers from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich, Switzerland has developed a tool...

via http://www.youngandferal.com/

via http://otakugangsta.com/post/45766630197/photoset_iframe/arpeggia/tumblr_mbydwdqgTH1qdrgo9/500/false

FACT CHECK: Video shows an amazing behind-the-back return by Japanese tennis player Yoshihito Nishioka.

Reuters reports that a pair of former employees have accused Moscow-based Kaspersky Labs of building malware to trick its competition into flagging and quarantining important, non-viral, files on customers' computers. Basically the malware would in...

Dusty debris from

Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush said today that the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq to topple Saddam Hussein was a “pretty good deal.”

Bush was speaking at an event sponsored by Americans for Peace, Prosperity and Security (APPS), a group formed and backed by a number of people associated with major defense contractors.

Video of Bush’s remark was posted online by an attendee of the event:

According to journalist Alan He, Bush also criticized efforts to reform the National Security Agency’s dragnet metadata surveillance program, telling the audience that it was a “mistake to repeal the metadata provisions of the Patriot Act.”

As The Intercept previously reported, the APPS is advised by Raytheon’s Stephen Hadley, BAE Systems’ Rich Ashooh, former SAIC chief executive Walt Havenstein, among other defense contractors and defense industry lobbyists. APPS was formed earlier this year as a pressure group to “help elect a president who supports American engagement and a strong foreign policy.”

APPS, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, does not disclose its donor information. The chairman of the group, former House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Mich., a hawkish politician who has called for greater U.S. military involvement in a number of conflicts around the world, now works for a number of private interests, though he has refused to disclose them.

Costs associated with the war in Iraq, including medical treatment for war veterans, could grow to more than $6 trillion over the next decade, according to a study by the Watson Institute for International Studies at Brown University. The war killed at least 134,000 Iraqi civillians, as well as nearly 8,000 U.S. forces and contractors, according to the study.

The period following 9/11, including the war in Iraq, has been a boon for the defense contracting industry. From 2001 through 2010, the stock prices of major defense firms surged 67 percent as the U.S. increased defense spending to manage the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well new homeland security spending.

The post Jeb Bush, Hosted By Defense Contractor-Backed Group, Calls Iraq War “A Pretty Good Deal” appeared first on The Intercept.

(via chelsperry)

obviousplant:

I left this letter from ‘Management’ on the doors of an apartment complex

If it's been a while since you've had your heart broken, and you forgot the feelings it can provoke, watching the vertical video for Harrison's song "How Can It Be (feat. Maddee)" will bring up that distinct combination of disbelief, loss, regret a...

In its fifth year, WALL/THERAPY continues to transform Rochester, New York through art and neighborhood intervention, using elaborate public murals to inspire and bond communities. Not only are the images provided for the community a way to inspire the areas that they are placed into, but the walls on which the artists create their work are also resurfaced and rehabilitated, bringing a literal therapy to the murals’ structures.

This year the 14 murals were focused on the themes of surrealism and the fantastic, with work ranging from a gigantic superhero casually sitting on the side of a building, to a gigantic whale swimming within a whale-shaped bubble. Each also varied in size and location, with murals wrapping around corners of brick walls and scaling vertically to the top of buildings.

To see more murals from this year’s WALLTHERAPY and learn about other programs associated with the project follow the link here.

NEWS: A Facebook user posed as a Target customer service rep and trolled critics of the chain's gender-neutral merchandise labeling policy.

“By the age of six the average child will have completed the basic American education. … From television, the child will have learned how to pick a lock, commit a fairly elaborate bank holdup, prevent wetness all day long, get the laundry twice as white, and kill people with a variety of sophisticated armaments.”

- Russell Baker, columnist and author (b. 14 Aug 1925) 

Immobilizers are supposed to kill a vehicle's engine to prevent it from being stolen. However, a trio of researchers recently released a study that reveals the Megamos immobilizer system used by more than two dozen car manufacturers -- including Vo...

New Comic: Freaks And Beaks

Have you watched the

A University of Cambridge team of researchers has created a "mother robot" capable of giving birth to -- or more correctly, building its own -- baby cube-bots. The team conducted five rounds of experiments, wherein it assembled 10 pint-sized machin...

Are you happy that Google's new Play Services software for Android developers is out? If not, one of the new features may tell you to turn that frown upside down. Google's latest APIs for Android apps include "Mobile Vision" face detection and "Nea...