Adam

When designers and architects need a fancy centerpiece, a design element, or even some wall sconces, they don’t head over to the machine shop by themselves. They get someone else, who owns some fancy machines, knows how to use those fancy machines, and can create anything out of wood, foam, or metal to do the fabrication for them. Think of these companies as artisan contractors, capable of turning whatever an architect thinks of into a real, tangible object.

One of these such companies is MachineHistories, a joint venture between [Steven Joyner] and [Jason Pilarsky], who work in the medium of computer code and CNC programming. As part of the SupplyFrame Design Lab’s Detoured series, lead Staff Designer [Majenta Strongheart] takes us along for a tour of MachineHistories to figure out how this collaboration actually works.

This collaboration began at the ArtCenter College of Design where [Steven] and [Jason] spent most of their time working in the shop. Eventually, they realized they didn’t actually need the ArtCenter and decided to sign a lease and strike out on their own. The first tools in their new shop were just a 3-axis CNC and a laser cutter, but MachineHistories gradually expanded to enormous five-axis machines and other incredible tools. These machines are put to work creating works of art for architectural and design installations, ranging from futuristic chairs, fine furniture, to sculptures and even new designs for simple home items.

The skill and craftsmanship that goes into these works of art are beyond compare, but this is a great insight into how all those manufactured panels, design elements, and artistic accents are created, and one that shows you can do anything, provided you have the right tools.

As you're probably aware, Attorney General Jeff Sessions is against the legalization of cannabis. At a Senate drug hearing in 2016, he even said, "Good people don’t smoke marijuana."

Now some enterprising folks are selling General Jeff's "Old Rebel" Session Papers, $5 packs of rolling papers that feature a cartoon image of Sessions smoking a fat joint. It started out as a joke but now they report they are close to selling out.

They write:

#JeffSesh is a campaign to tell Jeff Sessions:

We’re not criminals, junkies or idiots. Regular Jeffs all over the country—good, responsible, patriotic Americans—have a sesh now and then… and it's OK!

(The World's Best Ever)

In 1939, the city of Tulsa, Oklahoma, erected a huge brick incinerator to dispose of the city's trash. It was only in operation for a year before they passed an ordinance prohibiting trash burning within the city limits. So the building was abandoned, unused for decades. Nature took over, until the building was barely visible. In 1979, artist Ron Fleming discovered it.

Fleming spent several months trying to persuade city officials to auction the building, and they finally did a year later -- without notifying Fleming.

"They only received one bid from a man who put in $500 just to tear it down for the bricks," he said.

Fortunately, Fleming was able to persuade the city to reject the bid and auction the building again in 1981. This time, he won with a $5,400 bid.

"I took a shot in the dark on the price," he said. "I had no idea what it was worth."

Fleming and his wife went to work making the incinerator a home and a glorious piece of art. The building, now on the historical register, has plenty of light, open spaces, and modern amenities, while still retaining its historical quirkiness. After his wife died, Fleming decided to sell his masterpiece. The Incinerator House can be yours for $275,000. See a gallery of images at the real estate listing. It has four stories, 14 rooms, three bedrooms and three bathrooms. And look at the size of those chimneys!  -Thanks, hearsetrax!

Archaeologists digging in the sand dunes of Santa Barbara County, California discovered a 300-pound sphinx head. Notably, the artifact does not date back to ancient times but is only 95-years-old. The sphinx is actually a prop from pioneering filmmaker Cecile DeMille's 1923 movie The Ten Commandments. It was part of the so-called "Lost City of DeMille," a massive Egyptian set made for the movie. From the Guadalupe-Nipomo Dunes Center:

Legend has it that after filming, it was too expensive to move and too valuable to leave for rival filmmakers to poach—so DeMille had it buried.

In the 1980s, director Peter Brosnan and a group of young filmmakers set out to find the ruins. Over 30 years later, excavations began, and have since turned up a trove of historical artifacts including an entire sphinx broken into pieces. Everyday relics—prohibition liquor bottles, makeup, and tobacco tins—have also been found, shedding light on what life was like for the cast and crew in 1923.

There's also a recent documentary on the subject, titled "The Lost City of Cecil B. DeMille." (Hollywood Reporter)

Some people claim English is the hardest language to learn because, among other reasons, English speakers use so many different words to say the same thing.

The truth is only people who speak a language far removed from English, such as Japanese or Arabic, have a hard time learning English, while Spanish and German speakers find it fairly easy to learn the basics.

Likewise most English speakers find it really hard to learn Arabic or Japanese because they're not from the Germanic family of language, 

This infographic created by Voxy using information from the Foreign Service Institute shows how difficult it would be for an English speaker to learn a particular language and provides explanations for why Arabic, Japanese, Korean and Chinese are the hardest languages to learn.

-Via Mental Floss

As artificial intelligence reshapes law enforcement, healthcare, education and more, tech firms need to widen their data lens.

 

You can pick up a wide variety of software development skills with this Learn to Code 2017 Bundle. It’s available now in the Boing Boing Store for a pay-what-you-want arrangement — just beat the average purchase price to lock in a healthy discount for this collection of professional tech courses.

To get you up to speed on modern web development, you’ll get access to beginner resources for learning basic HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. Once you’ve got a handle on the fundamentals of front-end, you can get familiar with advanced tools like Angular and Ruby on Rails to help you build robust full-stack applications. This bundle also features a dedicated section for iOS development if mobile apps are your true calling.

Here’s the full course list:

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You can pay what you want for the Learn to Code 2017 Bundle here.

Found this on the Internet and decided that Pom was correct; am therefore now turning the Internet off.

Here's a chaser, though:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dCAORZphnlY

When people take photos of things they’re interested in, they tend to focus on those things more intently.

Push Pin Studios legend is illustrating a book about the 5,000-year history of warfare. The post The Bloody History of War, Illustrated by Design Legend Seymour Chwast appeared first on WIRED.

Ever since the Ukrainian "Maidan" revolution, the country has been subjected to waves of punishing cyberwar attacks, targeting its power grids, finance ministry, TV networks, election officials, and other critical systems. (more…)

A new $65 million renovation makes Mass MoCA the 120,000-square foot gorilla of the contemporary art world.

More women have blockbusters in theaters now than any summer before. And the season is just getting started.

People think the only way to scale a wall is by using a ladder or a rope, or climbing claws if you're an old timey ninja, but the Vietnamese SWAT team in this video use a technique straight from ancient times.

All you need is a long bamboo pole and a pair of strong friends at the base of the pole to help prop you up and you can scale any wall as swiftly and silently as the aforementioned ninja.

This clever technique allows SWAT officers to "sneak up on a target unannounced" during hostage situations and standoffs, which is as close as these officers will ever come to being Batman.

(YouTube Link)

-Via Geekologie

I spend a day in my driveway looking for answers. The post My Creepy Quest to Save Humanity from Robocar Commuting appeared first on WIRED.

At the Los Angeles Times, David Pierson unties the story of why doughnut boxes are so frequently pink, particularly in southern California. It's a story of Cambodian refugees who emigrated to the US in the 1970s and built the donut market. But why pink? From the LA Times:

According to (Bakemark, formerly Westco) company lore, a Cambodian doughnut shop owner asked Westco some four decades ago if there were any cheaper boxes available other than the standard white cardboard. So Westco found leftover pink cardboard stock and formed a 9-by-9-by-4-inch container with four semicircle flaps to fold together. To this day, people in the business refer to the box as the “9-9-4.”

“It’s the perfect fit for a dozen doughnuts,” said Jim Parker, BakeMark’s president and chief executive.

More importantly to the thrifty refugees, it cost a few cents less than the standard white. That’s a big deal for shops that go through hundreds, if not thousands, of boxes a week. It didn’t hurt either that pink was a few shades short of red, a lucky color for the refugees, many of whom are ethnic Chinese. White, on the other hand, is the color of mourning.

Len Bell, president of Evergreen Packaging in La Mirada, first noticed the proliferation of pink boxes as a regional manager for Winchell’s in the early 1980s. Back in the Southland after a few years in Minnesota, Bell was amazed to see the doughnut business seemingly transformed overnight by Cambodian refugees, who proved quick studies and skillful businesspeople.

“Pink boxes have been around for a long time, don’t get me wrong,” he said. “But they really came into vogue in the late ’70s and early ’80s simply because it was a less expensive box to produce and buy.”

"Why are doughnut boxes pink? The answer could only come out of Southern California" (LA Times)

photo: Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times

Blue Apron delivers perfectly portioned ingredients so you can cook beautiful homemade meals easily, with subscription plans that match size of your household . Or appetite.

If you want to wrangle in your restaurant habit and start cooking at home, Blue Apron eliminates the time-intensive trips to the grocery store to ensure that you have fresh, exciting ingredients on hand at dinner time. With their easy-to-follow instructions, you can try out unfamiliar flavors and pick up new cooking styles and techniques. Your meals are delivered weekly, so you can decide when you want to prepare them.

While any home-cooked meal is going to be healthier than that fast food stop on the way home, Blue Apron portions servings between 500 and 800 calories so you can easily stick within dietary goals. All ingredients are seasonally chosen and sourced from local farms so you can enjoy delicious, home-cooked, sustainable meals.

Blue Apron subscription plans are available in the Boing Boing Store.

Click here to go see the bonus panel!

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If you can't remember your password, you spend eternity as a disembodied mind, wandering the Earth.

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Today's News:

The award-winning TV series Friday Night Lights ran for five seasons from 2006 to 2011. It was a drama about a high school football team, but it was also experimental TV in many ways. The series was based on a movie, which was based on a book, which you might not know, was based on a true story.

For starters, the 2004 FNL movie was loosely based on real live people from a non-fiction book by H.G. “Buzz” Bissinger entitled Friday Night Lights: A Town, a Team, and a Dream, which was published in 1990. The book explored a high school football team and their 1988 season. They were called the Permian Panthers and their school was located in Odessa, Texas. The film was released by Universal Pictures and starred Billy Bob Thornton and Connie Britton. It was directed by Peter Berg, who actually happened to be H.G. Bissinger’s second cousin.

Read the many ways that Friday Night Lights was unique among TV series at TVOM.

Yahoo announced this afternoon that hackers stole data from more than one billion user accounts in an attack that took place back in 2013. It’s believed that this attack is separate from the other 2013 breach they announced back in September.

Read more...

Possibly the greatest thing we've seen on the internet.

This splendid little video was captured at a Halloween rodeo in Laramie, Wyoming on on October 28, 2016.

(more…)

Car makers are using the French motor show to demonstrate their latest electric automotive technology. The post This Year’s Paris Auto Show is Très Électrisante appeared first on WIRED.

Apple’s WWDC kicked off today with the usual keynote speech, but this one was packed with details about Apple’s next set of operating systems: iOS 10, the new tvOS, updates to watchOS, and OS X, now renamed to macOS.

Read more...