firehose

These intricately detailed masks were designed by artist Melissa Ng and are available as 3D-printed works through the Shapeways platform.

photos via Melissa Ng

submitted via Laughing Squid Tips

When movies were in their infancy, the biggest and most extreme storylines weren't in tentpole summer films, but in other media. Like books — but also, music sheets. Sheet music of 100 years ago featured alien messages, posthuman visitors and more. Check out the most fantastical sheet music covers of all time!

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American students are well over $1 trillion in debt, and it's starting to hurt everyone, economists say.

@rosalindofarden

Super excited to read this. Been searching for a good book on Martian topography/geography. Stupid cover, but endorsed by NASA and Kim Stanley Robinson.

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Biologists have discovered a rare mutation that kills off the gene responsible for Type 2 diabetes. The mutation, which reduces risk by up to two-thirds (even in obese people), destroys a gene used by pancreas cells where insulin is made. It's a promising discovery that could result a drug that mimics the mutation's effect.

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theodp writes "The LA Times reports that Google will fund free bus passes for low- and middle-income kids in a move to quiet the controversy surrounding tech-driven gentrification in San Francisco. In a statement, Google said, 'San Francisco residents are rightly frustrated that we don't pay more to use city bus stops. So we'll continue to work with the city on these fees, and in the meantime will fund MUNI passes for low income students [an existing program] for the next two years.' SF Mayor Ed Lee said, 'I want to thank Google for this enormous gift to the SFMTA, and I look forward to continuing to work with this great San Francisco employer towards improving our City for everyone.' But not all were impressed. 'It's a last-minute PR move on their part, and they're trying to use youth unfairly to create a better brand image in the city,' said Erin McElroy of the SF Anti-Eviction Mapping Project."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Combat Stress Isn't Lead Suicide Cause Wall Street Journal The first publicly released findings from the largest mental-health study conducted by the military gave a sobering picture of the prevalence of mental disorders and suicide indicators among active-duty troops. Among the findings released Monday: ... Study: Rates of many mental disorders much higher in soldiers than in civiliansCNN Study: High suicide rates for soldiers in, out of warPalladium-Item all 21 news articles »

explore-blog:

Measles has surged back in Europe, while whooping cough is has become a problem here in the U.S.

Childhood immunization rates plummeted in parts of Europe and the U.K. after a 1998 study falsely claimed that the vaccine for measles, mumps and rubella was linked to autism.

That study has since been found to be fraudulent. But fears about vaccine safety have stuck around in Europe and here in the U.S.

NPR maps the resurgence of preventable diseases due to public ignorance and lamentable misinformation about vaccines.

Pair with Bill Gates on vaccines, animated.

vanity-est-venganza:

officialundertaker:

i  DONT KNOW W HY IM LAUGHING S O HA RD A T  THIS

PET ME, YOU STUPID FUCK

mrspoonsi writes "Joining MtGox, Flexcoin today announced they have had their vault wiped out, to the tune of some 896 BTC (about $615,000) by hackers. 'On March 2nd 2014 Flexcoin was attacked and robbed of all coins in the hot wallet. The attacker made off with 896 BTC, dividing them into these two addresses: 1NDkevapt4SWYFEmquCDBSf7DLMTNVggdu [and] 1QFcC5JitGwpFKqRDd9QNH3eGN56dCNgy6. As Flexcoin does not have the resources, assets, or otherwise to come back from this loss, we are closing our doors immediately.'"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Early signs suggest that US president Barack Obama’s health care overhaul is driving the cost of healthcare lower, according to Goldman Sachs analysts, spotlighting yesterday’s data on consumer spending and prices.

“Cuts to Medicare payments that were used to finance some of the new benefits under the law have resulted in significant slowing in the health-related components of the PCE price index,” wrote Goldman analysts in a note to clients.

They note that the decrease in January health care prices is related to cuts to Medicare, the US program of health care for the elderly, which were made in the Affordable Care Act in order to pay for coverage of the uninsured:

Rather than reducing the quantity of services provided, the law mandates a smaller annual increase in the prices Medicare pays for services. This increase happens once a year in January or October, there should be little additional effect on the change in prices from the ACA for the next several months, though we expect the effect on the level of prices to persist.

While the Obamacare overhaul remains controversial in the US, budget geeks are nearly unanimous in spotlighting runaway health care costs as a long-term driver of the US national debt. And cross-country comparisons show that US health care spending is clearly out of line with international norms.

In other words, early indications that the Affordable Care Act is starting to control health care inflation is a good thing.

After adopting two girls from China, Kim Kelley-Wagner found herself frequently having to explain people’s hurtful comments to her daughters. In an effort to show people how incredibly ridiculous and painful their words were, she took a series of photographs with her daughters holding a whiteboard showing the insensitive questions and comments they’ve received…

(via Neatorama)

You can see more at Kelley-Wagner’s site or on her Facebook page, where she says…

I have tried to explain to my daughters that people do not say these things to be mean, they say them out of ignorance, which is why I am sharing some of them. Words are powerful, they can become tools or weapons, choose to use them wisely.

Late night host Jimmy Kimmel celebrated the Academy Awards in the only way he's become accustomed to: poking fun at the entertainment industry using its own stars. Riffing off the fact that many of the Oscar-nominated films were adapted from books, Kimmel turned to internet memes as a source for future films, resulting in a four clips that star A-list actors doing things you would never expect.

Key among them is a version of Amadeus — somewhat unfortunately — "Ameowdeus," that stars Kevin Spacey as Keyboard Cat. Spacey is joined by a slew of other famous actors, including Gary Oldman, Ben Kingsley, Mandy Patinkin, Christoph Waltz, and Abbie Cornish. Kimmel throws in references to "Hamster on a Piano" and "Dramatic Chipmunk," in a clip that gets real dark, real fast.

Kimmel, who's hosted Jimmy Kimmel Live! since 2003, has a history of producing post-Oscar Hollywood spoofs. Following the past two award shows, he put out "Movie: The Movie," and "Movie: The Movie: 2V," both highlighting frequent movie cliches. This latest volley of shorts ventures into the equally absurd, though splits it up into smaller chunks.

“

Because that’s the thing about Scooby-Doo: The bad guys in every episode aren’t monsters, they’re liars. I can’t imagine how scandalized those critics who were relieved to have something that was mild enough to not excite their kids would’ve been if they’d stopped for a second and realized what was actually going on. The very first rule of Scooby-Doo, the single premise that sits at the heart of their adventures, is that the world is full of grown-ups who lie to kids, and that it’s up to those kids to figure out what those lies are and call them on it, even if there are other adults who believe those lies with every fiber of their being. And the way that you win isn’t through supernatural powers, or even through fighting. The way that you win is by doing the most dangerous thing that any person being lied to by someone in power can do: You think.

”

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-Ask Chris #81: Scooby-Doo and Secular Humanism (via missshirley)

A little-known bit of trivia which DD may not have mentioned - writing scripts for Scooby-Doo* financed the unpaid time needed to write So You Want To Be A Wizard.

(*She had nothing to do with introducing Scrappy…) (via ozymandias314)

Quite. (The redoubtable Mark Evanier was responsible for introducing Scrappy. (But was not responsible for him, except insofar as any writer can be forced to take responsibility for something that the Upper-Ups insisted must be made.)

KIEV, UKRAINE—Following his overnight arrival in Ukraine amid the escalating regional tensions over the the Crimean peninsula, sources confirmed seeing U.S.

There's a bunch of online speculation that this celebrity-filled fake hoverboard commercial is actually a secret viral for Back To the Future 4. But we're pretty sure it's just a fake ad, plain and simple.

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Online retailer theory11 now offers a product called Mystery Box, a handcrafted, wooden lockbox designed at least in part by J.J. Abrams of Bad Robot Productions in collaboration with theory11 CEO Jonathan Bayme. The box was inspired by a 2007 TED talk that Abrams gave about a mysterious box his grandfather gave him as a child that he never opened.

Inside the box, which is sealed with an alphanumeric lock and branded with the Mystery Box emblem, are 12 decks of Mystery Box Playing Cards that are individually wrapped in letterpress kraft paper with the Mystery Box emblem on the front. There is also a short letter from J.J. Abrams included within.

Mystery Box Playing Cards are available as single decks as well as inside the Mystery Box over at theory11. For each deck purchased, Bad Robot Productions will donate $1 to 826 National, a United States non-profit dedicated to promoting creative writing workshops in schools.

submitted via Laughing Squid Tips

Becky Stern, Director of Wearable Electronics at Adafruit, walks through one of the most commonly asked questions about wearable electronics: how do you wash them? The most important step is being sure to remove the battery before doing anything else. Stern’s full guide on washing wearable electronics is available on Adafruit’s website.

images via Adafruit

submitted via Laughing Squid Tips

personsuit:

broken britain magazine headlines part 2 electric boogaloo

bonus:

Air freshener company Air Wick has released a collection of scents branded Familiar Favorites that includes a specific scent that is meant to smell like freshly baked cinnamon rolls from Cinnabon. The cinnamon-scented fragrance is available in both spray refill form and scented oil form.

via Brand Eating, Consumerist

ABC News

Rachel Canning Sues Parents to Make Them Cover Her School Expenses ABC News A New Jersey family is in court today with the teenage daughter facing off against her parents in a battle to get them to pay for her schooling and living costs even though she's 18. Rachel Canning is suing her parents in family court in Morristown, N.J., ... and more »