firehose

Although they came close, cassette tapes never went away completely. With most manufacturers discontinuing production of tape decks long ago—and Sony retiring its line of handheld tape recorders this year—it seems the final nails have been banged into the format’s coffin. But thanks to a number of cassette-enthusiast record labels, tapes have returned to merch tables and online distros—mimicking, in a smaller way, the vinyl resurgence of the 2000s. There’s even a Cassette Store Day this weekend.

I swore off cassette tapes the same day I replaced my forest-green two-door Ford Explorer with a bike. I knew the songs on the tapes in the glovebox well, but their warbled, fuzzy sounds didn’t so much re-create the records they came from as they bended, warped, and pitch-shifted them. But for all their flaws, giving up cassettes felt bittersweet. Eventually, tapes began to re-infiltrate my record ...

Read more

The exact language voters will parse in the upcoming battle for Portland’s water and sewer systems hasn’t been ironed out—it’s currently before a judge.

But the first notion of who’s bankrolling the effort became public today, as organizers for a proposed Portland Public Water District have filed the first batch of fundraising transactions with Oregon Secretary of State Kate Brown.

Surprising no one, the group's received a hefty infusion from Portland Bottling Company, which has long complained about the city's water rates. The company—whose president, Tom Keenan, was on-hand to speak at a press conference unveiling the push—cut a $25,000 check for the initiative. The only other item? An $800 payment to local web design firm BitClone LLC.

The initiative would wrest control of the Portland Water Bureau and Bureau of Environmental Services from the City Council, and put it in the hands of a seven-member elected board. It’s an initiative backed by industrial interests—who think they’re paying too much for their considerable water use—and water activists leery of the city’s stewardship.

Organizers of the initiative petition have claimed for more than a month that people have been clamoring to give to the cause, but hadn’t tipped their hand. They have 30 days to report contributions.

As the Mercury first reported, the political action committee hit the ground running, tapping seasoned Republican fundraiser Tiffany Grabenhorst shortly after announcing its formation in July.

The initiative needs almost 30,000 signatures to get an initiative on the May 2014 ballot.

[ Subscribe to the comments on this story ]

Calibax writes "Parallels recently released version 9 of Parallels Desktop, their popular hypervisor application for Mac. They also released a new product named Parallels Access that offers access to Windows applications from an iPad for $80 per year. Access has received less than stellar reviews. When a user upgrades Parallels Desktop, he is asked if he wants a free six-month subscription to Parallels Access. Even if he says no, the product is installed on his system and the application is started each time the system is rebooted. It is installed with ancillary files scattered around several directories in the system and Parallels has not supplied an uninstaller or listed the steps to fully uninstall the application, despite a number of requests. In other words, Parallels has decided it's a good idea to silently install a difficult to remove daemon application on the system, even if the user has explicitly stated they do not want it. They have not provided an uninstaller or a list of files installed or instructions on how to remove the application files. These are scattered to at least four Mac OS X OS system level directories."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Amazon isn’t just working on a phone, but the company is considering giving it away, anonymous sources have told ex-Wall Street Journal reporter Amir Efrati. The same sources say that Amazon’s plan to give away phones is unlikely, but the fact that Amazon is even thinking about such a plan is indicative of the company’s long-term strategy, which is to give away hardware while making money on content and advertising.

Amazon has for some time been open about its strategy of making little or no money on hardware, and there has long been speculation that eventually the price of its Kindle e-reader will drop to 0, when the price of hardware declines to the point that Amazon calculates it can recoup the cost of devices from sales of ebooks. And unlike its competitors, as a whole Amazon is content with making little or no profit.

As outrageous as a free smartphone might sound, it’s worth remembering that the price of low-end Android smartphones is already approaching $50. If Amazon thinks it can make more money selling content on a phone than on a tablet or e-reader, or perhaps by taking a cut of the costs for pre-paid wireless data plans, a complete subsidy of the lowest-end smartphones might make sense.

2013 Limited Edition Yankee Candle Scents: Peach Travis, Golden Regrets (3 of 3)

Deadline reports that Heroes creator Tim Kring has sold Dorothy Must Die to The CW, described as a “revisionist take on the classic tale” of The Wizard Of NOPE. We went over this last week. Peter Dinklage hula-hooping.

It’s a revisionist take on the classic tale of Peter Dinklage hula-hooping, set in a contemporary wonderland of Peter Dinklage hula-hooping. It features a magical underground world of Peter Dinklage hula-hooping. Modern audiences should thrill to Peter Dinklage hula-hooping. 

We’re going to A.V. Fest now. 

Read more

via @newdadguy

1996 CTA train map: before Dennis took over.


CTA Train Map: Concept in the style of HC Beck.


Dennis' 2006 CTA map using Frutiger Condensed instead of Helvetica


Dennis' 2011 map with the Loop integrated into the main map


Current CTA rail map as found in the "CTA System Map Brochure"

Behind the Scenes: Evolution of the Chicago CTA Rail Map from 1996-2006 and Beyond

This material was sent to me via email by Dennis McClendon, who runs Chicago CartoGraphics, a design firm in the Windy City that specialises in maps and information graphics. His email — which outlines his role in the development of the Chicago “L” map as used in the CTA system map brochure (the first link on this page) — is so fascinating that I’m basically reproducing it in its entirety below. In effect, Dennis is Transit Maps’ first guest writer!

——

A little inside history on the CTA map:

I took over the CTA system map (the folded paper citywide map showing all buses and trains) in 1995. The “cover side” of the map was produced by an internal graphics department and had all the bus schedule info, how to ride info, and a diagrammatic train map.

Transit maps are a longtime passion, and I had quite a collection from around the world. I thought the diagrammatic train map CTA was using (Image 1 above) was embarrassing, and asked permission to redesign it. I was told they’d “take a look.” So I spent a Saturday trying a couple of different approaches. Since the 1980s, I’ve had a London Underground Journey Planner on my office wall for inspiration, so I first tried a very Beck-like approach for grins (Image 2). But it just didn’t feel like it belonged to Chicago.

I had a hazy memory of a map CTA had used, probably only on carcards, in the late 1970s or early 1980s, but there were no examples of that left around the system. Nonetheless, that memory guided me to try fat color lines with white circles for stations. One of the main innovations I wanted to introduce was the “hollow dumbbell” to show transfer points in an instantly comprehensible way. At the time, CTA was using a circled T to indicate transfer points—and those survived as a sort of belt-and-suspenders thing.

One strange thing about CTA is that different departments do maps for the paper system map, maps displayed at train stations, and the maps over the doors in the trains (carcards). I only produced the one on the paper system map, which was also provided to guidebook publishers (and soon turned into neckties and shower curtains, and used on a variety of marketing and branding materials). CTA soon imitated my diagram, however, for the station maps and carcard maps (though they would not give up the “T for transfer” on the carcards). The typeface began as Helvetica, which has a strong heritage at CTA, then changed to Frutiger Condensed (Image 3) on recommendation of an outside consultant (to my delight, since I’m a big Frutiger fan); then reverted to Helvetica after that design firm disappeared.

One particularly tricky thing in Chicago is the orthogonal nature of the city, whose gridded streets run absolutely straight for 25 miles.  Chicago has five rapid transit stations called “Western,” and there’s a natural inclination to see them line up. That limits the spatial distortion that can be introduced, yet the downtown area has many closely spaced stations. CTA always preferred, therefore, to have an enlarged inset for the Loop area. I’ve always maintained a “unitary” version (Image 4), however, that I use for other tourism clients, sometimes in other typefaces. I also figured it would let me sidestep copyright issues with CTA.

I lost the CTA system map contract to another company in 2007 (though I recently got the RTA contract). Meanwhile, Graham Garfield at CTA assumed oversight of all customer information, finally putting all the different maps under one boss. Among many other things, he’s a design aficionado, but I don’t always agree with his decisions. He put the highly accurate gridded maps into the stations rather than the diagrammatic map; I think his feeling was that it helps give riders more context of the city around that rail system. (The latest version of this map was reviewed on Transit Maps here)

This not-so-diagrammatic map (Image 5) is the one on the [brochure PDF on the] CTA website these days as well. The carcards, however, still retain the diagrammatic look.

An element I always thought was important was having the station names in the same color as the lines, so I was surprised that the most recent system map changed that. The wheelchair icons got fussier, and readers are now insulted with the notation “Map Not to Scale.” As a cartographer, I also cringe to see “Lake Michigan” not in italics. I asked Graham about that over lunch recently, and he mumbled something about italics being harder to read.

Ylvis - Stonehenge [Official music video HD] (by tvnorge)

While I've been exploring the mechanics of trick-taking games lately, I stumbled across this odd notion of using the trick you win to trigger a cascading series of mechanics that you would normally find in a more formal euro strategy game. Usually about farming. (Looking at Agricola here, mainly.)

What if by winning a trick, you also acquired various resources and quests from that trick? It's worth exploring, if for nothing less than just pure giggles. Naturally, when I start thinking about a farming mechanic, my mind drifts back to a theme that has so far eluded a really solid mechanical framework.

Dung & Dragons is about a group of people raising dragons for their valuable poop. See, dragon poop has lots and lots of gold coins in it. (Smaug was absolutely filthy, by the way.) So these ranchers raise dragons, feed them their favorite foods, and literally rake in profits.

Here's a loose outline of how I think it could combine very fast trick-taking tactics with more strategic Euro-style engine building.

Click the diagram above for a better look at the components, but here's the details:

The game is comprised of a deck of Supply cards, Dragon tiles, and Power-Ups.

Supply cards feature three types of icons: The top icons are the egg clusters, representing how soon an egg will hatch. The middle icons are a type of dragon, which will determine which dragon emerges from the egg. And the bottom icons are food bundles you can use to feed other dragons.

Each Dragon tile features a unique dragon you can raise for their poop. Dragons come in three types and three hybrids. Dragon tiles are arranged in their own stacks in descending order, with the #1 card on top.

Power-ups are special equipment, like laxatives. Because poop.

Each player has a hand of supply cards.

INCUBATING DRAGON EGGS
Taking turns, each player discards a supply card into one of three piles in play at any time. Whoever causes the total egg clusters in a pile to reach 7 or higher takes the pile.

HATCHING A DRAGON
Whatever has the majority of middle icons in the pile determines your dragon. You may take your dragon from the top of a Hatchery stack or from another player. You may only take a dragon from another player if you have more of the requisite icon than your opponent had to claim that dragon in the first place.

FEEDING A DRAGON
You can feed dragons you already own with the food icons shown on supply cards. Divide them up to your dragons as you wish. Each dragon has a different diet, preferring their own favorite food. The conversion rate for various amounts of food to 1, 2, 3, or 4 poops is shown at the bottom of the card.

For example, Earth Dragon #1 requires 4 grain to make the first poop, 8 to make the second poop, 10 to make the third, and 12 to make the fourth. Different types of dragons get better conversion rates depending on whether they’re hatched later or earlier.

HARVESTING POOP
Each poop is a victory point or may be converted to gold. The gold value of each dragon’s poop is shown on its card. Gold can be used to buy laxatives, buy extra food, buy a dragon from an opponent, and other stuff.

POWER-UPS
When you buy a power-up, you apply it to a dragon of your choice. These are just a loose smattering if ideas so far.

• Laxatives: Lowers the required food per poop by 1. So a 4/8/10/12 would then be a 3/7/9/12.
• Treats: Counts as any type of food, but each type of treat can only be used once per dragon. (They like variety.)
• Coop: Raises the cost of anyone else buying this dragon from you.
• Moon Statue, Sun Statue, Earth Statue: Counts towards the middle-icon total so you have more control over which types of dragons you hatch.
• Moon Prize, Sun Prize, Earth Prize: Grants bonus points for each of this type of dragon you have at the end of the game.
• Scooper: Raises the gold value of each poop from this dragon.

And that's it so far! Kind of a weird idea, but it might work. It's just a lot of balancing to figure out between the various economies and conversion rates.

First, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk inspired Robert Downey Jr.'s portrayal of Iron Man. Now, the futuristic design interfaces depicted in the movie trilogy have inspired Musk to create 3D immersive reality visualizations for designing and printing rocket parts on the fly. We've come full circle, people. Reality and fiction are colliding and the outcome is incredible.

Read more...

Achewood strip for Friday, September 6, 2013

Finally, a movie trailer that properly conveys the inherent creepiness of walking with your doppelgänger down an imperfectly lit corridor to the rhythmic sound of a cappella blues. The Double—Richard Ayoade's follow-up to the critically-acclaimed bittersweird Submarine—is a loose adaptation of the classic Fyodor Dostoevsky novella that features Jesse Eisenberg as a man whose world and precarious mental state begin to crumble following the appearance of a man who looks exactly like him.

Mia Wasikowska, Wallace Shawn, and Noah Taylor co-star, while fans of Ayoade's work as a British TV actor may note what appears to be the briefest flash of Chris Morris—The IT Crowd's Denholm Reynholm and the co-creator of Nathan Barley—around the 0:25 mark, even though he's not officially credited on IMDB. Ayoade has previously referred to Morris as an idol of his, and the darkly comic ...

Read more

“Superman”

Austin, Texas artist Mike Alcantara of ComicCollageArt has made a fantastic collection of collages depicting well-known superheroes and villains from old recycled comic books. Prints are available to purchase online at Etsy.

“Batman”

“Venom”

“Wonder Woman”

“Joker”

“Silver Surfer”

images via Mike Alcantara

via cromeyellow.com, Visual News

Oyster is a new subscription service that lets members read unlimited books on their mobile device for a flat monthly fee. Members can choose from a growing library of more than 100,000 titles. The service is designed specifically for mobile (currently iPhone and iPod touch only) and includes social features that help members discover new books and recommend favorites to their friends. For more info check out this Oyster blog post. You can request an invite for Oyster on their site.

Every four years one city is shackled with massive cost overruns, underused venues and displaced and disaffected citizens. Why not just build an Olympic island?

Some might say that if you've got access to an atomic force microscope, you'd want to learn about the fundamental structures of molecules or something. But we know better. We want to know how much nano-damage our hair is suffering after it's been bleached.

Read more...

EA is working on an indeterminate number of new intellectual properties, EA Games executive VP Patrick Söderlund told MVCUK. "We have six to eight completely new IPs in the works," Söderlund said. "The day we stop making new IP is when we go onto life support."

EA's definition of a "new IP," however, may be a bit more liberal than what that term implies at first blush. "We are working on a new Mirror's Edge game, and although that's not a new IP, it is a revival done in a new way," Söderlund said. "We are developing Star Wars: Battlefront, which to us is a new IP, even though it isn't technically."

So by "new," EA doesn't necessarily mean new new, but rather new-ish, or new enough, perhaps. In any case, it does make us wonder what that other handful of fresh IPs are all about. The sky is practically the limit! In fact, there are so many incalculable variables to consider when predicting that sort of thing that we're just going to stop thinking about it. Ah, that's better.

EA working on new IPs to avoid 'life support' scenario originally appeared on Joystiq on Fri, 06 Sep 2013 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink | Email this | Comments

petermorwood:

What gets me about all this ornamental work is that it’s on a part of the door so seldom seen unless the door was left open all the time, which seems a bit improbable. And yet there it is, ready to be admired for what, two seconds? during every open-and-close cycle.

The first thought is Why?

The second thought is Why Not?

Heyrex is a sensor that you can attach to your dog’s collar to monitor their overall health, similar to the Fitbit or other holistic fitness trackers for humans. The system monitors your dog’s “activity levels, scratching, resting patterns, and sleep disturbances,” and collects the information in a browser-based app that users can access from anywhere. Heyrex also emails users about any suspect changes in their dog’s activity that could be indicative of a health problem. The system is currently available to purchase from the Heyrex website.

image and video via Heyrex

submitted via Laughing Squid Tips

San Francisco Chronicle

State High Court: Judge Can't Change Rape Sentence ABC News A Montana judge lacks the authority to impose a new sentence on a man sent to prison for a month for raping a 14-year-old girl, who later committed suicide, the state's high court has ruled. Friday's decision came as the judge sought to change the former ... Montana high court blocks hearing to review rapist's 30-day jail sentenceCNN Montana Legal Officials Step In on Rape Case SentenceNew York Times No resentencing for Montana rapist Stacey RamboldBBC News Los Angeles Times -CBS News -Houston Chronicle all 105 news articles »

Original Source

Hey Gaymers! My pals at GaymerX are having a sale until Monday (9/9). Items are already discounted, but if you have an order over $20 and you enter the code "smbc15" and you stand on one leg, you get 15% off.