firehose

Filling In New York City Rivers Was A Popular Idea In the 1800s:

Removing New York City’s rivers by filling them in with land seems completely insane idea today, but it was proposed—and seriously considered—many times in the past. We’ve looked at…

The embankment and park on Charles River Bay by Norman B. Leventhal Map Center at the BPL on Flickr.

Plan of location of projected ship canal from Taunton River to Boston Harbor, through Weymouth Fore River by Norman B. Leventhal Map Center at the BPL on Flickr.

http://maps.bpl.org/id/12950 for big.

Hillsboro is hiring a new police chief, with applications due in September. It's unclear who's been applying so far, but it's pretty clear the rank-and-file really wants their new boss to be "funny."

I'll accept bets, in the comments, on which recently retired senior Portland cop you think might get the gig and receive a nice, big suburban salary alongside his or her nice, big pension.

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Investing in startups is such a risky endeavor that only 1 in 10 pan out. Hollywood is so risk-averse that only 1 in 10 movies get made.

The few theaters that haven't already converted to digital projection are finally realizing they need to do it soon—the Academy Theater just launched an Indiegogo campaign to raise $75,000 to convert their three theaters to digital.

They follow Vancouver's Kiggins Theater, which is in the middle of a Kickstarter campaign for $85,000, and two other Oregon theaters, the Columbian in Astoria (asking for $30,000) and the Pine in Prineville (their failed Kickstarter was for $30,000, though they're still trying to raise $90,000 using other methods).

I just chipped in on the Academy's Indiegogo. I'd encourage you to do the same! It's a solid second-run theater and one of my favorite things in the Montavilla neighborhood. It's a pleasant place to be, they've got fun repertory booking (they've currently got Gremlins on 35mm, so that's delightful, and they showed Tombstone a while back, so high five), they have beer and good pizza, and they generally seem to have their shit together: not only are they tweeting and Facebooking about their campaign, but take a look at their site's homepage, which lets you know right away that they've got a fundraising campaign going on, why they're doing it, and how.

That's a marked difference from the campaigns for the Pine and (so far) the Kiggins. As a backer, I can attest that the Pine's Kickstarter campaign was not, shall we say, involved, and as of now, visitors to the Kiggins site would have no idea they even have a campaign going on. (There also wasn't anything as simple as a press release.) For backers, the Kiggins campaign has had all of two updates, the most recent of which boils down to this:

As you can tell with just over 2 weeks left we are far short of where we need to be. At the current rate we won't make it, but there's hope! The money is in the seats! So far about 260 of you have donated - thank you! Now if we could just ask one favor - to be a sales force. If just half of you could reach out to one individual who is willing and able to purchase a seat, we would meet our goal. $500 is a lot for many people, but think of it, your name in the Kiggins in perpetuity! A sweet name plaque right there for you to point out to your friends how you proudly supported this transition into a new era. Can we do this?!!

Good question! Also, are you seriously asking all of your backers to make a friend of theirs donate $500? Because I am not going to do that, and the fact that's the "hope" for the campaign to succeed doesn't bode particularly well. (This is similar to the Pine's campaign, which in the fifth of its six updates, asked people to send $400 checks directly to the theater.)

When I think about the most successful Kickstarters I've contributed to—Ryan North's comes to mind (hey, look what Alison wrote!), the Veronica Mars one, Greg Rucka's—the thing that they have in common is that they treated the campaign as just that: a campaign, a thing that had to be well-designed and constant and tended to on a daily basis, that went above and beyond to make contributors feel like part of the process. As a result, I told people about those campaigns, and I contributed a lot more money once I saw how that money was going to be spent and witnessed the passion of those who would be spending it.

This is a tough time for small, independent theaters, but if they're going to be relying on crowdsourcing as much as they clearly are, they need to figure out how to run those sort of campaigns—or hire someone who already knows how. Crowdsourcing isn't just going online and telling people you want some money—in many ways, a successful Kickstarter is essentially a business of its own, albeit one that opens up your core business to more people and makes sure those people feel involved and adequately rewarded.

I like independent theaters. I want them to convert to digital, and I want them to stay in business. Here's hoping they figure out how.

UPDATE: Dan Halsted at the Hollywood Theatre sent out an email blast this afternoon alerting people to a different kind of campaign to digitally convert Newberg's 99W Drive-in: Looks like the drive-in has decided to take part in a Honda ad campaign that's donating five digital projectors to the most popular drive-ins. Watch this and then try not to vote for them, you heartless bastard.

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If you’re a good editor, you’re able to look at a page without using your brain. Put another way, you need to be able to look at words in a way that goes against everything your brain would naturally do when it looks at words.

Fantastic new video from Special Effect, a charity in england helping gamers of all ages! If you watch this, you’ll understand why people want to help. Look how freaking happy that guy is!

popular shared this story from Boing Boing.

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Earlier today, Xeni blogged Bruce Sterling's latest essay, "The Ecuadorian Library." I thought this piece had a lot of merit, but was brought up short by one passage that made me think that despite Bruce's keen observations, he hasn't been paying very close attention to what groups like the Electronic Frontier Foundation has been doing since 2005. Indeed, when it comes to the view he presents of Internet activists, Bruce is just plain, flat-out, factually wrong.

Sterling writes,

Before Snowden showed up from a red-eye flight from Hawaii, did they have the least idea what was actually going on with the hardware of their beloved Internet? Not a clue. They’ve been living in a pitiful dream world where their imaginary rule of law applies to an electronic frontier — a frontier being, by definition, a place that never had any laws.

The civil lib contingent here looks, if anything, even stupider than the US Senate Intelligence Oversight contingent — who have at least been paying lavishly to fund the NSA, and to invent a pet surveillance court for it, with secret laws. That silly Potemkin mechanism — it’s like a cardboard steering wheel in the cockpit of a Predator drone.

This is wrong.

In 2005, a former AT&T technician named Mark Klein walked into the EFF offices in San Francisco with an amazing story: he had been ordered by his boss to install a beam-splitter on AT&T's main fiber optic trunk and run it into a secret room at the Folsom Street central office, where the NSA would be wiretapping the entire Internet, without a warrant.

For more than eight years and three presidential administrations, EFF and its allies at groups like the ACLU have waged tireless war in the courtroom and the court of public opinion over the mass, illegal, warrantless surveillance of everything and everyone on the Internet. This is no secret: it's been front-page news for close to a decade.

There is a poisonous, revisionist version of Internet history that goes like this: "The Internet was popularized by starry-eyed utopians who thought that technology would only liberate and never enslave. These people never anticipated that some day, governments and crooks would seize control of the network and use it to spy upon, compromise and prey upon the powerless at unimaginable scale. Today, as governments and criminals converge on the Internet as a convenient way of watching everyone all the time, it's time to realize that these cyber-utopians were naive fools, who should never have been given a hearing."

But the reality is that the world of civil libertarians and cyber-activists has been defined, since its very earliest days, by the fear that technology would be used for authoritarian purposes and crime. The crypto wars -- EFF's origin story -- were all about that fear.

The free software movement has always been closely entwined with the wider free speech/privacy/civil liberties world, and for good reason: the lack of transparency and freedom in our tools is a gateway to totalitarian control.

Finally, the network policy world -- with its rallying point of network neutrality, an outgrowth of early Internet principles like peering -- likewise recognizes that the major risk of concentration in the telcoms sector is the ease with which the entire sector can be captured as an element of state surveillance.

Historical revisionism be damned. Since day zero, the "civil liberties contingent" has been shouting as loudly and forcefully as they could about the dangers of technology without policies, rules, norms and code that enshrined liberty. Yes, they also dreamed of the possibilities for networked freedom, but this doesn't make them cockeyed optimists: it means that they've known, all along, what they were fighting for -- and what they were fighting against.

Mongolia, a country with one of the world’s fastest growing economies, is also the least dense, with 2.8 million people spread out over an area approximately three times the size of France (slightly over 600,000 square miles). Each year, between 30,000 to 40,000 people migrate to the nation's capital, Ulan Bator, home to more than half of Mongolia's population.

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More than half of Ulan Bator's residents live in "ger" districts, where there's no access to basic public services like roads, plumbing or electricity. In the winter, residents burn coal and trash to stay warm, which can produce pollution bad enough to cause problems at the airport's air control tower.

"Ger" refers to the round tents synonymous with Mongolia's nomadic traditions. Thanks to Ulan Bator's lack of affordable housing, they attract a surprising range of inhabitants. Many residents, in fact, have a steady income. According to a World Bank report, unemployment in ger districts is slightly over 62 percent.

Reuters photographer Carlos Barria documented life in Ulan Bator's gers. Below, what he discovered:

A boy walks at an area known as a ger district, where some residents live in traditional Mongolian tents, in Ulan Bator June 22, 2013. (REUTERS/Carlos Barria) 

Gers, traditional Mongolian tents, stand next to houses in an area known as a ger district in Ulan Bator June 26, 2013. (REUTERS/Carlos Barria) 

A crack is seen in the wall of a ger in Ulan Bator June 22, 2013. (REUTERS/Carlos Barria) 

A boy walks along a street next to a ger in Ulan Bator June 26, 2013. (REUTERS/Carlos Barria)

Children play near gers in Ulan Bator June 22, 2013. (REUTERS/Carlos Barria)

Baljirjantsan Otgonseren, 32, stands inside her family ger in Ulan Bator June 26, 2013. (REUTERS/Carlos Barria)

Baljirjantsan Otgonseren, 32, stands outside her family ger in Ulan Bator June 26, 2013. (REUTERS/Carlos Barria)

An area known as a ger district in Ulan Bator June 28, 2013. (REUTERS/Carlos Barria)

A child stands next to a ger in Ulan Bator June 22, 2013. (REUTERS/Carlos Barria)

A ger stands near a busy street in downtown Ulan Bator June 22, 2013. (REUTERS/Carlos Barria)

Mix the ultimate camping cocktail with Lydia from Tender Bar (by POMO Mag)

Ominous, random photo.

carrionlaughing:

wintermoth:

bookishandi:

madmanswords:

thewibblywobblytardis:

batsymcchicken:

torchwood1701:

where’s my photoshop of Six in Nine’s jacket already?

Ask and you shall receive:

// dude this is the best fucking thing ever holy shit

Now, give us Nine in Six’s outfit.

OH MY GOD

This is one of those times I want to snuggle with tumblr.

Nine’s FACE.

Writes our submitter in Denver: “I parked my ’82 VW van in the closest guest spot to my home about a week ago, as I’ve been cleaning it out to sell it. Then I was sick for a few days so I didn’t leave the house. Today I found this on the windshield.”

related: It’s my spot and I’ll park what I want to

Like the water-filled plastic bags, the glass sphere functions as a sustainable pesticide. The refracted water reflects and amplifies colors and movements, irritating the fly’s the sensitive eyes to repel it unharmed, while leaving food free of flies in a no fly zone. (via Outdoor Hanging Glass Sculpture Functions As a Sustainable Fly Repellent | Urban Gardens)

darynstokes:

Lightning rod of hate appreciation post #1.

Weird Newscasters: Colin’s anchor names.

1974.

August 9.

Defense is working out details with the Justice Department; benefits could be available as soon as August.

MASTER ROGERS - COME ON AND HAIL SATAN

Malcolm Tucker IS Dr Who! (by Pete Nottage)

Over the past few weeks, I’ve been dipping into a project called “Moby Dick Big Read.” Plymouth University in England is posting a reading of Moby Dick, one chapter a day. The readers are a mix of writers, artists, and actors, including Tilda Swinton.  They are also posting the chapters on SoundCloud, which makes them very easy to embed. Here is one of my personal favorites, Chapter 32, “Cetology.”

When I was an English major in college, I read Moby Dick under the guidance of English professors and literary critics. They only paid attention to a fraction of the book–the fraction that followed Ishmael on his adventures with Captain Ahab. This was the part of the book that they could easily compare to other great novels, the part they could use for their vague critiques of imperialism, the part–in other words–that you could read without having to bother much with learning about the particulars of the world beyond people: about ships, about oceans, and, most of all, about whales. How many teachers, assigning Moby Dick to their students, have told them on the sly that they could skip over great slabs of the book? How many students have missed the fine passages of “Cetology”?

I’ve read Moby Dick several times since graduating college and becoming a science writer. I look back now at the way I was taught the book, and I can see it was a disaster, foisted upon me by people who either didn’t understand science or were hostile to it, or both. Of course the historical particulars of the book matter. It’s a book, in part, about globalization–the first worldwide energy network. But the biology of the book is essential to its whole point. Just as Ahab becomes obsessed with Moby Dick, the scientific mind of the nineteenth century became mad with whales.

“Cetology” reminds the reader that Melville came before Darwin. Ishmael tries to make sense of the diversity of whales, and he can only rely on the work of naturalists who lacked a theory of evolution to make sense of the mammalian features on what looked like fish. You couldn’t ask for a better subject for a writer looking for some absurd feature of the natural world that could serve as a wall against which Western science could bang its head.

The people I know who don’t like the “whale stuff” in Moby Dick probably hate this chapter. It seems to do nothing but grind the Ahab-centered story line to a halt. (No movie version of Moby Dick has put “Cetology” on film.) But do you really think that a writer like Melville would just randomly wedge a chapter like “Cetology” into a novel for no reason–not to mention the dozens of other chapters just like it? Or perhaps it would be worth trying to find out what Melville had in mind, even if you might have to do a bit of outside reading about Carl Linnaeus or Richard Owen? It would be quite something if students could be co-taught Moby Dick by English professors and biologists.

“Cetology” is organized, explicitly, as a catalog, but don’t let the systematic divisions of its catalog put you off. This is science writing of the highest order, before there was science writing. Listen to the words he uses to describe each species. If you go whale watching some day and are lucky enough to spot a fin whale raising its sundial-like dorsal fin above the water, chances are you will utter to yourself, “gnomon.” 

A statue of Josef Stalin in his hometown of Gori, Georgia, pulled down in 2010, will be re-erected, thanks to prime-minister Bidzina Ivanishvili, a billionaire who is friendly to Russia.

On Tuesday, President Saakashvili described the Gori statue's reinstatement as "anti-Georgian." He called for the prime minister to reverse the decision. "I'm not stupid. I understand who makes all the decisions now," Saakashvili said, adding that the statue would "do Georgia no good."

"The West will laugh at us and turn away from us because of such ideological decisions," he said in comments carried by The Associated Press, adding that the move wouldn't have been possible without Prime Minister Bidzina Ivanishvili's approval.

Saakashvili's presidential term does not end until October, but his authority has been further weakened by a constitutional reform that has shifted powers from the presidency to Parliament and the prime minister.

Georgia to Re-Erect Stalin Statue [RIA Novosti/Moscow Times]

(via Making Light)

(Image: Wikimedia Commons/Smerus)

Jesse Brown writes, "Boing Boing readers may remember Rehteah Parsons, the Nova Scotia teen who, in news media shorthand, was driven to suicide last April by cyber bullies. The public's understandable shock and outrage over her death, and the lack of any charges being laid against her abusers* has resulted in Nova Scotia's Bill 61: the Cyber Safety Act. But pre-existing laws could have brought Rehteah justice while she was alive- they just weren't enforced. Rehteah may have been cyber bullied, but more descriptively, she was (allegedly) gang-raped while severely intoxicated and chronically harassed. But the RCMP closed her case without interviewing the four boys accused, despite the existence of photo evidence."

*The RCMP re-opened Rehteah's case under pressure from the Prime Minister. This morning, they finally laid charges against two individuals, assumedly not under Bill 61, which of course did not exist at the time of the incident.

The cops failed to take her rape seriously, as did her school. Her father reports that the mental health institute he sent her to had her strip-searched by male attendants, despite her history of sexual abuse. In her dad's words, "she didn't die of bullying, she died of disappointment". Yet in her memory comes Bill 61, a law that makes "cyber bullying" illegal, and defines it as anything you or your kids say online that could be expected to humiliate a person or harm their self-esteem or emotional well-being. This covers most journalism, I'd guess, as well as at least 60% of everything said on Twitter or Facebook.

If you're merely accused, a judge can issue a Protection Order against you before you have a chance to defend yourself. The cops can seize your computers, you can lose Internet access, you can be gagged from mentioning your accuser online or forbidden to use the Internet entirely. There's much more- the bill encourages parents and school administrators to spy on minors, and it gives police new powers to demand your data from your ISP.

I've written in more detail about the trouble with this abusive bill here.

Nova Scotia’s awful cyber abuse law makes bullies of us all

Are you a think-for-yourselfer? Do you weigh positive and negative Yelp reviews with a cold, dispassionate sagacity? Do you fancy yourself immune to the influence of others when you browse Reddit? That's cute. Newly published research says you're wrong.

Read more...

In downtown Birmingham, Alabama, an otherwise drab underpass at 18th street is equipped with thousands of LEDs that sees it light up like a rainbow every night. Artist Bill FitzGibbons is behind this fab work funded by the Community Foundation of Greater Birmingham’s Community Catalyst Fund in partnership with REV Birmingham.

The post Colorful underpass lights up in neon rainbow hues, makes your day at night appeared first on Lost At E Minor: For creative people.

Textile artist Olek has just completed work on what may be her largest piece ever, a four-car locomotive covered in crocheted technicolor camo in Lodz, Poland. The artist didn’t even stop to change out of a costume she wore at the Animal Ball in London before jumping on a plane to meet four assistants who began a four-day assault on the large train that was completed on July 19th. You may remember Olek’s work from just over a year ago here on Colossal when she crocheted an entire alligator-themed playground in São Paulo. The locomotive will be on view through August 19th, and you can see more over on Hi-Fructose.

two life-sized poster board cut-outs of a real life Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) police officer were placed “on duty” near the bike cage at the station. Since the replicas of officer David Silen, a 10-year veteran of the force, have been in place, bike thefts decreased by 67%.

"In a dramatic about-face on a key internet issue yesterday, Google told the FCC that the network neutrality rules Google once championed don’t give citizens the right to run servers on their home broadband connections, and that the Google Fiber network is perfectly within its rights to prohibit customers from attaching the legal devices of their choice to its network."

Now That It’s in the Broadband Game, Google Flip-Flops on Network Neutrality | Threat Level | Wired.com)