I’ve been tinkering with computers since I was a kid, but in the past ten or so years, mainstream computing has become more and more locked down, enclosed, lightweight, and, well, polished. I even wrote a blog post about how, nowadays, most computers are amazing. Long gone are the days when I had to worry about line voltage, IRQ settings, diagnosing bad capacitors, and replacing 40-pin cables that went bad!
But I’m always tempted back into my earlier years of more hardware-oriented hacking when I pull out one of my Raspberry Pi B+/A+ or Arduino Unos. These devices are as raw of modern computers as you can get—requiring you to actual touch the silicone chips and pins to be able to even use the devices. I’ve been building a temperature monitoring network that’s based around a Node.js/Express app using Pis and Arduinos placed around my house. I’ve also been working a lot lately on a project that incorporates three of my current favorite technologies: The Raspberry Pi 2 model B (just announced earlier this month), Ansible, and Drupal!
In short, I’m building a cluster of Raspberry Pis, and designating it a ‘Dramble’—a ‘bramble’ of Raspberry Pis running Drupal 8.
Motivation
I’ve been giving a number of presentations on managing infrastructure with Ansible in the past couple years. And in the course of writing Ansible for DevOps (available on LeanPub!), I’ve done a lot of testing on VMs both locally and in the cloud.
But doing this testing on a ‘local datacenter’—especially one that fits in the palm of my hand—is great for two reasons:
All networking is local; conferences don’t always have the most stable networking, so I can do all my infrastructure testing on my own ‘local cloud’.
It’s pretty awesome to be able to hold a cluster of physical servers and a Gigabit network in my hand!
Each Friday is PiDay here at Adafruit! Be sure to check out our posts, tutorials and new Raspberry Pi related products. Adafruit has the largest and best selection of Raspberry Pi accessories and all the code & tutorials to get you up and running in no time!
Remember when Ridley Scott excused the unrecognizably whitewashed Egypt he presented in Exodus by saying he couldn’t hire “Mohammad so-and-so” for “a film of this budget?” Seems like it’s that time of year again.
Speaking to The Hollywood Reporter for the article “Hollywood on Alert: Actors’ Ethnicities Under Scrutiny Amid Heightened Sensitivities,” (poor white Hollywood!) a Pan “insider” addressed the controversial choice to cast Rooney Mara in the role of Tiger Lily, saying:
There’s a misconception about the ethnicity of the original character and we felt no obligation to perpetuate that misconception. We looked at Native American actresses. We looked at African-American actresses. We looked at African actresses. We looked at Middle Eastern actresses. White actresses. After a very exhaustive casting process, we ultimately went with the best actress for the part.
THR goes on to call it “ironic” that Warner Bros. “has been branded as insensitive for attempting to offer a color-blind, modern Pan,” which, I mean…
I am straight up laughing at that THR piece. Did Warner Bros. sponsor that article to justify Rooney Mara casting? I have questions.
Why would casting a white woman to play a Native American character make Warner Bros.’ Pan “modern”? Productions of Peter Pan have a long history of whitewashing. And using “I don’t see color!” as the defense for casting Mara as Tiger Lily also rings hollow when every single iconic character in Pan‘s supposedly post-racial world is white.
It’s the world’s smallest violin, Warner Bros.
Another producer who “declined to be identified” told THR that “much of the controversy surrounding off-race and off-ethnicity castings is naive because studios are putting faith in proven stars rather than excluding particular types of actors.” Presumably referring to Aloha, the producer went on to say
If you’re going to wait around to find the perfect actress who is a quarter Asian, and not just a quarter Asian but a quarter Hawaiian Asian, you will never cast your movie.
Memoirs of a Geisha producer Doug Wick, recalling the controversy that arose when Chinese actress Ziyi Zhang was cast to play the lead Japanese character in the 2005 film, told THR:
There is certainly a history of insensitivity. And you have to ask if it’s part of a dangerous pattern. But you can’t throw down the DNA gauntlet, and you’ve got to be able to cast for artistry and in the spirit of the character.
It’s telling to see a push for diversity as “throwing down the DNA gauntlet” rather than a necessary and vital step in people of color receiving the respect and representation they’ve long been denied in mainstream Western media. Sure is a crazy coincidence that Rooney Mara, Emma Stone, Scarlett Johansson, Christian Bale, and Adam Sandler “just happened” to be the best fit to play characters of color.
“We have to have the freedom in the arts to choose the right artist for the project” somehow always works in favor of the status quo.
jfruh writes: As part of a new user agreement created in preparation for its spinoff from eBay as an independent company, PayPal told users that the only way to avoid advertising robocalls from PayPal and its 'partners' was to stop using the service. This caused something of a firestorm, and now the FCC is saying the policy may violate Federal law, which requires an explicit opt-in to receive such messages.
As folks dust off, starch, & iron their capes in defense of #RachelDolezal We r reminded that privilege continues to swing only in the white direction.
Reality don’t feel like reality sometimes. This ridiculous shit surprising me less and less the more I read is what is upsetting me more and more
The Satechi Bluetooth Shutter Button is a small device for remotely triggering a smartphone camera. The device is just 1.375 inches wide, and easily pairs to a smartphone. Once connected, users can press the device rather than the physical button on their smartphone to take more interesting selfies or difficult-to-capture photographs.
The button comes with a keychain attachment, an adhesive sticker, or a mount that can be used to attach the button to a selfie stick or other similarly rod-shaped object.
Japanese retailer Parco has expanded their line of sushi-themed suitcase covers to include new types of sushi: tako (octopus), ikura (salmon roe), and saba (mackerel). Each suitcase cover slips over a suitcase and leaves openings for the handle and wheels. When luggage is sent through the conveyor belt in baggage claim, the sushi suitcase looks adorably like a sushi-go-round found at Japanese fast-food retaurants.
Cotton’s just gotten a 21st Century upgrade. Welcome to the future of fashion and nanotechnology. Kelby and Co. offer stylish men’s shirts and jackets with a game changer – an invisible shield engineered to repel spills and resist stains. Using Dropel Fabrics enhanced technology, we are the only company on the market to offer nanotechnology and natural fabrics in one package. Our designs are made of 100% premium cotton and have the plush, soft hand feel we expect from well-crafted apparel.
merbs writes: Reed Milewicz, a computer science researcher, wowed a major online Magic: The Gathering forum when he posted the results of an experiment to "teach" a weak AI to auto-generate Magic cards. Milewicz had trained a deep, recurrent neural network—a kind of statistical machine learning model designed to emulate the neural networks of animal brains—to "learn" the text of every Magic card currently in existence. Then he had it generate thousands of its own. He shared a number of the bizarre "cards" his program had come up with, replete with their properly fantastical names ("Shring the Artist," "Mided Hied Parira's Scepter") and freshly invented abilities ("fuseback"). Players devoured—and cheered—the results.
There is no soccer game today in the main stadium of Pristina, the capital of the small nation of Kosovo. In this traditionally male-oriented space, artist Alketa Xhafa-Mripa is drawing attention to women, and symbolically airing the country’s dirty laundry to help raise awareness about rape during the war in Kosovo in the late 1990s.
Today (June 12) marks the 16th anniversary of NATO’s arrival in Kosovo after Serb forces carried out a brutal campaign of ethnic cleansing. Rights organizations estimate that up to 20,000 women were raped during the conflict. An overwhelming majority of the women kept silent about their experiences, fearing public shame and stigmatization.
Xhafa-Mripa, along with other women, including Kosovo’s president, organized clothing drives over the past couple of weeks, during which a number of women came forward, recounting their experiences. Read the story behind the installation here.
(Jetmir Idrizi)(Jetmir Idrizi)President Atifete Jahjaga supported the initiative from the very beginning. (Jetmir Idrizi)
RUN! MAKE SURE NOBODY SAYS YOU SUCK ON THE INTERNET!
An enterprising Internet domain registry named Vox Populi -- NOT AFFILIATED WITH OUR PARENT COMPANY VOX MEDIA FWIW -- will begin offering access to ".sucks" domains in June. For example: Company.sucks, Business.sucks, PresidentialCandidate.sucks, SportsTeam.sucks, etc. Knowing that sports fans are hateful and mean, sports teams are rushing to buy them. The Blackhawks have reportedly purchased "ChicagoBlackhawks.sucks," according to Crain's Chicago Business:
So far, Chicago entities including McDonald's, Edelman and the Chicago Blackhawks have ponied up the $2,500 (which must be paid annually) to claim their .sucks sites and deny someone else the opportunity to exploit them.
It's a pretty cynical cashgrab: In September, the domains will go on sale for just $10 a month. But Vox Populi has set aside certain trademarks -- like the Blackhawks -- and told businesses that if they want to prevent them from ever going on sale to the general public, they have to pay $2,500 up front.
"We can call it a scam, a form of extortion or predatory pricing, but these guys are cloaking themselves in the First Amendment and saying that consumers deserve a place to air their grievances against companies," [Congressman Jerry Nadler] says.
Honestly, we don't really think teams should go crazy snatching these up. Annoying fans can already make "chicagoblackhawkssuck.com" or things like that, and if you buy "ChicagoBlackhawks.suck," someone can just buy "Blackhawks.suck" or "TheBlackhawks.suck" or "BlackhawksReally.suck" or a million other things.
At some point, the cost of letting a company extort you outweighs the value of preventing angry fans from being angry fans on the Internet. No rational fan is going to actually look down on a team because someone bought "ChicagoBlackhawks.suck."
They will view it as a person dumb enough to spend $250 a year to host a website with the intellectual value of a drunk dude yelling at a sports game.
Yesterday evening, news broke of allegations that Rachel Dolezal, president of the NAACP chapter in Spokane, Washington, has been passing for black for years. Unsurprisingly, the reaction—at least on Twitter—was a mixture of hilarity and mockery, with hashtags such as #AskRachel or #blackreceipts proliferating across social media.
It would be tempting to simply laugh at this woman, but perhaps a more productive use of everyone’s time—especially as we continue to parse the murky facts of this case—would be to take a moment to interrogate the themes of racial identity and allyship apparent here.
First, a bit of context. Whites passing as black for so long and so apparently well as Dolezal are relatively uncommon. Historically speaking, black people have always heard stories about very fair-skinned blacks passing for white. I had great cousins who decided to pass, move out west, and never speak to their “former” families again. At the time, passing made sense as a way to escape systemic oppression and attempt to be upwardly mobile.
The concept of performative blackness is not new, either. In the 19th century, white people donned blackface in order to dance, play music, do comedy, and perform a wide range of acts. At the time, shrouding one’s face in dark, theatrical make-up for a joke was considered normal. Rachel Dolezal, however, wasn’t looking for exploitative humor or cheap thrills. Her “performance,” assuming it was one, didn’t end when the curtains fell.
When questioned by Spokane Spokesman-Review about her race, Dolezal responded that the question of her race is “not as easy as it seems” and that she doesn’t “understand the question.”
As the facts remain murky, questions are about all we have for Dolezal.
According to Lawrence and Ruthanne Dolezal, a white couple from Montana who claim to be Rachel Dolezal’s parents, Rachel has always been passionate about family and social justice work, especially after her parents adopted two black children. She was involved in racial conciliation projects in her local community and even applied to Howard University to study art, where she received a full scholarship.
So was this an issue of passing, or did Dolezal become so invested in the black experience that she felt she needed to alter her identity to fit her passion? It has not been disclosed whether or not she has any kind of mental illness, but her accounts of having been the victim of both race-based hate crimes and her parents’ abuse are no laughing matter.
One has to wonder whether, deep down, Dolezal might have believed that race is something unfixed and amorphous, a construct created by society. In an age of increasingly fluid gender identities, are some people also beginning to believe they can change racial identities, too? Then there are the comments of those like beloved author Toni Morrison, who told Stephen Colbert last year that: “There is no such thing as race. None. There is just a human race—scientifically, anthropologically.”
"Our daughter is Caucasian" say parents of Spokane NAACP President Rachel Dolezal. pic.twitter.com/6VHxm9v4Wt
Ultimately, perhaps the biggest question is this: why would Dolezal think that she had to transform herself in order to be taken seriously by the black community?
She could have thought that no matter how much social justice work she did, her status as a white woman would always diminish her efforts. Perhaps she feared being excluded from a community that she not only respected but exalted. But her alleged deceit would not have been unnecessary—the NAACP has always been a multiracial coalition, something Dolezal should know from her earlier years as an advocate for reconciliation. Indeed, so far the NAACP has stood by Dolezal, noting in a statement that “racial identity is not a qualifying criteria or disqualifying standard for NAACP leadership” and that the group “stands behind Ms. Dolezal’s advocacy record.” But the way Dolezal seems to have manipulated the public, the NAACP, and the community would presume the exact opposite: that solidarity can only be achieved through homogeneity.
Self-hatred is a dangerous thing. In this case, it seems possible that Dolezal could have became so wrapped up in her own desire to belong that she became an inadvertent mockery of the very community she wanted so desperately to belong to.
But blackness should never be performed. It is not some abstract concept that can be morphed and shaped from foundation or elaborate extensions purchased from the beauty salon. It’s the skin that you wake up in the morning and go to sleep in at night. It’s the life experiences that cannot be absorbed through books or vicarious erudition. And no matter how much make-up you don, wigs you wear, or colloquialisms you speak, one cannot become black.
Again, as we await further information and corroboration, the questions we have for Dolezal today are almost entirely hypothetical. But her story does provide an opportunity for reflection. A white president of the Spokane NAACP chapter could have been an example of proud, interracial cooperation and mutual respect.
Now, her legacy may ultimately be that of a warning instead: the truth is always more powerful than a lie.
This just in, a new branch of the Multnomah County Animal Shelter opens today in the far more convenient location of North Portland—their other location is waaaaaay over there in Troutdale, a town where no one has ever been ever. And I'm pretty sure you need a KITTEN, am I right? So according to their press release, this weekend might be the perfect opportunity to snag one:
Multnomah County Animal Services is kicking off a 3-day grand opening event to celebrate the opening of its new Adoption Center in North Portland, located at 2914 N. Lombard. The center will open Friday, June 12 at 10am and be open until 6pm featuring adorable adoptable cats and kittens, plus food and fun for everyone! Through the weekend, the center will be open both Saturday and Sunday, June 13-14 from 10 am to 4pm. The official Grand Opening Ribbon Cutting Ceremony will be Saturday at Noon. All three days will feature music, food including vegetarian options, and entertainment for kids and adults alike.
And since adorable cat/kitten videos are the primary currency of the internet, Multnomah County Animal Services produced this high-octane movie trailer featuring some of their adoptable residents to celebrate their grand opening. ENJOY!
SU&SD is on a grumpy run of posts looking for things to shit on lately
is Quinns taking Paul's move really poorly or something
Quinns: Hello everybody! Take your seats, the show’s about to begin.
We get sent twice as many games as we review on SU&SD. We cover the good games and set fire to the bad ones, but there’s a sort of purgatory in between of games that don't get reviewed and pile up in my corner.
Maybe a game’s too interesting for me to burn it. Maybe it’s too similar to something we just reviewed. This is what lead to 2013’s Rapid Review Special Episode- a big, weird release valve of a video that let me reclaim my corner for a hot minute and put a pot plant there.
That time has come again. Today, SU&SD is proud to present no less than seven reviews of the best and weirdest games to be found in my corner.
The great law school exodus continues, propelled by a weak job market for lawyers and securer, better paid opportunities in other professions. According to updated data from the US Law School Admissions Council (LSAC), as of June 5 the number of applicants to accredited American law schools are down 2.5% from the same point last year. As of this week in 2014, 95% of applications had been received so there aren’t likely to be many more coming in:
We won’t have the latest enrollment data until later this year, but lower application volume likely signals a further decline in law school enrollment, which is already way down, according to the ABA:
While it’s bad news for law schools, especially low-tier institutions facing a cash crunch, it might be good for others in the profession by making the labor market for lawyers a bit less saturated.
Where are people going instead? Engineering school, where graduates see some of the highest salary increases from investing in the degree. The numbers below somewhat understate the overall decline in law school enrollment, as they only include the subset of prestigious schools ranked by US News. Lower-tier law schools, which have much shakier career outcomes, have been the hardest hit by enrollment declines:
'Authorities today said no NGOs "working against the country" will be allowed to continue.
The charity's country office here was sealed yesterday after government officials accompanied by police placed a lock on its gate and and asked employees to leave.
The non-governmental organisation's foreign staff has been directed to leave Pakistan within 15 days, police said.
A statement issued by the Interior Ministry said the international NGO was involved in "anti-Pakistan activities", Geo News reported.
Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan said NGOs working against the country's national interest will not be allowed to continue its work in Pakistan.
"We don't want to put ban on any NGO but we want to compel them to work under their charter," Khan was quoted as saying by the Dawn.
The interior minister added that they had been receiving intelligence reports for many years but no action was being taken. NGOs, whose numbers run into hundreds, have been operating without any code of conduct, law and agenda, he said.
He also appealed to all international NGOs and governments to respect the laws of Pakistan, adding that the government will not bear any kind of foreign pressure regarding the working criteria of the NGOs.'
'It’s not entirely our fault. We delayed major milestones because of study, work, travel, recessions, financial concerns, and a changing marriage market.
Now, these late-bloomer parents are foregoing retirement savings, college savings for their kids, or any savings just to be able to come up with the cash to pay creches, babysitters and nannies.
Pew’s Elliott is co-authoring a forthcoming paper looking at how debt levels are affecting my generation’s capacity to set money aside.
‘‘With nearly four in 10 of these upwardly-mobile Gen Xers still paying college debt it presents this interesting scenario: are they in fact saving or how are they saving for their kids to go to college?’’ she asks.'
As birth rates in the US continue to fall, an educated older parent-driven ‘‘baby boom’’ is underway.
American men are also becoming fathers at an older age, particularly if they have a bachelor’s degree or more. US Census figures show a steady increase over the past 15 years in the proportion of 40- to 49-year-old married dads to kids under the age of six.
But contrary to a vociferous faction of the 40-plus “happymommy” blogger crowd and out-of-touch child-raising manuals, it’s not going well at all.
Katrina Alcorn, author of the bestselling Maxed out: American Moms on the brink, says women who delayed having kids ‘‘to try to get a foothold in their careers or to get some financial stability’’ are being pushed beyond their limits as they struggle with work-life balance and the the additional burdens that mid-life brings.
‘‘They find themselves in their 40s, sandwiched between raising young kids and trying to take care of aging parents while also trying to support their families financially,’’ she explains to Quartz.‘‘It’s too much.’’
One Washington, DC-area working mom in her 40s (who asked not to be named) tells Quartz: ‘‘I feel like I am a parent to four small children not two, and I’m not sure cloning myself would even be enough.” She’s also caring for her sick mom and dad (who live in another state) and juggling an array of end-of-year parties, concerts and “graduations” for her preschoolers. At the same time, she is holding down a full-time job, like her husband, except hers demands regular travel.
The men in these high-powered couples are wilting under the pressure too.
Rush hour of life
Alpha dads have to navigate what Dutch Economist Lans Bovenberg calls ‘‘the rush-hour of life,’’ typically in one’s late 30s or early 40s, when child-raising and professional responsibilities peak. Unfortunately, economic and social structures that have traditionally supported parents are disappearing.
One review of the academic literature shows ‘‘common sources of support for older parents like family, friends, neighbors and community,’’ have been found to exist ‘‘minimally, if at all.’’
It doesn’t necessarily ease the burden if parents managed to pop out one or two kids by their late 30s because they still have little ones of preschool age and younger in their 40s. Studies show parents are at their most exhausted when they have children under seven.
The income of a married couple with two children remained almost frozen for the 12 years prior to 2012 at just above $84,000 but the annual ‘‘costs of key elements of middle-class security—child care, higher education, health care, housing, and retirement—rose by more than $10,000’’ says the Center for American Progress.
Hit by the crisis
If things weren’t already bad, the late-starter parent crowd got whacked by the financial crisis. Americans born between 1965 and 1980, were almost knocked out when the global economy teetered after 2007.
A disturbing study of their financial vulnerability reveals that ‘‘Gen Xers were hit particularly hard by the Great Recession, which brought falling housing values and rising unemployment rates. As a result, they lost nearly half their wealth between 2007 and 2010.’’
According to Pew Charitable Trusts research, almost 50% of of their wealth, in the form of bank accounts and retirement savings, real estate, businesses, and vehicles, just vanished.
‘‘Three quarters of Gen Xers have higher incomes than their parents but just a little over a third have more wealth,’’ Diana Elliott co-author of the report “A New Financial Reality: The balance sheets and economic mobility of Generation X,” tells Quartz.
‘‘And one of the big reasons why they’re falling short is that they have a lot more debt than their parents had—for example six times more debt than their moms and dads had at the same age—which is a really big difference.’’
In her research, Elliott looked at upwardly-mobile college graduates to try to understand the wealth disparity. Elliot found that 38% of those who graduated college have student debt as a hold-over, and half have credit card debt.
Structural reforms that could lighten the load have stalled.
‘‘The US is uniquely hostile to the needs of working parents,’’ says Maxed Out author Katherine Alcorn. ‘‘Our government policies lag far behind those of most other developed nations (for example, we’re the only country in the developed world that lacks paid maternity leave and half of American workers lack paid sick days) and we also work longer hours and have less paid time off than people in other developed countries. This creates a perfect storm for working parents.”
Was postponing kids really worth it?
Gen X professionals left it perilously late to procreate, and are now juggling all manner of difficulties all at once: financial, career, personal and relationship, mental and physical.
It’s not entirely our fault. We delayed major milestones because of study, work, travel, recessions, financial concerns, and a changing marriage market.
Now, late-bloomer parents are foregoing retirement savings, college savings for their kids, or any savings just to be able to come up with the cash to pay creches, babysitters and nannies.
Pew’s Elliott is co-authoring a forthcoming paper looking at how debt levels are affecting my generation’s capacity to set money aside.
‘‘With nearly four in 10 of these upwardly-mobile Gen Xers still paying college debt it presents this interesting scenario: are they in fact saving or how are they saving for their kids to go to college?’’ she asks.
So let’s stop with the saccharine, in-denial paens to the joys of older parenthood. Just because Hollywood celebrities are allegedly giving birth “naturally” in their 40s and looking radiant doesn’t mean the journey of belated mother- and fatherhood for the rest of us is so seemingly effortless.
BBC newsreader Kate Silverton, who gave birth to her second child at 43, bravely acknowledged the reality: ‘‘My generation left parenthood till 40. I am not sure we got it right.’’
We are living the new demographic paradigm, but we are certainly not living the dream.
*Casts White Bread Cucumber for lead that could easily be given to an Asian actor, and then avoid the problematic backstory of ‘white guy learns “mystical asian powers”*
*Casts white actress in CANON Asian mentor role in shitty attempt to get fans clamoring for more female roles in MCU to sit up while also being “edgy”*
*Casts one minority actor in main cast as the presumed villain*
Each Friday is PiDay here at Adafruit! Be sure to check out our posts, tutorials and new Raspberry Pi related products. Adafruit has the largest and best selection of Raspberry Pi accessories and all the code & tutorials to get you up and running in no time!
Super Opinionated.
