firehose

Search engine traffic brings plenty of readers to Ars Technica, most looking for gadget reviews and technology writing. After looking through site logs, the top 20 incoming search terms for the first half of 2013 were largely expected:

• ars technica
• arstechnica
• ars
• iphone 5
• ps4
• porn
• blackberry z10
• raspberry pi
• blackberry 10
• xbox one
• htc one
• tablet
• youtube
• images
• revenge porn
• ars tech
• ios 7
• bitcoin
• wii u

Pretty standard stuff. But what about the oddball requests—you know, the true outliers that are so strange they appear only a single time in our logs? Well, they're present, too, and by the tens of thousands. Here are a small selection of the stranger search terms that somehow led users to Ars in the last six months:

• my downspout frozen
• can you change condo bylaws if someone is not paying hoa fees to not vote
• club of the month discounts
• u.s. military policy on pornography
• how dip i determine a neighbors wi-fi passkey
• how bad does it hurt to dislocate your kneecap
• can you be prosecuted by your ip address
• joining air force without agreeing to the policy
• why are cats so fascinated by laser pointers
• west wing the american president similarities
• too hot outside central air unit not cooling house
• mold in brita filter
• should i watch amelie dubbed or with subtitles
• how to make a cheap repurposed fire pit
• hot latex bed
• is youth xl the same size as adult small in shirts
• naked picture posted that was not distributed; how do i get it removed? no way to contact website owner
• are robots taking our jobs or creating them
• can apple detect my pirated music
• cause of turbulence in pipe flow
• why di they put bike seats so high
• sore tongue after eating fresh pineapple
• awesome evil names

Some of these queries are quite difficult to answer; others are surprisingly easy. Amélie should be watched dubbed, for instance, while Apple can probably see that you're a dirty pirate but is unlikely to act on that knowledge. (Update: Amélie should of course be watched subtitled. The writer responsible has been locked in a room with nothing but dubbed versions of Gérard Depardieu films.) As for evil names, try Franz von Schicklgruber.

How much does the metadata gathered in your inbox reveal about you? Quite a lot, judging by what researchers at the MIT Media Lab have managed to accomplish with Immersion. They've built a web app that — once you grant it permission to do so — digs through your email history to piece together a "people-centric view of your email life." What does Immersion look at, exactly? Only the senders, recipients (including those CC'd), and timestamps within your email archives. It steers clear of subject lines and the actual bodies of your messages. Still, the end result is fairly impressive depending on how much Immersion has to work with. What first appears to be an arbitrary list of people you've contacted is actually linked together in logical ways. (Again, this will depend largely on how far back your email trail goes.)

"All of this data is about people. Data basically doesn’t make sense without humans." César Hidalgo, one of the creators behind Immersion, told The Boston Globe. "When you see it all together, it is, in a way, an out-of-body experience." Your takeaway may not be that emotional, but Immersion succeeds in showing that, even with limited information like metadata, when collected in bulk, you can visualize the relationships contained within. You can try it at the source below, but keep in mind you'll need to grant MIT access to your Google account for the purpose.

Publisher Focus Entertainment has released a trailer for the console release of the long-running and inexplicably popular game series Farming Simulator, set to come to Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.

The new console release, slated to during the first week of September this year, includes new features such as an extensive American backdrop that will double the gameplay area of the title. The trailer also offers a look at some of the new vehicles you can expect in-game, including Case IH Axial-Flow harvester and the Magnum 340.

The new trailer offers a look at some of the new gameplay, items and setting that can be expected. Check out our earlier interview with the game's studio art director Thomas Frey on the reasoning behind the development.