firehose

Where do people in Kabul go when they want to buy an iPhone? The same place as everybody else: an Apple Store.

Four filing cabinets filled with index cards holding the late Milton Berle’s jokes are going up for auction next week. Each cabinet contains jokes typewritten onto 3x5 index cards then divided into subjects (kind of like what Joan Rivers showed off in A Piece Of Work). According to the auction house, Berle “meticulously maintained” the joke file over his whole career, and he considered it “to be the most valuable resource in his office.”

Some of the cards, for example, feature potential monologue bits from The Milton Berle Show’s 1966-67 run on ABC. Those cards have little notes on the back about whether the gag had been approved and whether it had been used on the show. The two cabinets are valued at between $10,000 and $15,000, though they certainly could go for more. [via Slate]

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Gus Van Sant—whose fascination with emptiness has manifested itself in everything from those long, arid stretches of Gerry, to his uninspired remake of Psycho, to working with Taylor Lautner—has now set his sights on the equally barren Fifty Shades Of Grey, the novel that is to literature and romance what the subjects of Elephant are to high schools. And to land his dream job of tackling this Holy Grail of emotional blankness, Van Sant reportedly “shot a steamy sex scene” from the book unsolicited, casting the appropriately vacuous Alex Pettyfer as billionaire Christian Grey, and having him and an unknown actress act out the moment where sort-of-heroine Anastasia Steele loses her virginity, announcing her blossoming into womanhood with an erotic “Aargh!”

Neither Van Sant nor Pettyfer are officially involved with the adaptation, of course—though possibly in their favor, the film is being produced through Focus Features, which ...

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Although you’d be forgiven for having overlooked it, amid all that awkward tension and your inability to stop thinking about ketchup ever since, Sunday’s Mad Men featured a quick reference to 30 Rock, one even more sly than Tracy Morgan’s incredible, Emmy-snubbed run as Miss Blankenship. During their post-pitch gloating over the Heinz account, Peggy’s boss Ted orders up a celebratory “Old Spanish”—a cocktail of red wine, tonic water, and olives traditionally favored by gullible government employees like Matthew Broderick’s Cooter Burger, and also completely fake. 30 Rock writer Tracey Wigfield caught the cameo and declared it the “best thing ever,” though no one from AMC or Mad Men has officially confirmed that the reference was intentional. (Though, c’mon.) What is confirmed is that an Old Spanish sounds disgusting, no matter what era you’re living in.  [via UPROXX] 

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The Stooges put out a record in 2007, but Iggy And The Stooges haven’t put out a record since 1973’s Raw Power. The group’s latest, Ready To Die, is out next week, though, and NPR has a stream of the whole thing. Listen below and judge for yourself whether or not these old punks still have it.

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David Chan knows Chinese food well, having documented eating in nearly 7,000 Chinese restaurants. Now, he's become a go-to expert for critics.

coolchicksfromhistory:

Harvard Observatory astronomer Muriel E. Mussells Seyfert after she discovered three new ring nebulae in the Milky Way, March 1936.

Muriel was also a painter, two of her portraits can be see at Vanderbilt University’s Dyer Observatory (1, 2).

abandonedporn:

Lake Reschen, South Tyrol, Italy. The reservoir submerged two villages, Graun and Reschen when it was created. Graun’s 14th Century church tower is still visible above the water…or ice.

During Apple's quarter earnings call, CEO Tim Cook took a question on whether or not Apple would consider shipping an iPhone with a 5-inch display. The question is pertinent not only because of sporadic rumors that Apple was considering a larger iPhone, but because so many of the iPhone's top-tier competitors have larger displays. Cook began as you'd expect, praising the current iPhone 5's screen, "iPhone 5 has the absolute best display in the industry," he said. Cook then began a small session about what sorts of "tradeoffs" to into a smartphone display, including "resolution, color quality, brightness, reflectivity, screen longevity, power consumption, portability, compatibility with apps, many things."

"We would not ship a larger display iPhone while these trade offs exist."

Although Cook didn't rule out the possibility, he said that Apple "would not ship a larger display iPhone while these trade offs exist." Presumably the biggest on on that list would be "compatibility with apps," as Apple just recently made developers create new versions of their apps for the iPhone 5 and would likely prefer not to do it again so quickly.

Cook also pointedly took a shot at other devices that ship with larger displays, saying "our competitors have made tradeoffs to ship a larger display." Surprisingly, he didn't mention one-handed use as one of those tradeoffs, instead implying that they fell short in the factors already mentioned. Although Cook may be right that many Android smartphones ship with disappointing screens, it's not as if the relatively worse color fidelity and white balance on the Samsung Galaxy S3 have stemmed its sales.

Cook's statements don't entirely preclude a larger iPhone in the future, but the hints do make it appear slightly less likely — that is, unless Apple would rather tout its ability to master those persnickety "tradeoffs."

• Related Items tim cook quarterly earnings iPhone 5 (GSM) Apple Cellphones

applepiesfromscratch:

Cost of the Mars Curiosity Rover - $800 million

Cost of a team to operate the Mars Rover - $1 billion

Total Cost of the Mars Science Laboratory mission - $2.5 billion

Accidentally drawing a penis on the surface of another planet - Priceless

he new line of clothing from Miguel Caballero, a Colombia-based company best-known for outfitting celebrities, executives, and political figures, is aimed specifically at the US market as a response to the number of mass shootings here.

San Francisco Chronicle

Rhode Island Poised to Back Gay Marriage Wall Street Journal Rhode Island is poised to become the 10th state to permit same-sex marriages, after the state Senate passed a bill legalizing the practice, which the governor has pledged to sign. The state senators passed the bill with a vote of 26 to 12 on Wednesday. Rhode Island to legalise gay marriage after senate voteBBC News Rhode Island set to become 10th state to allow gay marriageLos Angeles Times Rhode Island set to be 10th state to pass same-sex marriageReuters Keen News Service -USA TODAY -Patch.com all 263 news articles »

A good guess

In 2009, Apple filed a patent to transfer players' unique video game story paths, choices and customized characters to book form, available automatically after the game was finished as an e-book, book or graphic novel. The USPTO granted Apple that patent today and made it public, complete with scores of Mass Effect-themed mock-ups demonstrating how the system would work.

Today, we can see this program working well with a narrative-driven game such as Telltale's The Walking Dead: At the end of each episode, Apple's system would spit out a single-issue comic populated with each player's individual choices, dialogue trees and screenshots, shown directly on the console or PC and transferrable to tablets or other mobile devices. It's the circle of undead life, according to The Walking Dead - comic to game and back to comic, with some other lucrative multimedia stops along the way.

Of course there's no telling if Apple is still interested in its patent, or how it would implement the system if it were. It could, however, prove a nice fit for those iPads people seem so fond of.

Apple patent turns in-game choices into a customized comic book originally appeared on Joystiq on Tue, 23 Apr 2013 20:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Twitter is reportedly working on a two-factor authentication system. Wired writes that the company is currently testing the new security solution internally before rolling it out to the public.

Following a number of high-profile hacks, including that of Wired editor Mat Honan, several companies have shifted to two-factor authentication, including Apple, Dropbox, and others. Today’s hack of The Associated Press provides a vivid illustration of the need for some kind of enhanced security after a fraudulent claim of explosions at the White House sent the Dow plummeting by 100 points.

In the experimental project “Hi Carolyn: A Siri to Google Voice Experiment,” designer Michael Silber pitted Siri’s text-to-speech function against Google Voice’s voicemail transcription. Silber started by recording Siri reading a selection of text. He then called his Google Voice number and played the Siri audio in his voicemail message. Then he had Siri read Google’s transcription of the voicemail. He repeated this process 50 times. You can hear all 50 of Siri’s readings in the video—they get increasingly bizarre with each version.

submitted via Laughing Squid Tips

You can hear Cobain’s isolated vocal track from “Smells Like Teen Spirit” above.  The song was recorded at Sound City studios in Van Nuys, California in May of 1991.

doctorwhogifs:

TARDIS interiors - the swimming pool

SelFieZ Me Nd Da GHOST LOlz Txt it xoxox

favourite television costuming — lalla ward in destiny of the daleks (1970)

CONCORD, N.H. (AP) — Dartmouth College is canceling classes after students who staged a recent protest decrying homophobia, sexual assault and racism on campus were targeted by online threats.

Apr 23rd 2013 By: Bethany Fong

After last week's tragic events in the city of Boston led to the postponement of Boston Comic Con, the show's organizers collaborated with New England's local comic shops to put together a variety of events throughout the weekend, to the delight of the convention's would-be attendees. Local comic retailers held their own free mini-conventions, wherein each shop set up an artist alley featuring a handful of Boston Comic Con's guest creators. In light of Boston Comic Con's tumultuous events that occurred over the week in Boston, both fans and creators seemed rather content and grateful to participate in these events after a week of stress and anxiety.

After a day of "lockdown" in my headquarters, I decided to celebrate the new day in Boston by trekking out to the Not-The-Boston-Comic-Con Get-Together at Comicazi in Somerville, where Tim Sale, David Mack, Bill Willingham, Don Rosa, Ming Doyle, Erica Henderson, Agnes Garbowska, Tim Seeley, Ale Garza and Nick Bradshaw were stationed with merchandise in tow. Check out photos from the event after the cut!

Not only did Comicazi have the exclusive Boston Comic Con 2013 shirt (designed by Sale) and the exclusive Boston Comic Con variant cover for My Little Pony (illustrated by Agnes Garbowska) available, many of the artists provided free sketches for fans. Judging by the overwhelming turnout at all of the impromptu events this weekend, it's clear the spirit of the convention, and the city, is still standing strong.

Organizers plan to reschedule Boston Comic Con to a later date this year.

[Click images to enlarge]
Don Rosa

Erica Henderson

Tim Sale and Ming Doyle

Tim Sale

Bill Willingham and David Mack
Donald Duck by Don Rosa

Erica Henderson and Don Rosa

Ming Doyle

Ozma by Bill Willingham

Uncle Scrooge by Don Rosa

Ming Doyle

Batgirl and Marceline by Ming Doyle and Erica Henderson

We've all been pronouncing Daenerys Targaryen's title wrong!

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coondoggie writes "The term sequestration has certainly become a four-letter word for many across the country — and now you can count business and regular traveling public among those hating its impact. The Federal Aviation Administration today issued a blunt statement on the impact of sequestration on the nation's air traffic control system, which this week begain furloughing about 10% of air traffic controllers for two days or so per month. It reads as follows: 'As a result of employee furloughs due to sequestration, the FAA is implementing traffic management initiatives at airports and facilities around the country. Travelers can expect to see a wide range of delays that will change throughout the day depending on staffing and weather-related issues. ... Yesterday more than 1,200 delays in the system were attributable to staffing reductions resulting from the furlough.'" U.S. Democrats and Republicans spent the day using the FAA's statement as political fodder rather than working on resolving sequestration.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Dan Milstein from Hut 8 Labs has written a lengthy post about why software developers often struggle to estimate the time required to implement their projects. Drawing on lessons from a book called Thinking Fast and Slow by Dan Kahneman, he explains how overconfidence frequently leads to underestimations of a project's complexity. Unfortunately, the nature of overconfidence makes it tough to compensate. Quoting: "Specifically, in many, many situations, the following three things hold true: 1- 'Expert' predictions about some future event are so completely unreliable as to be basically meaningless 2- Nonetheless, the experts in question are extremely confident about the accuracy of their predictions. 3- And, best of all: absolutely nothing seems to be able to diminish the confidence that experts feel. The last one is truly remarkable: even if experts try to honestly face evidence of their own past failures, even if they deeply understand this flaw in human cognition they will still feel a deep sense of confidence in the accuracy of their predictions. As Kahneman explains it, after telling an amazing story about his own failing on this front: 'The confidence you will experience in your future judgments will not be diminished by what you just read, even if you believe every word.'"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

jfruh writes "The rap on the under-30 crowd is that they don't care anywhere near as much about online privacy as their elders — but that's not quite true. According to a recent study by USC's Annenberg Center for the Digital Future, millennials are just as concerned about the use of their personal data online as their elders. The difference arises when it comes to why they share that data: older users share with someone they trust, while millennials share when they perceive that there's something in it for them."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Portal The Cake Mix! Official licensed!: Amazon.co.uk: Grocery:

“I made the cake without the alcohol and and it taste’s delicious.”

“And also just a con so you think your get a cake mix just to make said cake when in fact it is a big fat lie this should be taken down right away.”

oceanportal:

How does a puffin hold so many fish in its mouth at once? The bloggers over at TYWKIWDBI did some research, and found the second photo above. It portrays:

An Atlantic puffin (Fratercula arctica) shows off its tongue, which is specially adapted to allow it to carry many fish in its bill at one time. Atlantic puffins typically carry about 10 fish in their bills at one time, using their tongues to hold their catch against spines on their palate.

Pretty amazing!

“Google has finally closed the deal on Wavii, a natural language processing startup, for a price that is more than $30 million, we’re hearing from a legitimate source. Both Apple and Google were competing for the Seattle-based startup, and Google eventually won. Apple wanted the company, which developed its own aggregation technology and natural summarization algorithms, for its Siri division. The 25-person-strong team, including founder Adrian Aoun, will be moving down from Seattle to join Google’s Knowledge Graph division.”

- Google Buys Wavii For North Of $30 Million | TechCrunch