firehose

As the director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives prepares to defend his budget before angry pro-gun senators Thursday, the agency is hitting the brakes on a plan to ban a type of armor-piercing ammunition after pushback from gun activists, sources tell Gawker.

A recent episode of the series BrainCraft looks at four lesser-known scientific discoveries and the women behind them. Host Vanessa Hill explains the discoveries that led to the misinformation effect, the effect of telomeres on human health, a promising Alzheimer’s treatment derived from the ashwagandha plant, and even the human brain’s opiate receptors, as well as the four women who made those discoveries.

NEW YORK—Calling it a major breakthrough that will significantly expedite and streamline its daily operations, Wall Street financial firm Goldman Sachs revealed Thursday it has developed a new high-speed algorithm that is capable of performing more ...

bryanthephotogeek:

Judi Dench is my favorite M. 

HUNTSVILLE, TX—Noting that their prison system’s supply of lethal injection drugs continues to dwindle as more manufacturers agree to halt sales, sources within the Texas Department of Criminal Justice confirmed Thursday that they now regret w...

When John Hughes came to shoot "The Breakfast Club," his two young actresses, Molly Ringwald and Ally Sheedy, joined swiftly by co-producer Michelle Manning, ganged up on him. They strongly objected to the gratuitous female nudity in the screenplay.

The doubts arose almost immediately when HarperCollins announced last month that it would release a rediscovered book by Harper Lee: Did Ms. Lee — 88, publicity-shy and famously resistant to producing a follow-up to her masterpiece, “To Kill a Mockingbird” — really want to publish a second novel that she wrote and set aside more than a half-century ago?

A guitarist in the Grammy-winning Iowa band Slipknot was severely injured Wednesday in what Clive police called a knife fight with his brother.

The largest nonprofit contractor working for the U.S. Agency for International Development during the height of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan billed the government $1.1 million for staff parties and pricey retreats — three of them held at one of the poshest destinations on the East Coast, Nemacolin Woodlands Resort in Pennsylvania.

Marc Freeman and ‘Stephanie’ detained for hours inside so-called ‘black site’ so they would confess and implicate others.

wabrandsma writes According to DutchNews.nl: "Internet providers no longer have to keep their clients phone, internet and email details because privacy is more important, a Dutch court ruled on Wednesday." Digital rights organization Bits of Freedom writes in a blog: "The law's underlying European directive was meant as a tool in the fight against serious crimes. The Dutch law, however, is much more expansive, including everything from terrorism to bike theft. During the hearing, the state's attorneys avowed that the Public Prosecution does not take the law lightly, and would not call on the law to request data in case of a bicycle theft. The judge's response: it doesn't matter if you exploit the possibility or not, the fact that the possibility exists is already reason enough to conclude that the current safeguards are unsatisfactory."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Mark Wilson writes Online censorship is rife. In many countries, notably China, citizens are prevented from accessing certain websites at the behest of their government. To help provide access to information and unbiased news, freedom of information organization Reporters Without Borders has set up mirrors to nine censored websites so they can be accessed from 11 countries that blocked them. As part of Operation Collateral Freedom, Reporters Without Borders is mirroring the likes of The Tibet Post International which is blocked in China, and Gooya News which is blocked in Iran. Mirrored sites are hosted on Amazon, Microsoft and Google servers which are unlikely to be blocked by a censoring country.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

How can you get your hands on the freshest, fluffiest doughnut around? You can wake up at 6 AM and stand in line outside your local doughnut establishment, or you can make them yourself.

submitted by argyleecho [link] [36 comments]

asylum-art:

Incredible Bird Feather Sculptures By

Kate MccGwire

Widely-renowned British artist Kate MccGwire uses an unusual medium – hundreds and hundreds of bird feathers – to create her unique sculptures. By meticulously layering the feathers side by side, she creates swirling, tactile and snake-like compositions that look disturbingly alien.

MccGwire was surrounded by nature since her early childhood, connecting her to natural forces and animals throughout her life, which even now impacts her creative choices.

Fantasy Flight Games lets you see what you’re getting into before you buy it, by posting the XCOM Board Game rules up online for your downloading pleasure. The game sees players working together to thwart an alien invasion while trying to keep everyone on Earth calm (as much as you can, anyway). Meanwhile, an AI, run on a tablet or smartphone, works to conquer our little, blue marble of a planet.

From the post:

In XCOM: The Board Game, the alien invasion is unrelenting. UFOs appear in orbit, alien combatants wield technology far more advanced than anything the world’s militaries have ever seen, the world’s nations teeter on the verge of panic, and civilization threatens to devolve into chaos.

At the heart of the invasion is the game’s free digital companion app, which coordinates the invaders, heighten’s the game’s tension, allows you to play at multiple levels of difficulty, and keeps you on your toes with turn sequences that can change from round to round.

More than that, though, the app also teaches you how to play the game, and it serves as your rules reference, easily accessible at the click of a button. However, as you race to save humanity from an unknown enemy, it may be comforting to pause, take a breath, and review your situation in a new light.

Source

Patrick Pichette has decided to follow his bliss, make time for what matters, and carpe diem the hell out of his life. 

During and a few weeks after a swank trip to Africa, where he and his wife soaked in a sunrise at the summit of Mount Kilimanjaro, Google’s soon-to-be former chief financial officer had an epiphany. He needed more work-life balance. He says he’s put in “25-30 years of nearly non-stop work (depending on how you cut the data)…”

So, on March 10, at 4:50 p.m., he posted a letter to his Google+ account, natch, explaining his decision to leave the company. He has grown children and wants to spend more time with his wife of 25 years. The letter ends, “In the end, life is wonderful, but nonetheless a series of trade offs, especially between business/professional endeavours and family/community. And thankfully, I feel I’m at a point in my life where I no longer have to make such tough choices anymore. And for that I am truly grateful.” In 2014, Mohamed El-Erian, former head of global investment firm PIMCO, had a similar moment of enlightenment when he stepped down to spend more time with his tween daughter.

But while the privileged few can just ditch it all in the name of work-life balance, most people have to figure out how to manage their lives and connect with their families while working full-time hours or longer. Just 12% of US workers are entitled to paid leave, even for the care of a newborn or sick family member. Out of 185 countries reviewed in a 2014 report by International Labour Organization, only two–the United States and Papua New Guinea–did not have public policies for paid maternity leave. The report found that 78 countries reviewed also mandated paternity leave, with 70 of those providing paid leave to new fathers.

And then there are the expectations around working hours. A recent discussion on Quora entitled, “What is the worst part about working at Google?” included insight from both people who ‘fessed up to working there and those who preferred to remain anonymous. Despite its designation on more than one “best place to work” list, the tech giant has never had a great reputation for work/life balance (see Pichette’s letter). But some of the insights in the Quora discussion were eye-opening.

“I don’t know if Google inadvertently hires the work-a-holics or if they create work-a-holics in us. Regardless, I have seen way too many of the following: marriages fall apart, colleagues choosing work and projects over family, colleagues getting physically sick and ill because of stress, colleagues crying while at work because of the stress, colleagues shooting out emails at midnight, 1am, 2am, 3am. It is absolutely ridiculous and something needs to change,” wrote an anonymous contributor.

In that same online discussion, a former Google sales rep made the disclaimer that no one gets to complain about working at Google because we all make our own decisions. Then, he went on to say, “Well basically, you end up spending the majority of your life eating Google food, with Google coworkers, wearing Google gear, talking in Google acronyms, sending Google emails on Google phones, and you eventually start to lose sight of what it’s like to be independent of the big G, and every corner of your life is set up to reinforce the idea that you would be absolutely insane to want to be anywhere else. Period…You are given everything you could ever want, but it costs you the only things that actually matter in the end. Your time and your energy.”

So, while I appreciate the overall theme of Pichette’s letter–work to live, don’t live to work–it’s hard to get lost in the vivid imagery his flowery prose invokes. Should we feel a little “atta boy” as privileged executives pat themselves on the backs for leaving huge, equity-laden compensation packages to “grab our packs and hit the trails”? Maybe.

But, then I think about the wealth that enabled such a decision and how it was made–mostly on the backs of people who are expected to work the equivalent of two or more full-time jobs. Luxurious African sojourns are made possible by legions of people who work such long hours they need on-site amenities like food service, gyms, child care, and dry cleaning to be able to conduct life’s most basic functions under crushing workloads.

Let’s lose the perception that the answer to finding meaning and joy in our lives lies in ditching our day jobs and strapping on backpacks. Instead, let’s start with a top-down look at more realistic routes to work-life balance. Instead of leaving, executives like Pichette and El-Erian could make a remarkable difference in the lives of their employees if they stuck around and focused more attention on ensuring that the people who work so hard for them are supported by adequate leave, vacation and child-care policies and making “last one to leave for the day wins” values obsolete.

As a matter of disclosure, the author owns six shares of Google stock. It used to be three, but they split. Follow Gwen on Twitter @gwenmoran. We welcome your comments at ideas@qz.com.

submitted by sacr3dc0w [link] [103 comments]

Reuters

US judge rejects Uber request that drivers deemed contractors Reuters The logo of car-sharing service app Uber on a smartphone over a reserved lane for taxis in a street is seen in this photo illustration taken in Madrid on December 10, 2014. Credit: Reuters/Sergio Perez/Files. (Reuters) - A U.S. judge on Wednesday denied ... and more »

What goes around, comes around.

Remember when James Harden kicked LeBron in the balls? Well, James, let us explain to you the ancient Hindu and Buddhist belief known as "karma:"

It doesn't seem like LaMarcus Aldridge's off arm to the groin was intentional. But that doesn't make it hurt any less.

ritasv:

06 Rowan 05 by Douglas Herring

‘Dame Rowan (Darragh Metzger) of the Seattle Knights - at the Washington Renaissance Fantasy Faire 2004 in Purdy Washington’

There are Adam Sandler movies, and then there are movies that happen to feature Adam Sandler. The former, the official kind, are the lowbrow star vehicles Sandler himself produces; they are directed—a term to be used as loosely as possible here—by guys like Frank Coraci and Dennis Dugan, and they often cast the SNL alum as some combination of sweet-natured everyman, short-tempered slob, and baby-talking simpleton. Movies that simply feature Adam Sandler, on the other hand, run a much wider spectrum—riffing on his star persona, as Punch-Drunk Love and Funny People do, or wedging him uncomfortably into dramatic roles, like the ones he occupies in Reign Over Me or last year’s Men, Women & Children. On a whole, the movies featuring Adam Sandler tend to be better than the Adam Sandler movies, if only by virtue of not being directed by Frank Coraci or Dennis Dugan ...

“Potential for abuse isn't grounds for us to deny a label," Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau spokesperson Tom Hogue told the AP.

Numerous witnesses at a protest Wednesday night outside the Ferguson Police Department reported shots fired at officers.

A potted forest of trees and branching steel beams disguise this 5-story apartment building in Turin, Italy. Designed by Luciano Pia, 25 Verde brings plants up off the ground in an attempt to evade Turin’s homogeneous urban scene and integrate life into the facade of the residential building.

The undulating structure creates a transition from outdoors to in, holding 150 trees that absorb close to 200,000 liters of carbon dioxide an hour. This natural absorption brings pollution protection to its residents, helping to eliminate harmful gasses caused by cars and harsh sounds from the bustling streets outside. The trees’ seasonal progression also creates the ideal microclimate inside the building, steadying temperature extremes during the cold and warmer months. The plants’ full foliage block rays of sun during the summer while letting in warm light during the winter.

The building holds 63 units, each benefiting from the terraces and vegetation just beyond their windows and walls. Each species of plant has been chosen purposefully from deciduous plant life in Turin to provide the highest variety of color, foliage, and blooming. This innovative design provides a childlike dream while also instilling real world benefits to those who live in this urban treehouse. (via Divisare)

buy this comic as a print!
Or share on: facebookreddit
If you enjoy the comic, please consider supporting A Softer World on Patreon

Maybe you remember your childhood Atari or that rec room NES, but today's kids are growing up with mobile games, and sixth-grader Madeline Messer has noticed something weird. Read the rest