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The worst song ever

admin — Thu, 17 May 2012 16:00:10 +0000

The worst song ever
Last year, at the Twin Cities branch of the BoingBoing Meetup Day event, musician Jeremy Messersmith brought the lyrics to a song he was working on—a song intended to be as terrible a song as he could possibly write. Now, you can enjoy “It’s the Heat” as an actual recorded song … a song that includes lyrics like, “There’s a fire in my belly / That I can’t put out / My two legs turn to jelly / Thrashing like a trout.”

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Geckos can’t climb teflon

admin — Thu, 17 May 2012 16:00:10 +0000

Geckos can’t climb teflon

Tom Quinn sez, “A gecko struggles with the low van der Waals forces encountered when climbing a non-stick pan.” Here’s a Google Translate of the French description on the video:

We conducted an experiment with a gecko on a Tefal frying pan, that is to say, a pan made of Teflon. The gecko, despite numerous attempts fails to climb onto the stove, it proves that it not adhere not in this matter.

Gecko.MOV

(Thanks, Tom Quinn!)

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People of Burning Man [NSFW]

admin — Thu, 17 May 2012 16:00:09 +0000

People of Burning Man [NSFW]

Julian Cash’s The People of Burning Man is a beautifully produced photo-portrait book shot over many consecutive years at Burning Man, the giant, weird, delightful art and culture festival that takes place every summer in Nevada’s Black Rock desert. Cash — who’s quite an accomplished and experimental portraitist — does a wonderful job of bringing out the decadence and playfulness of Burning Man. There’s plenty of the nudity that often comes to mind when people think of Burning Man (this is, after all, the home of the Critical Tits topless bicycle ride), but Cash manages the fantastic trick of allowing his nudes to be sensual and sometimes sexy without ever being pornographic or salacious. These aren’t “tasteful” nudes — but they are exuberant and above all, fun.

People of Burning Man is to be celebrated also for its admirable lack of text. There’s very little narration here, because very little is needed. The pictures tell their own stories — sometimes in a frozen snapshot, and sometimes over time, as we visit with the same Burners over consecutive years (including one woman who appears first in a very pregnant state, and then with a babe at her breast). What little text there is — a bit of background on the art of shooting portraits in a harsh desert, a little bit of biography supplied by the subjects — complements the images without upstaging them.

Cash was good enough to supply a gallery of (NSFW, naturally) photos that are included below. There’s plenty more — and lots more material, besides — at his The People of Burning Man site. The book was independently published with the help of a successful Kickstarter campaign, and it’s both a beautifully made thing and a thing of beauty.

The People of Burning Man

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How to Have a Brainstorming Session Without Talking

admin — Thu, 17 May 2012 15:45:02 +0000

How to Have a Brainstorming Session Without Talking

A typical brainstorming session consists of groups of individuals coming together to generate ideas surrounding a particular cause or topic. While the usual brainstorming session involves a bevy of chatter, consider trying a nonverbal brainstorming session, especially if old methods don’t seem to be doing the trick.

Edit Steps

Play “go find” surrounding the topic at hand. For example, if your team is brainstorming about how to sell a certain product, provide each team member with a copy of the product and then ask them to “go find” other items that convey or describe the product.
- Break your team into pairs of two or play the game with individual players.
- Provide either the actual product, prototype/model or a photo/description of the product. For example, if you’re trying to sell cars, you probably won’t be able to give each team member a vehicle during the exercise.
- Allow team members a certain amount of time to find items and parameters of where to look. You may want to limit the search to the office or within office property. Also, since this game could go on for hours on end, keep track of time and allot each team up to an hour, for example to search.
- Suggest that for each descriptive item found, the teammate must write a short statement or draw a visual depiction as to why that item best describes or promotes the product. For instance, if you’re brainstorming about how to make dog food seem healthier, you could gather some of the wholesome ingredients and write about or visually depict how real food, not byproducts are in this dog food.
- Ask each teammate or team to create a display making use of his or her items. Give teams creative freedom as to how they’d like to display items, such as using display boards, tables and any other fun tools. Another approach is a visual demonstration using mime, imagery, improvisation or skits (a little “talking” could be permitted but only if it is like a play, not like a meeting discussion––improvisation can force participants to use rhyme, singing and gestures rather than the usual talk).
- Request that everyone walks through the room to see what other team members have found. Suggest that individuals take notes surrounding each display which they can use later to come together as a unit to discuss. Doing so could take the brainstorming session to a new creative level. For the visual demonstration, simply have observers make notes as and when they like while watching, for later discussion.
Host a crazy movie night where everyone is a critic. Sometimes the best ideas can be derived from a film. Consider having an inspirational movie night or week (depending on your team size and amount of time) to pull brainstorming ideas from beloved films.
- Ask each person to suggest one or two films that they feel best describes the topic at hand. Films should be easily accessible on DVD and can be viewed at work or at a team member’s home. Make a few rules before viewing movies, such as film ratings and length so that no one brings in a lengthy, inappropriate film.
- Over the course of an evening, few days/afternoons or a week, host movie watching event. Request that the person who suggested the film(s) write a quick synopsis of why this film was chosen for the brainstorming project.
- Provide each participant with a sheet of paper and a pen to write about why they believe the film inspired or did not inspire them as they’re watching the movie.
- Request that each participant provide two to three ideas derived by watching the film on how to sell or promote the topic.
- Collect and maintain a file of the ideas and participant’s thoughts. When the team has watched all of the films, have the group review the entire file and begin a collaborative idea writing session based on the thoughts produced by watching the films.
Write a “fill-in-blank” story to generate ideas. The idea is to write a collaborative story based on a particular topic with the goal of reaching a new creative height. Each participant is given directional goals and writing parameters prior to the writing session.
- The team leader begins the story by writing the initial sentence. This sentence will set the tone for the story, however as the story travels from participant to participant, it is expected to morph and develop. The initial sentence could begin something like: “Once upon a time there was a lonely bottle of mustard who was lost on a shelf in the grocery store” (in the event selling mustard was your charge).
- Without speaking, the team leader will slide the story to the next participant who must write a specific number of sentences that build upon the initial statement. Be sure you designate how many sentences each participant should write.
- The last person to contribute to the story arrives at a conclusion and passes the story to the team leader.
- Without showing anyone, the team leader makes enough copies of the story for each participant and distributes the completed story to each participant.
- The participants should read the story in its entirely and then arrive at a statement that describes the story.
- The team leader collects all of the statements and then the group reviews the statements in order to arrive at a creative slant or way to promote or sell the item.
Describe random items using out-of-the-box words and phrases in order to get the creative juices flowing. This brainstorming session may not specifically lead to answers on how to sell a particular item, but may serve as an ice breaker for a hard core brainstorming session to follow.
- Gather several household/random items such as a hat, spoon, mixing bowl, dust buster etc. Provide several envelopes, pieces of paper and pens for each participant.
- Set the items up on individual tables within a room. Allow for enough space between items and possibly try to match the same number of items you have as participants (for example, if you have 10 people in the brainstorming session, find 10 household/random items).
- Ask each participant to stand in front of one item with a piece of paper and a pen. Request that the participant study the item for a few minutes, taking in its features.
- Ask each participant or team to write down five adjectives that describe the item. Suggest that instead of thinking deeply about which adjectives would work best, to just write down words that quickly come to mind.
- Give participants a certain amount of time to write down their words and then ask everyone to move to a new item until everyone has describe each item in the room.
- Request that each participant or team place their piece(s) of paper in the envelope and place the envelope either in a hat or on the table. Mix up the envelopes.
- Invite a participant to randomly select one envelope. The group should study the word list and then have to find the item in the room that is being described.
Hold art class instead of a meeting. Hand out art smocks and easels with paper and paints/markers to each participant. Tell them to paint several images that come to mind when particular objects, words or anything else is shown to them.
- Tell each participant that artistic ability is not being judged. They are free to paint, draw, squiggle, doodle, etc., however they like, whatever comes to mind. In fact, they’re not to delay, as it’s their initial ideas that count most.
- At the end, pass the images around the group to gauge other people’s thoughts and to see what new inspiration arises as a result of the images team members have drawn or painted.

Edit Tips

Consider trying a brainstorming session that plays on the senses including touch and smell if you’re working with an item or product that plays mainly on the senses (such as food).
Music in the background can often aid creativity.
It’s helpful to have someone keep track of things as they evolve because ideas at any stage of the brainstorming can prove useful later on. Take photos, write notes and record your observations. These can later be uploaded to an internal wiki or intranet for people to view again and be re-inspired by what they see.

Edit Warnings

Even though you aren’t vocalizing ideas, never be critical or attack another person in writing or give someone a dirty look if you don’t like their idea. The notion of brainstorming is to be open to any ideas.

Edit Things You’ll Need

Items to facilitate the session, such as paper, pens, movies, etc.
A willingness to let things lead wherever they go

Edit Related wikiHows

Article Tools

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How books are born

admin — Thu, 17 May 2012 14:45:20 +0000

How books are born
Mariah Bear created an amusing infographic explaining the book proposal process. [via Mediabistro. Thanks, John Biggs]

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Science fiction mass-signing in Arlington on May 18 (tomorrow!)

admin — Thu, 17 May 2012 14:45:20 +0000

Science fiction mass-signing in Arlington on May 18 (tomorrow!)
James Morrow writes, “As part of the 2012 Nebula Awards Weekend, the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America will hold a mass autographing session at the Hyatt Regency Crystal City, 2799 Jefferson Davis Highway, Arlington, Virginia, on Friday May 18th from 5.30 pm to 7.30 pm. This event is free and open to the public. Books will be available for sale on site, but you can also bring your own and get them signed. Here’s the list of participating authors.”

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Video of cool undersea jelly blob

admin — Thu, 17 May 2012 14:45:19 +0000

Video of cool undersea jelly blob

[Video Link] Steve Haddock, a research scientist at the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (as well as a MAKE contributor, and co-author of a great book called Practical Computing for Biologists) just posted this video about a weird and wonderful jelly called the scyphomedusa Deepstaria.

If you like what you see here, visit Jellywatch, Steve’s citizen-science website about jellies.

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London cops want to suck your phone dry in an instant

admin — Thu, 17 May 2012 14:45:18 +0000

London cops want to suck your phone dry in an instant

The Met, London’s police force, is buying “mobile device data extraction” devices that can suck all the data out of your phone “in minutes” — that’s where you’ve been, who you know, what you’ve said to them, what websites you visit, and, depending on your apps, what groceries you buy, when you’ve called for a cab, what your menstrual cycle is, what you eat, your passwords, and so on.

This is the police force that routinely DNA-swabbed suspects and refused to destroy the samples even after they were exonerated, despite being ordered to after a European high court ruling to the effect that this was illegal.

Does anyone know what technology they’re buying, and what its limits are? I’d be interested in knowing if, for example, it is effective against the built-in Android mass storage encryption.

“When a suspect is arrested and found with a mobile phone that we suspect may have been used in crime, traditionally we submit it to our digital forensic laboratory for analysis.”

Kavanagh said the new system located within the boroughs themselves will enable “trained officers to examine devices and gives immediate access to the data in that handset”.

He said: “Our ability to act on forensically-sound, time-critical information, from SMS to images contained on a device quickly gives us an advantage in combating crime, notably in terms of identifying people of interest quickly and progressing cases more efficiently.”

Met Police uses ‘quick’ mobile data extraction system against suspects

(via /.)

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Energy is more than sources; energy is systems

admin — Thu, 17 May 2012 14:45:17 +0000

Energy is more than sources; energy is systems

When we talk about energy, we often talk about it in very disconnected ways. By that, I mean we talk about new renewable generation projects, we talk about cleaning up dirty old power plants, and we talk about personal decisions you and I can make to use less energy, or get more benefits from the same amount.

What we fail to talk about is how all those ideas fit together into a coherent whole. And that matters, because our energy problems (and our energy solutions) are about more than just swapping sources of power or making individual choices. We have to fix the systems, not just the symptoms.

Back in April, I got to go on Minnesota Public Radio’s “Bright Ideas” to talk about my book, Before the Lights Go Out. Now MPR has the entire hour-long interview up on video. You can watch the whole thing if you want. But, if you’re short on time, I’d recommend the stretch from about minute 8:30 to 10:50. That’s where I explain in more detail why systems—infrastructures—are so important and why we can’t solve our energy problems without focusing on how choices and sources fit into those larger issues.

Watch that clip, then read this Minneapolis Star-Tribune article about how investments in transportation-oriented bicycle infrastructure have changed the way Minneapolites think about biking and dramatically increased the number of people who choose to bike. I think you’ll see some thematic connections.

Learn more about how our energy infrastructures shape our choices and our lives by reading Before the Lights Go Out.

Video Link

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Please insert your Sir Mix-a-Lot joke here

admin — Thu, 17 May 2012 14:45:05 +0000

Please insert your Sir Mix-a-Lot joke here
Humans’ have exceptionally rounded rear ends compared to our primate relatives. Turns out, that beefed-up gluteus maximus helps stabilize our upper body when we run, keeping us from falling forward. Read more about the biology and theoretical evolution of running at the Harvard Gazette. (Via Nicholas Thompson)

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