Flutterby™! From 2016-03-01 to 2016-03-30

Happy Bissextus! http://dictionary.reference.co...ordoftheday/2016/02/29/bissextus

If you are a square dancing and Perl nerd, I'm trying to use SD to augment my choreography on a tablet https://github.com/danlyke/square_dance_tools

[ related topics: Interactive Drama Perl Open Source hubris ]

Pylotron: ESP8266 Multiplayer First Person Shooter (YouTube video).

The ESP 8266 is a little microcontroller-ish thing that was originally set up as a way to add WiFi to embedded devices, but has enough CPU to do other interfacing. In this case it's using VNC to render a 3d game...

Via @Brainwagon

[ related topics: Games Movies Robotics Law Graphics Embedded Devices Video ]

PLOS One: Likelihood of Null Effects of Large NHLBI Clinical Trials Has Increased over Time

17 of 30 studies (57%) published prior to 2000 showed a significant benefit of intervention on the primary outcome in comparison to only 2 among the 25 (8%) trials published after 2000 (χ2=12.2,df= 1, p=0.0005). There has been no change in the proportion of trials that compared treatment to placebo versus active comparator. Industry co-sponsorship was unrelated to the probability of reporting a significant benefit. Pre-registration in clinical trials.gov was strongly associated with the trend toward null findings.

Or: When you start asking researchers to pre-register their trials, it becomes way harder to cherry pick only the good results.

So I was going to snark about paying for Facebook ads but not for proof readers, but then I went to this person's page, and clicked through to their Amazon reviews, and... felt vaguely disquieted about pointing and laughing. Instead I just felt kind of sad.

And as I sat here and let this stew, I also wondered: Why is "soldier" the strong metaphor in this person's expression of Christianity?

[ related topics: Religion Photography ]

On the one hand, I'm miffed at Signal for SMS delivery issues in St. Croix, on the other hand: Desktop! https://whispersystems.org/blog/signal-desktop/?ref=2914349

[ related topics: Weblogs ]

Here's an interesting development: Cloudflare: 400Gbps: Winter of Whopping Weekend DDoS Attacks:

... These new attacks are interesting for a couple of reasons. First, the spikes align with the weekends. It seems the attackers are busy with something else during the week. Second, they are targeting a couple of fairly benign websites—this demonstrates that anybody can become the target of a large attack. Third, the overall volume of the attack is enormous.

Interesting because once again we're back to a broadcast model with the web. We're back to the "content flows from centralized servers" state of data, and going that direction in ever stronger ways.

[ related topics: Weblogs Invention and Design Dan and Todd's Bandwidth Bet ]

"Day of Cyber"? That's dedication. Most people when they cyber just rub one out in a chat room... https://twitter.com/violetblue/status/705539939291672576

RT Nick Jacques ‏@RealNickJacques:

"A full-stack developer is one who can add technical debt to any layer of the application" -My coworker

User Chris2048 on Hacker News:

"We hire only the best"

"What do you pay?"

"Market Rate."

[ related topics: Current Events Economics ]

Put aside because I want to do a closer read: The Opposite of Rape Culture is Nurturance Culture starts out as a discussion of male and female roles and then dives into attachment theory.

[ related topics: Sociology California Culture Community ]

For when I break out the facial recognition stuff again, a big ol' collection of faces to train such systems on: http://www.face-rec.org/databases/

[ related topics: Databases ]

Realization: quad-copters only became "drones" when they enabled individuals to surveill in the same way government fixed-wing drones did.

[ related topics: moron Aviation - Helicopters ]

Ars Technica: San Bernardino DA says seized iPhone may hold “dormant cyber pathogen”: He says iPhone might be "a weapon" to trigger some nefarious worm of some sort.

Yep. These are our elected officials, making law enforcement decisions.

RT Nick Johnston ‏@NickInfoSec:

Maybe it's good the phone is locked. It means the cyber pathogen is quarantined. All the more reason to not unlock it.

RT matt blaze ‏@mattblaze:

Cyber pathogens are so unspeakably dangerous that the open research community has wisely never published a single paper about them.

And, summing up this whole Apple vs FBI thing: RT Jonathan Ździarski ‏@JZdziarski:

Imagine the FBI had a witness, then they took that witness and shot them in the head. Then blamed the medical examiner. That’s #FBIvsApple.

[ related topics: Apple Computer virus Law Enforcement Community Guns iPhone ]

RT Clayton Cubitt ‏@claytoncubitt:

Liberals who think mocking Trump will beat him also don't understand pro wrestling, monster truck rallies, and prosperity gospel.

The thing is... Looking back at the various analyses of Clinton vs Obama, we see that Clinton was very clearly taking the authoritarian track back in 2008. Sanders is taking the anti-establishment track.

Trump has managed to co-opt both of those constituencies.

[ related topics: Politics Machinery ]

For watching with Charlene: Sacramento Bee on water catchment, including a lot of stuff on doing it via mulch basins and landscaping design.

[ related topics: Current Events California Culture Graphic Design ]

So many of you will have seen this article about a woman who came into an unnamed hospital and said she had "..a GPS tracking device implanted in her side." Turns out she actually had an embedded RFID chip. Which brings us to 2 conclusions:

1. We need to make it very very clear to everyone right now that there is currently no implantable "GPS tracking device". The RFID chip is readable only from short distances, and it's hard to imagine that this had any application other than intimidation. Which brings us to:
2. We need to legalize prostitution, so that victims like this feel safe coming forward faster, and so that they can feel safe going to law enforcement. The fewer tools to intimidate and coerce people, the more likely they are to seek help.

http://www.marketplace.org/201...-takes-fight-against-trafficking

[ related topics: Sexual Culture Health Robotics Bay Area Law Enforcement Embedded Devices Maps and Mapping RFID ]

Ya know, I might use a "luber" ride sharing service... [Cough] https://twitter.com/DavesBlend/status/705754715527643137

I'm not saying "responsive design" should be a thing, but this was with my default desktop browser size...

[ related topics: Photography Graphic Design ]

Pleasant morning in the pool helping Charlene do SCUBA practice, oblivious to the rain.

If I lie to a judge, it's perjury. If a DA lies to a judge it's in service of a good cause... http://arstechnica.com/tech-po...ogen-san-bernardino-da-wont-say/

[ related topics: Interactive Drama Law ]

BBC: Peanut allergy theory backed up by new research:

In 2015, a study claimed early exposure to peanut products could cut the risk of allergy by 80%.

Now researchers say "long-lasting" allergy protection can be sustained - even when the snacks are later avoided for a year.

Eat those peanuts, address those food allergies, early.

[ related topics: Health Invention and Design Food Current Events Monty Python ]

New York Times: The Real Reason College Costs So Much:

In fact, public investment in higher education in America is vastly larger today, in inflation-adjusted dollars, than it was during the supposed golden age of public funding in the 1960s. Such spending has increased at a much faster rate than government spending in general. For example, the military’s budget is about 1.8 times higher today than it was in 1960, while legislative appropriations to higher education are more than 10 times higher.

Yeah, it's being spent on administration, and it's not due to a lack of government funding.

[ related topics: Invention and Design moron Education New York Economics ]

Clickbait headlines: Promised 10", given 7"...

[ related topics: Photography ]

USPS: Does a virtual PO Box Service appeal?

I hope to never move again, so I'm not the target audience, but this seems like a very 1980s or 1990s idea: Payments nowadays are largely online, especially those not related to a physical address. Subscriptions are online. Delivery is via whatever delivery service works best for the vendor in question at the time in question, which usually means some sort of other addressing scheme that may or may not get passed off to the US Post Office for the last mile.

[ related topics: Weblogs ]

The whole family together on the morning we left at Mt Victory on St Croix

[ related topics: Photography Sociology ]

Today's Perl and I'm delicately refraining from clobbering someone: if ($foo =~ /^\Q$bar\E$/) {...}

[ related topics: Interactive Drama Perl Open Source hubris ]

Wait, an influential theory in the discipline championed by Freud and Jung may be bunk? I'm *shocked* http://www.slate.com/articles/...nked.html?wpsrc=sh_all_dt_tw_top

[ related topics: Psychology, Psychiatry and Personality Health ]

I'm pretty flexible, but I think that at a gas station "No smoking" applies to both joints and cigarettes.

[ related topics: Drugs ]

Tossed this in here because I googled for it when someone on Facebook posted a receipt for childbirth from 1943. That's an even amazingly better improvement than I expected. A

... And in 1943 the mortality rate for infants was 4144.5 per 100,000 http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/vsus/vsus_1945_1.pdf , in 2013 it was 596.1 per 100,000 http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr65/nvsr65_02.pdf

Also notable: The modern death rate per 100k in the general is 821.5. In 1900 it was 17.2 per thousand or 17,200 per 100k, looks like '43 was about 10.6 per 1,000, with women in the high single digits per thousand, men higher, some of that difference being accounted for by war deaths.

So our death rate per hundred thousand is down over an order of magnitude vs a century ago.

[ related topics: History ]

For International Women's Day, I would like to honor @randileeharper without whom we wouldn't have (useful) Twitter.

We need stronger do not call legislation: "research" companies with bogus caller id data calling my cell phone

[ related topics: Wireless ]

It Took a FOIA Lawsuit to Uncover How the Obama Administration Killed FOIA Reform.

On how "the most transparent administration in history" has been trying hard to suppress efforts at transparency by fighting against the Freedom of Information Act.

[ related topics: Privacy Current Events Civil Liberties Government ]

Noticing more non-technical users with Post-it notes over their device cameras: Can we start getting hard mic & camera switches?

[ related topics: Photography ]

This whole Twitter thread on the excesses of interior design and over-funded companies...

[ related topics: Graphic Design ]

If you can measure problems in the economy by the number of old RVs parked in this office park, we're in a down-turn.

[ related topics: Interactive Drama Economics ]

I realize technologies that exist are in need of use, but my phone interrupting me with flood warnings does not make it more useful.

The headline seems particularly crafted to put off medical professionals, but Mosaic Science: You can train your body into thinking it’s had medicine talks about (successful) efforts to harness Pavlovian conditioning and placebo and auto-immune response to get the same impacts with lower drug doses.

[ related topics: Health Machinery Trains ]

If a company could be using hardware from a year or two in the future, would they? Because that's basically C++ vs anything else.

[ related topics: Interactive Drama ]

Danny Sullivan: RIP Google PageRank score: A retrospective on how it ruined the web.

After an easy breach, hackers leave “TIPS WHEN RUNNING A SECURITY COMPANY”: DDoS protection firm Staminus apparently stored customers' credit card data in the clear.

[ related topics: Sports ]

Why display rounding can get you in trouble:

$ perl -le 'print (125.85/41.95); print int(125.85/41.95);'

3

2

$ python
    Python 2.7.5 (default, Nov 20 2015, 02:00:19) 
    [GCC 4.8.5 20150623 (Red Hat 4.8.5-4)] on linux2
    Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
    >>> print (125.85/41.95)
    3.0
    >>> print int(125.85/41.95)
    2

[ related topics: Perl Open Source hubris ]

Great graphic example of the relative space occupied by parking cars vs bikes: Washington DC: Car crashes, lands on top of bikes in front of the Shrimp Boat

[ related topics: Space & Astronomy Current Events Automobiles Boats Machinery Bicycling ]

DOJ misleads the court on CALEA in the Apple case: http://cyberlaw.stanford.edu/b...-misleads-court-calea-apple-case

[ related topics: Apple Computer Weblogs Law Education ]

We need an idiom thesaurus companion to Urban Dictionary...

This, right here, is why I roll my eyes at people who think metric is good because base 10 https://twitter.com/fun_fifth/status/708265407069757440

The thing about square dance definitions is that "Spread" alphabetizes under "Anything and ...". Found it now, though...

How come a watched pot never boils, but unwatched pancakes burn in a heartbeat?

[ related topics: Movies ]

Okay, those of you who were wanting to video chat with me, Skype is working and I'm available today...

[ related topics: Work, productivity and environment Video ]

Virus warning a friend is trying to assess, is totally a use case for one-time USB sticks...

[ related topics: virus Law ]

Getting my CNC router debugged and running. Way more exciting when a reboot unexpectedly moves things than when I was building printers.

[ related topics: Sports Woodworking ]

Another great night calling for the Vallejo Pioneers. Sight called, with flow, most of the night. Martinez Swingers on Wednesday...

[ related topics: Sexual Culture ]

Okay, I realize that, historically it's the Bellamy salute, and the Nazis just appropriated it from the socialist who first introduced the Pledge of Allegiance and the American flag into United States classrooms, but can we re-brand this as the Trump salute now?

Norwegian mass killer Breivik makes Nazi salute at start of court case in Norway.

[ related topics: Law Current Events ]

RT @daveaitel:

The FBI has decided the War on Drugs is too winnable and has decided to start a War on Math as a second front.

[ related topics: Drugs Health History Law Enforcement Mathematics ]

A couple of TED and TEDx talks cued up for reading at home:

• How to sound smart in your TEDx Talk | Will Stephen | TEDxNewYork
• Casey Gerald: The gospel of doubt
• Is your stuff stopping you? | Elizabeth Dulemba | TEDxUniversityofEdinburgh

[ related topics: Movies ]

NPR: Forget About It: Your Middle- Aged Brain Is Not On The Decline.

Faced with her own forgetfulness, former NPR correspondent and author Barbara Bradley Hagerty tried to do something about it. She's written about her efforts in her book on midlife, called Life Reimagined. To her surprise, she discovered that an older dog can learn new tricks.

[ related topics: Books Content Management Invention and Design Dogs ]

Listened to Rubio's concession speech. He used a lot of words to say, essentially, "allahu akbar".

RT mkb ‏@mojinations:

"The number of people predicting the death of Moore's law doubles every two years."

— Peter Lee, Microsoft Research

[ related topics: Humor Microsoft moron ]

Square dance caller and music producer Wade Driver has a new blog where he talks about square dancing and music production: https://imohopcom.wordpress.com/

[ related topics: Music Weblogs Invention and Design Theater & Plays Work, productivity and environment ]

Most of the drivers that Google maps takes travel data in congested conditions from must be passing on the shoulder...

[ related topics: Maps and Mapping ]

For all of the snark I throw at newspapers, the answer is: Yes they do: http://researchbuzz.me/2016/03...rchives-need-a-dead-mans-switch/

[ related topics: Journalism and Media Archival ]

This is why open office plans or cubicles combined with headphones is such an amazingly bad idea: RT Ray Hammond @hammondfuturist:

Simple test: if you can listen to background music while you're doing it, your job will be lost to tech. pic.twitter.com/xktOzp6f8c

[ related topics: Hardware Hackery Interactive Drama Music Robotics Heinlein Embedded Devices ]

RT Mona Eltahawy ‏@monaeltahawy:

"the whole concept of “modesty” doesn’t just fail to protect women—it’s actively harmful" http://www.theestablishment.co...ne-freaks-out-over-nude-selfies/ … via @ESTBLSHMNT

The Real Reason Everyone Freaked Out Over Kim Kardashian’s Nude Selfie

[ related topics: Erotic Sexual Culture Nudity ]

RT Mona Eltahawy ‏@monaeltahawy:

"the whole concept of “modesty” doesn’t just fail to protect women—it’s actively harmful" http://www.theestablishment.co...ne-freaks-out-over-nude-selfies/ via @ESTBLSHMNT

The Real Reason Everyone Freaked Out Over Kim Kardashian’s Nude Selfie

[ related topics: Erotic Sexual Culture Nudity ]

I have been wondering where the internet went, and I think I've started seeing glimmers again, on various private spaces in Slack, Rocket.Chat, Telegram, and the like. Today's gem:

(The fun thing about the ju-c-air is that it registeres as a 6 axis game controller, and you can actually play Elite:Dangerous with your cock. Keeping your hardon is the biggest challenge though)

[ related topics: Games Space & Astronomy Net Culture ]

Eric Boutilier-Brown's photography at http://www.evolvingbeauty.com/ was once of regular note on Flutterby. He recently emailed around Kickstarter: Evolving Beauty 2016 Ingrid Portfolio

[ related topics: Photography Erotic ]

More reason to use Open Source: U.S. government has been using FISA courts to gain access to source code http://www.zdnet.com/article/u...-firms-to-hand-over-source-code/

[ related topics: Free Software Open Source moron ]

Denver Police Caught Misusing Databases Got Light Punishments, Report Says

Denver Office of the Independent Monitor Final Report 2015 (PDF). The incidents mentioned in the article are on pages 17 and 18.

The NYT article also mentions database abuse incidents in New York City and Hartford, CT.

[ related topics: Invention and Design Law Enforcement New York Databases ]

Run today: Stopped because of construction, checked my times, was super excited, then saw the gps errors. https://www.strava.com/activities/520345532

[ related topics: Machinery Fabrication Maps and Mapping Model Building Woodworking ]

What's the modern equivalent of a VCR blinking 12:00? FM radio? Still running Windows XP? Running Windows 10?

[ related topics: Microsoft Sports ]

In Twenty-fucking-sixteen. Microsoft alienates women with scantily clad 'schoolgirl' dancers at official party.

[ related topics: Humor Microsoft moron ]

Kind of terrifying to press start with the router bit spinning, and I have things to learn about cut paths... https://youtu.be/eqxY-MWSPew

[ related topics: Woodworking ]

Is are children learning?

[ related topics: Children and growing up Photography Education ]

Got the CNC router cutting, spent the afternoon in the pool working with Charlene on SCUBA, got pitched on a cool startup. Good day.

[ related topics: Work, productivity and environment Woodworking ]

Face2Face: Real-time Face Capture and Reenactment of RGB Videos (CVPR 2016 Oral) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ohmajJTcpNk&feature=youtu.be

[ related topics: Movies ]

Oh, well played, Anonymous... http://anonhq.com/anonymous-ju...donald-trump-secret-service-fbi/

[ related topics: Law Enforcement ]

It's Monday night. I'll be calling for the Vallejo Pioneers, 7:30 at the First Baptist Church, mixed Mainstream class and Plus.

[ related topics: Religion ]

If you're like me, you've probably watched the opening to some episode or another of Comedians In Cars Getting Coffee, and then said "yeah, I don't have time to watch this right now", and then it's fallen by the wayside...

Well, one you will watch all the way through: Comedians Sitting On Vibrators Getting Coffee.

[ related topics: Interactive Drama Erotic Sexual Culture Movies ]

Washington Post: Wonkblog: Why smart people are better off with fewer friends:

First, they find that people who live in more densely populated areas tend to report less satisfaction with their life overall. "The higher the population density of the immediate environment, the less happy" the survey respondents said they were. Second, they find that the more social interactions with close friends a person has, the greater their self-reported happiness.

But there was one big exception. For more intelligent people, these correlations were diminished or even reversed.

[ related topics: Nature and environment Theater & Plays Current Events ]

I don't mind when code comments are wrong, but when the institutional knowledge of experience is completely bogus...

Nothing in here you don't already know, but it's worth the reminder: Dan Baum in Harpers: Legalize It All: How to win the war on drugs:

At the time, I was writing a book about the politics of drug prohibition. I started to ask Ehrlichman a series of earnest, wonky questions that he impatiently waved away. “You want to know what this was really all about?” he asked with the bluntness of a man who, after public disgrace and a stretch in federal prison, had little left to protect. “The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. You understand what I’m saying? We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.”

[ related topics: Drugs Politics Books Health History Writing Current Events Community Race Real Estate ]

Added the Sysadmin's Coat Of Arms to my laptop...

[ related topics: Photography Net Culture ]

If you can watch it with sound, it's worth clicking through for the short video: RT Andy Kelly ‏@ultrabrilliant:

Koyaanisqatsi isn't quite as haunting if you replace Philip Glass with the music from the Wii Shop Channel.

[ related topics: Interactive Drama Music Movies Video ]

Friend suggested that the quality of code in NPM may be worse than all other repos. CPAN authors, step up your game!

[ related topics: Games Perl ]

Imagine if your newspaper was bloated to a coffee table book that might spontaneously combust. That's what web advertising has become.

[ related topics: Interactive Drama Books Consumerism and advertising Journalism and Media Furniture ]

RT Tyler Hendrix ‏@TylerHendrix:

trying out a new fetish but I don't know the etiquette

I feel like I'm getting off on the wrong foot

Hat tip to @EccentricFlower

[ related topics: Invention and Design ]

It's easy to throw stones at professional certification organizations, but... oh, who am I kidding, there is no "but". Certs are bullshit and the organizations that administer them are... well... In this case spreading ransomware:

• http://blog.fox-it.com/2016/03...n-provider-spreading-ransomware/
• http://arstechnica.com/securit...ght-spreading-crypto-ransomware/

[ related topics: Weblogs Ethics Law Cryptography ]

It's hot air balloon season in Sonoma County again

[ related topics: Photography ]

Separate bathrooms for Senators is a move I could get behind: RT Stephanie Skora ‏@Stephanie_Skora:

Time to remind folks that there have been more US Senators arrested for sexual misconduct in bathrooms than trans people #NorthCarolina

[ related topics: Erotic Sexual Culture ]

RT Rob N ★ ‏@robn:

IBM: Chess AI

Google: Go AI

Microsoft: 4chan AI

(This is about Microsoft deletes 'teen girl' AI after it became a Hitler-loving sex robot within 24 hours. Chatbots are dangerous technology...)

[ related topics: Humor Erotic Sexual Culture Microsoft Robotics moron Pop Culture Artificial Intelligence Dictators ]

Okay, I both think the rumors of the Ted Cruz adultery thing are way too early to be anything, and, as Eλf Sternberg ‏@elfsternberg tweeted:

Meanwhile, #polyamory folk are over here, arms crossed, going, "The rest of y'all is fucked up over this #CruzSexScandal thing."

But.... the snark! The snark!

RT Ray Radlein ‏@Radlein:

Listen, what Ted Cruz does with his ovipositor in the privacy of his murder cave is really none of the public's business

RT John Fugelsang ‏@JohnFugelsang:

Oh yeah well I heard Ted Cruz had a threeway with Irony & Karma. #CruzSexScandal

RT John Fugelsang ‏@JohnFugelsang:

I hear chlamydia is terrified of catching Ted Cruz. #CruzSexScandal

RT Bunny ‏@twocrazybunnies:

They're calling it the Cuban Mistress Crisis. I can't stop laughing.  #CruzSexScandal

[ related topics: Privacy Sexual Culture ]

A slow Tomales bakery ride this morning, down to Aqus for a juggling gathering this afternoon https://www.strava.com/activities/527520220

[ related topics: Clowns ]

At the Aqus juggling event

[ related topics: Clowns ]

Trying again

[ related topics: Photography ]

Nope

[ related topics: Photography ]

Elf Sternberg has some good thoughts on public transit funding and rural v urban government revenue http://elfs.livejournal.com/1598407.html

[ related topics: tolkien moron Public Transportation ]

Copied from a Facebook meme response:

Terrence Masson and Jimbo Hillin are doing tIhe "12 favorite movies" meme, and I got tagged. I'm not sure I can get to 12 (there's a reason I left the film biz, and movies have gotten less important to me since then), but I'll try:

Before Sunrise, Before Sunset, Before Midnight - leading the list, I'll take all 3 as one film. "Before Sunrise" is the best twenty something romance ever put to film, "Before Sunset" the best thirty something film, and "Before Midnight" has uncomfortable laughs and maybe hits too close to home on some things but takes those characters into their forties in a believable insightful way.

Top Secret! - every top movies list needs at least one Zucker, Abrahams and Zucker film. I actually prefer this one to Airplane.

Real Genius - because sometimes ya need a good geek fantasy.

Boyhood - going back serious again, this was two hours of watching kids I knew grow up, in ways that hit me right in the feels in so many ways.

Star Wars (A New Hope) - if you can see it at 9 years old, and not get caught up into deconstructing Campbell's myth structure and comparing that to other theorists. I think that "The Force Awakens" managed to capture some of that same thrilling ride, only at this point we've become used to the special effects, and I'm old enough to start asking questions about the economy of the empire and... it all goes to hell.

Blazing Saddles - Mel Brooks at his prime is a genius, this one's eminently quotable, and it's got some really insightful cultural critique going on.

Kiss Kiss Bang Bang - okay, yeah, I've got 3 Val Kilmer movies on here. So be it.

Toy Story - I didn't work on it, my Pixar credits are the next two. Because I worked on the tie-in games, including watching clips over and over again while tuning codecs, I have experienced some of the characters to death (Hamm, particularly). However, this was a huge cusp in film, and a great movie. Both an *important* film because of the inflection point in technology, and a fun one.

Mononoke Hime (Princess Mononoki) - I have loved various animated films, this one was visually amazing, but also disturbing (in a good way) in a deep visceral sense. It's one of those films where I still have a direct reaction to hearing snippets of the soundtrack, and it has conflicting characters, but not necessarily villains.

The Incredibles - you can take any set of Bond films, any set of superhero films, and this just gets them all.

Princess Bride - yes.

Casablanca - I don't think it's a great film, but it is a decent film from a day when films were slapped out super quickly, and is so useful for examining both the visual and story structure of film.

There's 12. I'm not one for social obligation, so feel free to self-tag.

[ related topics: Pixar Children and growing up Interactive Drama Star Wars Erotic Games Animation Movies Invention and Design Aviation History Space & Astronomy Sociology Work, productivity and environment Graphics Marketing Economics Aviation - Helicopters ]

Couldn't find my cycling shorts, so my 43 miles first time on the road bike since fall was in regular shorts w/cotton underwear. Mistake.

[ related topics: Sports Clothing Pedal Power Bicycling ]

Dang. The Inkscape gcodetools plugin doesn't deal with gradients along paths correctly. Which makes carving with a V bit harder.

Washington Post: The Switch: Mass surveillance silences minority opinions, according to study.

The study is Under Surveillance: Examining Facebook’s Spiral of Silence Effects in the Wake of NSA Internet Monitoring (PDF).

Normatively, these results provide important considerations for policymakers as they seek to renew, revise, and draft additional provisions that continue to allow bulk online data collection and mass surveillance practices. Interestingly, the participants in this study who were the most susceptible to conformist behavior were those who supported these controversial surveillance policies. These individuals expressed that surveillance was necessary for maintaining national security and they have nothing to hide. However, when these individuals perceive they are being monitored, they readily conform their behavior—expressing opinions when they are in the majority, and suppressing them when they’re not. Similar to Dinev et al.’s (2008) results, those holding the dominant opinion eagerly volunteered their ideas (over 6 on a 7-point scale), but the “nothing to hide” group seemed to experience some degree of dissonance when their views were in the minority, as they were inclined to “hide” them.

[ related topics: Current Events Net Culture ]

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[ related topics: Drugs Current Events Journalism and Media California Culture Currency Dogs Economics ]

The business park street names are mostly space related, but we wonder about the wisdom of one of them...

[ related topics: Photography Space & Astronomy ]

And some nights it all just flows. Very fun calling square dance for Vallejo Pioneers tonight!

Subject line from PayPal email: "Hi Daniel, where's your favorite place to eat out?" ... uh ... I ... hmmm ... sooooo ...

[ related topics: Food ]

Your cyberpunk future has totally arrived: SNES Code Injection -- Flappy Bird in Super Mario World (YouTube video).

Using a series of glitches in Super Mario World to, by hand, do a code injection attack which reprograms Super Mario World into Flappy Bird. This has been done with automated controllers before, but not manually...

[ related topics: Movies Birds Video ]

In Syria, militias armed by the Pentagon fight those armed by the CIA. The article calls this an "unintented conflict", but, no, I think this is pretty much exactly what you get when you have two institutions trying like hell to justify outsized budgets.

Speaking of your dystopian cyberpunk future: In Pod-Based Community Living, Rent Is Cheap, But Sex Is Banned. The hostel meets coworking space.

At least in China, company dorms have some minor notion of job security...

[ related topics: Erotic Sexual Culture Space & Astronomy Heinlein Community ]

Okay, I don't say this about video very often, but this is worth watching all 10 minutes: Smarter Every Date looks at some 3d printed magnet technology that allows building rotational latches and marble tracks on flat surfaces and more (YouTube).

The company is Polymagnet.

[ related topics: Movies Graphics Video ]

At ARBA meet-up. If you thought QR codes were a terrifying infection vector, AR is gonna amaze you...

[ related topics: Interactive Drama Graphics Mathematics ]

Vulpar is doing maritime data overlays. I know a couple of people who want this for navigating the northern bay.

[ related topics: California Culture ]

Whoah: Some sort of POSIX shim layer that apparently allows you to put Ubuntu on top of the Windows 10 kernel? This is mind-blowing if it's true (A little too close to April 1 for me to believe everything...): Developers can run Bash Shell and user-mode Ubuntu Linux binaries on Windows 10

[ related topics: Free Software Interactive Drama Weblogs Microsoft Open Source ]