The New York Times is running this photo comparison on its front page today:
On a related note, Slactivist had this to say.
Monthly Archives: August 2006
Dept. of things we’d forgotten
Our favorite novel was up for the National Book Award in 1961. That part we know. What we forgot was that its competition was two other favorites: Catch-22 and The Moviegoer.
Good year for books, eh?
It’s like watching grass grow, but less exciting
BoingBoing points us to the Pitch Drop Experiment, which began in 1927.
The first Professor of Physics at the University of Queensland, Professor Thomas Parnell, began an experiment in 1927 to illustrate that everyday materials can exhibit quite surprising properties. The experiment demonstrates the fluidity and high viscosity of pitch, a derivative of tar once used for waterproofing boats. At room temperature pitch feels solid – even brittle – and can easily be shattered with a blow from a hammer (see the video clip below). It’s quite amazing then, to see that pitch at room temperature is actually fluid!
In 1927 Professor Parnell heated a sample of pitch and poured it into a glass funnel with a sealed stem. Three years were allowed for the pitch to settle, and in 1930 the sealed stem was cut. From that date on the pitch has slowly dripped out of the funnel – so slowly that now, 72 years later, the eighth drop is only just about to fall.
The next drop should come by winter.
At last, safe Heathen browsing from work!
Uptight boss? Still need to read Heathen to get through the day? WorkFriendly has just the thing!
Dept. of Twisted and Weird Stick Cartoons
Go watch.
Mostly, we think they’re just unclear on the concept
Some of the folks upset about the Flying Spaghetti Monster on religious grounds seem to be missing more or less the entire point of the religion which they purportedly follow. Our favorite follows; all spelling, punctuation, and capitalization is original, but we couldn’t resist adding a bit of emphasis:
I CANT FUCKING BELIEVE THAT ANYONE WOULD EVER BUY THIS LOAD OF HORSEHIT YOUR TRYING TO PASS OFF AS A RELIGION YOU GODDAMN FAGGOT – WHY DONT YOU LET JESUS INTO YOUR HEART YOU SON OF A WHORE AND STOP DOING SATANS WORK WITH YOUR RETARTED FAKE RELIGION. I CANT BELEVE PEOPLE LIKE YOU EVEN EXIST AT ALL HAVE FUN GOING TO HELL (AN ETERNAL LAKE OF FIRE IN CASE YOU FORGOT). YOU WANT PROOF THAT JESUS EXISTS? HOW ABOUT THE FACT HE HASN’T KILLED YOU FOR ALL THE FUCKED UP THINGS YOU SAY AND FOR BEING A LIBERAL COCKSUCKER
Dept. of Fine Music Videos
The New York Dolls implore you to Dance Like a Monkey in this fantastic and topical song. It’s got monkeys in it. And Dick Cheney.
Ew.
No surprises here
WORST EVER SECURITY FLAW FOUND IN DIEBOLD TS VOTING MACHINE:
“This may be the worst security flaw we have seen in touch screen voting machines,” says Open Voting Foundation president, Alan Dechert. Upon examining the inner workings of one of the most popular paperless touch screen voting machines used in public elections in the United States, it has been determined that with the flip of a single switch inside, the machine can behave in a completely different manner compared to the tested and certified version.
“Diebold has made the testing and certification process practically irrelevant,” according to Dechert. “If you have access to these machines and you want to rig an election, anything is possible with the Diebold TS — and it could be done without leaving a trace. All you need is a screwdriver.” This model does not produce a voter verified paper trail so there is no way to check if the voter’s choices are accurately reflected in the tabulation.
Citizen concerns about Diebold’s machines have been common knowledge now for years. At this point, we must admit that either Diebold is the most absurdly incompetent firm ever, or that they’re deliberately making easily hackable machines for some nefarious purpose.