I love the Lego wigs used in this Elroy Klee campaign for Mindplay. They've got the perfect mix of impracticality and strikingness to qualify as gen-you-wine coo-choore.
[Video Link] Here's how The Listserve works: you subscribe to the mailing list (13,667 people are subscribers so far). Once a day, a subscriber is chosen at random to share a self-written essay with the other subscribers. I've been a member for a couple of weeks and every essay has been worth reading. I've received recipes, advice for being happier, information about keeping bees, business-starting tips, and more.
Here's a recent essay:
When I turned twenty I had reached a point where my earthly possessions could be summarized as the clothes I was wearing, an old bag containing some more clothes, a few science-fiction books, and my guitar. No money, no place to live, just a bunch of friends who helped me out of the streets and put me back on my feet.
Ending up in such a pit you first feel anger, then sorrow, then you make fun of it because that is the only way to make it bearable, and then you can go forward. It took me three more years to be able to shop for food without having to count change in my pockets.
Twenty years later I gave the books away but I still keep the old bag as a memory and my guitar is now standing in the living-room where I occasionally use it to sing for my kids.
Life has been a tough ride so far, but at least I know how to live without being bothered by simple objects. I know the only things you can count on are:
- What is inside you: your skills, your knowledge
- Good friends, and other people you love
Be generous and help somebody today get out of poverty. We all deserve a future.
Eric Valli spent 3 years taking photos of people in the United States who have "decided to live light on the earth." The photographs are terrific. It looks like Valli spent time with two clans: a frontier/settler type group, and another group that look almost like cave people. I wish he had included more information about them!
On a whim in 1962, British newspaper editor Brendon Grimshaw bought the tiny deserted Moyenne Island in the Seychelles for £8,000. In 1972 he moved to the island and has remained its caretaker ever since. Now 86 years old (and yet remarkably spry and fit), Grimshaw has planted 16,000 trees and reintroduced giant tortoises to the island (see this BBC clip on Grimshaw). Developers have reportedly offered him $50 million dollars or more for the island, but he has always refused to sell. The island is now a national park.
Courtesy of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, a list of "things that government officials could do to an American citizen and still claim later that they didn't know they were "torturing" that citizen."
Prolonged isolation;
Deprivation of light;
Exposure to prolonged periods of light and/or darkness;
Extreme variations in temperature;
Sleep adjustment;
Threats of severe physical abuse;
Death threats;
Administration of psychotropic drugs;
Shackling and manacling for hours at a time;
Use of "stress" positions;
Noxious fumes that caused pain to eyes and nose;
Withholding of any mattress, pillow, sheet or blanket;
Forced grooming;
Suspension of showers;
Removal of religious items;
Constant surveillance;
Incommunicado detention, including denial of all contact with family and legal counsel for a 21-month period;
Interference with religious observance; and
Denial of medical care for serious and potentially life-threatening ailments, including chest pain and difficulty breathing, as well as for treatment of the chronic, extreme pain caused by being forced to endure stress positions, resulting in severe and continuing mental and physical harm, pain, and profound disruption of the senses and personality.
Lowering the Bar explains:
The legal issue was whether John Yoo should be entitled to "qualified immunity" in a case brought by Jose Padilla, a U.S. citizen detained as an "enemy combatant." "Qualified immunity" is a doctrine that bars claims against government officials if, at the time they acted, it was not "sufficiently clear that every reasonable official would have understood that what he or she was doing violated the plaintiff's rights." The idea is to try to preserve some freedom of action for officials who have to act in areas where the law may not always be clear. If it applies, no lawsuit.
So, next question: do you think a "reasonable official" in 2001-03, when John Yoo was in the government, should have understood that doing those things to an American citizen -- one who, by the way, had not been convicted of or even charged with a crime -- violated that citizen's rights?
When Derek L My was a freshman at UC Berkeley, he kitted out his dorm-room with a variety of automation systems controlling the lights, drapes, and music (include a plastic-encased "Emergency Party Button" that triggered a disco ball and awesome strobing light-show). In this short video, he demonstrates the many preprogrammed modes he designed into the system. It's a nice testament to the ways that elaborate effects can be attained with simple mechanisms, and all the ways that a small space can be enhanced with superfluous gadgetry.
One neat thing about Bugs Galore, besides its funny/gross poetry and delightful artwork, is that Bob's six year old niece, Amelia Leonard, drew some of the bugs that appear in the book (right). Jane and I had a great time seeking them out in the colorful, busy pages. Below, a couple of sample pages, so you can hunt for Amelia's bugs, too.
The Disney Blog's John Frost captures one of my favorite sights: the interior of the Walt Disney World Space Mountain with the lights on, as seen from the silently retrofuturistic maglev safety of the Wedway Peoplecrusher.
Chip Kidd is one of my favorite book designers and, as I learned when I saw his talk at TED, he is also a funny and entertaining performer. (I have no idea what is going on with the broken eyeglasses; he was still wearing them that way when I met him later in the evening!)
Early 2012, HEYHEYHEY had some time to spare and they felt the need to challenge themselves once again, so they set out to build another one of their chain reaction machines called Melvin.
Conveniently built in two old suitcases, Melvin the Mini Machine is a Rube Goldberg machine specifically designed to travel the world. Each time Melvin fully completes a run, he ‘signs’ a postcard and sticks a stamp to it - making it ready to be sent.
Like its bigger brother, Melvin the Mini Machine also has an online non-physical side which he uses to connect to the people he meets. To keep things truly mobile Melvin uses a smartphone for his online identity.
Liu Wei, an artist from Beijing, is currently exhibiting a show called "Foreign" at the Almine Rech gallery in Paris. Wei's art plays with cityscapes, and "Foreign" features cityscapes made from schoolbooks affixed with steel rods and clamps. To the right is Library No.4, above is Library No.6.
Today James Woosley became the fifth — and highest-ranking — individual to plead guilty as part of a series of fraud schemes among rogue employees and contractors at ICE,” said U.S. Attorney Ronald Machen said in a statement. “He abused his sensitive position of trust to fleece the government by submitting phony paperwork for and taking kickbacks from subordinates who were also on the take.”
I love the Lego wigs used in this Elroy Klee campaign for Mindplay. They've got the perfect mix of impracticality and strikingness to qualify as gen-you-wine coo-choore.
Liu Wei, an artist from Beijing, is currently exhibiting a show called "Foreign" at the Almine Rech gallery in Paris. Wei's art 
After we learned this week about how rotten the