I can confirm that the little Bluetooth speaker that was on sale for $7 last week sounds great. Despite its diminutive size, the sound is very solid and can be turned up a lot louder than I would have thought. I don't know if the Amazon promo code Y98TGMLD still works, but even if it doesn't $15 is a good price. I'm going to take this with me on trips so I can listen to music and podcasts in my hotel. Read the rest
Acclaimed UK photographer Andy Rosen, who took many of the iconic photos of the early punk days, has written a nerve-racking, but entertaining piece about his bizarre experience he had after photographing Simon LeBon of Duran Duran.
Excerpt:
It all began innocently with an assignment to photograph Simon Le Bon, lead singer of Duran Duran in 1983. It was the first time one of my images was worth more than the cost of an Indian takeaway and a pint of beer. It should have been a great moment. Instead, it ended badly, very badly. The band’s representatives threatened me to try and get me to sign over the copyright. When I refused they told me that if I sold the pictures “blood would be spilled”. A contract would be put out on me, my fingers would be broken, and for the next ten years, I better be watching behind me. The irony is everybody loved the images.
Recently, Rosen launched a blockchain based company called Sendergram, "a secure blockchain registered file sending, presentation, delivery and transaction platform for digital media for all creative types."
Read the restWhat makes Sendergram unique, is the way in which it aggregates and networks a variety of cloud storage services and ties them together with blockchain-based registration, tracking and certification to reinforce, protect and report copyright infringement.
From concept to delivery an immutable, time-stamped, and legally-defensible record of each digital asset and all communication, at each stage of the creative process, are protected, tracked & blockchain registered.
An undercover police car ran a red light at an intersection in Brooklyn, almost cutting off a driver who made a legal left turn in front of him. The officer pulled him over and took pleasure in repeatedly asking the driver why he was "shaking so hard." The officer's amusement was cut short when the driver informed the officer that he had a dashcam recording that would prove the officer a liar in court. The cop made one last attempt to nail the driver for not having his current address on his license, but the driver pointed out that he didn't need to get a new license to reflect that.
From YouTube: "Undercover silver police car with three officers, NY Plate HMJ 7410. Approximately around 12-12:15am on March 9th at the intersection of Morgan and Grand." Read the rest
French antipodists Régina and Yvonne Baranton wow the audience in this 1969 episode of the Ed Sullivan Show. Fun fact: Regina was married to famous juggler Gil Dova: Read the rest
A young man named Mohammad Hashem caused a furor on a live Egypt television show after telling the host and his "debate" partner, former Deputy Sheikh of Al-Azhar Mahmoud Ashour, that he was an atheist. Ashour looked as if he'd been startled awake, saying "What? What was that?" When the Hashem said the words "Big Bang" in English, the host (looking dapper in an electric blue suit) angrily interrupted and shouted "Speak Arabic! You are in Egypt and you are addressing simple people, so don't use big words for no reason."
It went downhill from there, with the host whipping himself into an artificial frenzy worthy of Wally George. "You are confused and unreliable," he said. "You deny the existence of God and reject our religion and principles. You come here to talk about a certain idea, but have nothing to offer. You offer atheism! You offer heresy!" The former Deputy Sheikh of Al-Azhar told Hashem he needed "psychiatric treatment." The host jumped in and said, "I advise you to leave the studio and go straight to a psychiatric hospital... Please get up and leave and I will continue the show with Dr. Mahmoud." Read the rest
A man has been living in a tent hidden in a tube on top of a train station in Antioch, CA. He was spotted lowering a bicycle from roof and was reported to police, who determined he was maintaining an "unsafe camp."
From Fox News:
Read the restOfficials from the city's public works department placed an officer in a boom truck, and then lifted him to the roof... The police department said "homelessness is not a crime," and officers try to "get our homeless citizens into services so they can have a stable environment."
A good way to scare yourself is by googling "phosphorus shortage." Agriculture requires lots of phosphorus for fertilizer, and after it's spread on crops, most of it gets washed into the ocean, where it is irrecoverable. Without phosphorus, food production will plummet, unless people come up with new ways to grow food.
From the Global And Chinese Phosphate Fertilizer Industry, 2018 Market Research Report:
In 2007, at the current rate of consumption, the supply of phosphorus was estimated to run out in 345 years. However, some scientists thought that a "peak phosphorus" will occur in 30 years and Dana Cordell from Institute for Sustainable Futures said that at "current rates, reserves will be depleted in the next 50 to 100 years."
From The Conversation:
Fertiliser use has quadrupled over the past half century and will continue rising as the population expands. The growing wealth of developing countries allows people to afford more meat which has a “phosphorus footprint” 50 times higher than most vegetables. This, together with the increasing usage of biofuels, is estimated to double the demand for phosphorus fertilisers by 2050.
Today phosphorus is also used in pharmaceuticals, personal care products, flame retardants, catalysts for chemical industries, building materials, cleaners, detergents and food preservatives.
From Critical Shots:
Read the restThe greatest natural reserves of unmined phosphorus exist in [Morocco]... According to the USGS, 42% of all phosphorus imported by the United States between 2012-2015 came from Morocco. China beats them out by a tremendous margin in production, but based on the most recent data Morocco and Western Sahara combined are sitting on 50,000,000,000 metric tons of reserves.
The Logitech Create iPad Pro keyboard (on sale for $81 on Amazon) has changed the way I use my iPad. Mainly, I'm using my iPad much more often, now that I can enter text with a keyboard. If I'm on a short trip, I'll often take it with me instead of my bulkier MacBook Pro. It works well with Google Docs, which is how I do most of my work.
It has a backlit keyboard, which is essential. The keyboard is smaller than a standard keyboard, but it's not so cramped that I resent it when I have to do a lot of writing. I appreciate that it is powered directly from the iPad Pro via the Apple smart connector, because I don't need to remember to charge it. It also doesn't need Bluetooth pairing -- just insert the iPad into the case and start using it.
The top row of keys have controls for common things like one-tap to home, screen brightness adjustment, search, language switch, keyboard backlighting adjustment, media controls, volume controls, iPad on/off sleep/wake.
The case itself is textured so it won't slip easily when I carry it, and when closed the entire iPad is protected.
It's surprisingly thin and light, too. I wish I'd started using it sooner!
A team of MIT researchers "analyzed every major contested news story in English across the span of Twitter’s existence" and found that "fake news and false rumors reach more people, penetrate deeper into the social network, and spread much faster than accurate stories," reports The Atlantic. Why? The MIT team has two hypotheses:
First, fake news seems to be more “novel” than real news. Falsehoods are often notably different from the all the tweets that have appeared in a user’s timeline 60 days prior to their retweeting them, the team found.
Second, fake news evokes much more emotion than the average tweet. The researchers created a database of the words that Twitter users used to reply to the 126,000 contested tweets, then analyzed it with a state-of-the-art sentiment-analysis tool. Fake tweets tended to elicit words associated with surprise and disgust, while accurate tweets summoned words associated with sadness and trust, they found.
Image: Shutterstock Read the rest
If you were hoping that a person you detest will get hit by a piece of the out-of-control Chinese space station when it crashes to Earth the in the next few weeks, I have bad news: The European Space Agency (ESA) says the "average American citizen is around ten times more likely to win the Powerball lottery than they are to be struck by a piece of the Tiangong-1 as it plummets back to earth."
From SOFREP:
Read the restThere has only ever been one confirmed report of a person being struck by a piece of debris that fell from space in history: Lottie Williams, who was hit by a piece of a defunct NASA satellite as she walked through a park in Oklahoma in 1997. Despite holding what may be that singular distinction, William’s recollection of the incident may assuage any fears people may have about the Chinese space station’s reentry.
“We were still walking through the park when I felt a tapping on my shoulder,” Williams told reporters. That tapping was actually debris that had survived reentry and made it all the way from orbit to her walking path. “The weight was comparable to an empty soda can,” Williams went on. “It looked like a piece of fabric except when you tap it, it sounded metallic.”
Corey King, a sheriff's deputy in Washington County, Georgia put out an arrest warrant for his wife, Anne King, after she posted on Facebook: "That moment when everyone in your house has the flu and you ask your kid's dad to get them (not me) more Motrin and Tylenol and he refuses."
Anne King's friend, Susan Hines, commented on the post, calling Deputy King a "POS." "Give me an hour and check your mailbox," she wrote. "I'll be GLAD to pick up the slack."
Deputy King told his ex-wife to delete the post. When she didn't, he requested a warrant to arrest both women on a charge of "intent to defame another, communicate false matter which tends to expose one who is alive to hatred, contempt, or ridicule, and which tends to provoke a breach of peace.
CNN reports on what happened next, which shouldn't surprise you:
The next day, a Washington County court magistrate issued warrants for both Anne King and Hines.
The women were charged with "criminal defamation of character," processed and spent about four hours in jail before posting $1,000 bail.
At their hearing, state-court judge stated there was no basis for the arrest and the case was dropped.
"I don't even know why we're here," the judge said, according to the complaint.
Also not surprising, Anne King is suing for compensatory and punitive damages and Deputy King is saying it's not his fault; it's Magistrate Judge Ralph Todd's fault for actually issuing the warrants. Read the rest
Hamilton has traveled to the city of my birth, Denver, Colorado.
The Oregon Trail adventure game, published in 1974, was a classroom favorite, teaching students about managing resources and making good decisions in order successfully cross 2000 miles of rugged terrain with your family in a covered wagon in 1848. You can play it at Archive.org with their online emulator.
Basic Fun has just introduced a handheld version and it looks cool. If you want "The Oregon Trail Hand Held Portable Classic Computer Video Game" for $25 you have to go to a Target store. (Amazon has it but it's $44).
Charlie Hall of Polygon got the portable version and was impressed:
Read the restThis little gem is as full-featured as it gets. Onboard is the complete game, in full color and including the original sound effects. You can choose your starting career, name your party of five travellers, load up the wagon and, yes, even hunt for food.
...
The most exciting part of this handheld for me, however, isn’t the game itself. I can play The Oregon Trail online or with a laptop pretty easily. No, it’s the way that the game is presented. The little handheld is clearly modeled after the Apple II, big chunky gray buttons and all. To turn it on and off you even have to push the floppy disk into the slot. It’s the same computer on which I first encountered the classic game in grade school.
For twenty-five bucks, it’s a small price to pay for some nice nostalgia. I can’t wait to show it to my seven year-old when she gets home from school.
Colorado has a booming economy and high employment, yet its schools and infrastructure are seriously underfunded. The reason, according to this Full Frontal segment, is that 25 years ago an amendment to the state constitution was added requiring any tax increase to be voted on by the people of Colorado. As you might guess, people hardly ever vote to raise their taxes. The segment focuses on the man who fought to get the amendment added to the constitution, Douglas Bruce. He's quite a character. He was imprisoned for tax evasion, once charged with assault, calls himself a freedom fighter ("Martin Luther King and I are both freedom fighters."), and thinks an invitation to hug is a "homosexual encounter." Read the rest
A gruesome discovery on a frozen island in Siberia: 53 human hands in a bag, and another hand 18 miles away. The Siberian Times reports that it remains a “mystery over who the sinister hands belonged to, when they were chopped off – and why.” Photos here if you are curious and strong of stomach.
Image: Shutterstock Read the rest
This 3-ounce Bluetooth speaker is highly rated on Amazon (and Fakespot gives the reviews an A grade for authenticity). It also comes with a built in mic so you can use it as a speakerphone. It's normally $13 but if you use the promo code Y98TGMLD at checkout it is only $7. Read the rest
