Read more of this story at Slashdot.
As part of part of Global Entrepreneurship Week, Make: DC, Dorkbot DC, and HacDC have teamed up with the wonderful Koshland Science Museum to present:
Innovation Program: Test Your Imagination
Date: Wednesday, November 19, 2008
Location: Koshland Science Museum
Time: 6:30 PM to 8:00 PM
Cost: $7/$5 for students
Age Range: 13+
Innovation. New ideas. What can you do with an everyday item?
People drive the future, from economics to solutions to world-wide problems. For its part in Global Entrepreneurship Week, the Koshland Science Museum presents a mini-challenge to participants in this unique public program.
As part of the program, participants will get to test their own hands and minds with a mini-challenge. Come with your own team, or be ready to be paired with a few strangers and make some new friends. We will provide an item, a task, and give you 30 minutes to plan and create. Afterwards, teams can share their results. The evening will be capped by a presentation from the Koshland/Singapore Team.
The evening will start with a few words from Robert Litan, Vice President of Research and Development at the Kaufmann Foundation.
Innovation Program: Test Your Imagination
Peacekeeping chickens don't need tasers to maintain order. (Thanks, Antinous!)
From the MAKE Flickr photo pool
If you're not concerned with keeping dust out of that old copy of Bad Dudes, Planetwrite shows how an old Nintendo cartridge sleeve makes for quite a retro-chic pen holder (once you add a base)
Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Crafts | Digg this!
Nikki from Bristol UK writes in to tell of the next TechAdventures meetup.
"An Adventure in Technology" is a party which will be held on the 28th February at the Trinity Centre in Bristol.
We want you to create and discover new ideas using technology. Bring your unexpected toys, your creations, projects and ideas, put them together with others, and see what happens! We won't really know what's going to happen until the day, but we will be announcing any pre-confirmed items in the programme. The day will include talks, workshops, hands-on demos and presentations, and lots of opportunities to play. We are expecting visitors from all over the country and even the world bringing skills, toys and puzzles to share.
Doors will open at 10:30, admission is free, there is a licensed bar, and the party will go on for as long as we do.
It looks like they had a great time at the summer event in June 2008. There was a neat collection of functioning vintage computers, and the panoramic lego camera mechanism looks sweet.
If you would like to help out, check their group page.
Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Announcements | Digg this!
What we have here are four groups of grunting set-extras billed as actual contestants on a pseudo-reality show set in a hostile environment. They are labelled: Military, Cowboys, Contractors, and Firemen, which made me think of the Village People. Presumably each pair reflects a well-researched segment of the American truck-buying population who might just get so excited by these commercials that they'd actually buy a gas-guzzling Ram truck, something that many will have trouble affording.
Remember, during this same period Chrysler has also been desperately trying to persuade GM to buy them. Step back from the flash and fury here and you'll see a metaphor for the challenges faced by US auto industry; you'll see these ads as a story about what's happening not in the desert but in Detroit.
Quick, jump in an oversized American-made truck, see how fast it can go downhill without crashing, next tow a heavy trailer (pensions?) along hair-pin curves without tumbling down a hillside, and then go try to build and cross a makeshift bridge without dropping into a deep gully. During this race to the finish, you're running out of time and trying to avoid disaster. The media in helicopters hover above you, following your every move, waiting to move in. Even if you make it, the group that finishes last is eliminated. It's like we're watching a dream sequence from a movie about a US auto industry exec! Wake up, wake up!
To place a bet this size selling the wrong product at the wrong time is like pushing all your chips to the middle of the poker table and bluffing with a pair of threes. Is there any way any of the auto companies win? Do you and other US taxpayers want to add your own money to their pile? Never Back Down? Never Surrender? How is this for a new slogan: "Hold On!" It's better than "Fold."
The oddest thing about the Ram Challenge reality-ad is the warning that accompanies it: "Chrysler, LLC, Dodge and its Agencies insist that no one attempt to replicate the activity on this site." No, few of us have this kind of budget, even if such "stupid fun" somehow made sense for anyone to want to do.
Perhaps Dodge and its Agencies should go back and look at this Depression-era truck ad also produced at a time when it was equally tough to sell cars. This is back when car companies could look their customer in the eye and speak with some honesty about their products.
(image from Adclassix.com)
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
"It’s gratifying to hear Jim’s name being mentioned for drug czar," said Ramstad spokesman Dean Peterson. "Jim has worked in a bipartisan way for 27 years on anti-drug efforts in Congress and the Minnesota Senate. And as a recovering person, he’s worked every day to help those suffering the ravages of chemical addiction."
In January, Obama said he supported marijuana decriminalization.
And in August, Obama stated, "I would not have the Justice Department prosecuting and raiding medical marijuana users. It's not a good use of our resources."
So why is he considering Ramstad to be the drug czar?
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Plan-K-Troniks demos this unique mod for the Gakken SX-150 analog synthesizer - a green plasma disc, used to control sound via contact with the stylus. Great - now on to the Gakken Tesla coil!
Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Kits | Digg this!
The new version of Google SketchUp was released this morning. The dynamic components feature, explained in this video, is really cool.
Previously on Boing Boing:
• Google Sketchup for Dummies
• Chicken tractor design
More photos and information about the project: Improv Everywhere welcomes strangers arriving at JFK airport
[T]he fact that the US meltdown has now flowed into China is potentially disastrous for this most populous nation, but as its exports shrink and its factories shut, the meltdown is starting to flow back to America again, making an ugly situation even worse.The solution (for the US, anyway), says Darley: "rebuilding of the American and British manufacturing economies (less so the European), along with the supply chains to feed it and the return of the knowledge and skills to recreate it and run it." The China Syndrome Bites BackThis vicious cycle is playing out in interconnected ways. Reduced Chinese exports to the US mean that the Chinese have less foreign currency to lend back to America, which further exacerbates the credit crisis and tends to tighten the money supply, making it more difficult for Americans to buy Chinese exports (or anything else).
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Adrian from Google has an overview of the latest SketchUp, he writes -
We're very excited to announce the new release of Google SketchUp 7. If you don't already know about the fun you can have with SketchUp, here's a quick recap:SketchUp is software you can use to build 3D models of anything: your house, killer robots, furniture, trees, abstract art — anything. Architects and engineers use it to design buildings and other structures. Woodworkers use it to plan their projects. And lots of people use it to figure out where to put their furniture. SketchUp is easy to learn, it comes in free and Pro versions, and it's more fun than a houseful of clowns. Oh, and you can use it to build models for Google Earth, too.
So what's new in SketchUp 7? There's too much to list here, but we focused on three major areas for this release:
Making it even easier to get started – We've created a new class of "smart" objects called Dynamic Components, which are simpler to work with for new modelers. Take a look at this video to see what I mean:
Making it easier to share what you make and collaborate with other people – We built a better link between SketchUp and the rest of the 3D world, made it possible to "sign" your models, and added Google Docs–style collaboration and sharing to our 3D Warehouse.
Adding powerful features for experienced SketchUp Pro users – SketchUp is only half of the SketchUp Pro suite; the other half is all about sharing your work with your clients. LayOut 2 (which is now officially out of beta and rarin' to go) lets you create multi-page documents and presentations. Your models are linked to your LayOut file so that changing the former automatically updates the latter.
Take a look at the What's New in 7 page on the SketchUp website to get the whole scoop. There's a great video to watch, and it stars some of the more prone-to-sunlight members of our engineering team — in lab coats, no less. Don't miss it.
The Scratch Input project explores an interesting very economical method for human-computer interface using a contact mic/stethoscope and a wall. table, or similar -
We present Scratch Input, an acoustic-based input technique that relies on the unique sound produced when a fingernail is dragged over the surface of a textured material, such as wood, fabric, or wall paint. We employ a simple sensor that can be easily coupled with existing surfaces, such as walls and tables, turning them into large, unpowered and ad hoc finger input surfaces. Our sensor is sufficiently small that it could be incorporated into a mobile device, allowing any suitable surface on which it rests to be appropriated as a gestural input surface. Several example applications were developed to demonstrate possible interactions. We conclude with a study that shows users can perform six Scratch Input gestures at about 90% accuracy with less than five minutes of training and on wide variety of surfaces.- Scratch Input Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Computers | Digg this!
I've heard that a support group for lame ducks is forming called D.O.N.A.L.D (Defense Of North American Lame Ducks) but they don't have their website up yet. They will be affiliated with D.A.F.F.I. (Ducks And Feathered Friends International.) Both organizations hope that when Barack Obama takes office, he will not be referred to as a sitting duck for his opponents.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Julie invites Los Angeles area Boing Boing readers to attend the Valley of the Dolls Lolita Tea Party at Royal/T (8910 Washington Blvd, Culver City, CA 90232. 310-559-6300)
Royal/T and the Los Angeles-based doll shop Valley of the Dolls are pleased to present a Valley of the Dolls Tea Party on November 23rd from 12-5pm at Royal/T. This meet-up event for L.A. Lolitas and their dolls will feature a Valley of the Dolls Pop-Up Store in the Royal/T shop, a screening of the Japanese anime series Rozen Maiden in the Lounge, and a raffle for 8 dolls (including Pullip, Taeyang, Dal, J-Doll and Ai Doll and Blythe). Tune in Tokyo will be playing J-POP and J-ROCK throughout the event.Valley of the Dolls Lolita Tea PartyRoyal/T is offering a special Lolita High Tea that features settings for both lolitas and their dolls. The High Tea includes mini pastries, finger sandwiches, a mini quiche, and a pot of tea of your choice for only $25.00 per person.
RSVP suggested @ RSVP@ROYAL-T.org with the subject "Valley of the Dolls." (No reservations will be taken - seating will be first come, first serve)
INFO: Valley of the Dolls is Los Angeles-based specialty doll store with one of the largest selections of Pullip dolls on the planet.
A six foot long rubber band hardly qualifies as a gadget except in the loosest interpretation of the term, but still... many uses thoughtfully present themselves, not the least of which is a Wile E. Coyote like scenario in which it is secured about a nemesis' ears, stretched taut around an anvil, then released. That's a lot of fun for $5.50.
Giant rubber band has ACME possibilities,
Discuss this on Boing Boing Gadgets
On today's episode of Bre Petis' I Make Things, my pal Nick Farr of HacDC demonstrates the Polyalphabetic Substitution Cypher Slide Rule (PASCSR) he made and uploaded to Thingiverse. Thingiverse launches today, too. It's a site, created by Bre and Zach Hoeken, where you can share your digital designs/object files with the world. Cool.
Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in DIY Projects | Digg this!
Today on Boing Boing Gadgets, we started the day with an arboricultural look at a genuine power plant, then mocked CNet's inability to indentify a blue screen of death. A matrioshka-like nesting bowl captured Brownlee's fancy, then railed against the aesthetics of bacon.
There were iPhone cases that glittered like Christmas lights and a Lilluputioan Mac Pro. Eyes rolled back, Joel spent himself lusting after a 1970 Nissan 270X Concept Car.
We spotted a watch made of old spaceship parts that had a dash of Le Voyage Dans La Lune to it. Joel looked at a strange wireless peripheral that tickles the O-ring during gaming or movie sessions and a wind powered Times Square sign.
Neat: pictures with their own moving shadows. Neater: an African incerator that turns slum garbage into heat. Beschizza spotted a watch that gloats at your gastropoidal lack of inertia, and a stick-of-gum sized set of speakers that are dismal, but less dismal than most of their ilk. And he openly pined to strap a boombox to his wrist.
Otherwise, Joel had no idea that Jodorowsky, Giger and Floyd (Pink) conspired to make an adaptation of Dune. Jury's still out on how this is about gadgets. An awesome clavitar one-upped the ageless keytar, and Joel inadvertently revealed some bedroom awkwardness as he admired some easy apply prophylactics.
Finally, there was a giant rubber band perfect for Road Runner style pranking, an electronic chewing sensor, a sci-fi novel delivered by mobile phone and a horribly racist Christmas ornament. It was a fun day.
Link
In September, Charles Platt wrote a piece for Boing Boing about his visit to Tokyo's Akihabara district. This month, he submitted this astounding report about taking a zero-gravity flight.
Anti-Gravity
by Charles Platt
I've always resented the force of attraction that traps me here on Planet Earth. It makes me feel like a bug stuck to a piece of duct tape. Ever since my teenage years, when I used to read a lot of science fiction and took it much too seriously, I’ve dreamed of somehow reaching escape velocity. I am, you might say, anti-gravity.
This afternoon, I will have a modest opportunity to do something about it. I am sitting in a conference room at a Marriott Residence Inn with 34 other people who share my desire to defy terrestrial pull. Together we are watching an orientation video screened by Zero Gravity Corporation, after which we will ride a bus to San Jose International Airport, where a modified Boeing 727-200 is waiting for us. In a suitably empty block of airspace above the Pacific, the airplane will start soaring and diving—much like a dolphin leaping from the ocean below—to create the transient sensation of weightlessness. Fifteen parabolic arcs will allow us a total of little more than five minutes in free fall, but for those of us desiring gravitational liberation, it’s the only affordable option.
Of course, “affordable” is a relative term. When I booked earlier in the year, I paid $4,000, plus tax. Many of those sitting around me paid the current price of $5,000. What sort of wacko would want to spend all that money just to float upside-down for a few minutes?
Well, next to me is a couple who fit the profile that one might expect here, in San Jose, close to Silicon Valley. They met when she used to work for Netscape, back in the day when Marc Andreessen could still speak seriously about trouncing Microsoft in the browser wars, and people could still believe him. Her husband is now in a new startup, which he can’t talk about yet.
Sitting behind me is rather a different San Jose local resident: A lady who has come here to celebrate her 90th birthday. She has spent much of her life airborne, after obtaining her first pilot license in 1948, when one of her early jobs was to fly a single-engined plane dragging advertising banners above California beaches.
Others in the room are mostly male, in their 20s or 30s. During the hotel buffet breakfast of fruit and muffins I spoke to a few who said they were engineers, and several who have pilot licenses.
Why do we want to do this? The simplest answer is, because we can.
Motion Sickness Denial
After the orientation video, a Zero Gravity representative invites questions. I raise my hand. “Where are the pills?” I ask. I am referring to the motion-sickness pills recommended in Zero-G documents, which advised me to bring a doctor’s prescription, authorizing Zero-G to pick up the medication from its “local pharmacy.”
The representative stares at me blankly. He knows nothing about pills, and when I look more closely at the form that I filled out, I realize I have made an unfortunate error. I was supposed to fax my prescription five days previously. There is no way to obtain medications now.
This may be a problem. According to a space-enthusiast friend of mine, when astronaut John Glenn did his zero-gravity training, he vomited copiously, despite years of experience as a fighter pilot. If it could happen to him, presumably it can happen to me, especially since I am currently taking clindamycin for a gum infection, and the antibiotic is making me feel nauseated even before I’m airborne.
“Here, have one of these,” says the elderly lady sitting behind me. She pops a pill out of a blister pack. But I can’t help noticing, she hasn’t bothered to take any herself—and suddenly my reflexive tendency toward rebellion kicks in, as it often does when someone suggests something that seems extremely sensible. I’m too proud to take a pill. Forget about John Glenn. I will refuse to succumb to motion sickness, and that’s that.
Matters of a Personal Nature
I become slightly more worried when our team leader advises us strongly to use the bathroom before we leave the hotel. Apparently there’s no toilet on the airplane, just “a plastic bag for emergencies.”
This raises some issues of a more personal nature. First, a slight enlargement of the prostate, typical for someone of my age, sometimes creates what the medical profession describes as a “feeling of urgency.” I suppose the plastic bag can suffice for that, but a second concern is more serious. Clindamycin has had its characteristic loosening effect on my lower gastrointestinal tract, prompting me to make urgent and unpredictable visits to the bathroom during the past two or three days.
So, here I am, already feeling slightly queasy, and liable to suffer the pharmaceutical version of Montezuma’s Revenge, as I get ready to enjoy a ride which may make me vomit and will eliminate any easy option to void my bowels. In fact I would have postponed my reservation today if Zero Gravity Corporation had allowed it—but, they don’t. Once you click the “pay” button on their web page, effortlessly transferring thousands of dollars from your credit card to their bank account, you have said goodbye to that money on a permanent basis, regardless of circumstances. You will fly on the date you chose, or you won’t fly at all. No refunds, no cancellations, no schedule changes. Your only option is to substitute someone else in your place. I understand why, of course: This is a marginal venture. They have to be certain of filling all 35 seats on the plane.
Since there’s nothing I can do at this point, I tell myself that any unexpected events involving my stomach, my bladder, or my intestines will just make the whole thing more memorable. Misery is the stuff of comedy, if one can just live long enough to get over it.
The Humiliation Ritual
Some forms of misery, however, have minimal entertainment value at any time, as I am reminded when I leave the conference room and find myself confronted with the ritual known as a “TSA screening.” Yes, two employees from the Transportation Security Administration have somehow installed themselves in the hallway of this nice hotel, like rodents invading the basement of a mansion, and they are ready to demonstrate that even an elite group of zeronauts must be humbled by search and possible seizure, to keep the nation safe from terrorist acts. “If you are carrying a camera,” a short, humorless woman in a black TSA uniform yells at us, “you may not point it at us. If you do so, you will never see it again.”
That’s precisely what she says, and even though we are all gravity rebels, none of us raises a murmur of dissent, because we know that this deeply offensive martinet has been given more authority than a police officer.
I know of only one relatively risk-free form of defiance in such a situation: Pretend to be deaf. A retired sherriff suggested this ploy to me long ago. “Cops really get pissed if someone can’t hear them,” he told me. “It makes it hard for them to give orders.”
On the other hand, anything that prolongs the process will keep everyone else waiting. So, I surrender passively—which takes a while, because the TSA doesn’t have x-ray equipment here. First I have to switch on each of my cameras (pointing them safely away from the TSA officials) to demonstrate that the picture on the LCD screen moves as I swing the lens from side to side. “Fake cameras just display one fixed picture,” the TSA employee explains to me, with an air of utter certainty, as if the TSA encounters fake cameras all the time. Then I stand with legs apart and arms extended while a metal-sensing wand is passed around me, and I have to loosen my belt to prove that no knife blade is hidden behind the buckle.
In D. B. Cooper's Footsteps
Finally we board the bus to take us to the airport, and there’s a mood of great anticipation as we drive right onto the tarmac where the 727 is waiting, painted in Zero Gravity colors, with its rear stairs hinged down. All 727s were originally built with rear stairs for emergency egress, until legendary hijacker D. B. Cooper took advantage of this feature to make a parachute jump with a large sack of cash. After that, the rear exits on passenger 727s were rendered inoperable. This aircraft, however, was configured for freight, and I’m excited by the rare opportunity to tread the same path that D. B. Cooper trod. (He was never apprehended.)
Inside, the aircraft is a long, empty tube with no windows other than the small panes in emergency-exit doors over the wings. Six or seven rows of seats have been added at the rear, and colorful strips of carpet have been laid in a well-intentioned but not totally professional manner. Beyond this small seating area, the fuselage is lined with protective foam pads wrapped in cream-colored vinyl, so that we can bounce around without hurting ourselves. Actually the foam padding is incomplete; the company didn’t have time to finish the job before today’s flight. Strips of Velcro will attach future padding, and the Velcro has been covered, for the time being, with two-inch adhesive tape. I like this homespun look. It makes the adventure seem less corporate, more as if it has been created by a small group of individuals who may be as eccentric as I am.
The Flying Roller-Coaster
The FAA requires the usual series of instructions about seat belts and emergency landings, and then the 727 starts its engines, all three of which are located at the rear, generating enough noise to make conversation impossible. We taxi onto the runway, and the roll begins. Taking off in airplanes is an everyday routine, yet it never fails to delight me, because it is already a partial defiance of gravity. Once the plane reaches cruising altitude, though, I feel the same old pull of the Earth holding me against the cushions of my seat. Gravity, like a TSA employee, wants to keep me under its control. I can’t wait for the opportunity to break free.
Our guides move up and down the aisle, gathering our shoes and putting them in plastic bags. We struggle into special-issue tube socks, each of which has the Zero-G logo on it. Then we move into the open area of the aircraft, where we scatter ourselves across its padded floor.
My stomach is relatively calm, my bowels are relatively stable, and I feel no special need to urinate. I’m in pretty good shape! But I do feel mildly apprehensive, as if I’m on the world’s biggest roller coaster, with no idea of how steep the first drop is going to be.
Each parabolic up-cycle will be framed by down-cycles. Consequently, each period of reduced gravity will be preceded and followed by a period of enhanced gravity caused by centripetal acceleration (usually referred to as centrifugal force). We will experience a 1.8-G downward pull, and the least disorienting way to deal with this is by lying flat on our backs while staring at a fixed point on the ceiling. Obediently, we do so. I feel heavier, and heavier, while wind noise around the fuselage increases. When I try to raise my arm, if feels ridiculously heavy. When I try to raise my head, my neck muscles are barely strong enough. Then the burden lifts, and suddenly I realize that my apparent weight has diminished. I roll over and push myself away from the floor. This first cycle simulates Mars gravity, and I find myself feeling buoyant, imbued with unnatural strength, as if I just ate some No-Doz tablets chased with a couple glasses of scotch. I'm like a cartoon character with springs under my feet. Hey, this is great!
My fellow passengers are laughing and exclaiming as they bounce around, delighted by the feeling of power and freedom. We’re as silly as a bunch of kids.
All too soon, our guide issues the warning: “Feet down!” We return to our prone state as the aircraft straightens its descent and then, once again, reaches the lower part of its cycle, pressing us against the floor.
The next up-cycle simulates lunar gravity. We’re even lighter, with one-sixth normal weight. I feel like a feather. “Are you having fun?” I ask the 90-year-old lady, who is jumping up and down around beside me, wearing a happy grin.
“I love it!” she cries.
We go through one more lunar cycle, and then a prolonged period of normal gravity as the aircraft reaches the end of its designated air space and makes a slow U-turn to fly back the way it came. Now, finally, we will experience zero G.
Again I feel a little apprehensive. Maybe, just maybe, I should have taken that sensible motion-sickness pill. I will be so embarrassed if I puke all over my companions.
But then we enter the first zero-G cycle, and as I drift up into the air, I feel as if there’s nothing unusual about it at all. My internal organs actually feel better, freed from the usual downward pull. I feel more normal in this state. I laugh with relief and excitement. I move up to the ceiling, spin myself around, and then dive down among the legs of the other zeronauts. I’m like a fish in an ocean of magical water that presents no resistance to movement. Without exaggeration, I can say that this is the most utterly free, liberating experience of my life.
Quickly, it ends—but then we enjoy another cycle, and another, each as effortless and natural as the first. “This is how I was meant to be,” I say, to no one in particular. Nausea? Why should I feel nausea? The sensations are the same regardless of my orientation. All directions are equal, here. When I put my head down near the floor and my feet in the air, my only concern is that I’m liable to fall in a clumsy heap when the cycle ends.
During one of the down swings, when I feel almost twice my normal weight, I decide to disobey instructions and experiment a little. I struggle half upright, turning my head to and fro. This certainly could induce nausea. When I rotate my head I feel as if my brain is lagging behind by half a second, and when I stop rotating my head my brain feels as if it is catching up. Not good!
The weightless cycles remain joyous, though. One of our guides scatters some droplets from a bottle of water, and sure enough they form almost perfect spheres. Another guide tosses M&Ms into the air, and people try to grab them in their mouths, like sea-lions gobbling fish thrown at the zoo. Weightlessness brings out the child in all of us.
When the last arc is complete, I’m very sad. I’d like to stay up here floating forever. I do notice that my sinuses aren’t entirely happy about the experience, presumably because some fluid that is normally restrained by gravity has had the opportunity to shift around. I feel a bit congested, but it’s a trivial inconvenience compared with the pure pleasure of floating.
A Chat with Peter Diamandis
A few weeks later, after I've decided to write about this for Boing Boing, I call the PR department of Zero Gravity Corporation and ask if I may have an opportunity to talk to Peter Diamandis, its cofounder. Kindly, he spares some time for a telephone interview. He has a fascinating history, having received an undergraduate degree in molecular genetics and graduate degree in aerospace engineering from MIT, after which he got an MD at Harvard Medical School. He cofounded the X-Prize in 1995 with Space Shuttle astronaut Byron Lichtenberg, offering $10 million to the first private team to build and launch a space-plane capable of carrying three people 100 kilometers above the earth’s surface, twice within two weeks. Burt Rutan’s company, Scaled Composites, won that prize in 2004, which led to Richard Branson creating Virgin Galactic.
Diamandis also cofounded Space Adventures, which currently brokers tourist flights to the space station. He has been extremely influential. I think it’s no exaggeration to say that without his efforts, space tourism probably would not exist today.
I begin by asking what motivates him.
“My mission on Earth is to get as many people off it as possible,” he tells me. “I’ve wanted to achieve this since the age of 9. I’ve built companies that are intended to be viable economic engines that will help to bring down the cost of getting into space. I think humanity’s future lies in space, since we will need access to resources in space.”
I’ve heard that mantra many times during several decades. I can’t help wondering if he has a more personal interest. Does he want to go into space himself?
“I want to go into orbit,” he says without hesitation, “and my long term goal is to be one of the first private citizens to set foot on the moon.”
Born in 1961, he’s obviously in a race against time to achieve that goal—but he doesn’t sound the kind of guy who gives up easily. “I believe that in the decades ahead the amount of wealth available to individuals, and the technology available to small groups of people, will be extraordinary,” he tells me. “Opening the space frontier and developing technology, to enable humanity to get off the earth, used to be affordable only to governments. Now a small team backed by a visionary billionaire can do it.”
Is he the visionary billionaire?
“No,” he laughs. “Several orders of magnitude away from that, unfortunately.”
Personally I believe that government, rather than money, tends to be the primary factor limiting the development of new technologies. I’ve been told that it took Diamandis 11 years merely to get FAA certification for zero-gravity flights. Doesn’t this kind of thing make him feel frustrated?
He agrees that it does. But, “The only thing greater than my frustration is my stubbornness,” he tells me. “Byron Lichtenberg, my cofounder of Zero-G, was twice a space shuttle astronaut. In may 1993 we waltzed into the FAA headquarters, saying we wanted to commercialize what NASA had been doing for the past 30 years. The idea of putting an airplane through this rollercoaster maneuver and having people float about the cabin was not allowed for in FAA regulations. In fact the FAA lawyers flatly told us it was impossible. I refused to give up, but we had to out-wait three administrations.”
I ask if there was a particular tipping point which made it happen.
“We started offering zero-gravity flights in Russia. We told [FAA Administrator] Marion Blakey that we had to take American citizens to Russia to experience zero gravity. Shouldn’t they be allowed to do it in the United States? We finally got the focus and attention of someone who was sufficiently visionary to change the rules.”
Since the Ansari X-Prize, which Diamandis popularized, was awarded to Space Composites, I’m wondering if he’ll be riding their space-plane.
“I was offered a flight on Virgin Galactic,” he says, “but I turned it down at the time, my goal being to fly to space on one of our own suborbital vehicles. The Rocket Racing League just announced we are developing our own suborbital vehicle. I intend to be on the first commercial flight. We plan to offer flights for $100,000. We think a little competition will be good for them [Virgin].”
In case you haven’t heard of the Rocket Racing League, it’s a far-fetched yet serious attempt to create an entire new spectator sport, featuring rocket-powered airplanes racing each other through a three-dimensional course, with virtual participation available for an audience online. Check out www.rocketracingleague.com. Also check Armadillo Aerospace, the company codeveloping the aircraft that will be used in League events.
Finally I ask Diamandis the most obvious question: What’s so special about weightlessness?
“I’ve experienced it 70 times, and it’s still an amazing amount of fun. It’s a sense of pure joy, a magic show, a feeling of bliss, a return to a childhood state. It creates a true sense of wonder. It’s hard, as an adult, to have a new experience that is so transcendent, because normally everything you do is a slight variation of something else you’ve already done. But here is something completely different and wonderful.”
From his tone of spontaneous enthusiasm, you’d almost imagine he never answered that question before.
The Negatives
Inevitably there are some down sides to zero-G. Here are the ones that I am aware of:
1. Brevity. Each period of pure weightlessness only lasts for about 20 seconds, being preceded and followed by a transitional period of reduced weight. Why do the cycles have to be so brief? As the airplane reaches the top of its arc and starts to dive, naturally the downward component of its speed increases rapidly. Sooner or later, and preferably sooner, the aircraft has to straighten out, inducing the 1.8-G force mentioned previously. Boeing designed the 727 to withstand a 2.5-G downward force, but Zero Gravity Corporation stays well within that limit. Fortunately each 20-second cycle is just long enough to be enjoyable.
2. Price. The cost of aviation fuel has to be shared among just 35 passengers. Since I had dreamed of going into space for about forty-five years, and this was the closest I could get, I have no regrets. Still, even for me, it was a once-in-a-lifetime indulgence.
3. Inflexibility. As noted above, you can’t opt out if your plans change, or if the flight date changes. Zero-G only has one airplane, and if it needs maintenance, your flight will be postponed. Zero-G also has to ask nicely for air space in which to perform its maneuvers, and cannot fly unless it is granted this favor by federal authorities.
4. You may get sick. I didn’t, but on my flight, two people did. They seemed to be having a great time at the beginning, but they ended up holding paper bags and clutching their stomachs thoughtfully. I’m told that nausea is relatively rare, and the risk of it increases with the number of weightless cycles. Personally I found the experience far more benign than sitting in a small boat in turbulent water, and less disruptive than even a mild roller-coaster.
5. Environment. If you care about such things, your friends may accuse you of enlarging your carbon footprint by consuming a lot of aviation fuel for a frivolous purpose. Personally this doesn’t bother me, because I don’t see climate change as a problem that can be solved by “economizing.” Some sort of technology-driven solution will be necessary. Sulfur particles, for instance, have been proposed as a means to reflect sunlight at high altitudes, and we know that this can create global cooling, since it has occurred naturally in conjunction with volcanic eruptions. Check the Wikipedia entry for Nobel laureate and atmospheric scientist Paul Crutzen: The mere fact that his suggestion has spawned numerous dire warnings about its potential harm indicates that it should be considered seriously. If it wasn’t worthy of serious consideration, the doomsayers wouldn't bother to warn us against it. In any case, I think PR events that popularize the commercialization of space are not frivolous, since sooner or later the human race will need space resources, as Diamandis points out.
6. Not-so-great customer care is the final negative that I have to list for Zero-G, just to balance all my lyricism. While the personnel who guided us through our adventure were attentive, well-informed, friendly, and patient enough to answer endless questions, the back office didn’t create such a warm-fuzzy experience. After I paid my $4,000 by clicking that little button on the web site, I got less response than if I had bought an item for $4 on eBay—which is to say, no response at all. The lack of an emailed acknowledgment or receipt caused me to wonder, briefly, if the Zero-G web site had been hijacked, or if the whole thing was a new kind of Nigerian ”send money!” scam. After a few days I called to see if my cash was in the right hands, and reached voicemail. Eventually someone did call me back apologetically, but still it was a long while before I received email with a PDF of the contractual agreement that each passenger must sign, and during that time I didn’t know what was going on. Lastly, each of us was promised a DVD containing still photos shot by the staff photographer, and video recorded by four automatic cameras in the airplane, but almost two months later, no disc has shown up. Fortunately I took a few pictures of my own. Today I was told that the company had problems with the DVD production people, and the discs finally have been mailed.
To be fair, Zero-G shouldn’t be judged harshly, since it is operating right out there on the margins of feasibility. We early adopters should expect to rough it a little.
How it Works
Lastly, some technical background. Even though it feels as if you’re defying gravity, in reality, you’re surrendering to it. By analogy:
Imagine an ant in a small capsule, such as a pill bottle. So long as the bottle is motionless relative to the Earth, gravity holds the ant against the bottom of the bottle, and he feels “heavy.” Then someone drops the bottle, and during the moments before the bottle hits the ground, the ant enjoys the experience of weightlessness, because he and the bottle are both in free fall. Every particle in the bottle, and every particle in the ant, are complying with gravity, so there’s no feeling of resistance (if we ignore air resistance).
Now, imagine that instead of merely dropping the bottle, someone tosses it up into the air. Initially the ant feels heavier than normal, as the throw accelerates the bottle upward; but as soon as it leaves the person’s hand, the ant feels weightless, because once again all the particles in the ant and the bottle are equally affected by gravity—even during the upward section of the trajectory.
So it is with a zero-gravity flight, which gives everyone (and every thing) on the airplane the ant-in-a-bottle experience. Two pilots control the aircraft, one minimizing lateral movements while the other controls vertical orientation, injecting the airplane into a parabolic path which emulates the arc that it would follow if it were thrown freely across the sky.
When Virgin Galactic starts to offer suborbital flights, they will induce weightlessness for around 5 minutes. This will cost 40 times the current price of a Zero-G flight, and will entail travel in a space-plane that is considerably less well proven than a Boeing 727. Of course the Virgin flight will provide a wonderful view, and the 5 minutes of weightlessness will be contiguous, instead of being divided into short segments. Still, $200,000 is a price that few people can pay.
Seen in these terms, maybe the Zero-G flight isn’t so unaffordable after all.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
This is Johnny Henry of Laurel, Mississippi who has invented a vibrating toilet seat. "“This invention is designed to stimulate,” he told the Laurel Leader Call newspaper. “It’s to make you feel good while you are there.” More interesting to me than the invention is the odd composition of the photo.
Gabe Adiv snapped this photo of a c.1975 Vincent Price Shrunken Head kit for sale at a Brooklyn flea market. The shrunken heads were made from shriveled apples. For budding PT Barnums, this kit was far more interesting than a lame plastic potato head. X-Entertainment has more on Vincent Price's Shrunken Heads.
Thingiverse is an "object sharing" site that enables anyone to upload the schematics, designs, and images for their projects. Users can then download and reuse the work in their projects using their own laser cutters, 3D printers, and analog tools. Think of it as a Flickr for the Maker set.I uploaded my iPhone stand, you can check it out there!
Besides implementing our licenses, Bre and Zach have also gone the distance and allowed users to license works under the GNU GPL, LGPL, and BSD licenses, as well as allowing them to release works into the public domain. Thingiverse uses our license wrappers for each of these licenses thereby enabling automatic indexing by machines like search engines.
Next Meeting:
25 November 2008
7 PM - 9 PM (ET)
ALWAYS FREE!
Location:
Smith Hall of Art, Room 114
(Map of Block)
George Washington University
801 22nd St NW
Washington, DC 20037
Schedule for next meeting Alden Hart : Practical Microcontroller LED Designs - lessons and gotchas from prototype to production
LED projects are a popular topic these days. This talk covers some microcontroller LED projects Alden has done ranging from at-home projects to manufactured units. Alden will have a variety of projects that should perhaps not have been attempted - such as Balls on Sticks and The Low Rider Christmas, Silent Music Box, and 10mi2 Lucites.
The talk will cover practical lessons that resulted, including:
Time permitting we may also get into some of the more arcane details about circuit board design, manufacture, and assembly; surface mount at home, mechanical considerations, and other topics.
Alden is a hardware and software engineer who started doing gate-level design in the late '70s and has been working his way up the stack ever since...Only to fall down again a few years ago with a renewed interest in microcontrollers and electronics. His company Ten Mile Square is a small group of technology practitioners who specialize in the disciplines surrounding media and web systems.
Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Announcements | Digg this!
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
In a post about Comcast: "I bought EyeTV devices for three of my computers so I could receive digital over-the-air broadcasts. It amazes people when they find out that such high quality transmissions are available for free over the public air waves."
Thirteen Ways of Looking at DecapitationThe evidence for the survival of awareness (as opposed to brain activity) after decapitation remains inconclusive. According to Dr. Ron Wright, a forensic pathologist and former chief medical examiner of Broward County Florida, "After your head is cut off by a guillotine, you have 13 seconds of consciousness (+/- 1 or 2). [...] The 13 seconds is the amount of high energy phosphates that the cytochromes in the brain have to keep going without new oxygen and glucose."4 Naturally, electrochemical activity is no guarantor of conscious thought, although as Wright notes, there are alleged instances of disembodied heads blinking in response to questions, "two for yes and one for no."
If bodiless heads can think, what about headless bodies? Mike the Headless Wonder Chicken springs immediately to mind. On September 10, 1945, Fruita, Colorado resident Lloyd Olsen sent—or attempted to send—Mike the way of all fryers with a well-aimed whack. Amazingly, the rooster survived his beheading; the next morning, Olsen discovered him pecking and preening (phantom head syndrome?), his reflex actions intact, thanks to a brainstem that had miraculously escaped the vorpal blade. Sustained by grain and water dripped into his exposed esophagus, Mike went on to sideshow fame. He lived for another 18 months before succumbing, at last, to decapitation-related complications.
NOTCOT put together one of the best "coupon books" online, it's filled with *a ton* of MAKE / CRAFT friendly shops and more (including a coupon for the Maker Shed!) -- go check it out!
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Image from The Green Microgym in Portland
Seems unlikely, but it's good to see CNN writing about even the more green-washed ends of the sustainability spectrum:
Couch potatoes will be horrified, but fresh advances in human-powered technology -- where users power appliances through their own motion -- could one day see a 'workout-to-watch' scenario become reality.
...
The profile of the technology is set to receive a further boost this month when a human-powered gym opens in Portland, Oregon, and again in September when the human-powered 'sustainable dance club', Club Watt, opens its doors in Rotterdam, Netherlands.Human power is already being used to run the 'California Fitness' gym in Hong Kong, and to power the recently opened 'Club Surya' in London.
Later in the article, I think the designer of one of the (partially) human-powered gyms gets it right:
Although he shows enthusiasm for the battery project, Gambarota, who now spends much of his time developing micro wind turbines, is sceptical about the future of human-power on a mass-scale.He raises doubts about the efficiency of human power and questioned its economic viability.
The average amount of power one person could produce going about normal activities on any given day was about one kilowatt-hour (kWh), which only amounted to about € 0.10 worth of electricity, Gambarota said.
"It's a very good marketing tool for businesses, but in terms of economics it does not make sense at all."
Sounds to me like a dance club would have a greater reduction in carbon emission by providing free admission and a bicycle valet for those who pedal to their evening entertainment...
Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Green | Digg this!
Maybe you like Neil Young's music. You might have heard about his opinions, but how about his car? Neil got his hands on one of the heaviest production automobiles, a Lincoln Continental Mark IV convertible, and has set out to make it into a more earth friendly transportation alternative. The car will be entered into competition for the Automotive X Prize. It looks cool, too. Young has collaborated on the project with Johnathan Goodwin and HLine Conversion, who has been converting heavy vehicles like Hummers to hybrids that get incredibly good fuel economy on fuels like biodiesel.
Neil talked to Charlie Rose about the Link-Vollt, where he demonstrated that his knowledge of physics isn't quite as spot on as his ideals. He has been outspoken about the possible solutions for the US automobile industry. He has been covered in the New York Times. There is a lot of info out there, Engadget had a post a bit ago, and the project is getting some more attention now that the car is on the road at after 14 months of conversion.
What do you think will save the US auto industry? How can makers cause the industry to transform into a source of solutions to our economic and environmental challenges?
Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Green | Digg this!
Nesson argues that the Digital Theft Deterrence and Copyright Damages Improvement Act of 1999 is unconstitutional because it effectively lets a private group — the Recording Industry Association of America, or RIAA — carry out civil enforcement of a criminal law. He also says the music industry group abused the legal process by brandishing the prospects of lengthy and costly lawsuits in an effort to intimidate people into settling cases out of court.Go Charlie!Nesson, the founder of Harvard's Berkman Center for Internet and Society, said in an interview that his goal is to "turn the courts away from allowing themselves to be used like a low-grade collection agency."
Nesson is best known for defending the man who leaked the Pentagon Papers and for consulting on the case against chemical companies that was depicted in the film "A Civil Action." His challenge against the music labels, made in U.S. District Court in Boston, is one of the most determined attempts to derail the industry's flurry of litigation.
Law professor fires back at song-swapping lawsuits
(Thanks, Michaelann and everyone else who sent this in!)
I've just gotten a review copy of my own and it's even better than I'd hoped. The print quality is spectacular, reproducing cleaned-up pages from the archives of The Chicagoan at full size, in the manner of the gigantic Little Nemo book that came out a couple years ago. I had to physically restrain myself from slicing out the 80 pages' worth of color plates of the covers and sending them to the framers.
Chicago is one of the loveliest, most livable cities I've ever visited (even in the winter! I'm a Torontonian, so I'm not scared of a little snow and wind) and the vivid historical picture conjured up by this volume is pure loveliness to me.
The Chicagoan: A Lost Magazine of the Jazz Age on Amazon, The Chicagoan at Chicago Press, Excerpted pages PDF
While browsing the stacks of the Regenstein Library at the University of Chicago some years ago, noted historian Neil Harris made a surprising discovery: a group of nine plainly bound volumes whose unassuming spines bore the name the Chicagoan. Pulling one down and leafing through its pages, Harris was startled to find it brimming with striking covers, fanciful art, witty cartoons, profiles of local personalities, and a whole range of incisive articles. He quickly realized that he had stumbled upon a Chicago counterpart to the New Yorker that mysteriously had slipped through the cracks of history and memory.Here Harris brings this lost magazine of the Jazz Age back to life. In its own words, the Chicagoan claimed to represent “a cultural, civilized, and vibrant” city “which needs make no obeisance to Park Avenue, Mayfair, or the Champs Elysees.” Urbane in aspiration and first published just sixteen months after the 1925 appearance of the New Yorker, it sought passionately to redeem the Windy City’s unhappy reputation for organized crime, political mayhem, and industrial squalor by demonstrating the presence of style and sophistication in the Midwest. Harris’s substantial introductory essay here sets the stage, exploring the ambitions, tastes, and prejudices of Chicagoans during the 1920s and 30s. The author then lets the Chicagoan speak for itself in lavish full-color segments that reproduce its many elements: from covers, cartoons, and editorials to reviews, features—and even one issue reprinted in its entirety.
Kids really have the best ideas! Sometimes they aren't really practical, but they are always creative. About a month ago, we were driving in the car and she said she wanted tally marks on her birthday shirt. Perfect! Of course, it was 6:30 on the morning of her birthday when I finally got around to making it. Some things never change. I do know what I am going to do for Jane's shirt (also her idea). I have two and a half weeks to do that one. Let's see if I can avoid procrastination. Probably not. (Just me trying to be realistic).
Tally - ho!
(via Craft)
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
At the end of the last class yesterday the idea came up to form a mailing list for young people who're interested in digital freedoms, computer security and so on, and one of the students suggested that we call the list "Watching Back". The list is watchingback@googlegroups.com and almost all the kids who took the course are on it.Watching BackIt would be great if people running similar courses could get their students involved on the list, and that teachers and other people who know something about the subject hang around and help guide the discussion as mentors.
There's a lot to discuss. A running theme through the course was the importance of the power of young people to influence the world. I read from the Declaration of Independence of Cyberspace in the last class, because it is somewhat prophetic of what is going on:
"You are terrified of your own children, since they are natives in a world where you will always be immigrants. Because you fear them, you entrust your bureaucracies with the parental responsibilities you are too cowardly to confront yourselves."
Throughout the network young people are being empowered to change the world, they're figuring out the beauty of the hacker culture and the fight for freedom. In a world where big brother is watching with increasing scrutiny it is a big relief to know that at least the children are watching back.
The Commerce Department said Friday that retail sales fell by 2.8 percent last month, surpassing the old mark of a 2.65 percent drop in November 2001 in the wake of the terrorist attacks that year.U.S. retail sales collapse (via Beyond the Beyond)
The Internet is a system for efficiently making copies between computers. Whereas a conversation in your kitchen involves mere perturbations of air by noise, the same conversation on the net involves making thousands of copies. Every time you press a key, the keypress is copied several times on your computer, then copied into your modem, then copied onto a series of routers, thence (often) to a server, which may make hundreds of copies both ephemeral and long-term, and then to the other party(ies) to the conversation, where dozens more copies might be made.Copyright law valorizes copying as a rare and noteworthy event. On the Internet, copying is automatic, massive, instantaneous, free, and constant. Clip a Dilbert cartoon and stick it on your office door and you're not violating copyright. Take a picture of your office door and put it on your homepage so that the same co-workers can see it, and you've violated copyright law, and since copyright law treats copying as such a rarified activity, it assesses penalties that run to the hundreds of thousands of dollars for each act of infringement.
There's a word for all the stuff we do with creative works — all the conversing, retelling, singing, acting out, drawing, and thinking: we call it culture.
Culture's old. It's older than copyright.
Rivkasmom.com - Steampunk accessories for the discerning collector
“The Nursery Alice”, originally published in 1890, was the only edition of “Alice” that Sir John Tenniel ever coloured, with twenty illustrations drawn from “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland”, combined with a new text, adapted by Lewis Carroll for young children.White Rabbit Press is proud to announce the finest colour reproductions ever made of Tenniel's “Alice”, with this exquisite, museum-quality Limited Edition of 500 prints of Sir John Tenniel's renowned 20 colour illustrations, including cover art by Emily Gertrude Thomson.
White Rabbit Press
(Thanks, Lorna!)
Wafrica
(via Tokyomango)
Clever global warming rug... made by Nanimarquina via BoJ.
During a quiet moment on Sunday afternoon at Maker Faire Austin 2008, I had a nice conversation with Mitch Altman. At the end of a very busy weekend, he was pretty beat, but I was struck with what a wonderful and peaceful guy Mitch is.
Mitch Altman creates kits that inspire people to make things. "If we don't make things on our own, then we're stuck with what the corporations want to give us....If we make our own things, we can make whatever we want. If we can imagine it, we can make it."
Check out Mitch Altman and his TV-B-Gone and Brain Machine projects.
Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Interviews | Digg this!
It is with great sadness that my guestblogging stint at Boing Boing comes to an end. What will I do next? How will I fill the endless days that lie before me? Will I ever be able to guestblog anywhere else after having reaching these heady heights? Me thinks not. I would like to send a bouquet of thanks to Cory, Mark, and David for allowing me to run about on their awesome, esteemed stage, and a barrel of gratitude to Xeni Jardin, who had the audacity to invite me and never told me not to use the word "bukkake" in a post. Also, much appreciation to readers and commenters, most of whom did not say that all of my posts sucked. In total, it was the best of times, it was ... Well, it was pretty much just the best of times. XOX -- Susannah Breslin, aka The Reverse Cowgirl.
In 2007, Haliburton filed for patent protection – claiming a method of "patent acquisition and assertion by a (non-inventor) first party against a second party." It looks like the company wants to be able to sue non-inventing entities who try to patent and assert technology against a company who has been using the technology as a trade secret. Bilski wipes cleanly out the claims – except for those claiming the step of "performing research using a computer." The inventor Clive D. Menezes is a Halliburton patent attorney. The prosecuting attorney is Howard Speight.
Junk Patents
(via /.)
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Police had no idea that one SIM card could be used simultaneously from two handsets before the detention of Nazir Ahmed for interrogation. Nazir was picked up from Morigaon after an SMS from his mobile number in the name of ISF-IM claimed responsibility for Thursday's blasts in Assam...The cloning requires extracting the Ki (the secret code inside the SIM) and IMEI from the original card. It would take up to three days to extract the Ki and the IMEI from the original SIM card through the programmes offered by the sites. The experts said no one has actually done any research on SIM card cloning because the activity is illegal in the country.
SIM card clones new challenge for Assam cops
(via Schneier
Mark Wallace, of the TaxPayers' Alliance, said: 'It is crazy that so many councils are using anti-terror legislation to spy on their residents. It must cost a huge amount for all these concealed cameras, just to give a few people relatively low-level fines.'Other local authorities which gave details of how they used RIPA included Lewes District Council in East Sussex.
It admitted that the Act was used to gain evidence on residents who persistently left rubbish out at the wrong time.
South Bedfordshire council also admitted going through phone bills inside rubbish bags to identify who had left them outside.
Officers also electronically tagged certain types of rubbish to find out if they had been dumped illegally.
Wycombe District council in Buckinghamshire put an electronic tag on rubbish left outside a shop to see if it was taken.
March of the dustbin Stasi: Half of councils use anti-terror laws to watch people putting rubbish out on the wrong day
(via Schneier
?I like to imagine the person who would wear this gleaming silver skull belt buckle with built-in MP3 player and four LED pineal glands. In my mind's eye, I see a death metal man child, his flabby torso squeezed into a child's size Megadeth t-shirt. He is completely bald, but still manages to have a mullet. His hands are deformed, crab-like pincers in the shape of devil's horns; he is incapable of human speech except for the occasional moist shouting of the word "Metallica!" to denote excitement or approval. And, of course, the zipper on his leather pants must always be down: our man rocks with his [REDACTED] out.In short, I think Joel's really going to love this when he gets it from me for Christmas. The belt buckle includes a built-in MP3/MP4 player with 1GB of memory, an FM radio and LED lights that visualize the playing tune.
MP3-playing skull belt buckle is the perfect gift for the death metal man child,
Discuss this on Boing Boing Gadgets
I'm a huge fan of the OLPC XO1 -- it's a superb piece of hardware and a brilliant piece of pedagogy besides. My experiences working with kids on community-initiated sustainable development projects in the developing world lead me to believe that the poorest kids in the world stand to benefit enormously from getting one of these hackable, extendable devices in their hands.
The OLPC organization hasn't been without problems -- it's hard to imagine how something this ambitious would get everything right the first time -- but I have always been (and I remain) a staunch supporter of the project. I'll be ordering one for my daughter to play with when she gets a little older.
OLPC Give One Get One on Amazon
(via Engadget)
Please give a warm welcome to our next guest blogger, Dale Dougherty!
Dale is General Manager of the Maker Media, a division of O'Reilly Media. He is the founding editor and publisher of Make and Craft magazines, both of which focus on DIY projects, and the creator of Maker Faire, which showcases creative communities.
Dale has been instrumental in many of O'Reilly's most important efforts, working closely with Tim O'Reilly to establish O'Reilly as a leading technical publisher. An early Web pioneer, Dale was the developer and publisher of Global Network Navigator (GNN), the first commercial Web site launched in 1993 and sold to America Online in 1995. Dale was developer and publisher of Web Review, the online magazine for Web designers from 1995-1999, which was sold to CMP in 1999. He developed the Hacks Series of books in 2003, which includes the bestselling Google Hacks and Excel Hacks. He coined the term Web 2.0 as part of developing the Web 2.0 Conference.
In its fourth year, Make Magazine has a paid circulation of 110,000. It is the leader of a new DIY technology segment that includes hobbyists and enthusiasts and increasingly a growing number of teens. Craft, in its second year, has a circulation of 40,000, and combines traditional low-tech with new ideas and new technologies. Both are family-oriented publications.
Maker Faire in its third year has become the largest technology-oriented consumer event in America, a celebration of the DIY mindset and creativity. The most recent Maker Faire in the San Francisco Bay Area attracted 65,000 people over two days.
He lives and works in Sebastopol, California.
I do not speak or read Japanese, so I'm missing out on most of the story here -- but apparently this is a large collection of a child's drawings of yokai, or traditional Japanese folkloric monsters: Link one, Link two. We recently produced a series of Boing Boing tv episodes on this subject: part one, part two. (thanks, Darren Garrison)
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Here they are in entirety. I lost count at a gajillion. For the record, I'd be equally fascinated with a similar collection for the other side. (Thanks, Geoff.)
The REPLICATOR blog put together an overview of Open Source Hardware including a past presentation I co-authored, a good start if you're interested in the ongoing evolution of the Open Source Hardware movement.
The biggest challenges I see ahead involves the use of the term "Open source hardware" - for the folks who have been doing OSH, it's pretty specific - basically others can use your stuff in a commercial way, Arduino being a specific example, you can manufacture you own and sell them if you wanted (some have). The flipside is, some makers don't want to allow commercial use of their projects but *do* want to share their works in a non-commercial way. The term "open hardware" has been gaining some interest along with a specific Creative Common-like license, for example - "Open Hardware Project" with a "Non-commercial manufacturing license".
Post your thoughts in the comments!
More:
Open source hardware, what is it? Here's a start...
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Sony has announced the development of the finest-yet pixel-pitch 1/2.5" sensor. The 12.2MP CMOS sensor has been developed for mobile phone cameras, but is of a size commonly used in compact and super zoom cameras. The IMX060PQ sensor, which Sony brands 'Exmor' in common with its DSLR CMOS sensors, will also be available incorporated into an F2.8 28mm-equiv lens unit with piezoelectric driven autofocus - relatively advanced for a camera phone module.
I know I'm not the only one around here who has a soft spot for creative taxidermy - and who could not have their heart stolen completely by this gift of lovely squirrel feet earrings? Via Craftastrophe
Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Crafts | Digg this!
The North Wind Blew South from Keith Loutit on Vimeo.
Australian photographer Keith Loutit makes enchanting short films using time-lapse and tilt-shift photos. It's hard to believe these take place in the real world. Via Bent Objects
Learn how to make your own tilt-shift lens from Make Volume 9.
|
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
The "Breath Bra" was created as a simple excersize using a LilyPad Arduino to record its wearer's breath over the course of a day or week and transmit the data over a Bluetooth connection to their cellphone (in this case a Nokia N95). Check out the link below for code on this build.
Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Arts | Digg this!
The by-no-means-subtle flash and racket of Zippy's squarewave cylinder -
...here's my brand new homemade analog synth, inspired by the Thingamagoop, but designed from scratch by Zippy. It's controlled by three mercury tilt-switches and of course, buttons-and-knobs. Fun to play! The sound changes as you rotate the thing. It's brain is seven square-wave oscillators: three for the "notes," three for the blinky lights, and one for the "tremolo" mod. The whole thing mounts on a round, blank circuit board and fits inside this acrylic rocks-glass I got at Lucky's!!!! 1/4" output also installed to crank-it-up and annoy the neighbors.WHAT? - CAN'T HEAR YOU OVER the FUNX CAPACITOR [via Synthtopia] Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Music | Digg this!
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Antjes makes these lovely felted bacon iPod / iPhone cases via Giz.
More:
Maker of the day - Matty Sallin, Bacon-cooking alarm clock.
HOW TO - Bacon Tiara.
Fleece Bacon Scarf.
MMmmm bacon....costume.
HOW TO - Make bacon soap.
HOW TO - Make Bacon Curls.
HOW TO - Make bacon.
The AntiCraft Does Bacon Crafts.
Electro bacon.
The "Unique Monster" is a strange car mod that puts monster truck tires onto the Smart car, which is known as one of the smallest, most fuel efficient cars around. We like how this maker decided to turn this unassuming car into a road warrior and hope they don't have any evil motives for this beast. Watch the video and you will understand its potential.
Smart Monster via Core77
Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Transportation | Digg this!
Lorin Parker of Electric Western demonstrates his Phantastron vacuum-tube sound synthesizer under the control of electric guitar rendering "magic sub-octaves" in the process. I have witnessed firsthand what the Phantastron does to a guitar signal, it is both brutal and beautiful!
Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Kits | Digg this!
The AVGA project is an open source (It's GPL, but it says "don't make money with it") AVR based color video game development platform for a single chip game console via HackedGadgets.
?The "Spiral Sunrise" by Esther Polak visualizes the sun's rising and setting through a solar-powered robot that is tethered to a tree and moves in circular rings around the tree. The robot carries an open sandglass so that when it moves, it draws a line of sand and the thickness of the line depends on the speed the robot is moving. Interesting way to show patterns of sunlight over the course of a day.
Spiral Sunrise - Media Lab Prado
Dan Roe makes some really interesting robots that he calls "assorted experiments in artificial life". Check out his website for more information, including videos of some of his work.
More work from Dan Roe
In the Maker Shed:
We've had several neat projects over the years, and we're proud that Solarbotics has created a cool bundle kit to provide parts for completing them. In this great bundle you'll find what you need to build the Mousey (Make Issue #02), Trimit (Issue #06), SolarRoller (Issue #06), and Beetlebot (#12). Get this bundle and save over $20 compared to buying these kits separately.Please note: This kit includes the electronic components only, the build instructions and other parts needed for each project can be found in the corresponding Make issue (which are not included).
More about the Maker Bundle #1
Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Robotics | Digg this!
Federated Media, headed by John Battelle is the premiere online advertising agency for author-driven sites and the pragmatical avant-garde of conversational marketing made reality. The Federated Media network is a fantastic ring of independent, author-driven blogs and sites - such as TechCrunch, Digg, Search Engine Land, GigaOM, ReadWriteWeb, Mashable, Boing Boing and many other great ones.
"An FM site has influence not because its author is well known, but because the author has earned the trust of an influential community."
And this is why I am so happy to make this announcement: as John Battelle mentions in the short video here below, MasterNewMedia has been selected among 4000 sites that have applied in the last year to become part of the FM network. MasterNewMedia is also among the elite group of four sites not based in the US (only another one is based in Europe).
I feel very excited by FM choice to select this site as one of its network advertising partners and I like to think of this success as a reward for the hard work in publishing and sharing quality content that me and my team have been bringing forward.
To celebrate this new partnership, I have a very special present for you: John Battelle, CEO and founder of Federated Media has allowed me to get an exclusive video sneak-in inside his office to record a 4-min video where he explains to you what Federated Media is and what makes it so unique for independent online publishers.
FM has also kindly asked me to ask you, my readers, a few simple questions to help Federated Media find the most relevant potential advertisers for the MasterNewMedia community. This will help both Federated Media learn more about what kind of readers I have but also help them identify the best possible matches in terms of advertising brands that may have something really relevant to bring to you, the MasterNewMedia audience. I know surveys are never the most appealing thing to do, but I have taken two steps to make this one as sweet and approachable as it can get:
a) it is very short - you can go through it in a couple of minutes
b) As a thank you, I am giving away to each survey respondent my own complete list of RSS new sources. Yes, I am making available for all MasterNewMedia long-time readers and supporters my original OPML source file, containing all of the RSS news sources my newsroom taps into daily, to hand-select the very best news you see daily on the front page of MasterNewMedia.
So, if you are a Robin Good's passionate reader and want to give a little contribution to my publishing efforts please share your views about MasterNewMedia here: Federated Media / MasterNewMedia short-survey.
Here below John Battelle exclusive mini video interview for MasterNewMedia readers:
Intro
John Battelle: Hey Robin, and Robin's readers and viewers, it's John Battelle here, welcoming Robin to the FM family. I wanted to answer a couple of questions that Robin had for me about Federated Media. Two questions:
- What is FM? Why did you make it?
- What makes Federated Media unique for independent publishers like Robin Good?
What Is Federated Media
John Battelle: First of all, what FM is, it is a media business leveraging technology and leveraging shifts that are happening in the ecosystem of the media business over the past ten years. Toward a conversational form of media like this. Leveraging the Web as a platform. A couple of big trends that FM has built in:This is a trend that has been happening for ten years, we really took off in the last five. Federated is a business that has developed around those trends to support independent publishers. Not unlike what happened with music business, in the 50s, 60s and 70s, as musicians began to get tools of production in their own hands: in other words, the organ wasn't just in the church. You can have a guitar, and playing in your garage and get really good, but you needed a music label, a band manager and a talent agent, distribution people, to get you records out and all that stuff. You needed this all infrastructure for the musician to get to the point of making money. Similarly, independent web site publishers need a business around. Big difference of course is we don't control, own, or try to exploit the intellectual property. We actually work as partners with the publishers in finding ways to get brand revenue to those publishers mainly through working with top nudge, top five-hundred brands, in the United States, and increasingly globally.
- The cost of distribution, which is to be the largest cost in all media, has been mitigated by the Internet.
- Secondly, the tools of production are no longer an impediment to the creation of media allowing for talented individuals to create platforms to allow audiences to aggregate and have conversations around the individuals' passions, like what Robin has done.
What Makes Federated Media Unique
John Battelle: Second question: What makes FM unique? It's our approach to working as partners with publishers, and working as partners with marketers and bringing the marketers and the publishers together in conversations that add value to the audiences. I think what makes us unique is that we are very selective about who we bring on, and we're very selective about how we bring these conversations together, and actually keep marketing in this new environment. We're not a pumped-up banner ad, punch-the-monkey, ram-it display network, we try to bring high quality to everything we do. Sure, we run typical ads but we run a lot of different kinds campaigns that try to get the community involved in conversations, around the greater themes that are contributed toward to a brand. And there's a lot of examples of those on FederatedMedia.net site, so encourage anyone interested, given that I know most of the audience here is interested in new media and marketing, to go to FederatedMedia.net and check it out. I think you'll see our difference there.
MasterNewMedia Becomes Part of The Federated Media Family
John Battelle: That's like a good summary I think, of everything that we do, looking forward to engaging with you and your site as you become member of the family. Welcome! I guess I should say congratulations, 4.000 people applied last year to be part of the family and it's very rare that we let someone through the door, so I hope we can have a great partnership together with not just you Robin, but your audience in particular. Thanks very much!
Do you have a first generation iPod touch? If you do, this is a cheap way to make an external speaker, and stand, so you can enjoy hours of YouTube goodness without the need for headphones.
Seeing that Apple have sneakily added an internal speaker to the iPod touch Gen II, my Gen I felt sort of lame as I couldn't view YouTube, video or play games without having to use a headphone.
More about making an iPod cardboard speaker
Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in iPod | Digg this!
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
This is a nice way to spruce up those cheap looking tap lights. You should be able to make these lights in about 10 minutes for around $10. Not too bad for a custom light.
More about DIY: Contemporary luminaries out of tap lights
Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in DIY Projects | Digg this!
Industry gives a laboratory to America's young scientists... Popular Science 1941.
YOUTHFUL, IMAGINATION, an inexhaustible national resource, is being developed along scientific lines by the American Institute of the City of New-York. This organization, chartered in 1828 and devoted throughout its existence to the promulgation of science and the encouragement of American industry, established its junior branch in 1928 and recently has intensified its efforts in this direction through the American Institute Laboratory at 310 Fifth Avenue, New York.Its aim is to direct and utilize the imaginative faculties of youth which, since the founding of the institute, have been turning more and more toward science and mechanics. Under its wing are more than 730 juvenile science clubs, scattered throughout the United States, its possessions, and foreign countries. Some meet in high schools, some in settlement houses, and some are spontaneous youthful organizations with cellar or attic laboratories and club rooms. In the aggregate there are more than 30,000 youthful club members.
They experiment with model airplanes, bacteria, telescopes, radio, tropical fish, light, sound, animal-breeding, and in numerous other fields. Their ambition is limited only by their own knowledge and the cost of equipment, and it was to obviate the latter difficulty to some degree that the American Institute Laboratory has been established with the cooperation of the International Business Machines Corporation, which gave the use of two floors of a New York City office building, and of the Westinghouse Electric & Manufacturing Company, which supplied the equipment.
This is (was) pretty cool, maybe we as in makers, society and a science hungry public can bring this back!
Here are the companies listed in the article...
"American Institute Laboratory" I can't seem to find if it exists as it once did, anyone know? All the references on Google are from books from the early 1900's - they coordinated science fairs at the time it seems. Science fairs go back to at least as far as 1928 when the American Institute of New York City first held one for city youth at the Museum of Natural History. In 1950, science fairs went under the auspices of Science Service, a non-profit organization. It became international in 1960.
International Business Machines Corporation (IBM). IBM is still around and they continue to support science for kids. IBM gave 2 floors in NYC, I wonder if they'd be willing to do this again? I've email our team who has worked with IBM before on the IBM IGNITE camp.
Westinghouse Electric & Manufacturing Company. Westinghouse was founded in 1886, then it bought CBS in the 1995 and renamed itself the CBS corporation, in 1998 CBS creates a subsidiary called Westinghouse Electric Corporation. In 1999 CBS sells the nuclear assets to BNFL that operates as Westinghouse Electric Company, the business in then sold to Toshiba. CBS is then acquired by Viacom, Viacom calls itself CBS corporation and CBS retains ownership of Westinghouse Electric Company. Companies have licensed the Westinghouse name but they're not sold by the original company.
So... It seems to me CBS or Toshiba might be the ones to ask about sponsoring this again? Anyone work at either place, email me.
We have a chemistry book (below) - I'd like to see that get out there to more folks and perhaps develop a "new" chemistry set for kids to go along with it. Imagine 2 floors of science learning in each major city, doing real chemistry experiments!
Illustrated Guide to Home Chemistry Experiments
For students, DIY hobbyists, and science buffs, who can no longer get real chemistry sets, this one-of-a-kind guide explains how to set up and use a home chemistry lab, with step-by-step instructions for conducting experiments in basic chemistry. Learn how to smelt copper, purify alcohol, synthesize rayon, test for drugs and poisons, and much more. The book includes lessons on how to equip your home chemistry lab, master laboratory skills, and work safely in your lab, along with 17 hands-on chapters that include multiple laboratory sessions.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
This DIY bamboo frame is absolutely beautiful. Appropriate, since it appears to have hand crafted with love for a significant other. Aaron writes:
The ride quality is TOTALLY SWEET! I realize that I have a bit of a bias, but truthfully I have ridden very few bikes that felt nicer. The bike seems to float over bumpy road surfaces, almost as if it were on giant baloon tires, but nope, they are just 700x23 clinchers pumped hard as rocks. My big worry was that I had not gotten the frame alignment right, but that seems dead on too; riding no-handed is no problem. Oh yeah, and it corners like a fricking roller coaster and it accelerates as fast as anything I've ever ridden. Maybe that's due to the fact that it weighs only 16.5 pounds! I had no idea that it was going to be so light and honestly did a full on "YESSSS!" complete with double fist pump when I hung it on the scale.
There isn't a huge amount of info about the build process, suffice it to say that it began with harvesting carefully selected bamboo and ended with over 100 hours of epoxy and carbon fiber work.
Aaron's Finished Bamboo Bike [thanks, nick]
Details on Making the Bike
Previously:
The Bamboo Bike Project is a collaboration between scientists and engineers at The Earth Institute at Columbia University and a bicycle builder at Calfee Design. The project aims to examine the feasibility of implementing cargo bikes made of bamboo as a sustainable form of transportation in Africa. The ultimate goals of the project are:
1.To build a better bike for poor Africans in rural areas.
2.To stimulate a bicycle building industry in Africa to satisfy local needs.
Making a Carbon Fiber Bike frame
From the pages of MAKE
Working With Carbon Fiber - MAKE:09 p168
I'm pretty predictable. I couldn't wait 2-3 days to try the new batch of coffee I roasted yesterday. These are some photos of me making a shot of espresso. It was a bit overroasted, yet grassy at the same time! This points to my temperature being a bit high and my guess is the grassy taste will mellow out in a few days. It's still quite good, and very satisfying to have made from scratch. If only I could grow a few coffee trees in our back yard...
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
