- Strange Horizons is looking for female reviewers.
- Where was the robotics merit badge when I was a Boy Scout?
- On the decline of The Daily. I lost interest almost immediately in the app. [via]
- Reinventing the Muppets.
- And finally, Sandworm Size Chart:
art
Wednesday various
- Twenty-or-so questions with comedian Mike Birbiglia. On what makes someone a real New Yorker: “The willingness to live within ten inches of someone else at all times.”
- So much for that new Dune movie.
- Sperm whales may have names. [via]
- Would you pay $50 a month to rent original artwork?
- And finally, Warren Ellis asks artists to re-imagine the Fantastic Four. Chip Zdarsky’s contribution, the third at that main link, would likely substitute Dr. Doom for Dr. Heiter, but a lot of the reinterpretations are equally interesting.
Thursday various
- What are the Windows A: and B: drives used for?. Well, questions like this are used for making people like me feel old. (See, also, this video of French children playing with vintage technology.) [via]
- Nuclear bomb photo archives. Exactly what it says on the (likely radioactive) tin. [via]
- The Meaning of Dog Barks. Take the interactive quiz! [via]
- There’s something utterly charming about the idea of fifteen-year-old John Updike writing a fan letter to the creator of Little Orphan Annie.
- And finally, Choose your own Night of the Living Dead adventure
Thursday various
- Maybe I’ve been living under a rock, but is “it’s on like Donkey Kong” actually such a popular phrase? I’m going to try to popularize the phrase “This is gonna hurt like Q*bert!”
- I didn’t love what I saw of the Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear, and it seemed a little like a well-intentioned but disjointed mess. But I’m perfectly willing to accept Jon Stewart’s argument (expressed in this long and compelling interview with Rachel Maddow) that those intentions were entirely apolitical on their part. That they were just trying to put on a comedy show, and whatever “message” the rally had, it was not the same message that so many of his viewers, so many of the left-leaning progressives who attended the rally and are bemoaning its outcome, clearly wanted it to be. I’m perfectly willing to let Stewart pass for falling short of what I hoped the rally would be — a call to arms, groundbreaking satire, something, anything other than a singalong with Kid Rock and Sheryl Crow. I’m willing to let Stewart pass on this, the same way I’m not willing to let Obama pass for falling short on his own call to arms, because when you get right down to it, I buy Stewart’s contention that he’s just a comedian. A comedian with a political bent and sometimes important insight, but one following in pretty well-established treads and with pretty well-established boundaries. It can seem like a cop-out, and I think Stewart acknowledges that, but I think he also does a good job of explaining why it’s not, why his job isn’t drumming up progressive activism (on the left or right) but instead making people laugh.
I think you can argue that the rally wasn’t entirely successful on that front either, but I think it’s important to weigh expectations against intentions.
- On a less serious note, Harry Potter as space opera [via]
- Uwe Boll: he just might make you root for the Nazis.
- And finally, building the perfect zombie safe house.
Wednesday various
- The Monsters of H.P. Lovecraft’s Cthulhu Mythos, As Drawn By Children [via]
- I would so read an entire comic about The Motleys:
Lurk was the muscle. He didn’t talk much, except about Joss Whedon.
The Mime wasn’t on the team, he just followed them around, as if it was really windy.
- An incredible story about twins joined at the brain. [via]
- Ursula K. Le Guin’s touching tribute to her friend and collaborator: Someone Named Delores [via]
- And finally, Science Saved My Soul [via]: