Saturday, October 31, 2015

William Gibson: "'What would North Korea do with this?' is an essential initial thought-experiment of mine, for any new technology."









Link roundup

1. "For the second time in three weeks, the front-runner for the Democratic nomination wiped millions of dollars off the value of an industry."
On Friday, private prison stocks dropped sharply after Clinton said the U.S. needed to “end the era of mass incarceration.”
2. "Pedestrian seriously injured by sofa falling 130ft from luxury London hotel"

3. "Reformers pushing for body cameras may not have anticipated full-time facial recognition."
the Strategic Systems Alliance cameras can read license plates and faces.

"As I wear this and walk around, it's checking all the faces I walk past and all the vehicles I walk past and notifying me if any of those people are on my watch list"

Friday, October 30, 2015

Garnet sculpture



By Nooree Kim for a Cartoon Network-themed show opening tomorrow at Gallery Nucleus.

Link roundup

1. "With business weak, cargo vessels are happy to carry tourists, too."
Shipping companies like the dollars passengers such as McGuffick can bring aboard. In a slowing global economy, freight prices have fallen so far that hauling a person from Shanghai to Rotterdam brings in at least 10 times more revenue than a 20-foot container full of flat-packed furniture.
2. On ESPN ending Grantland:
"Look, guys, this is a business. And our business is miserable idiots trolling people with hot takes they don't even believe."
3. "Kind of extraordinary how much big scifi in past few years is about getting friendzoned by A.I.'s (Her, Halo 5, Tomorrowland, Ex Machina)."

4. "The placement of these telescopes—and a plan to build a new, mega-telescope—is the source of enormous tension in Hawaii, where Mauna Kea is at the center of an intense cultural and political debate."
Astronomers want to move forward with plans to build their $1 billion observatory, known as the Thirty Meter Telescope, or TMT, near the mountain’s summit, while local protesters are rallying against the project in an attempt to reclaim a unique and sacred place for the Hawaiian people.

Link roundup

1. "In Heroin Crisis, White Families Seek Gentler War on Drugs"
today’s heroin crisis is different. While heroin use has climbed among all demographic groups, it has skyrocketed among whites; nearly 90 percent of those who tried heroin for the first time in the last decade were white.

And the growing army of families of those lost to heroin — many of them in the suburbs and small towns — are now using their influence, anger and grief to cushion the country’s approach to drugs, from altering the language around addiction to prodding government to treat it not as a crime, but as a disease.
2. LA Times on the blimp from September:
How a $2.7 billion air-defense system became a 'zombie' program
JLENS was billed as the answer to an ever-expanding list of threats, from cruise missiles to explosive-laden trucks. But the blimp-borne radar system has yet to perform as promised.
3. "Why is Cortana naked? Halo franchise director Frank O'Connor has an answer"
the devs have "backed into" the fiction to address her choice in clothing (or lack thereof)

Thursday, October 29, 2015

Link roundup

1. Margaret Cho is Tweeting about being a sex worker.

2. "What if I told you that after a hundred years of rigorous competition, car manufacturers have finally created the perfect automobile? Would you believe that the evolution of car design has culminated in a vehicle so perfect that every manufacturer has agreed to produce the same model?"

3. Outrageously expensive spec homes being built in Los Angeles:
Mr. Niami’s spec home will include...Four separate swimming pools

Wednesday, October 28, 2015

"One of America’s most famously Christian businesses is amassing a vast collection of biblical antiquities—but some may have been looted from the Middle East"

TDB:
In 2011, a shipment of somewhere between 200 to 300 small clay tablets on their way to Oklahoma City from Israel was seized by U.S. Customs agents in Memphis. The tablets were inscribed in cuneiform—the script of ancient Assyria and Babylonia, present-day Iraq—and were thousands of years old. Their destination was the compound of the Hobby Lobby corporation

...

These tablets, like the other 40,000 or so ancient artifacts owned by the Green family, were destined for the Museum of the Bible, the giant new museum funded by the Greens, slated to open in Washington, D.C., in 2017.

...

the Greens went from evangelical players to bona fide Christian celebrities in June of 2014 when they won a Supreme Court case, Burwell v. Hobby Lobby. It granted them exemption from the Obamacare mandate to provide certain forms of contraception to their employees; forcing the company to do so, the Supreme Court ruled, would have violated the Greens’ deeply-held Christian beliefs.

King Shark on CW's The Flash



Tuesday, October 27, 2015

"Single-player games with dead authentication servers ruled DMCA exempt"

"However, the U.S. Copyright Office will permit preservationists to modify console firmware in order to make video games playable if their remote authentication systems are discontinued, but only if those modified consoles are used for non-commercial purposes in institutions which are 'open to the public and/or to unafficiliated researchers,' like libraries and museums."

Monday, October 26, 2015

Gifs of Cena, Neymar, Messi, and Ronaldo going super saiyan

Cena, Neymar, Messi, Ronaldo, Rousey.

Lego mecha walking through water



By Kosmas Santosa.

Link roundup

1. Dennis Nedry cosplay. Beyonce cosplaying as Storm

2. "California town gets gold fever as would-be miners dig in sewers"
The extensive drainage systems do hold remnants from old gold mines

Sunday, October 25, 2015

Link roundup

1. "A Colorado-based company called Mountain Drones is developing a line of octocopters armed with small explosive charges as a possible tool for setting off artificial avalanches."

2. Nightmare fuel:
One day I stood on the platform of a railway station, waiting for a train to take me to Bulawayo. It was late October, the peak of the dry season, and shriveled leaves were falling from trees onto my head in a rare, merciful breeze. One, fairly large and twisted brown leaf landed on my shoulder. I tried to brush it off but it just sat there, trembling in the wind. I flicked it again. It landed lower on my sleeve. And then the leaf started to climb up my arm. I looked, still not believing.

Link roundup

1. Calling the paparazzi to show off a handbag.

2. "The GOP has a tech talent problem it might not solve"
The difference only became more stark in 2012 when Republican candidate Mitt Romney’s much-hyped voter targeting tool, nicknamed ORCA, suffered a total meltdown on Election Day. In contrast, the tool President Obama’s team had built, called Narwhal, has been credited as crucial to the Democratic win.
3. For fans of The Peripheral, Quora answers, "Are bullpup rifles just a fad, or are they the future of infantry rifles?"

Point Break poster

Saturday, October 24, 2015

"Inside Katy Perry's Real-Estate Soap Opera: Why Nuns and the Catholic Church Are Battling Over Her Dream L.A. Property"

Long article at Billboard.
Unbeknownst to the sisters, the archdiocese was also using the premises at its discretion. Archbishop Mahony, later at the center of the Los Angeles-area church sex-abuse scandal, quietly began sheltering priests accused of molestation on the grounds.

...

On May 26, at the archbishop’s urging, the five nuns met with Perry at nearby convalescent home Nazareth House, where two IHM sisters lived. As Holzman recalls, the pop star arrived late. Holzman mentioned the “devil” video she’d seen online. Perry said her comment was just for entertainment and showed them her left-wrist tattoo: the word “Jesus,” inked when she was 18.

At the request of Dunne, who sang along, Perry belted out the gospel song “Oh Happy Day,” reading the lyrics off her iPhone.

Wonder Woman vs Giganta Lego diorama



By Tim Lydy.

Friday, October 23, 2015

Revoltech Stitch available for preorder



$55 at the BBTS.

"The First Beverly Hills Dog Park Will Be Super Exclusive"

LAist:
After an apparently heated public comment period at a lengthy Beverly Hills City Council meeting earlier this week, city staff were instructed to investigate plans that include limiting access to the park, possibly having a ranger there when it's open and shortening the hours from 6 a.m to 10 p.m. to 8 a.m to 8 p.m. Keyed access to the park could be limited to Beverly Hills residents, though exceptions may include hotel guests and businesses in the city.

Battlefront Jakku

Thursday, October 22, 2015

"Why every horror film of 1980's was built on Indian burial grounds"

Atlas Obscura:
there is no Indian burial ground in Poltergeist. This is a common mistake

...

there’s the idea that Indian Burial Grounds could be anywhere, that Indians themselves are incomprehensible and probably magic.

Wednesday, October 21, 2015

Link roundup

1. "A 23-year-old Google employee lives in a truck in the company's parking lot and saves 90% of his income"

2. This is a bad logo.

3. An article from 2011:
I've started to notice a certain prestige attached to the AOL.com survivors. Now that my mother has switched to Gmail, virtually the only people I email at AOL accounts are bigshots -- people who were already so important by the time the various new fads (and technical advantages) arrived that they couldn't be bothered to switch, and had nothing to prove to anyone.

Link roundup

1. "Seven out of the 10 most popular stories on ESPN.com last month were run-of-the-mill fantasy football takes."

2. BMD:
It turns out that the ruling Communist Party does not allow films that promote cults or superstitions, and they consider ghost stories to be superstitious. This means that Crimson Peak probably ain't gonna play China.
...
As Ant-Man opens as the biggest Marvel movie in Chinese history I wonder how the 'no superstition' rule will impact Doctor Strange, a movie about a sorceror. I already was curious how China's ugly history with Tibet would inform Strange's origin story, but now I'm wondering if this rule doesn't mean we'll be subjected to a speech about how Strange's magic is actually quantum field manipulation or some other bullshit.
3. "Rally race driver Alex Roy just completed a 2,700-mile sprint from California to New York behind the wheel of an Autopilot-enabled Tesla Model S in an impressive 57 hours and 48 minutes, spending most of that time hands-off. "

Tuesday, October 20, 2015

Marvel Comics


Venom: Space Knight #3 cover by Ariel Olivetti.



Amazing Spider-Man #6 cover by Alex Ross.

Link roundup

1. Suggested Blade Runner Voight-Kampff Tests. And part 2.

2. "A Small Indiana Town Scarred by a Trusted Doctor":
Mrs. Davidson is now one of 293 patients around Munster, Ind., who have filed lawsuits against Dr. Gandhi and two other doctors in his practice claiming that they performed needless procedures.

Monday, October 19, 2015

"Inside Stanford Business School’s Spiraling Sex Scandal"

Vanity Fair:
In his resignation statement, Saloner—who’d long coveted the business-school post, which might well have served him as a springboard to the soon-to-be-vacated Stanford presidency—insisted he’d done nothing wrong.
...
For Gruenfeld—who has been cited by Malcolm Gladwell; who tutored Sheryl Sandberg on gender issues (and sits on the board of Lean In, the nonprofit foundation connected to Sandberg’s best-selling book of the same name); and who sold her own book, Acting with Power, at auction last fall for nearly a million dollars—questions of credibility are equally crucial. How does it look for someone who built her career analyzing the abusiveness (she dubbed it “disinhibition”) of the powerful, and who, until a month before she became romantically entangled with the dean, was the G.S.B.’s sexual-harassment adviser, and who, as co-director of Stanford’s Executive Program for Women Leaders, counsels high-powered women on how to overcome gender stereotypes, to wind up secretly sleeping with her boss?

Jurassic Park pins



Going on sale at Mondo tomorrow.

BMO disassembled



Adventure Time #48 cover by Ryan Robinson.

Cable and Armor


Cable by Ulises Farinas, colored by Buster Moody.



Armor by David Bednar.

"When people say 'I'd love to be in the zombie apocalypse!' They're basically saying, 'I'd love to go on a killing spree and not feel bad about it'"

R/ST:
Apocalyptic literature seems to have a special draw to those who like frontiers. The United States grew up as a frontier-country, and that spirit still has traction in our psyche.
...
What the zombie apocalypse, doomsday, and the breakdown of society do, is wipe away a century of barbed wire fences--returning the atmosphere to that of a frontier where we can forge our own destinies and stuff.

Leopard coat

Town and Country magazine, still the best.

Sunday, October 18, 2015

Art from Gallery 1988's Seinfeld show is now online



An Art Show About Nothing.

Horrific Lego diaoramas



By Mihai Marius Mihu.

"Call of Duty: Black Ops III developer Treyarch has apologised to anyone offended by a recent marketing campaign taking place on its Twitter account that seemed to suggest a terrorist attack was taking place in Singapore."

IGN:
In case you missed it, the widely-criticised stunt saw the @callofduty account change its name and branding to "Current Events Aggregate", before tweeting a series of articles about fashion and movies, both out of context and seemingly unrelated to Call of Duty. The next one was then of a terrorist attack tweeted in real time.

Link roundup

1. "The week, the world learned about Jonah Reider, a 21-year-old Columbia University senior who's operating a 'restaurant' (of sorts) named Pith, which he runs out of his dorm room. The idea is that it costs just $10 to $20 for five- to eight-course dinners (capped at four people) that Reider prepares in his dorm's common kitchen."

2. "For some reason, I vividly remember really wanting to go see The Two Jakes when it came out. I can recite parts of the trailer verbatim. I was seven. I had no idea what Chinatown was. Something about two dudes named Jake just really captured my imagination."

3. "You Can Now Have Dinner in the Great Hall at Hogwarts"

Saturday, October 17, 2015

"The Oakland A's Billy Beane was among the highest water users in the East Bay during California's drought emergency this summer"

"trailing only a retired Chevron executive and a prominent venture capitalist."

"UPDATE: Facebook User, Asif, Regains Friendship With Scorned Ex-Best Friend, Mudasir"

"And according to today’s announcement, not only has he reconciled with the previously denounced Mudasir, but the two reunited friends have even formed something of a best friend triumvirate with Mudasir’s temporary replacement, Salman."

Friday, October 16, 2015

Thursday, October 15, 2015

"Hyatt Ditching On-Demand Porn In Hotel Rooms"

"According to the report, hotel movie rental revenue per room has dropped from $339/year to $107/year over the last four years."

Spectre poster

Link roundup

1. "John Carpenter Wins Plagiarism Case Against Luc Besson Over 'Lockout'"

2. "Wayne Simmons, a regular Fox News commentator who claimed to have worked for the Central Intelligence Agency for almost three decades, was arrested on Thursday for allegedly fabricating his agency experience." "He was also indicted for using that false claim to gain government security clearances and an assignment as a defense contractor, where he advised senior military personnel overseas."

Wednesday, October 14, 2015

Mad Max Fury Road Lego



By Jin Kei.

Link roundup

1.  WaPo: "People are getting shot by toddlers on a weekly basis this year"

2. There were so many Steelers fans at the Chargers game in San Diego that the Chargers quarterback had to use a silent count.

3. Consumerist:
McDonald’s has several methods for marketing directly to children and parents, including McTeacher’s Nights, where educators will volunteer to work for the night at a McD’s in exchange for a “percentage of sales from the event” being donated to the school. Today, groups and unions representing some 3 million American teachers are asking McDonald’s to put an end to the program.

Link roundup

1. "Survey: Game pre-orders on the rise, strongly tied to sadness"

2. "Fixed, The App That Fixes Your Parking Tickets, Gets Blocked In San Francisco, Oakland and L.A."
When Fixed began faxing its submissions to SFMTA last year, the agency emailed the startup to stop using their fax machine. When Fixed pointed out that it was legal to do so, the agency simply shut off their fax.
3. How would the post-scarcity world of Star Trek actually work? And are some of us already living it?
right now in the United States what used to be the principle occupation of the human race — farming — we are down to 1 per cent of our labour force growing essential nutrients . . ., and we have about three times as many people in our medical and health support professions working to try and offset the effects of excessive calories.

...

in a new industrial state that the standard of living of the average American would be so high that it’s basically only propaganda that would make them want more
4. A related discussion:
When you are sitting on a typical modern jetliner, you are traveling at 500 mph in an aluminum tube that is actually capable of some pretty scary acrobatics. … Yet a typical air traveler never experiences anything that one of our ancestors could not experience on a fast chariot or a boat. Air travel is manufactured normalcy. …

This suggests that only those futures arrive for which there is human capacity to cope. This conclusion is not true, because a future can arrive before humans figure out whether they have the ability to cope. For instance, the widespread problem of obesity suggests that food-abundance arrived before we figured out that most of us cannot cope.

Pythona is the latest G.I. Joe Collector's Club figure



G.I. Joe Club:
This FREE modern era action figure will be sent to any G.I. Joe Club member that selects the 3 3/4-inch figure option and whose membership is active by March 16, 2016. This exclusive and never before released female figure features an amazing NEW head sculpt with removable hairpiece, along with other unique parts to re-create her unique character from the 1987 animated feature... G.I. Joe: The Movie!

This highly requested female action figure comes with classic file card and accessories, including: Cobra logo stand, removable cloak, and tentacle creature.
Her compelling introduction to the G.I. Joe universe:

Link roundup

1. TA:
The sand that we use to make buildings is finite just like any other resource, there is only so much of it. Now we are churning through it at an alarming rate, 40 billion tons per year. The sand of deserts is no good for construction, only certain sand will do, mainly granite. The sand that is already concrete can never be destroyed and reconstituted, its chemical reactions are permanent. A time will come in the not too distant future where no more concrete as we currently know it will be able to be used to build the structures in which we live. Illegal trade in construction sand has killed as many people as the cocaine wars in South America.
2. Joseph Kahn (best director):
So @mtv just told me I can't get any moonmen statues I won because they ran out this year. Oh well. I should have waited in line.
3. Arabic-speaking street artists hired to decorate sets for the TV series Homeland posted anti-Homeland graffiti.

"TONIGHT, TESLA MAKES its cars autonomous. Well, semi-autonomous"

Wired:
And it did it with an over-the-air update, effectively making tens of thousands of cars already sold to customers way better.
...
in Autopilot, you keep your hands on the steering wheel. Well… you don’t have to keep your hands on the steering wheel. You can rest them on your knees (resting on knees, palms up, fingertips touching the wheel is advised), or keep one pinky on the wheel. And okay, you can take your hands off altogether for a moment. But after a few seconds, your car will give you a little message, asking you to touch the wheel in some capacity.

Tuesday, October 13, 2015

Link roundup

1. "The really remarkable thing about Centralia is not that the fire has been able to burn for so long, it’s that the town, the state, and the federal government spent twenty-two years trying to put it out, and failed."
The Centralia problem was only ‘solved’ when ignoring it became politically embarrassing. In 1982, twelve-year-old Todd Domboski was swallowed by a sudden rift in the ground, and sucked into a pit of hot mud. He was rescued by his teenage cousin. This occurred while a congressional delegation was visiting Centralia to evaluate how much of a problem the mine fire really was, and, you know: it looked terrible.
2. "Three reasons your favorite team stinks at special teams"
In NFL practices, offensive players usually wear white jerseys, and defensive players dark jerseys. If you watch your team’s training camp practices during the fall, and you notice that your kickoff and punt teams are a solid sea of light jerseys, head immediately to your local liquor store and stock up.
3. The Rise and Fall of Trading Spaces, the Home Design Show That Ruled the World
Regret—or the threat of it—was a crucial figure in the show’s background.
...
Her experience seems to speak to a problem the show faced throughout its run, which may have grown in later years: a need to get ratings that drove dramatic, unwelcome makeovers.

Link roundup

1. Tales of students seeing ghosts during exam week:
There’s a condition known as hypnogogic/hypnopompic hallucinations from which many of us have or will suffer at some time in our life, especially during stressful periods (such as illness, finals, when we’ve just moved, or broken up with or lost a loved one).

When we’re just exiting or entering REM sleep, we can wake in a confused state, and hallucinate that we’re seeing or experiencing something that isn’t there. This hallucination can feel very, very real. Most people who’ve experienced this describe witnessing a person in their room who disappears only when the light is turned on, feeling an intense pressure on their chest, or even hearing voices or smelling scents that don’t exist.

These hallucinations aren’t at all indicative of mental illness or brain dysfunction, and happen to nearly everyone at some time or another, especially during periods when we aren’t getting enough sleep. That’s why they’re often mistaken for “paranormal” experiences, especially when they happen in a strange or new building, or at times when a death has occurred.
2. Students live-tweeted Malia Obama's visit to Brown.

Link roundup

1. "New York department store Bergdorf Goodman unveiled its latest windows designs inspired by the upcoming gothic romance “Crimson Peak.” The five store windows along Fifth Avenue feature set pieces and original props from the film."

2. "A man is suing the U.S government, the National Park Service and the San Francisco
Maritime National Historical Park after a 16-pound pine cone fell from a tree and crushed his skull in October 2014."
Bunya pines are not indigenous to the area, the lawsuit notes, and the trees in question are thought to have been planted by park staff years ago. Their seedpods, or pine cones, can grow to enormous sizes, reaching nearly 16 inches in diameter and weighing up to 40 pounds.

Monday, October 12, 2015

Vader crushed by an A-Wing in Star Wars Battlefront

Link roundup

1. "the best test of what people really want to do is what they are actually doing."

2. "Coastal Commission bans captive orca breeding at SeaWorld San Diego"
SeaWorld officials opposed the condition barring breeding, saying it would mean that the park’s population of 11 whales would be the last orcas held in the park.

New Star Wars book by Ulises Farinas



Star Wars Where's the Wookiee Search and Find Book is available at Amazon:
Chewbacca, a notorious rebel ally, is wanted for crimes against the Empire. Not often seen without his partner-in-crime, Han Solo, this Wookiee has evaded capture on multiple occasions, due in no small part to the fastest freighter in the universe, the Millennium Falcon. Chewie, as he is more commonly known, has a sizeable bounty on his head. Can you find this furry criminal before other accomplished bounty hunters beat you to it? A uniquely illustrated search and find format, perfect for Star Wars fans young and old!

Link roundup

1. Olly Moss:
I watched a Youtube tutorial about how to recreate one of my pieces. Holy shit that video tought me so much about Photoshop.
2. NYT:
That was days after Calvert, 29, had repeatedly been challenged for head-to-head play in another game, on the website FanDuel, by a Rick Sawyer. After checking a search engine, Calvert said, he found that Sawyer was actually a business planning manager at DraftKings.

“I could only think that he had watched my DraftKings account and had me pegged as a suboptimal player,” Calvert said. “I felt like a moron.”

Calvert said it was “pretty obvious that with insider information and access to top players,” players like him would not have a chance in the long run.

Metal Gear Solid V no texture glitch



Friday, October 9, 2015

Father changes "Merry" to "Mary" when reading Lord of the Rings to daughters

R/Books:
I remember the first time I picked up the books to read myself at around 11, I was SHOCKED that Merry was actually a boy and not a girl.

My dad told me that he wanted my sister and I to know that girls join in on adventures too, and that they can be a part of something big.

Luke meets an untimely end in Star Wars Battlefront



Rejected Mondo posters


The Death of Gwen Stacy and other Mondo posters that were rejected.

Thursday, October 8, 2015

Link roundup

1. "Speaking of cracks in space-time, an urban legend I really love is the one about a tomb in Brompton Cemetery, London, allegedly designed by Egyptologist Joseph Bonomi and rumored to be a time machine."

2. VF:
[Bill] Simmons also conceded that Grantland was not profitable. “It was probably like right around even,” Simmons said. “This is probably going to sound like sour grapes

Link roundup

1. California "Gov. Jerry Brown signed Assembly Bill (AB) 949 on Wednesday that will classify cheerleading as a competitive CIF sport beginning in 2017-18."

2.  The Majestic Aquariums of the Tokyo Aquascape Union.

Link roundup

1. "Awaglass: an hourglass filled with bubbles"

2. Mother Jones:
We were sued by a billionaire political donor. We won. Here's what happened.

Wednesday, October 7, 2015

"Warby Parker sells a monocle. Which just about no one buys. But"



WP co-founder:
When we launched in 2010, our debut collection featured 27 pairs of eyeglasses and one monocle--a handsome tortoiseshell model named after Colonel Mustard. Despite dismal sales and growth prospects that roughly equal zero, the monocle has remained in rotation ever since.
...
But that's exactly why I love it. Nobody expects to stumble across a monocle while shopping in 2013. We have a showroom right inside our office headquarters in New York, and one of my favorite things to do is catch sight of customers discovering the monocle.
Also:
Q - What has been the most surprising insight/development you have found?
A - Warby Parker sells a monocle and it has an extremely high conversion rate. Most people who order this in their Home Try-On boxes end up purchasing it. Conversion is so high that we had to tweak our basket analysis algorithm specifically to account for it.

"The families of three North Port High School students who died after being hypnotized by former Principal George Kenney will receive $200,000 each"

"A subsequent investigation found that Kenney hypnotized as many as 75 students, staff members and others from 2006 until McKinley's death. One basketball player at the school said Kenney hypnotized him 30 to 40 times to improve his concentration."

Link roundup

1. "Frank Lloyd Wright house found in Madison"
For nearly 30 years, Mary Jane Hamilton had a curious feeling about the house at 2107 West Lawn Ave.
2. "Air Force dental technician accused of being a witch"
Speaking on condition of anonymity, two of her former co-workers confirmed Schoenfeld's account to Air Force Times and said that other employees at the dental clinic are devoutly Christian and deeply suspicious of Hinduism.

Tuesday, October 6, 2015

Sherlock Hound Figma Figure



Available for preorder.

Link roundup

1. "The Untold Story of the Texas Biker Gang Shoot-Out"
nine men were killed, 20 were wounded, and 177 wound up in jail. Was it a turf war gone mad? Or a botched police response?

2. "Petitioners Demand Apology For Theft Of Artifacts By ‘Maze Runner’ Cast"
The shoot, which took place in and around Albuquerque included a Pueblo burial site on which the cast was given strict instructions not to take anything — instructions, O’Brien said, that were ignored.

The crazy lengths Mondo goes to get likeness rights

From a much longer interview on all things Mondo:
JS: Sometimes it's crazy. When Martin Ansin did Taxi Driver, the way we were able to get Robert DeNiro to sign off on that was, we had to send him a finished copy of the poster. So we had to take this psychotic leap of faith, finish and print the damn poster, pay the artist, and if DeNiro had said "No thank you", that would've been it. No poster.

JB: That would've been over a year-long process that was just out the window.
...
We'd love to see Bruce Willis on a Die Hard poster, but look at what he came up with! I love that poster, it's crazy.

JB: What's funny is that on that print, we still had to get likeness approved on the building, for Nakatomi Towers. The FOX building, or whatever it is.

Haha, what?

JB: Yeah! We sent it in (an original version) for approval and they said, "No, you can't use the building". And we were like, what?! And they said, "Yeah, you can't use the building, it's copyrighted". We were like, so we can't use Bruce Willis and we can't use the building - what sort of Die Hard poster do you think we're going to make? Luckily we were able to get with the building owners and get the thing approved. We totally cleared it.
Relatedly, highlights from Jock's talk at Mondocon:
Jock was originally brought into the film industry by Peter Berg who was in line to direct an adaptation of his comic series The Losers. Despite leaving the project, Berg remembered Jock’s talents and called on him to contribute concept work for his later films including Hancock, Battleship and Dune.
...
Hearing of a new Dredd film being in development, Jock put out a piece of concept art he drew on social media. Someone found access to his online directory and found 3 more pieces of art which soon spread online. He received a call from the producer of the film and instead of being in trouble found himself with an offer to work on the film.

Monday, October 5, 2015

Link roundup

1. "Five Questions About the Bombing of a Hospital in Kunduz"
3. Why didn’t the bombing stop? It went on for an hour, in multiple waves, although M.S.F. has said that it immediately called contacts in Afghanistan, Washington, D.C., and wherever else it could think of—it is used to operating in war zones, and has the phone numbers for calls like that—to try to get the attack stopped. Who was on the other end of the line? Did those interlocutors make further calls, to Afghans or Americans?
2. Fanduel/Draftkings employees taking advantage of inside information?

3. "Yes, Burger King's Black-Bunned Halloween Whopper Will Turn Your Poop Green"

"Protesters Tear Air France Executives’ Shirts From Their Backs"

Photo gallery at The Atlantic:
On Monday, October 5, Union activists protesting against proposed layoffs at Air France-KLM broke through fences and disrupted a meeting, targeting at least two managers who were forced to flee the angry crowd, their clothes ripped from their backs.

Link roundup

1. Variety:
A family that had turned their lives into a popular reality show for digital platforms like YouTube is facing the dilemma of how that show goes on following the sudden death of their 13-year-old son.
...
the Bratayleys, who are seeking privacy for the first time since opening their lives to public consumption since 2010 in daily videos that have amassed over 1 billion views on YouTube alone, according to data from Tubular Labs. Their most popular episode singlehandedly generated over 22 million streams on YouTube.
2. Hobbit mound by Dior.

3. "A senior Navy intelligence official has been indicted on charges of theft and conspiracy as part of a long-running federal investigation into a secretive military operation featuring the Navy SEALs and untraceable weapons parts."

4. Waking up a sleeping otter.

"The Oregon [Ducks] Pioneers football uniform features a sublimated, tonal pattern of the Oregon Trail traversed by....Meriwether Lewis and William Clark"



Nike:
Each uniform is unique and showcases a different area of the map, ensuring each player’s uniform features a different pattern, maximizing the fabric and producing less cutting-floor waste.
...
A silhouette of Lewis and Clark, along with The Duck, appears as a decal on the helmet. Wrapping both sides of the headwear, it features Lewis looking through a telescope and The Duck pointing west, a nod to the explorers.

Sunday, October 4, 2015

Masterpiece Shockwave and Hot Rod



Both available for preorder. Shockwave lights up and comes with a miniature version of himself. Hot Rod comes with a fishing pole.