Thursday, June 30, 2016

Check out the soles on Nike's LunarEpic Flyknit

Spielberg wants to make a movie based on The Voyeur’s Motel

WaPo:
In his forthcoming book, “The Voyeur’s Motel,” acclaimed journalist and nonfiction author Gay Talese chronicles the bizarre story of Gerald Foos, who allegedly spied on guests at his Colorado motel from the late 1960s to the mid-1990s.

But Talese overlooked a key fact in his book: Foos sold the motel, located in Aurora, Colo., in 1980 and didn’t reacquire it until eight years later, according to local property records. His absence from the motel raises doubt about some of the things Foos told Talese he saw — enough that the author himself now has deep reservations about the truth of some material he presents.

“I should not have believed a word he said,” the 84-year-old author said after The Washington Post informed him of property records that showed Foos did not own the motel from 1980 to 1988.

...

The story attracted widespread media attention and led producer-director Steven Spielberg to buy the movie rights to the book. Spielberg has lined up Sam Mendes, who won an Academy Award for directing “American Beauty,” to create a film of Talese’s and Foos’s story.

"Cheri Bustos, one of the two members of the House of Representatives behind the 'Save America’s Pastime Act', has pivoted and withdrawn support from her own terrible bill."

"Interestingly, she did a complete 180 on the position she took against labor, and advocated that minor leaguers should actually be making more money, when she was warning just yesterday that financially empowered minor league baseball players were a threat to the fabric of baseball itself"

"Hubble Captures Vivid Auroras in Jupiter’s Atmosphere"



NASA:
Not only are the auroras huge in size, they are also hundreds of times more energetic than auroras on Earth. And, unlike those on Earth, they never cease. While on Earth the most intense auroras are caused by solar storms — when charged particles rain down on the upper atmosphere, excite gases and cause them to glow red, green and purple — Jupiter has an additional source for its auroras.

The strong magnetic field of the gas giant grabs charged particles from its surroundings. This includes not only the charged particles within the solar wind but also the particles thrown into space by its orbiting moon Io, known for its numerous and large volcanoes.

"I left some fake animal facts at the L.A. Zoo"



Part of a series.

Wednesday, June 29, 2016

"these Congresspeople want to codify that minor league [baseball players] are not entitled to minimum wage or overtime"

D:
On Wednesday, Rep. Cheri Bustos (D-Ill.) introduced the “Save America’s Pastime Act” (H.R. 5580) along with Rep. Brett Guthrie (R-Ky.) to amend the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) to clarify that minor league baseball players are exempt from federal wage laws.

...

But why would a Democrat who supports raising the federal minimum wage try to prevent any workers from actually earning a minimum wage?

...

It turns out that Rep. Bustos is the daughter of Major League Baseball’s first chief lobbyist Gene Callahan — a leader in preserving MLB’s antitrust exemption.

Newsreel advertising Peggy Carter Captain America in Marvel Puzzle Quest



Walkthrough of the new The Walking Dead attraction at Universal Studios

Tuesday, June 28, 2016

Want

A photo posted by Kibooki (@kibookied) on


A photo posted by Kibooki (@kibookied) on


A photo posted by Kibooki (@kibookied) on


A photo posted by Kibooki (@kibookied) on


A photo posted by Kibooki (@kibookied) on


A photo posted by Kibooki (@kibookied) on


A photo posted by Kibooki (@kibookied) on


A photo posted by Kibooki (@kibookied) on


A photo posted by Kibooki (@kibookied) on


(You can buy the Vinyl Idolz that have been made to date at Amazon.)

USA Women's Olympic soccer team uniforms include iridescent shoulders



"The kit’s new shirt replaces the current home kit’s blue sleeves with white sleeves featuring metallic foil pinstripes, preserving the properties of the kit’s high-performance yarn while producing an iridescent gleam."

Here's a closeup of the socks and shoes:

"Harry Hamlin Remembers His Real Clashes on Clash of the Titans"

BMD:
A more serious conflict arose when it came to Perseus’ climactic confrontation with the Gorgon Medusa. The actor, who did his thesis on mythology at Yale University, had been impressed by the bronze statue “Perseus With the Head of Medusa” by Italian sculptor Benvenuto Cellini, which depicts the sword-wielding hero holding up the snake-haired noggin. Hamlin wanted to recreate this indelible image, but the filmmakers had other ideas. “When I first got the script, it contained pages of storyboards,” he says. “I got to the scene with Medusa, and it had me throwing a shield, and then the shield bounces off a rock and cuts off her head. I said, ‘Wait a minute, I’m not cutting off Medusa’s head with my sword?’ I went to them the day they wanted me to sign to do the movie, and said, ‘I’m all for this, guys. This is great, Laurence Olivier and Maggie Smith, but…I gotta cut her head off with my sword!’ [Laughs] And they said, ‘Oh yeah, don’t worry about it, when we get to that scene, we’ll do that, it’s not a problem.’

“So we were in Malta, and the day we were going to shoot that scene, the director and Ray came up to me and said, ‘Harry, here’s the thing. We were really going to have you cut her head off with the sword, but we got a telex last night from London, and they said we can’t do it. We’ve got to go back to the storyboard.’ I was like, ‘What? Wait a minute, you promised me,’ and they said, ‘We know, but they just determined that if you cut her head off with the sword, the movie’s going to get an X rating for violence in England, and all these kids aren’t going to be able to see the movie.’ I said, ‘Well, that’s really too bad, guys, because you’re going to have to find another guy to play Perseus!’ And I went into my trailer and locked the door.

“They were all freaking out, and they unplugged all the electricity to the trailer to try to smoke me out

"Players Finally Solve GTA V's Bigfoot Mystery "

K:
Last year, fans found a golden peyote plant in GTA V that could transform players into Sasquatch. This discovery was actually the tip of the iceberg of a much larger, way more ridiculous mystery.

...

“The consensus so far has been that Rockstar only added the rest of the secret into the code when they knew that we had completed the 7 golden peyote spawning mystery,” LeBlond said.

“For everyone, this was a 100% confirmation that Rockstar was communicating something with us,” LeBlond said.

...

Since the peyotes eaten along the way turned the player into Bigfoot, fans figured out that they could use Bigfoot’s roaring mechanic to make the monster respond with a roar of its own. Using that audio cue, players then needed to race to the appropriate location, passing through invisible checkpoints that were littered with the victims that the creature presumably murdered. The chase was relentless, too: some players reported running after the monster for over an hour, across paths that sometimes required backtracking or going in circles over and over again.

Link roundup

1. "Florida State Spent $62,010 For 265 Of Those State Championship Rings"

2. "Remember the US Open in 1999 when Jennifer Capriati began a match before realizing she forgot her shorts?"

3. "UT’s glorified and extremely valuable football team, the Longhorns, was one of the last in the nation to let black athletes on it, in 1970."

Monday, June 27, 2016

"Quebec Taxpayers Spent Hundreds Of Millions On An NHL-Ready Arena And Didn't Get An NHL Team"

D:
The city and the province split the cost of the 18,259-seat arena, which came in at around $370 million (CAD). And then they turned the entire thing over to telecommunications giant Quebecor for $33 million, with the national assembly passing a controversial law to protect the arrangement from potential lawsuits. (Conflicts of interest abound: Qubecor’s controlling shareholder Pierre Karl Péladeau was the leader of the Parti Québécois from May 2015 until he resigned last month.)

...

Please note the confidentiality agreement; if opposition politicians had not announced these figures, citizens would have no idea how much money they’re still pumping into a largely empty arena.

Game of Thrones, plays of the game



Sunday, June 26, 2016

"there’s so much more audience, but the audience is largely less invested"

Obs:
music just doesn’t tie into fan’s identities anymore, beyond fashion at best. At its worst it’s just wallpaper people listen to on Spotify while they’re cleaning their houses or working out.

...

It used to be a different situation where a musician who was doing something legendary meant something to people, had a resonance to their lives. That same kind of small community of louder-level fans are still important to the process, the level where it’s artists watching other artists still plays a role in tiny clubs and new trends—but by the time an act has had any real level of fame they’ve jettisoned, or been abandoned by, the artistic tastemakers. And so ultimately the audience that matters are these half-interested people who find out about music via commercial outlets, don’t seek obscurity, buy show tickets online after reading reviews online

"EU to launch kettle and toaster crackdown after Brexit vote"

TG:
The EU is poised to ban high-powered appliances such as kettles, toasters, hair-dryers within months of Britain’s referendum vote, despite senior officials admitting the plan has brought them “ridicule”.

...

The plans have been ready for many months, but were shelved for fear of undermining the referendum campaign if they were perceived as an assault on the British staples of tea and toast.

"Weapons shipped into Jordan by the Central Intelligence Agency and Saudi Arabia intended for Syrian rebels have been systematically stolen"

ALJ:
...by Jordanian intelligence operatives and sold to arms merchants on the black market, according to American and Jordanian officials.

...

even after the Obama administration had hoped to keep the training programme in Jordan under tight control.

"Stop Using Google Trends"

MDP:
But it’s giving plenty of people cover to insult the entire country, when it’s likely just a few people searching for something in a way that they always search for something. It makes “The British are frantically Googling what the EU is, hours after voting to leave it” absurdly disingenuous without better numbers. Update: Remy Smith points out this out: The peak was merely ~1000 people! It’s ludicrous that so few people get turned into a massive story, but it underscores the need for context.

I’m disappointed that this is how data is being used, and really drives home the need for people to understand the data before they use it incorrectly. Google Trends is an interesting tool, but please do a bit more research before using it.

"Thousands of Tourists Stranded En Route to Christo's 'Floating Piers'"

AN:
Interest in Christo's new project The Floating Piers on Lake Iseo in northern Italy has left approximately 3,000 people stranded at a train station in the nearby city of Brescia.

...

In a statement on his website, Christo assured visitors, “The Floating Piers is absolutely free and accessible 24 hours a day, weather permitting. There are no tickets, no openings, no reservations and no owners.

...

However, organizers announced that the installation will temporarily close from midnight on Thursday until 7:30 a.m. on Friday for essential maintenance work.

Saturday, June 25, 2016

Video from the croc-viewing tube

A video posted by Franny (@franny.plumridge) on

Over a period of 10 months in 2015 and 2016, a robbery ring in Los Angeles "smashed and grabbed its way to $6 million in stolen goods"

TDB:
we can reconstruct what allegedly happened. We can piece together, nearly hour by hour, how prosecutors say a multimillion-dollar watch-theft ring took shape, its momentum nearly overwhelming the powers of the federal authorities who investigated them.

The group is accused of carrying out a streak of high-velocity heists, from the San Fernando Valley to Orange County, from Malibu to Mission Viejo.

"Overseas buyers race to secure London property bargains after Brexit vote"

"Opportunistic overseas buyers are jumping to buy property in some of London’s wealthiest areas and take advantage of effective discounts caused by sterling’s nosedive after the UK voted to leave the EU."

"The Los Angeles Board of Public Works moved Friday to punish a developer that illegally cut down three trees in Brentwood"

LAT:
The city’s forestry officials concluded three months ago that the developer had intentionally ripped out the trees to gain easier access to the site. Los Angeles Councilman Mike Bonin, who represents the area, said he did not buy the developer’s assertion that the trees were removed in error.

...

“We’re being unfairly treated, and punished massively disproportionately

S.H. Figuarts Ant-Man (Civil War) and Luke Skywalker (A New Hope)



Via.

Friday, June 24, 2016

New Slinkachu



Game of Thrones Battle of the Bastards poster



On sale here.

Disney Infinity 3.0 Spider-Gwen



Via.

Rio laboratory that was set to handle drug testing at the Olympics has been suspended by the World Anti-Doping Agency

NYT:
The Rio de Janeiro lab had a disciplinary record. It was suspended in 2013 — a year before Brazil hosted soccer’s World Cup — and was reinstated by WADA only last year.

To win back its certification, the lab spent roughly 200 million Brazilian real, or about $60 million

The croc photo is from Crocosaurus Cove Darwin

More photos here and here.
Crocosaurus Cove is also home to the famous, Cage of Death. The only cage in the world that brings you face to face with some of the largest Saltwater Crocodiles in captivity. Go it alone or grab a friend – this is a once in a lifetime opportunity to share the same environment of one of the world’s deadliest predators.

She's starred in two photos of a lifetime

A photo posted by Franny (@franny.plumridge) on


A photo posted by Franny (@franny.plumridge) on

"Reddit Is Actively Surveilling a Stranger Standing on the Street in Philadelphia"

MB:
It started innocently enough, I guess: On Reddit’s r/pics subreddit, someone uploaded a picture of this man catching some air in loose fitting clothes above a subway grate in Philadelphia.

...

And so another Redditor set up a Nest cam to surveil the subway grate, and there’s now a live feed of this block of Philadelphia: “Eagle has landed. Watch him live here,” a moderator of r/pics posted in the thread, which has now been dubbed the “Thread of the Year.”

...

We have no idea what he’s doing or why he’s doing it or if he has any idea that, literally, millions of people are laughing at him on the internet right now

Spotter's Guide To Dinosaurs poster



Jurassic Park poster by Matt Taylor for Mondo's upcoming show.

Nike Zoom Trout 3



"Geometric divots on the outsole help prevent dirt from clinging to the plate"

"Motivational speaker Robbins' coal walk burns more than 30"

"Tad Schinke, an event trainer, told WFAA-TV: 'We always have a few people that have some discomfort afterwards and we do our best to take care of them.'"

Thursday, June 23, 2016

Wednesday, June 22, 2016

"The New Panama Canal: A Risky Bet"

NYT:
In simple terms, to be successful, the new canal needs enough water, durable concrete and locks big enough to safely accommodate the larger ships. On all three counts, it has failed to meet expectations

...

The low winning bid, a billion dollars less than the nearest competitor’s, made “a technically complex mega-project” precarious from the outset,

...

Last summer, water began gushing through concrete that was supposed to last 100 years but could not make it to the first ship.

Arnold Schwarzenegger shares some stories from the filming of Conan

R:
I got attacked by a dog on the very first day of shooting - he pulled me down from the rocks into a thorn bush and I had to be stitched up on the set. Milius walked up to me and said "this sets the tone" - he meant this in a positive way.

Also, it is true that I had to bite a real dead vulture because in those days they couldn't make one that would look good in a close-up. So they soaked it in alcohol to kill bacteria and dried it out. It still had lice.

"Indie game developer Zoe Quinn—the first and most pronounced target of Gamergate—is among a number of people who think they've spotted a joke at her expense in a new Nintendo game"

"Paper Mario: Color Splash is in development by Nintendo, which demoed the game during a Nintendo Treehouse Live stream at E3 last week. Some dialogue that popped up during a minigame being played for the livestream audience is being interpreted by Quinn and others as a Gamergate joke."

Aliens Colonial Marines Collector's Edition with deluxe statue is $33





Forget the game, check out the statue. $33 at Amazon.

Trials of the Blood Dragon Development Diary

Tuesday, June 21, 2016

Monday, June 20, 2016

"L.A. education foundation became a lucrative source of income for USC's Pat Haden and his relatives"

LAT:
Haden, his daughter and sister-in-law together collected about $2.4 million from the foundation for part-time roles involving as little as one hour of work per week, according to the foundation’s federal tax returns for 1999 to 2014, the most recent year available.

...

In an email, Vince Scanlon, the Wells Fargo spokesman, also said that the tax forms for several years incorrectly reported that Haden and O’Connor worked only one hour a week for the foundation. In fact, Scanlon said, Haden worked an average of 16 hours a month and O’Connor worked 40 to 45 hours a month. The bank said it intends to amend the tax forms.

"A cat with a 'stegosaurus spine' design cut into its fur"

Deus Ex world



Canceled Dr. Strange/Cumberbatch Disney Infinity figure



Via.

"The Metropolitan Museum of Art announced in April that it faced a $10 million deficit and would begin to scale back costs"

"The three departures precede what is expected to be a series of voluntary buyouts, which the museum has said it hopes will allow it to avoid layoffs."

From a May 2015 Fast Company article:
When the Metropolitan Museum of Art was seeking its first chief digital officer in 2013, it "wanted someone not from the museum world and not from the art world," says Sree Sreenivasan. "So I am superbly qualified."

...

What is something about your job that you think would surprise people?

Most people are surprised to know that the digital media team at the Met has 70 people in it.

...

People always ask me how I justify the museum spending so many resources of digital media.

Saturday, June 18, 2016

CBR Stunt Team

A video posted by CBR Stunt Team (@cbrstuntteam) on




A video posted by CBR Stunt Team (@cbrstuntteam) on

Kaiju maximus®: “So Various, So Beautiful, So New” by Kai Ashante Wilson is a very good short story

You can read it here.
"Hamachi Poke With Cucumber and Avocado Recipe"

"officials of the Los Angeles Unified School District woke up in December to the grim news that only half of its students were on track to graduate, down from 74% the year before"

LAT:
But just a couple of months later, the situation suddenly, startlingly improved, with 63% on track to graduate. By the end of March, 68% had completed their A-G courses, and an additional 15% were close enough that they might be able to make it. The actual graduation rate will not be known for several months.

How did this remarkable turnaround happen, and what does it mean?

...

the district relied heavily on what are known as online credit-recovery classes.

...

Considering all the credit-recovery courses provided by educational publishers, it’s impossible to say as a rule whether these courses are sufficiently rigorous.

...

A 10-question multiple-choice quiz is given at the beginning of each of the three-dozen units. With a score of 60% or better — six of the questions — a student passes the unit, without having to go through the lectures, read the full materials or write the essays.

Friday, June 17, 2016

"Another Oakland police chief has stepped down after two days on the job"

"Acting Police Chief Paul Figueroa is the third chief to be replaced in nine days . . ."

"[Mayor Libby] Schaaf would not divulge Figueroa’s reasons for stepping down."

"A curious mini-golf course is opening up in Echo Park this weekend, with each obstacle exploring a different interpretation of terrain or territory in Los Angeles"

"Each of the nine selected entries offers a unique challenge. London-based Ordinary Architecture's Electric Palm Tree House features the traditional windmill obstacle, however, instead of a windmill, it's a spinning palm tree that employs fronds to block your shot."

Microscale Lego Myst Island



By Letranger Absurde.

"Steve [Kerr]’s father, was assassinated by members of Islamic Jihad, a precursor of Hezbollah, outside his office at the American University of Beirut, where he was president."

TNY:
Later, when we spoke, Ann Kerr revisited that day. She remembered getting word that Malcolm had been shot, and rushing to his office, where she saw him lying on the ground. It was a rainy day, and she remembers biting down on the handle of her umbrella on the way to the hospital.

...

Before his death, Malcolm Kerr had been a rising star in the world of Middle Eastern history. He and Ann had met in Beirut, in 1954, and they had four children together—Steve was the third.

Limited edition High-Rise poster



By Chris Thornley, aka Raid71. On sale Monday.

Thursday, June 16, 2016

"This year, 18 percent of the world's container ships are anchored and idle"

"Today's largest container vessels can cost $200 million and carry many thousands of containers -- potentially creating $1 billion in concentrated, floating risk that can only dock at a handful of the world's biggest ports. Such boats make prime targets for cyberattacks and terrorism, suffer from a dearth of qualified personnel to operate them, and are subject to huge insurance premiums."

"Is Snapchat stealing filters from makeup artists?"

TR:
these filters come and go, without much attention from the general public paid to whether or not it’s violating someone’s work. But now, multiple people have likely had their art used without consent by Snapchat.

In most cases, they’ve yet to even receive a response
And the response:
At 11:58 a.m. PT today, a Snapchat spokesperson responded to this story with the following statement:

“The creative process sometimes involves inspiration, but it should never result in copying. We have already implemented additional layers of review for all designs. Copying other artists isn’t something we will tolerate, and we’re taking appropriate action internally with those involved.”

"Stanford Women Swim Team Suspicious of Brock Turner for a Long Time"

ITW:
The insider explains that the women tried to come forward after learning of his sex crime. There were discussions among some of the women on the team about submitting letters to the judge about their negative experiences with Brock, says the insider, adding that the discussions were suddenly halted and the letters were never filed.

“There were rumblings that the women were pressured by Stanford officials to not do it since they hadn’t witnessed any crime that Brock had committed,” says the insider.

Injustice 2 wallpapers

"Tom Hiddleston Wore $425 Suede Boots On His Beach Date With Taylor Swift"

"But perhaps the most burning question which arose after The Sun first published images of the pair — which has thus been dubbed 'Swiddleston,' for better or for worse — canoodling on the less-than-tropical sands of Rhode Island, was this: Why is Tom Hiddleston wearing $425 suede desert boots on the beach?"

Star Trek Beyond poster



Via.

Neon Demon poster by Jay Shaw



For Mondo.

Wednesday, June 15, 2016

"Mars, the one-time maker of king-sized chocolate bars, is considering taking its M&Ms out of sugary dessert treats, including McDonald's McFlurry."

NBC:
Mars is concerned desserts that feature its candies - such as the McFlurry, Burger King's Snickers pie and Dairy Queen's Blizzard - exceed in a single serving the amount of sugar the U.S. government recommends anyone eat in a day, the source said.

That kind of sugar load conflicts with Mars' public stance that sweets are best enjoyed in moderation.

"the mistake that would have cost 'Jurassic World' director Colin Trevorrow his job "

HR:
SPIELBERG I looked at [Safety Not Guaranteed] and thought it was really good, but I wasn't convinced until the last scene 'cause that film could have gone two ways. When this [character] who I thought was certifiably insane actually invented something that could travel through time, that crystallized the choice that it had to be Colin to do Jurassic World.

I saw an earlier version of that film in which the time machine didn't work.

MARSHALL Well [for that version], he didn't have the money to do the effect.

SPIELBERG Had that machine not worked, Colin would not have directed Jurassic World.
From the same interview:
So when you look at young directors, how do you know you're not hiring another Josh Trank [who directed the Fox bomb Fantastic Four]?

SPIELBERG Who is that?

"Two propeller-driven planes took off today from Calgary, Canada, on a perilous rescue mission to the U.S. research station at the South Pole."

"NSF officials have not identified or released any information about the medical condition of the crew member, who is employed by Lockheed Martin Antarctic Support Contract (ASC)."

Tuesday, June 14, 2016

The database used by the Air Force Inspector General's Office to manage investigations into fraud has become corrupted, rendering over 100,000 case files unreadable

AT:
The database of the Air Force's Automated Case Tracking System (ACTS)—which is used by the Air Force Inspector General's Office to manage investigations into complaints from whistleblowers of waste, fraud, and abuse; Freedom Of Information Act requests; and congressional inquiries—has become corrupted, rendering over 100,000 case files dating back to 2004 unreadable. And because of the way the database was backed up, an Air Force spokesperson said that neither the service nor Lockheed Martin—the contractor that operates the ATCS system for the Air Force—can recover the data.

Clash Royale maker encourages trollish behavior because it wants players to experience "strong emotions"

Supercell comments:
Adding an option to mute, or delete, emotes is a highly requested change. However, we have no plans to implement this feature, and we want to explain why.

One of our core design principles is: Cards that evoke strong emotions are the best thing for Clash Royale....

The same principle - evoking strong emotions - is at the heart of why we're not planning to implement a mute option. Emotes are loved by some and hated by others - even within the Clash Royale team! We believe these strong emotions are integral to the core of the game.

"How to Be a Smart Football Fan in June"

TR:
Colts tight end Dwayne Allen is going to yoga to help with injury problems, while Saints wide receiver Michael Thomas decided that’s too broad, and is focusing primarily on hand yoga instead.

RG3 is working with private QB guru Tom House, who has a proven track record of working with famous quarterbacks, including Tom Brady.

Monday, June 13, 2016

Broken Age art show



Contributions by Jemuel Taganahan Bernaldez, Rem Broo, Alexandria Neonakis, and David Díaz Patrón for a Broken Age-themed art show.

Abzu



Figma Zero Suit Samus action figure

Sunday, June 12, 2016

Free SodaStreams for anyone who takes a selfie with a discontinued Keurig KOLD machine

"To qualify for a free SodaStream, owners of the discontinued KOLD machines must email a photo of themselves with the machine along with their name, address, phone number and their machine's serial number to info@sodastreamsupport.com."