Our Media, Ourselves: Are We Headed For A Matrix? hide captionDesign Within Reach? The cool sterility of 2001: A Space Odyssey is just one example of how pop culture expresses an anxiety that's seemingly about technology, but may be as old as time. When Hollywood imagines the future, from Logan's Run to Avatar, it tends to picture living spaces as sterile and characterless, without any cultural clues to the person who lives there. And here we are, catching up to that vision of the future. In short: "Welcome," as Morpheus put it in The Matrix, "to the desert of the real." In that film, as you'll recall, people interact in a reassuringly cluttered but virtual reality. This fear of losing ourselves as we lose our stuff — is it just a product of our experiences with technology? But the computer age didn't invent that fear. Imagine if you can a small room, hexagonal in shape like the cell of a bee. Remarkably prescient, no? There are good reasons for imagining sterile environments in stories about the future. Have a little ... face time?
RGB Murals Use Colored Light Filters To Create Beautiful Optical Illusions Carnovsky is a creative duo comprised of two Milan based artists, Francesco Rugi and Silvia Quintanilla. Their latest project RGB looks at image creation through a new lens. Each of the RGB images are made up of three layers represented by primary colors. This starting image is discombobulating and difficult to read. This installation totally reminds us of those graphics on the back of cereal boxes of yesteryear. Blow your mind? Pixar is all about details 6 things I learned from riding in a Google Self-Driving Car Last week, a friend and I got a sneak peek at Google's new self-driving cars. In addition to spending an afternoon cheating on my Intergalactic SpaceBoat of Light and Wonder, I got to chat with the engineers about the project. 1. We drink. 2. The car we rode in did not strike me as dangerous. In the early versions they tested on closed courses, the vehicles were programmed to be highly aggressive. 3. Google's new fleet was intentionally designed to look adorable. By turning self-driving cars into an adorable Skynet Marshmallow Bumper Bots, Google hopes to spiritually disarm other drivers. Google's next generation of self-driving cars are your Marshmallow Overlords. 4. Some of the scenarios autonomous vehicles have the most trouble with are the scenarios human beings have the most trouble with, such as traversing four-way stops or handling a yellow light (do you brake suddenly, or floor it and run the light?). Freaky. 5. I'm biased. They ignore the smarter questions. 6. -The Oatmeal
ESFJs in games/anime Originally Posted by AlekseiLelouch was pissed because his mother died, and he believed his father's government was harboring her true murderers. His father also believes in staunch eugenics, and Lelouch has a defensive complex about his little sister, who is blind and crippled.Yeah how about that? Didn't he commit a Fe ultra-fail there at the end when he used his geass on his sister? He ended up being hated by the whole world before being assassinated.Ah, I just thought of somebody:Stan, from Tales of Destiny: God I remember being distinctly annoyed by his whining about his sword buddy the whole freakin' game.
How to be a jerk. Sapiosexual (n) Nutella Lite and Dark Chocolate. Some stories stay with us forever. Scientific test #1876.5 This was outside my history professor's office. Text me when you get home. Epic Glass Floor Held Up By 180,000 Plastic There are a million ways you could make your home just a little bit more epic. Some people make it look like a Star Trek inspired apartment while others take a more subtle approach and just switch out the living room carpet. If you are looking to impress people, you should really put your back into it. Sure, custom making everything in the Star Trek apartment must have taken years of hard work (and to know it might be disassembled is just heart breaking), but if you want to really make people’s jaws drop when they walk into your home, you need to do something really spectacular and original. One approach might be to create an epic floor like South Korean artist Do Ho Suh. I mean, as an artist, what are you going to create after you have shown people this art piece? Via: [My Modern Met]
Why Nikola Tesla was the greatest geek who ever lived Additional notes from the author: If you want to learn more about Tesla, I highly recommend reading Tesla: Man Out of Time Also, this Badass of the week by Ben Thompson is what originally inspired me to write a comic about Tesla. Ben's also got a book out which is packed full of awesome. There's an old movie from the 80s on Netflix Instant Queue right now about Tesla: The Secret of Nikola Tesla. It's corny and full of bad acting, but it paints a fairly accurate depiction of his life. The drunk history of Tesla is quite awesome, too. History.com has a great article about Edison and how his douchebaggery had a chokehold on American cinema.
Biggest Pricing Errors in History | moneysupermarket Source Accurate pricing equals accumulation of profit. In business correctly pricing your product is essential: price your product too highly you will lose customers, too low and you risk losing profit. Number 8.Company: Best BuyError: $16,666 HDTV for $9.99 At that price it would have been. In the early hours of 12 August 2009, eagle-eyed bargain hunters spotted an incredible deal on the Best Buy website. 52 inches of fun. Unsurprisingly Best Buy did not honour the deal and many customers were convinced that this mistake was no accident. Loss: None. Source Number 7.Company: SearsError: $700 iPad for $69 Source Sears were left in an awkward position in July 2011. Yours for a mere $69. Sears refused to honour this price leading to a huge consumer backlash. Loss: Consumer backlash. Source Number 6.Company: DellError: $1000 dollar laptop priced at $25 Source Dell are quite unlucky when it comes to mispricing. This computer enraged thousands of America service people. Source Source Source Source Mr.
Popsicles! Not to sound full of myself, but I’m pretty sure this is the be all, end all of popsicle roundups. There’s a little something for everyone: the foodies, the purists, the ones who prefer frozen yogurt, the ones who prefer a little alcohol, everyone. Tweny-five options to be exact. Click on the photo to be taken to the recipe. All photos and recipes copyright of their respective source unless otherwise noted. sn0r comments on Santorum claims that in the Netherlands 50% of all euthanizations are forced and that elderly people flee the country in fear of being euthanized.
Book-A-Minute Classics Got another book report to do? English teachers have the inconsiderate habit of assigning mammoth-sized works of literature to read and then actually expecting you to do it. This wouldn't be so bad except that invariably the requisite reading is as boring as fly fishing in an empty lake. "That's nice," you say, "but I don't believe you." Latest additions: 4/6/12 Little Women by Louisa May Alcott. And, on Book-A-Minute SF/F... If you liked Book-A-Minute Classics, try our other Book-A-Minute pages: And try our companion site: RinkWorks Book-A-Minute Classics is a RinkWorks production. Talk Back Talk to us! Legalese Titles and trademarks are the property of their owners.
Speed Is Life - Plane & Pilot Magazine | PlaneAndPilotMag.com Tuesday, December 1, 2009 By Brian Shul As a former SR-71 pilot, and a professional keynote speaker, the question I’m most often asked is “How fast would that SR-71 fly?” I can be assured of hearing that question several times at any event I attend. It’s an interesting question, given the aircraft’s proclivity for speed, but there really isn’t one number to give, as the jet would always give you a little more speed if you wanted it to. It was common to see 35 miles a minute. So it was with great surprise, when at the end of one of my presentations, someone asked, “What was the slowest you ever flew in the Blackbird?” I was flying the SR-71 out of RAF Mildenhall, England, with my back-seater, Walt Watson; we were returning from a mission over Europe and the Iron Curtain when we received a radio transmission from home base. Walter had a myriad of sophisticated navigation equipment in the back seat, and began to vector me toward the field. Add Comment