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Pen out. Draw Fast. Blog. That’s the idea behind the Fastest Possible Drawings of Everything blog. Once the drawing is done, the author adds a few comments about their creation and, boom, blog post done. It’s a clever concept that’s artsy, fun and fast. Perfect for life in this fast-moving, over-consuming, media-rich world. [Kottke via…
When you think of a map of the US, you probably break it down by state or quadrants or party affiliation. But MIT, IBM and AT&T’s research teams decided to look at who was talking to whom, and the resulting map is pretty captivating. The researchers organized anonymous data from AT&T mobile phones into interactive…
About 165 years ago, astronomers figured out that Neptune is a planet. Since then, Pluto has lived and died as a planet, but Neptune is just now finishing its first solar cycle: It’ll turn 1 in Neptune years on July 12. Neptune is the only planet in our solar system that can’t be seen with…
Gabriela Calvo and Marco Peralta decided to build their dream house in San Jose, Costa Rica, but they wanted to do it debt-free. Rather than buy into cheap public housing, they snagged two discarded storage containers and let architect Benjamin Garcia work his magic. The structure Mr. Garcia built for the couple is dazzling. It…
It’s impossible to avoid awful people. They sit next to you on the subway and talk about toothpaste for 15 minutes, even as you wince, deliberately and obnoxiously. These glasses might help these people realize just how awkward they are. These “social x-ray specs,” as creator Rosalind Picard calls them, can identify six of the…
Foodies, you have to check out Gojee. It has awesome recipes and photos so strikingly gorgeous you’ll drool all over your keyboard. Gojee will even tell you what to make if you give it a list of ingredients and the food you’re craving. You’ll need an email and password to check it out. But once…
The 2002 Taschen book Future Perfect is kind of like a dead-tree Tumblr; no credits for illustrators, no dates, and no context. I even tried to reblog a page from the book by nailing it to a tree, but my neighbors tore it down. What a bunch of jerks. With a little old fashioned detective…
The ironing board. One of those pieces of functional technology that hasn’t really evolved much since, well, ever. No longer! At least, not if the bright minds behind the Ironing Station get their way. The Ironing Station, seen above as a prototype and below as the awesome reality, is an adjustable, rotatable, clampable bit of…
BetaBlog says that Turntable.fm user Woooooo has more likes (over 9000) and more fans (over 1000) than anyone else on the service. They also quote him spouting absurd things like “‘You want to be me? You have to have your own room. DJ Wooooo is a brand.'” So, who the hell is this guy? Woooooo…
Social Reject | Your social media history is up for grabs to employers. https://gizmodo.com/i-flunked-my-social-media-background-check-will-you-5818774 How To Fix the Five Most Common iPhone Injuries https://lifehacker.com/how-to-fix-the-five-most-common-iphone-injuries-30810097 iPhones aren’t built to last forever, but that doesn’t mean you should let a cracked display or dead battery finish your handset. Here are detailed instructions for five of the most…
A rumor from 9to5Mac suggests Apple may be planning overnight work shifts for store employees on July 13th. During these overnights, associates usually prep the store for a new product launch. If this is true, we may hear the roar of a Lion or the sweet sound of a new MacBook Air next week. [9to5Mac]…
If your smartphone doesn’t kill you with cancer, it might be fated to help crash your car: MSNBC reports that according to a study by the Governors Highway Safety Association, 25% of all car crashes are connected to portable electronics. The study pulled together hundreds of previous papers ob the subject, and concluded that a…
It’s a circus with Amazon, Google, Apple and possibly Facebook launching an online music service. Software Engineer Jeff Rose peered into the code of the app required for the new Facebook video chat and discovered a reference to Vibes and a MusicDownloadDialog. Here’s the code he found: if(paramString.equals(“com.facebook.peep”)) return this.window.getMember(“VideoChatPlugin”); if (paramString.equals(“com.facebook.vibes”)) { return this.window.getMember(“MusicDownloadDialog”);…
Andrew Castle’s wife wanted to get a divorce. He didn’t. So he decided to rig up a crude electric chair in his garage, and asked her to sit in it. Warning: everything you’re about to read is terrible. When Castle found out about his wife’s intentions to leave him, he invited her for a “chat”…
Apple has been silently deleting outgoing mail that contains unacceptable words and phrases. What sorts of words and phrases? Good question! Apple won’t say. It definitely doesn’t like political yammering. Shut up, hippies. One email that has repeatedly triggered a silent block on outgoing messages from me.com reads as follows: The authoritarian Governments in Syria,…
Watches are things from the olden days that people wore on their wrists. They came after sundials but before electricity. Now people are wearing watches, again. Who knew? Oh the New York Times Style section did, duh. “Right now there is no clearer indication of cool than wearing a watch.” —Some Guy. But don’t just…
To call Google Maps just an app of a day is to do it a disservice. Because it should be app of the day, everyday. It’s earned Lifetime Achievement status. It’s the best app available. And it still gets better. The latest update to Google Maps on Android brings a feature we’ve long been wanting…
The thought of cramming a desk lamp and a speaker into one body seems contrary to all laws of nature and design. A lightbulb?! A driver!? Together? Perversity! But Gem Hsin makes it work—and all powered by USB. The Topaz lamp fits both sound and light into a form that looks natural for both. You’ve…
The very last Space Shuttle launch is scheduled for this weekend. To the men responsible for every detail, that’s like an eternity. NASA Navigation and Flights Control Engineer George W. Hatcher describes those final moments. [Jalopnik] https://jalopnik.com/behind-the-scenes-of-the-final-space-shuttle-launch-5805812
For the first time in history, a patient has been implanted with a synthetic windpipe that was created using the patient’s stem cells and a replica of his original windpipe. It’s amazing even though it kinda looks like PVC piping It’s the future of medical science: there’s no donor needed and no depressingly long wait…
