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Over at Forbes Joel Kotkin suggests that Tampa and the cities along the I-4 corridor focus on “medical services, business services and light manufacturing” as a substitute for tourism and development. That sounds like pretty weak sauce to me. I’d like to see a huge hobbyist culture develop around the arduino, which leads to [...] Through the 1950s and 1960s a loosely associated group of African American artists became known as the Florida Highwaymen. Selling paintings door-to-door and out of the trunks of their cars, these artists produced approximately 200,000 paintings. Many of these naive works portray a paradisiacal, dream-like Florida. They are in great demand today by collectors (but [...] Of course, once I start thinking about brain-computer interface (BCI) it starts popping up everywhere. Joel Garreau writes about toys controlled by the mind for the Washington Post. “Steve Koenig, director of industry analysis at the Consumer Electronics Association, has little doubt about the high-end, professional possibilities of the mind-over-matter market. He sees the opportunities for military [...] The Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religion & Public Life took a survey about torture and divvied up the results according to religion. Guess who is least likely to support torture? White, non-Hispanic Catholics? C’mon, these are the folks that invented the Inquisition. More than half thought torture can often or sometimes be justified. White evangelical Protestants? You [...] Here’s a free idea for anyone who wants it. No child could resist a series of classic children’s tales re-told with zombies for characters. For example, in Zombie Cinderella, the young prince scours the town to find the beautiful maiden who left her foot behind at the ball. UPDATE: Whoops, may be too close to Cinderella [...] Jon Stewart succinctly lays out the Jane Harman scandal. The Daily Show With Jon Stewart Your Government Not at Work – Jane Harman Scandal thedailyshow.com Daily Show Full Episodes If Harman had any principles she’s resign immediately. (Thanks, JFR!) Here’s an article that clarifies a point I made the other day about Brain-Computer Interface (BCI). “Scientists have developed a wheelchair controlled by the power of thought.” Here’s an example of direct brain control of a robot. All cool and wonderful enough, but I want one for fun and games around the house. Jens Roland has written a clear explanation of why you should care about file-sharing. A lot of money has been poured into creating a campaign of fear, uncertainty, and doubt about file-sharing. When discussed in the mainstream media it’s almost always associated with piracy and theft of intellectual property. The recent ruling in Sweden against the [...] Here’s some Internet humor made with the Church Sign Generator (which is currently offline). “If there are no dogs in heaven, then when I die I want to go where they went.” – Will Rogers (Thanks, J-EB!) Kathy Castor is hosting a Financial Aid Workshop this Saturday. I think the class is mostly geared toward high school juniors and seniors, but it might be a good time and place to start learning about adult and non-traditional education.
Financial Aid Workshop I don’t see how this could possibly go wrong. If there’s one thing computers do well, it’s understand human behavior. Oh, wait, even HUMANS have a hard time understanding human behavior. “In a new request for research proposals aimed at small businesses, the Pentagon says it wants technology that would “enable accurate forecasting of a given [...] The latest from my favorite Persian pop band. This time with a latin flavor. (Thanks, Anti!) BLDGBlog speculates about design that helps prevent the spread of infectious disease. “You go to the Salone del Mobile next year in Milan and discover that I’ve somehow released a new line of furniture. Each piece varies just slightly from the rest, in that their measurements have been dictated not by human comfort, international rates of [...] Short, but link-rich interview with Marion Nestle about the connections between swine flu, China, and Smithfield foods. “We also better figure out how to make our food production system more sustainable and less harmful to farm animals, the environment, farm workers, and consumers. I was a member of the Pew Commission on Industrial Farm Animal Production, [...] No Patents on Seeds says no. It may seem obvious, or at least it seems obvious to me, that naturally occurring plants should not be protected by patents, but agri-business conglomerates have been battling for decades to control seed supply. NPoS has posted their argument against patenting conventional plants in response to a forthcoming European Patent [...] Here is a completely unfounded rumor which I just made up, but hope to spread widely. Citgo is the anonymous energy company behind the mysterious and anonymous Florida Energy Associates. FEA is shelling out big bucks to get 2 dozen of the biggest lobbyists in Florida to push for legislation allowing drilling off the Florida coast. The [...] Man, after I had all those Fili Fanatic t-shirts printed up and was ready to milk the filibustering Republicans for all they’re worth, it seems like it’s all for naught. Arlen had an article in Sunday’s NY Review of Books about rolling back presidential power. Something tells me he wouldn’t be switching parties if there weren’t [...] WFMU’s Free Music Archive is up and has a ton of great music. You can either search for artists, or browse by genre. Since most of the music is unfamiliar it’s a sort of hit and miss proposition, but if you’re a lover of music that’s a little off the beaten path, this is a [...] Stallman and Ellison are not so keen on cloud computing. “It’s stupidity. It’s worse than stupidity: it’s a marketing hype campaign,” he [Stallman] told The Guardian. “Somebody is saying this is inevitable – and whenever you hear somebody saying that, it’s very likely to be a set of businesses campaigning to make it true.” Larry Ellison echoes the [...] A very funny, 20-minute tale from Kevin Smith on writing a script for Superman. Look, I don’t think Florida Congressman Posey is the grandchild of some nightmarish alligator/human breeding. But, there are people out there who do, so why doesn’t he just submit to a DNA test to put the rumors to rest? Frankly, I don’t care if his grandmother had sex with an alligator, but his continually dodging [...] Liberals: There’s nothing wrong with fellatio. Torture is wicked. Conservatives: There’s nothing wrong with torture. Fellatio is wicked. It sounds like the Florida Senate is not going to take up the bill to drill for oil off the Florida coast. The Buzz cites Sen. J.D. Alexander, R-Lake Wales. But, looking deeper into the drilling shenanigans in the House I wonder why Rep. Dean Cannon replaced “an innocuous one-page bill (HB 1219) that would have [...] This guerrilla documentary provides a fascinating glimpse into North Korea. Here is part one of 14 parts (each about 5 minutes long). “A BRIEF NOTE FROM SHANE SMITH ON THE BYZANTINE NORTH KOREAN VISA PROCESS “Getting into North Korea was one of the hardest and weirdest processes VBS has ever dealt with.” (Thanks, SH!) Tremendous map from NPR of the U.S. electric grid, power plants, solar power, and wind power. This a part of their series about Reinventing the U.S. Electric Grid. (Thanks, LT!) Republicans most likely to vote for filibustering are Sam Brownback, Jim Bunning, Tom Coburn, John Cornyn, Jim DeMint, John Ensign, Jim Inhofe, and Jeff Sessions. These are the true Fili Fanatics aka the Obstructionist Eight. Between 2002 and 2006 nothing was more un-American than threatening a filibuster. The Republican mantra was “the president deserves an up-or-down vote” when it comes to appointments, and threatening to block legislation was as good as siding with the terrorists. In the past six weeks Republicans Jeff Sessions, Richard Shelby, Mike Crapo, Jim Risch, Chuck Grassley, [...] It’s disappointing that the NYT obit by Bruce Weber refers to Bea Arthur’s television characters as “battle-axes.” Arthur had a long, successful, and storied career which Weber immediately diminishes in the opening sentence of his obit. Bea Arthur made her name in television playing Maude in the eponymous series from 1972 to 1978. Created by [...] Back in the early 90s virtual reality was the future. You couldn’t turn around without seeing Jaron Lanier and his crazy cyber-future glove. Timothy Leary, Wired magazine, Mondo 2000, the print version of Boing Boing, Whole Earth Review, there wasn’t a hipster in the land who didn’t know that VR was just around the corner [...] The Sunlight Foundation, a non-profit civic endeavor to shine some light on the workings of government, recently held a contest for the best web applications that help citizens keep track of what’s happening with their federal gov. (The winner was Filibusted.) This page collects all forty submissions. There are a lot of great ideas and sites [...] |
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