~metafilter | Bookmarks (935)

The James Brown Show is both an enactment — an unlikely conjuration in the present moment of an alternate reality, one that dissipates into the air and can never be recovered — and at the same time a re-enactment: the ritual celebration of an enshrined historical victory, a battle won long ago, against forces difficult to name — funklessness? — yet whose vanquishing seems...

A soft furred hedgehog, a high-altitude crocodile newt and a keelback snake are some of the of the 234 new species to have been found in South-East Asia.

Scientists explore why penguins on this island are bolder and more aggressive. There are only a few little penguins left on Granite Island, South Australia but they're bolder than most and researchers are keen to find out why.

You have a massive collection of e-books, music, video games, software, and movies that you bought as a digital download, and you probably think you own them, like you own a physical book or a DVD. Think again. from Do I really own the digital media I bought?A "Digital Rights Byte" from the EFF Others include: Why is it so expensive to repair my...

Friendly and Hostile Analogies for Taste. Artistic Taste is like...: A. Physics. B. A Priesthood. C. A Priesthood, But With A Fig Leaf Of Semi-Fake Justifications D. As Above, Except The Justifications Are Good And Important E. BDSM Porn F. Like Fashion. A counterargument to this essay provides a definition of taste.Don't know if these articles are paywalled so here are the two links....

Inspired by jedicus's comment from a Fanfare thread on The Squid and the Whale: "This was a remarkably bad first date movie, as I am occasionally reminded by the person who, despite that, married me." Post title is derived from this Letterboxd feature, Crushed at the movies: ten of our worst dates at the picturesWhat is your story?

"At Dawn We Ate Sugar Smacks" begins as possibly the funniest wargaming session report ever written. It ends as something more.I commenced to slog on and off through the first section or two of the rules, not even thinking about getting into Production, Diplomacy, or Research for now, focusing instead on introductory concepts like Look at the Pretty Pretty Maps and Hey! I Recognize...

"The brilliant exiles it refers to, those creative American women who went to Paris between 1900 and 1939, were not really exiled in the French capital. Rather, they were liberated from convention and expectation in the US, finding new freedom to live their lives as they wished in early 20th-century Paris."I just saw this exhibition yesterday, and it was fantastic. More than just a...

Statistics suggest that the "average" American reads something like twelve books a year. Upon a moment's reflection it should be obvious that this statistic is useless. Millions of people finish school and never read another book in their lives: not long ago I spoke to a recent high school graduate (his grade point average was just below perfect) who had not read a book...

...there is a possibility that some mangos are not mangos at all.India loves mangos. It produces roughly half the world's mangos--and eats them all, exporting almost none. The story has long been that mangos evolved and were domesticated in South Asia, and were exported to Southeast Asia, where new varieties were developed. But as with so much in taxonomy, genetic analysis has complicated the...

Wooden buoys developed to aid research while reducing marine waste. Thousands of buoys used for science end up as marine waste — one Tasmanian group is helping to change this. They've created a wooden prototype that can survive the ocean's harshest conditions.

Youtube channel PeriscopeFilm is a movie archival group that specializes in military subjects, but an anomaly among its collection is "Microcomputers: An Introduction" from 1982, a 17 minute cartoon where farm girl Jennifer positively dances and sings with delight at the prospect of introducing city cousin Jack to the wonders of home computing. They also trap a bank robber remotely in their entirely computer-automated...

America's largest buffet, The Shady Maple Smorgasbord, is 200 feet long and serves 1,200,000 hungry diners each year.Pennsylvania Dutch cuisine is an interesting choice to base any buffet around, let alone the biggest buffet in America. The Pennsylvania Dutch were, despite the name, a demographic of devoutly Protestant German immigrants who favored various degrees of simple living and conservatism, ranging from the assimilated "Fancy...

The Waiting : "Karen Lips is researcher and lives for several years in a tiny little shack in Costa Rica to observe frogs. When she leaves the cloud forest for a short time and returns, the frogs are gone. All of them. Karen sets out to find them – and encounters a horrible truth. Mysterious deaths occur all over the planet and have a...

"A small but influential independent record label ... C'est la Mort specialized in ethereal, ambient, dream pop, & darkwave bands." Ca. 1990, an interest in 4AD groups like His Name is Alive (2024 boxset; eponym for a quiescent MeFite) may have led you to early work by The Magnetic Fields (2024 Tiny Desk previously) on "Doctor Death's" compilations from C'est La Mort, also introducing...

ProPublica, in conjunction with the Montana Free Press, has published a detailed expose into Helena oncologist Dr. Tom Weiner - detailing a history of questionable diagnoses and patient harm.Journalist J. David McSwane covers the story with documentation as well as interviews with several principals and families. The investigation covers a pattern of misconduct, including sloppy and questionable diagnoses, aggressive treatments based on such, loose...

Baltimore Buried These Streams. Now an Artist Is Bringing One Back. The new "Ghost Rivers" installation is a reminder of Baltimore's hidden streams — and the visible costs of trying to control our urban waterways. Also: Daylighting: A Case Study of the Jones Falls River and How 'Daylighting' Buried Waterways Is Revitalizing Cities Across America.

The fire insurance maps produced by the Sanborn Map Company beginning in the 1860s are a rich and exceptionally detailed resource about American urban history. But they're also a beautiful collection of design and typography of the period. A new site brings together collections of digitized Sanborn Maps from libraries around the country to highlight the effusive design of the cover pages for each...

As it was previously noted by people on Metafilter, the Pandora Papers and the Panama Papers had a strange lack of dirt on US oligarchs. Ever wonder why?The hidden links between a giant of investigative journalism and the US government (mediapart.fr): But there is a flip side. While the OCCRP presents itself as being totally independent, its management have placed it in a position...

More than two decades after the original film popularized the "fast zombie" craze, we finally have our first look at Danny Boyle's long-awaited return to horror, and one of the best trailers in years: 28 YEARS LATER. Though the trailer's terrifying, cultlike atmosphere and snatches of atavistic violence are intriguing, the real star is the soundtrack: a tinny, 110-year-old poetry reading whose hypnotically repetitive...

The most expensive dinosaur fossil ever discovered will be on display in New York at the American Museum of Natural History. The giant stegosaurus fossil, dubbed "Apex", is 3.3 metres tall and 8.2 metres nose to tail and is one of the most complete fossils of this type of dinosaur in existence.

The hankering for mulukhiyah is a unique hunger. When I lived in Europe for graduate school, it was the first meal I'd eat on my short visits home, texting my request before my plane even landed. It's the food I crave when I haven't been to my parents' for supper in a while. I can call its garlicky taste to my mouth as readily...