Every Wednesday, I’m going to take you on a whirlwind adventure of 13 links chronicling the news throughout the geek world I inhabit. Movies, music, art, politics, gadgets, science, sports, grammar, and superheroes – nothing’s out of bounds and everything’s interesting.
Let it begin…
- Giant rubberbands and aluminum pegs as furniture? If I was forced to bet on this ever happening, I would have lost.
- It seems like some massive scientific breakthrough takes place every week and yet I never hear about any of them, outside of the nerd circles I run in on the Internet. This week, it’s spinal injuries being negated by blue food dye. You couldn’t make these things up.
- Admittedly, I have no idea what the actual plot of this “Star Sports” parody film would actually be (I wonder if the creators even bothered working it out; the description under the video seems more like Mad Libs than extensive story structuring) but it is a very smart and aesthetically accurate translation of many Star Wars visuals and for that, I cannot say anything negative about it. It did win an award, after all.
- Even with the development of long-range weapons and extremely sophisticated technology, the Navy has always been handicapped in the area of “getting a submarine across a great distance in a very short period of time.” No longer. Prepare to travel at four times the current maximum speed, sailors.
- These cassette tape lamps by ooomydesign are ingenious, interesting to look at, and smart repurposing of obsolete technology. Of course, they are also extraordinarily overpriced, I feel – everyone should make their own and flood the market to drive prices down; 36 cassette tapes, a few dozen plastic ties, and a little bit of elbow grease don’t seem worth $80.
- While their heart is unquestionably in the right place (i.e., attempting to create awareness to increase security), I have trouble believing that the International Commission on Nuclear Non-proliferation and Disarmament would be entirely realistic and objective when it comes to discussing the threat of computer hackers taking control of nuclear weapons.
- Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? and Regis Philbin return to primetime television on August 9 and to prepare, mental_floss has arranged twelve of the million-dollar questions asked on the show into a quiz with which you can test your game show mettle. I got six right. I should have cheated.
- I would like to believe the good people at Joule Biotechnologies (actually, I have no idea if they are good people — I’ve never heard of this company) when they claim that they have a revolutionary system for producing astronomical amounts of biofuel with astonishing efficiency but the story is just too good to be true, at this point. Thus, I will remain a healthy skeptic until more details surface.
- If you like simple artwork that manages to be extremely beautiful, unique, and interesting, you will like Federico Yankelevich.
- I always knew there was a reason I felt the need to watch so much familiar television late at night. It just took a Scientific American report for it to make sense outside of my head.
- io9 naturally made sure to run down all the news, rumors, surprise appearances, and best fan costumes coming out of the 2009 San Diego Comic-Con but the best part of their coverage is easily a summary of the lamest advertising ideas visible at the convention. Just a reminder that it’s not all chic comic book fans, good-looking people, and genre films.
- On the heels of Apple rejecting the Google Voice iPhone application, Lifehacker has decided it’s a prudent time to make a list of all the reasons that Apple’s revolutionary mobile device is not flawless and why this most recent decision by the Jobs empire is especially telling.
- I have never even come close to winning any of those “guess how many [tiny objects] are in this [larger object]” contests but now that I have an Australian physics professor and the world of science on my side… no M&Ms will be safe.
Have a week!
About Justin Brown
Justin Brown is a writer and artist living in Virginia. He channels most of his mind's molten river of creativity into his blog Esteban Was Eaten!. For even more information about him, check out his website.