jron

"I think the big mistake in schools is trying to teach children anything, and by using fear as the..."

Fri, 24 May 2013 14:15:51 -0400

“I think the big mistake in schools is trying to teach children anything, and by using fear as the basic motivation. Fear of getting failing grades, fear of not staying with your class, etc. Interest can produce learning on a scale compared to fear as a nuclear explosion to a firecracker.”

- Stanley Kubrick (via nezua)

"These are not illegal hotels. These are amazing stories within a core community of hosts and..."

Fri, 24 May 2013 09:59:35 -0400

“These are not illegal hotels. These are amazing stories within a core community of hosts and travelers adding to the diverse fabric of New York.”

- New York today: the real story (via nickgrossman)

sourcedumal: oddpicturesoddpeople: kqedscience: Cleared of...

Thu, 23 May 2013 22:24:53 -0400

sourcedumal:

oddpicturesoddpeople:

kqedscience:

Cleared of Charges of Setting Off a School Explosion, Florida Honor Student Heads to Space Camp

“The explosion struck a chord with 18-year NASA veteran Homer Hickam, a former lead astronaut training manager for Spacelab, and later for the International Space Station.

In the late 1950s, Hickam had a brush with law enforcement for allegedly starting a forest fire. State police came to his high school and led him and his friends away in handcuffs, but his high school physics professor and school principal came to the rescue, clearing him of wrongdoing.

Back then, schools did not have zero tolerance rules. Kids could make their mistakes without the threat of a criminal record, or serving time in jail.

“I couldn’t let this go without doing something,” Hickam said. “I’m not a lawyer, but I could give her something that would encourage her. I’ve worked closely with the U.S. Space Academy, and so I purchased a scholarship for her.”

YES.

YES!!!! YOU GO

gunsandposes: A man of the Svan people with traditional dagger...

Thu, 23 May 2013 22:22:47 -0400

gunsandposes:

A man of the Svan people with traditional dagger and long pipe in the village of Mestia in the mountains of Georgia, Russian Empire, circa 1888-1900.

collectivehistory: Armaments manufacturer Alfred Krupp...

Wed, 22 May 2013 16:40:31 -0400

collectivehistory:

Armaments manufacturer Alfred Krupp who allegedly used slave labor to make weapons for the Nazis, contacted the famous Arnold Newman for a portrait in 1963.

Upon finding out that Newman was a Jew, Krupp refused to let him take the photograph. Newman insisted to have Krupp look at his portfolio before making a final decision and after seeing Newman’s portfolio Krupp accepted.

On July 6, 1963, they went into a factory in Essen which belonged to Krupp, where Newman decided to make Krupp look as evil as possible under the eerie demonic lighting of the factory.

When Krupp first saw the portrait he was livid. Newman was more tongue-in-cheek: “As a Jew, it’s my own little moment of revenge.”

Sources: 1, 2

explore-blog: If there ever was tragically visceral evidence of...

Tue, 21 May 2013 23:29:36 -0400

explore-blog:

If there ever was tragically visceral evidence of how remix culture fuels creativity and copyright hinders it, it is this: Despite – or perhaps because of – millions of views in less than a week, The David Foster Wallace Literary Trust has filed a copyright claim against the wildly popular YouTube version of the wonderful short film adaptation of Wallace’s timeless 2005 commencement address, This Is Water. (Luckily, you can still watch the film on Vimeo – but that’s beside the point.)

Here is an example of a project made out of love, the existence of which harms the estate in no way, financial or otherwise, but serves the public good by way of cultural preservation and celebration of Wallace’s spirit and legacy, extending his message and allowing it to touch more lives. That the estate finds any of this harmful is gobsmacking, at once an aberration of the law and a complete failure of cultural duty.

fishingboatproceeds: David Foster Wallace was like, Art must be...

Mon, 20 May 2013 21:33:28 -0400

fishingboatproceeds:

David Foster Wallace was like, Art must be sincere! We must use every tool in the linguistic toolbox to cut through sentiment and dishonest cliche and build fresh ways to reveal the power and reality of unironized emotion.

And Mister Rogers was like, Basically the same thing, but without any shame or pretense or fear of sincerity.

beautilation: “I’ll never forget the day Marilyn and I were...

Mon, 20 May 2013 20:20:46 -0400

beautilation:

“I’ll never forget the day Marilyn and I were walking around New York City, just having a stroll on a nice day. She loved New York because no one bothered her there like they did in Hollywood, she could put on her plain-jane clothes and no one would notice her. She loved that. So as we we’re walking down Broadway, she turns to me and says ‘Do you want to see me become her?’ I didn’t know what she meant but I just said ‘Yes’- and then I saw it. I don’t know how to explain what she did because it was so very subtle, but she turned something on within herself that was almost like magic. And suddenly cars were slowing and people were turning their heads and stopping to stare. They were recognizing that this was Marilyn Monroe as if she pulled off a mask or something, even though a second ago nobody noticed her. I had never seen anything like it before.” - Amy Greene, wife of Marilyn’s personal photographer Milton Greene

emergentfutures: Nintendo claiming ad revenue for user-created...

Mon, 20 May 2013 07:46:16 -0400

emergentfutures:

Nintendo claiming ad revenue for user-created YouTube videos

The Japanese game giant is not following the path of music publishers and film studios in demanding this content be blocked, but rather wants to place ads surrounding videos featuring Nintendo games, like Let’s Play videos. The revenue from these ads would go to Nintendo, not the video’s creators.

Full Story: Gamespot

Creative approach.

Hermes, ready for action, with his Vans modified for speed.

Sun, 19 May 2013 18:25:20 -0400

Hermes, ready for action, with his Vans modified for speed.

Photo

Sat, 18 May 2013 20:45:21 -0400

For old times' sake: How Yahoo Killed Flickr and Lost the Internet

Sat, 18 May 2013 19:08:21 -0400

For old times' sake: How Yahoo Killed Flickr and Lost the Internet:

And so when Flickr hit the ground at Yahoo it was crushed with engineering and service requirements it had to meet as per demands of the acquisition integration team. Those were a drain on resources, human and financial. Even though many of the resources came from Yahoo, they were debited against Flickr. This created an untenable cycle that actively hampered innovation.

I have a Yahoo email address already, for the sole purpose of setting up a Flickr account. So I guess this particular blog is ready.

cineraria: Crazy glass toilet door at Cafe Diglas, Vienna,...

Sat, 18 May 2013 16:35:30 -0400

cineraria:

Crazy glass toilet door at Cafe Diglas, Vienna, Austria - YouTube

I remember doors like this in NYC in the mid-90’s, in a big long unisex restroom above a bar whose name I no longer remember. My friend didn’t know that the opaque glass meant occupied, since all stalls were occupied, and pulled the handle of one. The random guy’s face, as he sat there with his pants around his ankles watching the glass turn clear, was priceless.

Five Things That Will Get You Nowhere Fast — I.M.H.O.

Sat, 18 May 2013 16:35:00 -0400

Five Things That Will Get You Nowhere Fast — I.M.H.O.:

Nike has a motto of Just Do It. Well, if there was a brand championing this cause, its tagline would be Just Don’t. If you’re the smartest…

sndtrck: The Post-Punk / New Wave Super Friends by Butcher...

Thu, 16 May 2013 14:15:44 -0400

sndtrck:

The Post-Punk / New Wave Super Friends by Butcher Billy

Ka’Nard Allen, 10, does not want to talk about what must be the...

Thu, 16 May 2013 09:51:56 -0400

Ka’Nard Allen, 10, does not want to talk about what must be the longest and hardest year of his life. He doesn’t want to talk about Mother’s Day, when he was grazed by a bullet at a second line parade in New Orleans’ 7th Ward, one of 19 people injured in amass shooting.

He doesn’t want to talk about October, when his father, 38-year-old Bernard Washington, was fatally stabbed in eastern New Orleans by his stepmother after Washington allegedly choked and beat her. She has been charged with manslaughter.

And he really doesn’t want to talk about his 10th birthday party last May 29, when his 5-year-old cousin, Briana Allen, was fatally shot and a bullet hit Ka’Nard in the neck. The man accused of shooting Briana was arrested last month and, last week, was among 15 people indicted on gang racketeering charges in that incident and many others.

Standing on the Simon Bolivar Avenue neutral ground Monday evening, across from his grandmother’s house where Briana was killed, Ka’Nard just wants to ride his shiny black four-wheeler, a gift from his mom after his dad’s death.

He wants an adult to start peeling an orange for him because he can’t get it started himself. He wants to dunk an empty juice bottle into a garbage can and launch high, elegant roundhouse kicks at the pail. He wants to get on that black four-wheeler and drive it off the grass speckled with broken glass, watching for traffic, circling on Simon Bolivar — fast. He’ll even give you a ride on the back.

Rush-hour traffic raced by the skinny boy, dressed all in red with a Band-Aid on his right cheek. Maybe when one has endured two of the most shocking shootings in the city in less than a year, and come within a hair’s breadth of serious harm or even death each time, there are bigger worries than traffic.

When the adults started shouting over his head about whether his mother was doing enough to protect him, he shared a grin and started giggling. He slouched on his chair and pulled out his phone — new that day, a gift from his mom — and pressed its buttons, even though it doesn’t do much.

“I’ve been trying to keep him out of a lot of stuff, so I’ve been giving him what he wants and what he needs,” mom Tynia Allen said of the four-wheeler and the phone. She has Angry Bird tattoos on each shoulder marked “Bri,” one with the girl’s birthdate and the other with her death date.

Some people told her she shouldn’t have taken Ka’Nard to the second line. But he’s been going to parades “since the mutt was knee-high to a pup,” she said. They have friends who march. Besides, “It was Mother’s Day! No one expected that! We went to church first. I cooked breakfast.”

Despite it all, Ka’Nard has been pressing forward. He’s getting counseling, Tynia said. He’s an usher at Greater Mount Rose Baptist Church. He’s been playing the drums, once pounding so hard they broke.

He’s a student at Pride College Prep in eastern New Orleans, in, well — he didn’t want the other kids nearby to know which grade, so he typed the number into his new cellphone. He figured he would be back in class Tuesday.

In the fall, he’s switching to the James Singleton school at the Dryades YMCA, he said, because he wants to be on the drill team. He wants to march with the “fake rifles, the wood rifles and the flag,” he said, swishing imaginary equipment in the air.

And in about two weeks, Ka’Nard will celebrate his 11th birthday. Not where he had the party last year, on Simon Bolivar. This time he wants to go to a hotel, swim in the pool and stay overnight. His mother said she couldn’t afford it.

The sun was drawing low. Ka’Nard wanted to go home. He asked his mom what was for dinner. Crawfish or pizza? Probably pizza.

But there was a small crisis: He could not find his brand-new phone. The neutral ground and his grandmother’s porch — 10 minutes passed, and still it was nowhere to be found. He slumped back on the chair.

“Am I punished?” he asked his mom.

She said, “No.”

Source

"Archaeologists have not yet discovered any stage of human existence without art. Even in the..."

Tue, 14 May 2013 17:56:24 -0400

“Archaeologists have not yet discovered any stage of human existence without art. Even in the half-light before the dawn of humanity we received this gift from Hands we did not manage to discern. Nor have we managed to ask: Why was this gift given to us and what are we to do with it?
And all those prophets who are predicting that art is disintegrating, that it has used up all its forms, that it is dying, are mistaken. We are the ones who shall die. And art will remain. The question is whether before we perish we shall understand all its aspects and all its ends.”

- Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Beauty Will Save the World (via delicateswans)

nevver: Birds and Dinosaurs

Tue, 14 May 2013 14:15:27 -0400

nevver:

Birds and Dinosaurs

Photo

Sat, 11 May 2013 21:34:51 -0400

Photo

Sat, 11 May 2013 20:45:27 -0400