Transit Music

MTA.ME turns the NY subway into a string instrument.

And, worth a relink, SolarBeat does likewise with our solar system, and Birds on the Wires with birds.

The Cars the Transformers Were Based On

Original Image from carinsurance.org

(via)

Realtime Traffic

Whenever there’s a big storm like yesterday’s that shuts down traffic in the area, I think about James Surowiecki’s Wisdom of the Crowds. In it, Surowiecki attempts to describe how groups of people can work together well and arrive at very precise solutions to problems, and why they often don’t. The basic problem with traffic jams is that there’s no way for people to share information easily. If a certain road is blocked (and this probably isn’t relevant for giant snowstorms when every road is blocked) there’s often no way to know not to go near that road until you’re stuck on it. The ideal solution would be one in which a large proportion of cars on the road all used GPS units for directions which could report instantly on traffic issues. If cars in one area weren’t moving, those cars’ GPS computers could tell others cars in the area to take alternate routes until the congestion cleared, spreading the traffic out to other routes that made the most sense for where that particular driver was going.

The Washington Post writes today about a system that does this sort of thing.

The Newman Sinclair

There’s a part in A Clockwork Orange where Alex (Malcolm McDowell) jumps out of a window. The shot is done from his point of view as he falls. I’d heard before that Stanley Kubrick accomplished this by dropping a camera, but not this:

We bought an old Newman Sinclair clockwork mechanism camera (no pun intended) for £50. It’s a beautiful camera and it’s built like a battleship. We made a number of polystyrene boxes which gave about eighteen inches of protection around the camera, and cut out a slice for the lens. We then threw the camera off a roof. In order to get it to land lens first, we had to do this six times and the camera survived all six drops.

—Interviews with Stanley Kubrick

Six takes!

493 Pokemons Drawn As Anime Girls

493 Pokemons Drawn As Anime Girls

Wow. Thanks, internet. (via)

OAuth Will Murder Your Children

OAuth Will Murder Your Children

Good suggestion for improving all those “such and such application wants access” pages on Twitter and Facebook. I should be able to decide whether an app can merely access my information or also update/edit it.

London Intrusion

China Miéville has, so far, published four pages of a comic he’s written on his blog. (via)

In Nuclear Silos, Death Wears a Snuggie

Fascinating article on what it’s actually like to serve in a nuclear silo. You spend years preparing to be ready for a launch order that never comes.

In four years on nuclear-alert duty, I ran through an infinite number of attack sequences and fought countless virtual nuclear wars. I knew how to target my missiles within minutes and launch them within seconds. The process was rigorous, thorough and fully governed by a checklist that was, to our knowledge, without defect. The room for human error was minimal.

But that training was about as exciting as the job got, a blessing considering the mission. Being a missileer means that your worst enemy is boredom. No battlefield heroism, no medals to be won. The duty is seen today as a dull anachronism.

“In Nuclear Silos, Death Wears a Snuggie,” by John Noonan

The First Decade of the Future Is Behind Us

Fun Discover article about how sci-fi life is now compared to even fifteen years ago. I admit that after having an iPhone for over three years, it still seems like a Star Trek gadget to me sometimes. (via)

Doctor Who Theme in Mario Paint

“This video is bigger on the inside.”

I used to love Mario Paint. (via)

Hobbit Meals

What do you eat when you watch the extended versions of all three Lord of the Rings movies? The Alamo Drafthouse served up an eight-course meal during its LOTR marathon, including First Breakfast, Second Breakfast, Elevensies and Coney Stew.

io9 has photos of the event, including the full menu.

When our daughter was born we joked that since babies eat every three hours, we should refer to her meals like hobbits do. After a small bit of research we found that hobbits regularly eat these seven meals:

• First Breakfast
• Second Breakfast
• Elevenses
• Luncheon
• Tea
• Dinner
• Supper

Turns out that winds up being fewer meals than a newborn baby needs. Even if you eat supper late at, say, nine, there’s no name for the midnight and 3:00 AM feedings.

Brand New on the Nationals' Slight Rebranding

There is a New “W” in Town”

I like the change to script for the wording but do think it looks a bit generic baseball. Also the “O” looks too much like the Orioles’ “O”.

Todd Alcott on The Shining

Screenwriter Todd Alcott’s seven-part series on The Shining: one, two, three, four, five, six, seven.

Lots of great insight into the film, its structure, and who the actual protagonist is. I hadn’t heard this one:

One of my favorite factoids regarding the movie is that Kubrick didn’t just have a ream of “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy” typed up, no — he had reams and reams typed up, in different languages, one for every major territory the movie would play in — Spanish, Italian, French, German, etc., all with a regional phrase specific to the territory. Production Assistant on a Kubrick movie must have been the worst job available in show business.

(via)

Batmobile History

The Evolution of the Batmobile. I’ll always have a soft spot for the 60s TV show convertible. (via)

Covers

I did not know that They Might Be Giants’s “Istanbul” is a cover. This page has some other that are, too.

Flex Mentallo to be Republished in Fall 2011

DC has just announced that Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely’s Flex Mentallo will finally be collected and published as a deluxe hardcover in the fall:

If youre a fan of Grant Morrison (and who isnt?), youll be stoked to know that FLEX MENTALLO will be published in book form this year. This marks the first time the four-issue mini-series written by Morrison and illustrated by artist Frank Quitely is being collected. FLEX MENTALLO sprang out of Grants mind bending and infamous run on DOOM PATROL.

Pick up this beautiful Deluxe Edition hardcover with bonus material this Fall.

The story was one of the first collaborations between Morrison and Quitely but has never been republished due to a lawsuit by Charles Atlas Ltd. Flex Mentallo’s origin story is a parody of Atlas’s famous “The Insult That Made a Man Out of Mac” ad that ran in comics in the 60s and 70s, and the character bears an undeniable resemblance to Atlas (c.f. the photo of Atlas in this article and the pinup of Flex Mentallo in this one). The case was dismissed but DC decided not to reprint the series, until today. (More info on the case, including Jim Shooter’s afadavit, here, and on its decision not to reprint it here.)

Flex Mentallo is important not just because it’s an early collaboration between Morrison and Quitely, who’d go on to reinvent the X-Men, Superman, and Batman, but because it is an amazing commentary on comics themselves and states many of the themes of fiction vs. reality that Morrison has continued to play with subsequently. It takes a tour of comics from their fun origins through the zany silver age to the dark 80s and toward Morrison’s idea of the future of comics, which he’s attempted to realize in his Batman work and others. Many have called it one of the greatest short comics series ever published, up there with Watchmen. Greg Burgas takes a stab at explaining why here.

The real question, since I own the original copies (and even had them bound into a hardcover), is whether I’ll need to buy the series again in this deluxe format with bonus material. (Answer: yes.)

Generic Dr Pepper

Here’s a list, with screenshots, of tons of generic Dr Pepper drinks. I know I’ve had Dr. Perky before. I feel like I’m duty-bound to seek out some Dr Extreme at some point. On that topic, I’m totally craving some Dr Pepper with sugar now. Here’s a roundup of the retro can designs from last fall’s batch. (via)

Sixties Seventies

Sixties Seventies is a gorgeous collection of models from that era sporting miniskirts, bellbottoms, boots, and more. (via)

Law and the Multiverse

Law and the Multiverse examines how superhero (and villain) activities and powers would work legally. It looks at issues like anti-mutant discrimination, whether Iron Man would run afoul of the FAA when he flies in his suit (vs. a hero who can fly without one), the legal ethics of sentencing an immortal villain to life without parole, and so on. I recommend checking it out.

I think it falls a bit short, though, in its strict focus on applying the laws of our world to fictitious ones. Marvel’s Civil War, for example, is predicated on the idea that Marvel’s US legal system has adapted its laws to account for superpowered individuals. It’s likely that laws have been adjusted to allow for, say, evidence obtained by Batman to be presented in court. Otherwise either every criminal could demand to be set free because the chain was tainted, or conversely dirty cops could constantly lose evidence (or plant it) and claim a vigilante had messed with the scene. (via)

What Could Have Been Entering the Public Domain on January 1, 2011?

Current US law extends copyright protections for 70 years from the date of the authors death. (Corporate works-for-hire are copyrighted for 95 years.) But prior to the 1976 Copyright Act (which became effective in 1978), the maximum copyright term was 56 years (an initial term of 28 years, renewable for another 28 years). Under those laws, works published in 1954 would be passing into the public domain on January 1, 2011.

What might you be able to read or print online, quote as much as you want, or translate, republish or make a play or a movie from?

And here's a list of the authors whose works did enter public domain this weekend.

The Rules for Long S

The rules for uſing the long letter “s” in older Engliſh works.

Neptune's Year

On July 12 of this year, Neptune will complete its first transit around the sun since its discovery in 1846. A Neptunian year is 164 Earth years.