the monkeys know all
Local killbot proprietors, Survival Research Labs is having a show! It’s this Saturday (July 24, 2010) in Petaluma, at the Petaluma River Heritage Center (260 Water St, Petaluma). Admission is free, and is part of the Friends of the Petaluma River‘s Rivertown Revival.
It is going to be fun on the bun.
China Daily reports:
Afghanistan’s Taliban insurgents are training monkeys to use weapons to attack American troops, according to a recent report by a British-based media agency.
Reporters from the media agency spotted and took photos of a few “monkey soldiers” holding AK-47 rifles and Bren light machine guns in the Waziristan tribal region near the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan. The report and photos have been widely spread by media agencies and Web sites across the world.
Well there there is precedence for monkey armies, along with tales of their legendary ferociousness. AND DON’T YOU DARE SAY THAT MONKEY ARMIES ARE A MYTH!
rAndom International unveiled xhibited “Swarm Light” (video and detail photo after the jump) at Design Miami / Basel last month. The installation consists of the three cubes of white LEDs. The LEDs are lit according to a flocking algorithm, and move in three dimensions around the cubes. Viewers can interact with the light by standing under the different cubes and by using sound to “scare” flock.
via matandme
Street animators Blu‘s new video “Big Bang. Big Boom.” The story from the Big Bang to the nuclear armageddon.
With hysteric cries of “socialism” and “communism,” penny wise and pound foolish austerity measures, the lionization of Ayn Rand style reductionist misanthropy, and the increasingly desperate attempts of governments to raise funds, this bench from Fabian Brunsing seems particularly apropos for the times.
Take a load off for a while, but only if you cough up € 0.50. What you thought benches were free? You know who else had free park benches? The Nazis.
This bench was originally designed two years ago for a joint show of FH Potsdam’s Interface Design Program, and the Parsons’s School of Design at the New School. That show encouraged students to come up with new objects for urban space.
What I like about this, is that it so completely embodies the anti-tax, anti-government mindset. (Interesting how often the question “Why should I pay to educated someone else’s child?” comes up, but “Why should I pay for police patrols across town?” or “Why should someone else pay for the government service I like?” never comes up.)
Of course, I’m simply projecting my own commentary onto the work, when it may not actually be the artist’s intent. Another possible inspiration for the bench is the passive aggressive antivagrant benches. Instead of simply having a benches uncomfortable for everyone, the bench is uncomfortable only for the indigent. As much as lament/despise bums (Santa Cruz will do that to you.), I’m always depressed by antivagrant design. It’s pigeon spikes for people, that typically aren’t actually hurting anything.
Searching around for a suitable example of a real antivagrant bench, I came across an orphaned page from, of all places, homepage of St Louis Loft Style. The page really does a great job of listing both antivagrant and vagrant friendly designs. Not just of benches and the like, but even devices that share building waste heat. It’s kind of inspiring.
MIT has published a paper entitled Programmable Matter by Folding (full article) that describes paper that can fold itself into a variety of shapes. The paper is covered by is divided into triangular sections that are joined by a network of thin nitinol actuators that contract under voltage. At the center of each section is a magnet that is used to retain the paper’s shape.
While I’m sure MIT had bigger plans for this tech (Well if it was the Media Lab, perhaps not.), I immediately thought that this was the perfect thing for synthetic plants. I’ve been thinking about how nitinol wires, or at least something like them, could deform a paper but thought that the being able to compresses only about 4% was a problem. When I first saw this video, I thought they were using something else besides nitinol, but they’re not. The trick they they used to get 180 degree bending is folding and annealing the 100μm foil so that the nitinol will remember the folded shape. Once it cooled, the foil is manually flattened, and then reheating the foil with electrical current will cause it return to the folded shape.
Guess it’s time to get some nitinol sheets.
I managed to make my way up to San Francisco and see both the USS Bunker Hill and the Varyag. Unfortunately, there was a mixup about how long Russians were giving tours of the ship. Instead of going to 3 pm, they stopped at 1 pm. However, I did get some decent photos of the ship from the pier. For more detailed shots, I suggest you view the Chronicle’s pictures of ship. I did manage to take a tour of the Bunker Hill. We mainly stayed on the outside of ship, seeing the fore and aft vertical launch systems, the helicopter hanger, and also the bridge. About 350 crew members are on board, and about 40% of those are female. In 2008, the ship was the first Ticonderoga class cruiser to underwent an upgrade to its fire control systems, that allowed (in addition to other things) the ability of both the fore and aft 5 inch guns to be targeted independently. On of the new roles for the Bunker Hill is ballistic missile defense, and the ship is of the same type that recently shot down a satellite.
It was very cool tour, and look forward to the next San Francisco Fleet Week (October 7 – 12).
UPDATE Fri Jun 25 12:23:50 PDT 2010
Flickr user Kyle Mizokami has some great shots from tours of both the Varyag and Japanese ships that were in town.
Today, five warships from three countries arrived in San Francisco. The Ticonderoga class guided missile cruiser, CG-52 USS Bunker Hill Three Japanese training ships, lead by the Kashima class, TV-3508 JDS Kashima, and the Russian Slava class guided missile cruiser Varyag (formerly the Chervona Ukraina) will be there.
Why mention this? Well you can get photos and tours of all these ships, except the American Bunker Hill.
Updated: Thu Jun 24 09:26:24 PDT 2010: Thanks to some mysterious stranger in the comments, the Bunker Hill is conducting tours. Table updated.
| Bunker Hill | Pier 17 | Thursday, 1 pm – 4 pm |
| Kashima | Pier 27 | Monday 9 am – 11 am and 2 pm – 4 pm |
| Varyag | Pier 30-32 | Thursday, 10 am – 3 pm |
Being a child of the Cold War, I was fascinated with military; both with the weapons and the uniforms. My World Book encyclopedias would fall open to the insignia entries for the Air Force, Army, Navy, and Marines. My interest in medals and insignia continues to this day. I can literally spend hours browsing the Army Institute of Heraldry, or Starfleet uniforms, or Imperial rank insignias.
I was bit surprised (and taken back) by the fact that the Utah Department of Corrections issue ribbons to prison guards that participate in executions. Well, more accurately, the did, now they issue commemorative coins, just like the Super Bowl. (“The staff preferred something a little more modern than the ribbons.”)
Apparently the guards “awarded” these ribbons didn’t actually wear them. I’m thinking more out of fear of retribution rather than decorum. The ribbons weren’t issued to only the firing squad, but to anyone involved. Perhaps it’s my opposition to the death penalty talking, but I find these medals morbid. While the military awards combat ribbons, many of the actions that they’re awarded for involve rescuing someone, or at least holding out against an enemy. It’s rarely for just killing. Even if it was, at least the people being killed at least are fighting back. Shooting a man that’s tied to a chair, is just state sanctioned murder.
Even as I’m repulsed by the notion of these ribbons, I stare at them and try and deduce a schema for them. Do slants represent executions? Do diamonds represent escapes? Does squares represent administrative tasks? Its frustrating not to know. I wish the picture showed them all. I even want one for some macabre reason, just to put on a shelf, or even a Wunderkammer.
