Posts tagged “wikipedia”

• In September of 2023, geophysicists across the world started monitoring a very odd signal coming from the ground under them. (I love stories like this!) – via mikeachim.bsky.social
• The Wikipedia List of Unexplained Sounds – via my son
• I enjoyed this quick profile on Howard Katz, the man behind the NFL schedule.
• Someone on bluesky asked, “Do you remember the hardest you’ve ever laughed at anything?” That was an easy answer for me: I remember watching the SNL All-Drug Olympics sketch when it aired in October of 1988. I was fifteen and thought it was the funniest thing I’d ever seen. I still think it’s hysterical.
• Related: I’ve seen Overboard (1987, Kurt Russell, Goldie Hawn) at least 1,000 times and Mother’s Day 2025 was the first time I noticed that one of the VHS tapes in Grant’s collection is clearly a porno titled Pink Clam.
• Pope Leo XIV, the first American pope, became an instant hit among trading card collectors.
• Can confirm: It Only Tuesday
• How Is Any of This Happening?
  • POTUS is attempting to place Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, the guy who defended him in his porn star hush money trial, as the interim acting librarian of Congress. I cannot fathom how anyone is acting like this is… normal. (How does the AP even allow that headline?!) POTUS and/or anyone in the Executive branch cannot simply hire or fire someone who is de jure employed by the Legislative branch. It’s the Library of Congress, not the Library of the President, ffs!
  • I couldn’t have said it better myself: POTUS accepting a $400 million jet from the royal family of Qatar is banana republic shit.
  • The ICE detainment of progressive Twitch streamer Hasan Piker is a cautionary tale for multiple reasons.
  • A contestant (justifiably!) feels betrayed after spending $10,000 auditioning for a fake singing competition on the Nathan Fielder HBOMAX series The Rehearsal.
  • “This is insane. Republicans have inserted language into the budget reconciliation bill that would ban states from regulating AI in any capacity for 10 years.” – via bcmerchant.bsky.social
  • Employees who use AI tools like ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini at work face negative judgments about their competence and motivation from colleagues and managers, according to a new study. – via sethpartnow.bsky.social

• The US government wants to start protecting you (and your kids) from Roblox robux scams. – via Anil
• The Moon is part of the Diocese of Orlando, in accordance with the 1917 Code of Canon Law, which states that “any newly discovered territory was placed under the jurisdiction of the diocese from which the expedition which discovered that territory left.” – via Kent Hendricks
• I can’t be the only GenXer really struggling with the fact that it’s 2025. That number seems impossible to me. It sounds like a year from The Jetsons or Space Mountain. (Related: Wikipedia’s list of movies set in 2025 is somewhat disappointing.)
• I thoroughly enjoyed reading this essay on the evolution of the Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade screenplay. – via hiro.report, via Phil Gyford
• Bad news for people who hate good news:
  • In a 6-1 ruling in favor of sixteen youth who sued, the Montana Supreme Court affirmed their constitutional right to a “clean and healthful environment.” – via kottke
  • The U.S. Supreme Court won’t hear appeals from oil companies challenging a lawsuit in Hawaii that aims to hold them accountable for climate change. – via Crooked Media
  • The US jobs market roared to life in December – via Semafor
  • Trump can still vote after sentencing, but can’t own a gun and will have to turn over DNA sample – via The Associated Press
  • Biden Issues Sweeping Deportation Protections Before Trump Takes Office
• Good news for people who love bad news:
  • Global temperatures in 2024 eclipsed 2023’s average by more than a fifth of a degree Fahrenheit. That’s an unusually large jump; until the last couple of super-hot years, global temperature records were exceeded only by hundredths of a degree. – via The Morning Wire
  • Tens of millions of American Christians are embracing a charismatic movement known as the New Apostolic Reformation, which seeks to destroy the secular state. – via my dad

This is going to kill my weekend. I’ve maxed out at 13 and can’t seem to beat that.

• Not many things are cooler than Johnny Depp reading a letter from Hunter S. Thompson.
• The Zodiac Killer! Grey goo! There are all sorts of creepy Wikipedia articles.
• The team @Flip has done it again. They are just killing in the video recorder market. Their new product — the Flip SlideHD — is incredible. It shoots 4 hours of HD video and has a touchscreen. (via The Awesomer)
• Phil Mickelson visited Krispy Kreme, wearing his spiffy new green jacket.
• The best Twitter exchange of the year has got to go to Aimee Mann and Ice T.
• I don’t subscribe to Scientific American, but I always grab it in airport bookstores. My favorite recurring feature is the one that details an interesting article from 50, 100, and 150 years ago. So it was with some pleasure that I discovered that the author of one of my favorite blogs, Ironic Sans, has recently started publishing Sunday Magazine. Every Friday he posts the most interesting articles from the New York Times Sunday Magazine from 100 years ago that weekend. Trés cool.
• The towel-folding robot is just more proof that I am going to get to meet C-3PO (or at least R2-D2) in my lifetime.

• General Stuff
  • My dad has posted more gorgeous shots of New England to his Flickr feed.
  • Nothing is over until we decide it is!
  • Suck it, Michael. The Beatles are one notch above the King of Pop for most-viewed Wikipedia article.
  • How the hell does a car’s differential work? I never understood it… and then I watched this General Motors 1930s tutorial which explains it wonderfully. (link via Kottke)
  • “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” – MLK, Jr.
  • Dooce is still writing the best stuff on the Internet. Seriously. If you haven’t yet read everything she’s ever written, take a few months off work and go do that right now. You’ll laugh. You’ll cry. You’ll wonder why she doesn’t have her own television show.
  • What did you think you were going to find at hiddenpassageway.com?
  • What’s the business benefit of free bread at restaurants? (AskMeFi is just awesome, although some of the questions people ask can be quite depressing.)
  • My wife is sure to be thrilled to see LA Weekly’s list of 99 Essential L.A. Restaurants.
  • Yes, you could build your house with LEGO blocks. But why?
  • Pizza Hut Fails Basic Grammar, another excellent post from the witty One Step Forward
• Techie Stuff
  • Check out these cool grunge peeling sticker social media icons.
  • Ten ways to stop spam in WordPress covers the basics and includes a few new tricks I didn’t know.
  • Make your Mac prettier with a glossy dock.

• General Stuff
  • If you’re taking any medicine for any reason at all, you should read this article.
  • Abusive relationships like this one just suck.
  • Perspective
  • Wired has a great article all about craigslist, if you like that site.
  • Whole Foods has crazy expensive groceries, but terrific thoughts on healthcare reform.
  • I had no idea that the word avocado comes from the Nahuatl word ãhuacatl (“testicle”), a reference to the shape of the fruit.
  • Think that we’re not living in the future yet? Read The bright side of sitting in traffic: Crowdsourcing road congestion data from Google. Or take a look at how you could use your iPhone as a restaurant HUD. And start saving up for that jetpack.
  • Here’s your cute kitten fix for the day.
  • You can convey quite a bit with just three frames. (The ones from Jaws, The Goonies, and Jurassic Park are my favorites.)
• Gator Stuff
  • Bill Belichick presents a stone face to the world, but succeeds in part because he is open to change. For the past two years, the Patriots have run an offense that is all but identical to Urban Meyer‘s Florida spread.
  • Stopping Tim Tebow isn’t easy, but it is possible.
  • Kirk Herbstreit on Tebow
  • Boom! – must-watch YouTube vid of big Gator hits
  • “Tim Tebow’s proficiency as a passer and rusher have placed him among the all-time greats after only two seasons as a starter,” according to statistical analysis done by Sports Illustrated’s Stewart Mandel.
• Techie Stuff
  • Oh, hey! I didn’t realize you could create animated images with Photoshop!
  • Apple did a very smart thing when it priced Snow Leopard below the cost of a typical family visit to the movies.
  • Do you use any of the out-of-touch computer terms on this list at your office?