To hell with the future of the Internet(s). Where was the book's cover photo taken? Was it Photoshopped? It looked so very cool.

@12 posted by Takuan
all I can suggest is to have video cameras and record everything

HOLY COW! We all know how much trouble they'd get in to if they whip out a camera! Boy, don't bring 'the man' down on you by doing that!

I stopped enjoying as much of Carlin as I used to, the last decade of his life because it seemed that he'd started hating a good portion of the human race. There was a nasty turn in his humor that mad eme think he'd regretted being a member. My wife pointed it out in an HBO special in the '90's, and it was quite obvious over the next 2-3. We never watched the last few.

Two thoughts on this news-

1. Does this balance the two Democratic Senators who we've discovered have gotten marvelous 'deals' on their home mortgages that aren't available to the rest of us? Senators Conrad and Dodd must be hoping that news of AmEx's little 'understanding' with the McCain family pushes them off the Political pages (not that Faux News will drop it unless the RNC tells them to!).

2. These cards are in Cindy McCain's name? Just to confirm ,s this the same Cindy McCain that Senator McCain called a cunt during the 1992 campaign? I guess she must want this election as much as he does. The phrase that comes to mind is "She wouldn't say 'shit' if her mouth was full of it". I guess she must okay with it- hope she's never disfigured like first Mrs. McCain.

Wow Mark, you know Roy Doty? I grew up on Wordless Workshop (Fathers in the 1960's had to subscribe to POPULAR SCIENCE- it was the law), and loved the simple clear logic of the things that he drew. I subscribe now myself (after a 40 year gap), and while I love the PopSci Futures thingie they do, I miss Wordless Workshop.

As a former bookbinder (I would capitalize it if I was still earning as one, but, I'm decades past that life-stage), one can sew the pages in a number of different ways to produce a book. Sewn signatures are the easiest (allowing me to produce a bound book while still in high school), but groups of pages can be sewn together in groups, either manually or on an oversewing machine. Manually is also a great way to build up hand and arm strength, if you don't pre-drill the holes for the needle and thread. Gluing the back should be avoided at all costs- first of all, you'll only have Elmer's available to you at home, and Elmer's dries hard- you need flexible glue for all binding application. I am shuddering just thinking about about glued backs. Never pay someone to bind in this manner either.

Always round over the spine of the book. If the spine is straight/flat, it will be too much strain on the binding, and shorten the life of your effort. They had machines to do this, dating back to the early 20th century, and that was the first job I had as a binder, in the 1970's.

Producing good looking end pages were the most boring part of the process. My dad, who was a binder for 50 years, always supplied me with end pages, being easier then assembling my own. He also showed me the frame used for signature sewing, and that allowed me to make my own frame at home.

I also tended to cheat and make covers at his shop in Waltham, because finding materials to create durable covers and cutting the boards for them was a bear. They always had scraps of buckram laying around that I could use. I had quite a flashback when I just googled buckram. Same company is obviously making it since the 1960's.

Years later, I was working at another Bindery in South Boston, and by not paying attention while cutting cover boards for a Harvard Library job, I whacked off the end of my left middle finger, making me lust after that fingertip growing piggy powder that was mentioned a few weeks ago, even 30 years later.

Stamping the title on the spine or cover is obviously a job for professionals- maybe you could use a paper cover like Abi did, so it will look as nice as his example.

Maybe after talking about this for this long, I'll go down into the basement tonight and pull out some of the bound Astoundings and Analogs that I did in the 1970's ,and see how they're holding up. I worked on jobs for Isaac Asimov and Charlie Brown at that first bindery- ah, the old days...

#180 by Rob Beschizza

http://gadgets.boingboing.net/threeweekslater.jpg

Okay, after 180 comments, this was the best.

Thanks, Bob!

We've come so far from the original MIT version of this (almost 50 years ago) where four kinds would get off the streetcar first, and attach thermite bombs to each wheel, while the fifth kid gets off while paying for his ride with a $20 bill, allowing his goombas to fire off the thermite while the driver made change.

When the driver took his foot off the brake, nothing happened, and the MTA had to get a crew out with a set of chisels to break the wheels free of the rails, where they were now welded. Clever guys those MIT students.

See the Wiki article about later hacks.

I want to know the source of the cover art. Is it a photo or just photoshopped?

Many of Piper's stories were a part of that history, including Space Viking. I think of Space Piper every time my screen saver kicks in, because I have a huge array of John Schoenherr covers including Space Viking in my Google Screen saver art folder. I loved his stories, and it might just be time for to get them out again and reread them all. I do that with LORD OF LIGHT about every ten years too.

As an avid reader (more books/magazines in the bathrooms then some of the rooms of our house), a book collector (still have the Foundation Trilogy paperbacks that my dad got The Good Doctor to autograph to me in the late 1960's), a home decorating maven (watching and critiquing HGTV shows and working on our own house for two decades), and as a former bookbinder (total of five years in two places in New England), this business horrifies me on some many different levels.

Book are SACRED, for Christ's sake, and to use books that you could not even read if you wanted to, is simply beyond the pale.

Well, when I link to my Scottish Harvey/Harvie ancestors,who left Dalry and Kilwinning in 1758, I'll have to mention this lovely fellow. Fills me heart with pride of place, doesn't it?

...not using electronic ballots, eh?

I'd be willing to bet that exit polling works in this jurisdiction then. Funny how 'the World's Greatest Democracy' is one of the few places where exit polling doesn't seem to work.

Thank God our news media is right on top of that story.

You may want to link to the book available at Amazon.com at: http://www.amazon.com/First-American-Suppressed-People-Discovered/dp/1564149420
This book lists some of the sites where the Clovis Firsters have been blown out of the water before, but have suppressed the research. Truly amazing reading. Luckily the American Government and the Main Stream Media would never allow this to happen today. Oh. Never mind.

The St. Paul Pioneer Press BULLETIN BOARD column got a hold of this yesterday, and they published this same link in today's paper. I looked them up on YouTube and found some even better videos that I turned around and suggested back to BB this morning. It's all so circular, don't yeah know. I think I like their version of 'Delilah' even better then 'Sweet Home Alabama', and their 'My Way' threw in a little 'Cabaret' as well, for good measure.

44 - joellevand was talking about the folks who scammed us out of services- that's the thing I hate the most of the last third of a century of this country's history, that the corporations have scammed tax dollars out of us for corporate welfare schemes that are inherently stupid, but have all been put in place by the revolving door congress that then steps into the companies and helps drain off the money. Time for American Revolution II, and rolling back this whole notion that companies can be beings (Oliver Wendell Holmes, what the HELL were you thinking of?!?).

I thought maybe the dry river beyond the barrier was calling to them to restore it's flow by inducing theirs.

I lopped the end of my left middle finger in 1975 (it was a slow afternoon at the book bindery up until the incident, and made up for the fact I wasn't going to the Worldcon anyway), and while the emergency room doc took some nice snaps of the injury, I never got the option of leaving the wound open and letting my body grow another fingertip / nail. I used to read the medical magazines for the nasty bits, and then afterwards, I was the nasty bits. Go figure, eh?

Thirty years later, if I could (1) get a doctor to remove the skin graft and nasty fingertip I have lived with, and (2) find someone to sell me the damned powder, I'd do the regenerated finger thing in a heartbeat. I suppose I'd have to get used to having a different length finger all over again, as well.

If you find the article about fingertip amputations that he published (not sure if it was in the Journal of the New England Medical Association or some other august tome), I'm the left hand with the silver and turquoise ring on the little finger. The skin graft site on my left forearm looked like some sort of weird postage stamps (there were two done) for many years, but it's barely perceptible now. Time flies.