My first thought: ZOMG ZOMG ZOMG.

My second thought: My wife will never let me put one in our living room.

My third thought: Damn.

My first thought: ZOMG ZOMG ZOMG.

My second thought: My wife will never let me put one in our living room.

My third thought: Damn.

How can I get a gig as a streetviewer?

I prefer my eggs scrambled. But they're not as pretty that way . . .

Cute overload!

It seems like there's some sort of linguistic arms race taking place among the bb gadgets bloggers . . . Everybody launching volleys of the sorts of words that get you high scores on the GRE.

I love it. Keeps me coming back to bb gadgets more than bb.

How come I feel like I'm watching some sort of strange Wild Kingdom episode? Quick, someone dub Sir David Attinborough's voice over this!

I think I'm tired of reading the word "steampunk."

I don't really know what it's exact meaning is, but I have a clue as to why it's so popular. In our world of mass-produced gadgets, we yearn for the old-timey craftsmanship of yore. The days when labor was cheaper than technology, the days when you could pay somebody to hand carve filigree into anything, or turn out some fantastically ornate banister on a foot-powered lathe.

It's backlash against disposable durables—cheaply made gadgets and appliances that are easier to replace than repair. We yearn for quality stuff.

Anyway, these things are beautiful. I dig them.

I've been to Bangkok a few times and while the stifling heat and humidity press down on you like a 20-ton steam-heated moist towelette, the sun isn't always shining. It tends to rain a lot. Wonder how much downtime he has.

Still, I'd buy a sun-seared chicken from this guy. Looks tasty.

I love Japan. I saw something similar gobbling up subcompacts in Tokyo. Nom nom nom.

Oh, and you should get some sort of gold-plated statue for writing the phrase "velocipedal hunger."

John Brownlee, your writing is inspiring and the most fun I've had in months. Keep it up, I LOVE the tangents and the dense vocabulary—spread liberally like chunky jam on dry toast.

honestly, i thought it was something to do with firefox on ubuntu. thx for the fix!

Shmengie, you get the award for the most boingboing-est system setup. Cory would be proud!

Cheers!

Awww man! Now where am I gonna get my daily dose of Bisphenol A? I find the synthetic chemical hormone impersonators (including the other, less-well-known bisphenols) to be very refreshing in the morning. There's nothing quite like the rapturous chills of a body battling to incorporate man-made uber compounds into its delicately balanced chemistry!

Seriously though, I'm a biker and I must've drank a few million liters of water out of janky giveaway plastic water bottles. Cheers! Here's looking to a bright future full of extra limbs and horrible growths!

Now I try to get bottles without the nasty bits in them (although who knows what else lurks in the milky white plastic) or just use stainless steel. Glass is the best, of course, but a bit hazardous on a bike. It's great for baby bottles though, my wife and I just ordered some of them for our little one and he'll be able to pass them down to his little one! Hooray for reuse!

Well, technically—and I've been thinking about this a lot lately—it IS steampunk.

You see, we get a lot of our electricity from good old coal-fired steam turbines. Or nuclear-powered steam turbines. Either way, we're steampunk!

Seems like this spam arms race could inadvertently lead to the creation of the first self-aware AI. A self-aware AI that would peddle viagra and knock-off Rolex watches.

Why not a Remember Ring providing instead of pain,pleasure sensations because couples are united first of all through the pleasure they are giving to each other and not through the pain.The pain only divides people,also a Pleasure Remember Ring would have a much more commercial success.

And orgasmo ring would be even better.

Quick, somebody call Dan Brown!

Srsly though, the Christians have a lot of nerve calling the pentagram a mark of satan. It's a pagan symbol and last time I checked almost every Christian holiday and holy day is in some way based on a pagan holiday (Sunday, Easter, Christmas, Eat a Goat Heart Day).

I'm always surprised at how many intelligent people are "dumbist" (ie, seem to hate/fear dumb people). Should everyone really be intelligent? Some of the most wonderful people I know are dumb as shit. Some of the worst people I know are intelligent. Being foolish or stupid should not be a cardinal sin...

It's easy to blame people for their foolish acts while overlooking the root of their foolishness. Not to get too off topic here, but Americans aren't really taught how to be financially responsible. It just isn't part of the curriculum. Plus, we're bombarded with "spend" messages all the time, everywhere. It takes real will power and financial knowhow to resist.

Are people to blame for their foolish acts? Yes, partially. Is that the whole story? Nope.

You know, I used to spend a lot of time at boingboing. Now, with commenting, I spend ABSURD amounts of time at boingboing. That's absolutely awesome.

Before this tread, I never would've even given the steampunk subculture a second thought. Call yourself what you want. Wear what you want. Doesn't bother me.

I might, however, take a look at someone's steampunk project and say "meh, that's just some watch cogs glued to an old radio," or "the beauty and craftsmanship of this piece has induced an apoplectic state of aesthetic ecstasy and I think I just messed myself." (It's often the latter) That's just normal liking and not liking.

But every time I see "steampunk" in the headline of a boingboing post I click on it because overall I find steampunk stuff exceedingly fascinating. And that's what boingboing is all about. Finding stuff exceedingly fascinating. Or is it finding exceedingly fascinating stuff?

BTW, That last post was supposed to get you to think about how funny a steam-powered penis pump would actually be. It wasn't supposed to offend.

Regardless of whether the video pegs the needle on your laf-o-meter, you have to admit it does a great job of pointing out some of the ludicrousness of Steampunk.

I wouldn't ask boing boing to stop covering steampunk, but perhaps it could apply a new rubric. As in, to be labeled "steampunk," said hand-crafted lamp, computer case, penis pump or what have you must involve, in some way, steam.

The ROM machine people buy a lot of ad space in Discover magazine. So somebody has to be buying the thing. Also, note its steampunkiness.

How do the two redhead "modern" parents make a blonde girl and brunette boy? "Modern" must be a euphemism for something else.

The "modern" parents have access to modern hair dye . . . and complex genetic engineering techniques that allow them to choose the hair and eye colors for their kids.

Okay, so what's with Superman? Looks like he's totally freaking out, tossing sedans at CEOs. And that guy in the lower left-hand corner . . . What's on his mind? Could it possibly be . . ."MY EMPIRE IS CRUMBLING!" ?

Another thought: Disemvowelling seems like a troll tool, not a moderator tool. I can imagine a troll/coder writing a worm that would somehow disemvowel other people's posts. Seems eggzonctly what such a technique would be used for. A moderator's use of the disemvowelling technique seems kind nanner-nanner-goo-goo-ish to me.

I agree: disemvowelling is more annoying than useful. It makes "rude" comments almost impossible to read and makes rude commenters even angrier.

Yes, but how can I possibly resist my own potent urge to interrupt my work with forays into the delightful world of the Internets?

That's the best use for a robot that I've ever seen.

I like the lead singer's Judogi-style blouse. Judo chop!

I hate used books. Knowing that someone else has handled and dogeared and broken the book I'm trying to read just creeps me out, especially if it's a stranger. It's worse with paperbacks, but only because they're more fragile. Even in college I hated it when the only copy of a textbook that was available was used, with someone else's ideas on the most important parts highlighted or underlined.

Hmm, never bothered me. But I would read a secondhand photocopy of a book, especially a good book.

THESULLIV wrote:

Yes there are problems and there will probably be some painful decisions in our future. That's how the whole thing works, some like to call it a market cycle. It's probably not the end of the world. Although note, I did say probably...

I see economic downturn as a great opportunity to reexamine the political/social/economic systems. I mean, we're doing it right now in this forum. Recession also provides a chance to improve efficiency at all levels of society. Scarcity and tough times have a way of breeding innovation. I mean, my great grandma learned to cook a mean opossum gumbo during the last Great Depression. Oh, and she also learned how to shoot a hobo who broke into her farmhouse looking for a meal. Just thing of all the opportunities!

Seriously though, tough times tend to get minds working. That's one positive aspect of hardship. Anyway, the world won't truly end unless a gamma ray burst strips away the atmosphere, an asteroid or comet smashes into the earth or some hothead geezer president pushes the button and plunges the earth into nuclear winter. Oh yeah, and there's alway a super-virulent and deadly strain of the flu that wipes out 80 percent of the population. If none of that happens, you're golden.

Me, I'm good to go, on account of having made the wise decision some time back to convert all my personal wealth into giant stone Yap Island coins.

134 laf points awarded. Thanks, this thread needs more posts like yours.

Hello,

I just wanted to repost something ZUZU posted in the Amsterdam currency exchange post:

The sliding value of the dollar is the result of increasing the supply of money and credit to pay for the invasion and occupation of Iraq starting in 2003 without raising a war tax or selling war bonds. The military-industrial complex was paid with created money, which then filtered into the general dollar-based economy. Now that's come home to roost.

So a big chunk of the crisis can be attributed to borrowing money to fund an unpopular war. Even worse, the return for investment in this war is less than zero. The only measurable return on the war "investment" is control. War funding sucks resources from social programs, leading to a populous that is poor, desperate and controllable. It's straight out of 1984.

I know I'm over-simplifying, but I can't help it. I was trained to be a journalist, a knowledge distiller.

But I thought gamma rays would just make me big, green and angry. Who knew?

RRSAFETY: Maybe the big corporations get called out more often because the magic of marginal gains means that the bigger you are, the cheaper it is to be evil to yet another person. As the cost of evil goes down, it becomes more attractive.

Aluxeterna: I love that idea! We should start tracking the "Cost of Evil." The "Cost of Evil Index." It would be a better indicator of overall well being of the country than the GDP.

So, no ideas? Zuzu, what do the economists say about recovery? Or better yet, do you have any ideas?

Innovation is one way out of this mess. New technology to increase energy efficiency and harvest renewable energy would be a good start.

Any other ideas?

Seems like we've really got a handle on how we got here, now let's start planning and adapting.

ZUZU: I love Princess Bride. Read that quote and the two or three brain cells in my head lit right up. Thanks for that.

And now that I think about it, it's true. That word does not mean what I think it means. And I also realize that I don't know anything about economics. I just have this vague sense of injustice and a kind of 14-year-old angst about it. And my warped mind fuses it with some kind of crazy utopian philosophy that I must've gotten from watching Sesame Street or something. Or maybe 3-2-1 Contact. No, Reading Rainbow. Definitely Reading Rainbow. Makes my stomach do backflips to realize it, but there it is. Time to pick up that dusty econ book I shoved behind all those bad sci-fi novels ten years ago.

Thanks. I wouldn't have realized it without your clear explanations. And really, I'm not being sarcastic. I'm being honest.

And your furniture isn't crap. Sorry about that.

antinous, I'm saying that there's a stigma to renting. I'm saying that it's inherently unfair to renters.

And what does losing a tooth have to do with anything? Are you saying that dental care is some kind of frivolous expense? People's teeth fell out because they didn't have good dental or health care. Because they couldn't afford it. Because their rents were too high. (Okay, now I'm just being a punk)

Wealth is not evenly distributed. Check out the definition of wealth. It means an abundance of something that is held somewhere for the benefit of a few.

How is return on investment any different than profit or money for nothing?

Wealth inequity does affect you, it affects everyone in society. The wealthy get to manipulate laws in ways that you can never hope to manipulate (i.e. changing government law to steal your money through higher taxes on your income than the high incomes of the wealthy). So wealth inequity affects your income.

Sure, you can fix some things in your apartment, but are you willing to hire a HAZMAT team to clean up chipping lead paint or crumbling asbestos? Or what about a cracked foundation? Or a major problem with your steam radiator heat system? You won't fix any of those. And if the landlord doesn't fix them, you'll suffer with the problems.

I'm not talking about Ikea furniture (which is crap). I'm talking about the buildings people live and work in.

ZUZU: Ah, I see where you're coming from. I definitely agree with you; a "good living" is subjective.

You're making me re-thing wealth disparity and wealth accumulation. Does wealth create poverty? Or is poverty created by a lack of resources, stale economies, lack of knowledge (and thus adaptability)? I think it's both. Wealth isn't evenly distributed and tends to circulate among the, well, wealthy. Wealth rarely if ever reaches the poor. Wealth concentration also has a way of entrenching the rich. Elite moneymakers often direct policy and dictate culture (through movies, television, news media, even education). They mold society to support inequity in wealth distribution. Any society with a big wealth disparity will inevitably support that disparity, even without really knowing it (look around us).

Getting back to menial labor jobs. . . Wealth disparity creates a system that eats away at itself. Construction and maintenance jobs become devalued because the wealthy and middle class aren't willing to pay for the work. Maintenance workers become dejected and aren't willing to improve their skills or craft (it makes more economic sense to get out of construction and work in an office). You end up with poorly constructed buildings and shoddy workmanship. You can see it everywhere.

As for home ownership, I don't really see how you can say that renting is preferable to owning a home. It may make economic sense in that you can invest the money you save, but paying rent ultimately just feeds another system of inequity. How? To landlords, rent is pure profit—money for nothing. Margins between rents and actual costs are huge. Many landlords (and I've seen hundreds of apartments across the country and the world) do not perform basic maintenance on their properties and rarely, if ever, spring for upgrades. Home ownership gives people control over their surroundings. Yes, it takes money and effort to upgrade or refinish a home, but the benefits are well worth it. Renters don't have the option to change their space and must endure depressing dwellings. All the while, landlords collect rent, which is often funneled into the stock market, the great game of the wealthy. Renting perpetuates wealth inequity.

"Why is that sad? Professional athletes and film actors earn huge salaries too, because someone is willing to pay them that, likely because it's part of a sustainable business model. The truth speaks for itself. This "romantic nobility of the blue collar worker" is mythological, like "noble farmers" and cowboys. Get real; there's nothing particularly noble about "working with your hands". If you enjoy it, fine, but don't expect to make a good living out of it."

Why not? Why shouldn't a construction worker or mechanic expect to make a good living doing what they do? Why doesn't everyone deserve to make a good living?

"People are not entitled to having kids or owning a house. Children and home ownership are expensive luxuries; if you cannot afford them, then you can't have them. It's that simple."

Okay, so you're saying that there isn't enough wealth, land and resources in this country for everyone to own a home? But there is enough for a few very wealthy people to own lots and lots of homes and land? Why aren't people entitled to have homes?

Do you simply believe that wealth should be concentrated among a few people? If so, what are your beliefs based on? Do you believe that the privileged are just better than those who don't have money to begin with?

Let me follow that up by saying that I am privileged, being a member of the middle class. But I can see that there's no real reason for it.

I've learned more about our economy and the state it's in from reading recent BB comments than I have from reading Market Watch, WSJ, NYT and many other major news publications. And while the truth is scary, knowing what's behind it all makes me feel much better about our situation. Thanks BB posters, you are awesome.

Re: The Knowledge Economy—I don't think it's realistic to believe that we can have an entire economy of knowledge workers. I am a knowledge worker and I often wish that I could spend a third of my time on a community farm or in a community wood shop working with my hands. I know many others who find great satisfaction in building things, fixing things and generally working with something that's not a computer. But here's the thing: It's been my observation that those hands-on, practical professions are undervalued. A mid-level knowledge worker is often paid more than, say, a construction worker with a few years' experience. This isn't a surprise to anybody. In fact, nobody really seems to care. That's really sad.

#18: Yeah, I've thought about gold too, but it really won't help if there isn't any food in the grocery store or gas at the pumps. Or jobs. It is shiny and glow-y though, so it has that going for it.

I think that knowledge, cunning and cleverness are the only currencies that will help us weather the coming economic ugliness. But I got a C in high school econ, so don't believe what I write.

Well, shows like American Idol have been torturing the audience for a few years now . . . Time to turn things around I guess.

Seriously though, this is going too far. The producers should have their salaries revoked and donated to Amnesty International.

Okay, I take that back. "Thick, lightly waxed canvas" and "comfortable" can belong in the same sentence, as long as it goes something like this:

The thick, lightly waxed canvas is comfortable—in the same way that steel wool nickers are comfortable.

Like cuddling a belt sander . . .

"Thick, lightly waxed canvas" and "comfortable" do not belong in the same sentence.

Pay very close attention to water-filter company stock.

Johannm, that's insane.

check this out:

http://www.whatsthatbug.com

WTB

Read Bill Bryson's "A Walk in the Woods."

Well, I guess we all know now that there really is no faking it.

phloodpants, I love Shel Silverstein. One of the greatest minds, ever.

I used to cover schools for a small paper in Northern California and I ran into this kind of thing all the time. School administrators are clueless. You'd think they never ever interact with or even see teenagers, or children for that matter. One great example I can remember: High school vice principals went berserk when they saw some posters hanging in the school newspaper's staff room. They deemed the posters "inappropriate." They tore the posters down and scoured the room clean. They were posters of Albert Einstein, Pink Floyd and the best-selling British novel "Porn." The teacher was suspended for allowing such smut to plaster the walls of their pristine classroom. Everybody defended the action, right on up to the superintendent.

I award Rob 342 awesome points.

I have a few babies in my life and I've definitely geeked out over all the tremendously cool baby stuff out there. Rob, however, has taken it to blissful levels.

The mushroom velcro pattern reminds me of the tiny tiny hairs/post thingies on gecko hands. Check out this SciAm article about it:

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=0001FA66-4F72-1C75-9B81809EC588EF21

Molecular velcro. And geckos are adorable.

"The fact Burt wants to be president of SFWA after jamming the organization into a wall twice in the last year suggests to my mind either an Aspergian lack of cluefulness, or a grim, committed drive to prove that the Peter Principle is wrong, and that, indeed, one can rise beyond one’s level of incompetence, perchance to explore heretofore unknown, virgin realms of incompetence none have ever seen before."

Them's fightin' words. Beautiful, hilarious, ingenious fightin' words.

I meant just a remix for remix's sake. Not to bash Cory or anything. I mean, it's Cory talking about sci-fi and the Interwebs with German overdubbing. Makes my little brain buzz with silly ideas.

Okay, I'll give it a shot. The remixing, I mean. Should be fun . . .

Hey! This is great, but I want to comment about the end of the world and the link to the very latest post is giving me a 404 error.

And, um, these sketches are disturbing. So Hitler was really just a frustrated animator who took out his disappointment on a few million people?

A lamp that lasts 200 years? The Lamps Plus cartel will never allow such a device to be made.

The worst part of this art installment isn't even mentioned: There's a cage full of hungry monkeys on the other side of the room.

The nursing homes of the future (our nursing homes) will have balloon-making robots. That will be the one and only advance in nursing-home technology.

If raccoons were bigger, they'd eat you. Serious.

@50

Bicycles are extremely cool! Just not cop bikes. . . maybe if they were armored or had awesome suspension systems. But really, they usually just look like Target bikes. Oh, and to make things worse, why do they always put the biggest guys on the bikes? At least find the svelte cops for bike duty. Burly guys in stiff cop shirts on bikes . . . well . . . um . . .

Officer needs anger management class and some mindfulness-based stress reduction therapy.

I hope the kid is okay. Being bullied is traumatic. I mean, how is the guy supposed to respect authority figures when they toss him around like a rag doll? He'll likely walk away with this with a burning hatred of cops and authority figures. Nice work officer.

Oh! I get it. Stop any threat to the current power structure using any means possible. Got it. *salutes*

My congresscritter has been very good on this issue. My senatecritters have been very, very bad, however. On this issue and many others. Bad senatecritter! *swats with newspaper, rubs nose in mess*

The term "representative democracy" saddens me because I never feel that my political/ideological/scientific views are being represented in almost any area of government.

But it's a beautiful sunny day today!

Gorgeous. I love it. Makes me want a model city in the basement, like Maitland in Beteljuice.

Fascinating! Gross? A little. But I grew up on Wild Kingdom, NOVA and the like.

Post triggered uncontrollable gut-busting, apoplectic laughter.

The funniest thing I've read in a long time, second only to your comment about Oakleys a while back in the thread about that god-awful leather dreadlocks thing.

Keep up the good work man.

Where did he get the orange tires?

Great, they've removed the onion's only natural defense mechanism! Poor, helpless onions! How can we live with ourselves?!

The Aérotrain: A train with AFTERBURNERS. Sounds like very six-year-old's dream come true.

And I'm pretty sure that the Aérotrain could be written into an episode or two of Thomas. As a French villain, of course.

Um wow. That's hideous.

Oh yes . . . but there's something wrong with my forearms . . . I don't remember these anchor tattoos either . . .

I just ate a huge plate of spinach. Can someone check in on me every few minutes? I feel like I need a spirit guide.

@#37: Bravo! I wholeheartedly agree. But sadly, newspaper editors (and publishers) are addicted to the "we got it first" rush, despite the fact that there's no way in hell they got it first, thanks to Internet, TV and radio reporting. And many of them are simply too inept to provide good investigative reporting, or even leadership that encourages investigative reporting.

I read online news because it's instantaneous and it doesn't eat up natural resources like print publications. It's also searchable, which means I can get the info I want without having to wade through the miresome prose of an exhausted, over-worked reporter.

And am I the only one who absolutely hates newsprint? The way it sticks to your fingers? Its acrid industrial smell? And the newspaper format is horrendous. You don't read a newspaper. You wrestle with its huge, maddeningly thin and crinkly sheets. You fold and subdue it into rough rectangles just to isolate a few skinny columns of text that end in a jump, requiring you to do it all over again. Extracting information from the format is an utter nightmare.

@#4 Yeah, Yellowknife? A remote place for arms trading? A manufacturing center, perhaps?

Nice. But maybe it could've been done, say, with something other than a subway map? . . . Oh wait, here's my likes and dislikes plotted on the BART Pittsburg/Baypoint line! Ooo look, I've renamed the Rockridge station "Lemon Meringue Pie!" So clever!

He's a witch!

Meh. Wish the artwork was as intriguing as the cover art.

The true value of music: Feeding band managers Kobe beef burgers and Faberge egg omelets.

Amazing work! Now you definitely need to take it apart and start experimenting with the parts. Just think of all the possibilities . . . That is, after all, what LEGO is all about.

Had some brew like this in Japan at UCC coffee, a chain cafe. Some of the best coffee I've ever had, hands down. Oddly enough, UCC coffee is also available there in little cans. Not nearly as good though.

My two favorite toys as a kid: cardboard and masking tape. This is one awesome space ship and I will definitely build one with my son. Creativity is the greatist gift you can give a kid.

Looks great on my iPhone, thanks Joel!

@#30

YouTube comments are the absolute worst. Sometimes I think they must have a mainframe somewhere generating inane and nonsensical comments.

Wish I had a script for my brain that would block out annoying conversations at restaurants.

Wait, he gets paid for this?

The end is neigh.

My first thought was: "Wait, David Lynch still makes movies?" Then, "His hatred of small screens seems odd, given his penchant for creepy midgets. Seems like they would be more to scale on a smaller screen."

The copy is confusing, but the crest of intricately arranged fast-food delights is just plain genius. Look at how the fries seem to explode from the confines of their cardboard prison, perfect rays of deep-fried tuber representing pure culinary ecstasy. And the hot-dogs—one smothered in lava-like chili, the other stoically proud of its unadorned beauty and flavor. The chicken sandwich and hamburger are, of course, Queen and King of this glorious empire of mouth-watering goodness.

Long live the King.

Long live the KING.