`Miami’s South Beach is famously sexy. Everywhere you look there’s glistening, touchable skin, and every impulse that goes with it. But some of SoBe’s steamiest scenes aren’t in the clubs. Lots of images — naked celebrities, people doin’ it with game birds and women straddling airplanes — gather in a more discreet location, overseen by a 71-year-old grandmother.
On a corner building in the heart of South Beach, a small neon sign quietly advertises the “World Erotic Art Museum,” and inside is most of the $10 million erotic art collection of Naomi Wilzig, who has been hunting down images of our glorious sex lives for the past 15 years. She used to collect garden-variety antiques until that fateful day when her son asked her to find something a little more blue — not in color — for his apartment. She took up the challenge and found a new thrill in the world of sexy old things.’
`Fine example of a WW II Enigma cipher machine in a very good condition and a great history; full functional. Year of construction 1941 by Manufacturer Chiffriermaschinen Gesellschaft Heimsoeth and Rinke, Berlin. The Enigma machine is placed in an oak woodwork case. Three high-quality, all-metal, matched rotors and an Umkehrwalze “B”. The rotors are continuous numbered; serial numbers has been removed. There are two spare rotors in an additional small wooden box. Plug board is lettered QWERTZU…, wheels numbered 1-26. 100% Original!!! No Copy!!’
`One of the world’s last Stone Age tribes has murdered two fishermen whose boat drifted on to a desert island in the Indian Ocean.
The Sentinelese, thought to number between 50 and 200, have rebuffed all contact with the modern world, firing a shower of arrows at anyone who comes within range.
They are believed to be the last pre-Neolithic tribe in the world to remain isolated and appear to have survived the 2004 Asian tsunami.’
`The map depicts all of the continents, including Australia, North America, and Antarctica, in rough outline.
An inscription identifies the map as a copy made in 1763 of an original drawn in 1418. [..]
But experts have dismissed the map as a fake.
They say the map resembles a French 17th-century world map with its depiction of California as an island.’
followup to China map lays claim to Americas.
`What high-tech product advances the fastest? It’s probably the hard drive. The capacity doubles easily every two years and sometimes every year, faster even than the chip progress described by Moore’s Law. The first drives took up storage closets. Now, a 5GB drive can fit in a phone. Hitachi Global Storage Technologies, which has made drives for years and also now owns IBM’s drive division, recently collected pictures from hard drive history and made a calendar. Here are some highlights.’
`In the beginning…
…there was light. And that light was the fuel-propelled explosion of a fighter plane slicing right through a US carrier, which was forced to make an emergency landing on Chinese ground. And following on from the untimely demise of the (unfortunately named) Chinese pilot Wang, due to his dubious collision with an American plane that, as one American Hacker so eloquently put it, had all the agility of “A flying dildo”, so began a “World Hacker War” that has been somewhat lost to the mists of time. I’m looking to put that right.’
`When twenty-seven year old Henry M. entered the hospital in 1953 for radical brain surgery that was supposed to cure his epilepsy, he was hopeful that the procedure would change his life for the better. Instead, it trapped him in a mental time warp where TV is always a new invention and Truman is forever president. The removal of large sections of his temporal lobes left Henry unable to form any new personal memories, but his tragic loss revolutionized the field of psychology and made “H.M.” the most-studied individual in the history of brain research.’
`Amongst all the fossils ever found in the world, there might be nothing more bizarre than this specimen. One Protoceratops, a herbivorous (plant-eating) dinosaur, perished in the struggle with a carnivorous theropod, Velociraptor. After their death 80 million years ago, both skeletons were fossilized, then finally unearthed in 1971 in fully articulated forms without having been smashed.
The reason why they fought with each other is not known. Protoceratops might have been defending its nest from the predator, or the two creatures might have encountered accidentally, but all we can do is build speculations and guesses about them.’
`Today, 19 January is the 20th anniversary for the appearance of the first PC virus. Brain, a boot sector virus, was let loose in January 1986 and spread via infected floppy disks.
This virus is thought to have originated in Pakistan and at the time there were suspicions that it was created as a way to promote a company called Brain Computer Services, as its name and address would appear inside of the virus.’
`Smashing, (but not totally P.C. nowadays!) 10 Little Nigger Boys sticker book.
It would have originally come with a sheet 48 sticky back pictures to stick on the relevant pages. These have all been stuck in the book correctly so the book is complete.
It is in good condition for its age.’
`But we claim not merely the praise of gratifying curiosity, or affording assistance to the ambitious; we are very sure that the moral influence of the Lexicon Balatronicum will be more certain and extensive than that of any methodist sermon that has ever been delivered within the bills of mortality. We need not descant on the dangerous impressions that are made on the female mind, by the remarks that fall incidentally from the lips of the brothers or servants of a family; and we have before observed, that improper topics can with our assistance be discussed, even before the ladies, without raising a blush on the cheek of modesty. It is impossible that a female should understand the meaning of TWIDDLE DIDDLES, or rise from table at the mention of BUCKINGER’S BOOT. Besides, Pope assures us, that “VICE TO BE HATED NEEDS BUT TO BE SEEN;” in this volume it cannot be denied, that she is seen very plainly; and a love of virtue is, therefore, the necessary result of perusing it.’
`For these stories we give the original 1884 text of Margaret Hunt, by all accounts a good translation, if somewhat old-fashioned by present-day standards. Hunt is based on the last revised edition of the Grimms tales. This electronic text follows Hunt as faithfully as possible and is, so far as we know, the only internet version to do so.’
`A map due to be unveiled in Beijing and London next week may lend weight to a theory a Chinese admiral discovered America before Christopher Columbus.
The map, which shows North and South America, apparently states that it is a 1763 copy of another map made in 1418.
If true, it could imply Chinese mariners discovered and mapped America decades before Columbus’ 1492 arrival.’
`Back in 1985, hard drives were gigantic and not to mention insanely expensive (40MB/$40,000) as shown in the above image. That was coincidentally the same year Microsoft released Windows 1.0 which sold for $100 ($177.47 with inflation) a piece. I like how the display behind it has a huge magnifying glass that almost makes you think hard drives now days (2006) are microscopic which they really aren’t…yet.’
‘Between July 1945 and November 1962 the United States is known to have conducted 216 atmospheric and underwater nuclear tests. After the Limited Test Ban Treaty between the U.S. and the Soviet Union in 1963, nuclear testing went underground. It became literally invisible – but more frequent: the United States conducted a further 723 underground tests until 1992. 100 SUNS documents the era of visible nuclear testing, the atmospheric era, with 100 photographs drawn by Michael Light from the archives at Los Alamos National Laboratory and the U.S. National Archives in Maryland. It includes previously classified material from the clandestine Lookout Mountain Air Force Station based in Hollywood, whose film directors, cameramen, and still photographers were sworn to secrecy.’
`”The Weyburn Mental Hospital opened in 1921 and quickly became one of Canada’s most notorious psychiatric institutions. It was the site of lobotomies, electric shock therapy, and some of Canada’s controversial LSD experiments. It was here that Dr. Humphrey Osmond coined the word “psychedelic.” Virtually anywhere across Canada, if you mentioned you were from Weyburn, there would always be somebody who would know about the hospital and say, ‘Oh,’ and make some comment about either your own mental health or the mental health of the community, or just a joke about mental illness,” remembers Schultz. In 1971, the Weyburn Mental Hospital closed its doors and patients were transferred to other institutions.”‘
`Jesus was almost certainly a cannabis user and an early proponent of the medicinal properties of the drug, according to a study of scriptural texts published this month. The study suggests that Jesus and his disciples used the drug to carry out miraculous healings.
The anointing oil used by Jesus and his disciples contained an ingredient called kaneh-bosem which has since been identified as cannabis extract, according to an article by Chris Bennett in the drugs magazine, High Times, entitled Was Jesus a Stoner? The incense used by Jesus in ceremonies also contained a cannabis extract, suggests Mr Bennett, who quotes scholars to back his claims.’
`Cabinet papers from 1975 detailing the government’s plans in the event of nuclear war are among new documents released by the National Archives. [..]
TV was to close down, and the BBC to begin a wartime service on radio.
The prime minister would be taken to his bunker but there were no plans at that time to evacuate civilians. [..]
However, the papers showed art treasures from London and Edinburgh would be saved by being sent to slate mines in Wales.
The information is among a raft of unseen material that has been revealed in government records from 1975, now released to the public at the National Archives in Kew, south-west London.’
`The tiny hobbit-like humans of Indonesia may have lived in Australia before they became extinct about 11,000 years ago.
The startling claim comes from archaeologist Mike Morwood, leader of the team that in 2003 uncovered remains of the 1m-tall hominid at Liang Bua cave on Indonesia’s Flores island.
They believe the pint-size person – known officially as Homo floresiensis and unofficially as the “Hobbit” – was wiped out by a volcanic eruption that spared their Homo sapiens neighbours. [..]
He suggested that the Hobbits may have been pushed out by the bigger people, in part because their population was too small to compete.’
`Out of the sun a black, cigar-shaped object falls toward the earth. At the edge of town a filling station attendant sees it cross the slice of sky between the car above him and the edge of his grease pit. The center fielder of the visiting baseball team sees the moving spot, then looks back toward the batter, impatient for the third out. A woman in the park hears a strange, thin whistle and looks up, shading her eyes.
At a point 2,000 feet above the ground, the first atomic rocket of World War III explodes over your city. In one vast flash of light, equal to 100 suns, the buildings are etched against a sky of fire. A blinding ball of flame leaps from the point where the rocket exploded.’
I love this retro nuclear war stuff. It’s great. 🙂 What other official documents would have lines like the following?
`If and when an atom bomb ever does fall near you, you will be scared. There is no doubt about that. If you are normal, you will be plenty scared.’
`Quantum fluctuation. Inflation. Expansion. Strong nuclear interaction. Particle-antiparticle annihilation. Deuterium and helium production. Density perturbations. Recombination. Blackbody radiation. Local contraction. Cluster formation. Reionization? Violent relaxation. Virialization. Biased galaxy formation? Turbulent fragmentation. Contraction. Ionization. Compression. Opaque hydrogen. Massive star formation. Deuterium ignition. Hydrogen fusion. Hydrogen depletion. Core contraction. Envelope expansion. Helium fusion. Carbon, oxygen, and silicon fusion. Iron production. Implosion. Supernova explosion. Metals injection. Star formation. Supernova explosions. Star formation. Condensation. Planetesimal accretion. Planetary differentiation. Crust solidification. Volatile gas expulsion. Water condensation. Water dissociation. Ozone production. Ultraviolet absorption. Photosynthetic unicellular organisms. Oxidation. Mutation. Natural selection and evolution. Respiration. Cell differentiation. Sexual reproduction. Fossilization. Land exploration. Dinosaur extinction. Mammal expansion. Glaciation. Homo sapiens manifestation. Animal domestication. Food surplus production. Civilization! Innovation. Exploration. Religion. Warring nations. Empire creation and destruction. Exploration. Colonization. Taxation without representation. Revolution. Constitution. Election. Expansion. Industrialization. Rebellion. Emancipation Proclamation. Invention. Mass production. Urbanization. Immigration. World conflagration. League of Nations. Suffrage extension. Depression. World conflagration. Fission explosions. United Nations. Space exploration. Assassinations. Lunar excursions. Resignation. Computerization. World Trade Organization. Terrorism. Internet expansion. Reunification. Dissolution. World-Wide Web creation. Composition. Extrapolation?’
‘Over three decades of work by diverse engineers and researchers intent on learning how best to interact with a computer come together in the windows and icons used today’
A history of the GUI and mouse reprinted from a 1989 IEEE journal article. Interesting, if you like that sorta thing.
‘Franz Reichel, a mustachioed Austrian tailor, was killed leaping from the first deck in 1912 to test a tent-like parachute coat he had invented. He is said to have died of fright before hitting the ground.’
Nothing particularly gory. Grainy black and white footage of some guy wearing some strange looking thing hesitating for a few minutes before leaping off the tower and experiencing a rapid acceleration towards the ground. The parachute coat doesn’t appear to have any effect whatsoever on his descent.
(2.6meg Flash video)
see it here »
`With that recall, the Prius joined the ranks of the buggy computer — a club that began in 1945 when engineers found a moth in Panel F, Relay #70 of the Harvard Mark II system.1The computer was running a test of its multiplier and adder when the engineers noticed something was wrong. The moth was trapped, removed and taped into the computer’s logbook with the words: “first actual case of a bug being found.”
Sixty years later, computer bugs are still with us, and show no sign of going extinct. As the line between software and hardware blurs, coding errors are increasingly playing tricks on our daily lives. Bugs don’t just inhabit our operating systems and applications — today they lurk within our cell phones and our pacemakers, our power plants and medical equipment. And now, in our cars.
But which are the worst?’
It’s not every day you see the phrase `largest non-nuclear explosion in the planet’s history’ in a story about computers. 🙂
‘During World War I, the British and Americans faced a serious threat from German U-boats, which were sinking allied shipping at a dangerous rate. All attempts to camouflage ships at sea had failed, as the appearance of the sea and sky are always changing. Any color scheme that was concealing in one situation was conspicuous in others. A British artist and naval officer, Norman Wilkinson, promoted a new camouflage scheme that was derived from the artistic fashions of the time, particularly cubism. Instead of trying to conceal the ship, it simply broke up its lines and made it more difficult for the U-boat captain to determine the ship’s course. The British called this camouflage scheme “Dazzle Painting.” The Americans called it “Razzle Dazzle.”‘
with a bunch of cool pictures of large boats painted strangely.
`Welcome to Cold War City (population: 4). It covers 240 acres and has 60 miles of roads and its own railway station. It even includes a pub called the Rose and Crown.
The most underpopulated town in Britain is being put on the market. But there will be no estate agent’s blurb extolling the marvellous views of the town for sale: true, it has a Wiltshire address, but it is 120ft underground.
The subterranean complex that was built in the 1950s to house the Conservative prime minister Harold Macmillan’s cabinet and 4,000 civil servants in the event of a Soviet nuclear attack is being thrown open to commercial use. Just four maintenance men are left.’
Public services announcements from the 50’s and 60’s.
All this electric cosmos stuff has me thinking about good old William of Ockham.
And I think latin is cool. 🙂
‘Just started bustin’ rhymes, finally found my groove,
Now the SS on my jacket stands for super smooth..
And when I step into the clubs you know I’m steppin’ with style,
I raise my left hand, party people say heil..’
(7.7meg Flash video)
see it here »
