First reading in Parliament passed, by a resounding 2 to 1 majority – it seems like NZ is on the road to marriage equality. Marvellous, marvellous news. Go celebrate with the webseries Husbands, by Jane Espenson among other smart folks. It has just started season 2, has a bunch of neat cameos, and is funny.
Doing the rounds again, a timely reminder of just what a dramatic and risky achievement Neil Armstrong (and Aldrin) managed: Nixon’s speech (by William Safire) prepared in case they didn’t come back. (via Frank)
Melanie Lynskey, NZ’s most Charlie-Sheeniated export, is doing a guest blog run at the interesting Film Experience. I like her DVD collection. Unsurprising really.
Back to the Future in Grand Theft Auto
How the patent system is really, really broken, and Apple’s recent legal victory shows how bad this is for pretty much everything. (via Michael U)
Some cute babbies listen to a guitar. I would have linkied this even before I became a dad. 45 seconds of delight.
Ruth H sent me the amazing Schmidt Pain Index. This is like a menu at a whisky appreciation night, only describing insect stings. (She got it via Mindhacks, who got it via RadioLab, which means this is the third time in six weeks that Friday Linky appreciates Robert Krulwich.)
Somehow or other Malc found this, which is an argument against the existence of e-books that just gets a leeeeeetle bit out of control. Er, WILDLY and OFFENSIVELY out of control.
Y’all are reading Gem Wilder’s blog by now right? She does linky stuff too! Her latest Wilder Web update has a big list of happymaking things, Laurie Penny on Julian Assange, Royal Tenenbaums, Stockholm subway, and moar! And she says nice things about me, *blush*.
It is actively hurting me to think about climate change stuff right now. George Monbiot captures the zeitgeist in his blog this week, pointing out that news of a huge new record melt of arctic ice was ignored by UK media, while front pages were covered with excited debate over where a new airport runway should go. In the US, the Republican National Convention has turned out to be a de facto climate denial party, rolling back even the verbal concessions to its reality made during the GWB administration. And closer to home, there’s this and there’s this and aaaargh. aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh.
Go read this post by Steve Hickey about why he’s giving a few bucks to the 350 movement. I recommend you do the same. I haven’t done this yet myself but blogging about it here will compel me to follow through. I’ve got to get back on the train of taking actions around this, and every little step builds momentum. (Also related: why we are poles apart on climate change, via Karen)
Baby Got Back, in the style of Ian McKellan (via Judd Karlman)
NYT investigative piece about online reviewers for hire. (via Making Light)
Album sleeves in their original locations (via Pippy D)
Do you have enough reasons yet to love Emma Stone? No? Here’s another one then: Blade Runner photoshoot (via starlajo)(LINK FIXED NOW DOH SORRY)
Star Wars, spaghetti western style (via Pearce)
Jayne Eyre (not a typo) (via Making Light)
An amazing piece of whimsical guerilla public art: ride the bus, make a fish eat people’s heads.
And finally, via Chris Elder: water wigs, images of water exploding on the heads of bald men.
Re the Dancing Babies, Sophie at 15 months does exactly this, both sitting and standing, and often in response to “Sophie dance?”. Love it.
“Blade Runner photoshoot” is the album covers link a second time.
And Blue Sunshine? Yes, oh yes!
Link fixed, ta!
Mel would have been an excellent fifth member of the ultimate movie posse.
Re Kaufman’s rant about ebooks: One of the HuffPo commenters has pointed out that Kaufman’s book (presumably about the same topic?) is available on Kindle.
Oh the irony… 🙂
*snort* that’s a great comment. snark purely by implication 🙂
Hi there,
Do you have an email I could contact you on?
are you a spam comment, kate? hard to tell. anyway my email is in the sidebar links and all sorts of other places, morgue@gmail.com
No i’m not a spam comment- just not very computer savvy 🙂 sorry guess I didn’t look for the email very well…
🙂 no worries at all! I get lots and lots and lots of spam comments, just being overcautious!
all good- sent an email.
Kaufman is brilliant – the first paragraph is rhetorical genius. “Kindles are like death. Hitler used technology! See???” You sort of have to admire that.
And re patents – Yeah, US patent law is screwed, Kevin Drum has written a lot about that. But according to CNN headlines, Japan and South Korea courts disagree with the US about the patent infringements, so there is some hope. Maybe if innovation is stifled for long enough in the US compared to Asia, they’ll fix up their own backyard, but I imagine it would be a long row to hoe, given that there are vested interests with lots of money, a la the record companies.
Nom, nom, nom….. I eat heads!
That fish game link is fantastic.