Ermahgerd Lernky

Vanity Fair has a nice interview with the woman from the ermahgerd meme

Russia has made a Blade-Runner-Hunger-Games movie based on the party game “Mafia”/”Werewolf” (trailer is here). I think this makes perfect sense but everyone else is freaking out.

Infographic of bizarre stuff found in sewers. Cute, but perhaps a sign we have reached Peak Infographic.

Some people want to Boycott Star Wars because it is against white people!
Actually they were just trolling everyone!
(Some say these guys meant it and are now saying they were just trolling as the reaction pours in. I think they never meant it, because internet!rebel! culture promotes a discursive style where meaning is actively suppressed, everything is just provocative words, and meaning/purpose can be added post-hoc to serve strategic needs. The reason they get away with it is that a surprising amount of human interaction works exactly like this; they’re just using the form to cause trouble.)
Anyway: Some better reasons to boycott Star Wars, of which my favourite is:
“He’s more machine now than man, twisted and evil.” Kind of a jerk thing to say about someone whose machine prostheses are the result of you cutting off his limbs and leaving him in a volcano earlier, leaving aside the other ways this is problematic.

Fake Halloween costumes by a prank artist. I’m going to be scared-of-socks this year. (Scroll down the page to see his great Trump bit, too.)

Musical tribute to David Bowie’s Area as it appeared in Labyrinth.

Neat photos of some movie miniature sets.

Some of the shots with a digitally created Paul Walker from the last Fast & Furious film. There were loads of them. Bloody impressive. Martin & team honestly deserve to walk away with a statue or two for this one. (There’s a link onwards to a Variety interview about it.)

There once was a dildo in Nantucket. – fascinating article on local history, and trying to decide what is actual history and what is just a story told about the past.

You might have seen coverage of the sleeping study that says early humans didn’t sleep longer than we modern humans do – The Atlantic has a good, clear overview and interview. (via D3vo)

And finally, via Scott A, Thinkprogress provides a valuable factcheck on whether George W. Bush was President of the United States of America on September 11, 2001.

School dance linky

Lovely wee article from the Sunday Star Times about school dances for 12-year-olds. I like to imagine Ira Glass introducing this as a “This American Life” story.

This one has spread steadily across my social networks this past week: Why do we hate things teen girls love?

David R shared this great Digg longread about the secret history of the Myers-Briggs test (including a foray into racist detective fiction, oddly enough).

I love it when Andrew O’Hehir, Salon’s film reviewer, files on politics. This is epic:
The Republican suicide ballad: The party that can’t govern and the country that hates its guts.

The Alligator shared this link about a group of restaurants moving to a no-tipping-allowed model, adding the comment: “An excellent read as to why we need to pay people in the restaurant industry more than a pittance, and change how we think about dining. We need to move away from an antiquated system that evolved from having servants & slaves- and recognize the value of the people providing your experience.” It’s also just a great read to discover how the economics of a restaurant play out – of course it’s US-specific but there will be stuff here relevant to business owners and particularly hospitality peeps anywhere.

And finally, via Karen, Famous quotes, the way a woman would have to say them during a meeting.

Dia de los Meurtos Linky

Dear white people, stop colonizing the Day of the Dead (via Evie)

Relevant to my interests right now: the rise of Buffy studies

Another cool interview with Kate Beaton, whose comics are just so great you guys.

The linguistic principles behind those cutesy couple names like “Bennifer”

Fonts In Use goes deep into the Cheers logo, but I opened this link because Jason M said it had a wonderful Halloween costume in it, and you know, it really does.

Via Stephanie P: “somehow we have constructed a language that adheres uncannily to an abstract mathematical idea” – fascinating look at some odd stuff about English words, and a look at whether the pattern is the same for punctuation.

Via Theron: web-based ambient sound mixer.

Via John F: Hell’s Club, where fictional characters meet

NYT opinion piece that recycling is overrated and often counterproductive. This piece irritates the hell out of me, because it makes some very solid points but wraps them up in some really, really unhelpful BS. (I guess straw men are pretty recyclable at least.) Well worth a read, but make sure your critical thinking cap is in the ready position.

The Daily Beast digs up some solid info on the shady group that set up the “Pope loves Kim Davis” silliness the other week.

And finally, many many Love Boat guest stars that I would’ve loved to see.

Apophenia Linky

The puzzle book that drove England to madness (doubles as a primer on where conspiracy theories come from)

Via Marieke, a good explainer on Syria and the migrant crisis:

Last Week Tonight on the migrant crisis has a particularly lovely finish (but you can’t skip to it, you gotta watch through or it doesn’t make sense).

Downton Abbey characters battle each other with lightsabers. (Star Wars is everywhere, Star Wars goes with everything.)

Ten minute creepy horror film by a friend of Pearce:

Chess master analyzes chess games from films.

More 70s ads from Dangerous Minds, this time, sexist stereo ads. “Here is a picture of a naked lady, buy our stereo” is just the beginning.

Also via DM, another Twin Peaks video game: Fire, Dance With Me

Via Allen Varney, two articles about how the world is all broke:
From the Boston Globe, a look at how much of the government of the USA is unaccountable to the President or to anyone really. And at the Awl, the gathering mess of “fascist teenage dungeon master[s]” that is Neoreaction, and why they are really bad news.

And finally, try to read this to the end – Pearce and I didn’t make it.

Ballet Linky

Happening in Wellington: Ballet for Everyone. This video is the cutest thing I’ve seen in a long time. Maybe your city needs Ballet for Everyone too?

The most misread poem in America: interesting article that, oddly, includes a very detailed recap of a New Zealand car commercial.

1902 trading cards depicting “women of the future”

Paintings tell kind of a love story in the shadow of giant robots… (via Craig Oxbrow)

The British PM and the pig. Two articles that are worth your time: Why people are laughing and (via Ivan) what it says about the state of British politics.

This sounds lovely – how traditional stories become part of the British landscape (via Hugh Dingwall)

Charming short telling a story with 1978 vintage Star Wars figures. (Coulda done without the “twist ending” though…)

The Twin Peaks tarot (via Pearce)

Someone discovered a third all-purpose caption for New Yorker cartoons.

And finally… I almost didn’t include this because I prefer not to go blue in the linky, but somehow I’ve talked myself into it… a hilarious three minute re-edit of apparently-legendary 1980s spoken word album “The Way to become a Sensuous Woman”. Definitely NSFW. (Dangerous Minds has more info.)

Atomic Linky

Next generation design tool Atomic has officially launched.
“Design has become an essential function inside every modern software business, and is destined to become a major software category. Atomic has over 30,000 beta users and many thousands more reviewing their designs, and we’ve only just begun.
The world’s most recognisable brands are using Atomic to create interactive prototypes without ever touching a line of code. It’s powerful, insanely fast and even runs in the browser, so there’s nothing to install and available everywhere. We’re determined to make prototyping more available to designers, and design more available to everyone.”
My friend Grant is one of the original gangsters of Atomic, and I am insanely happy for him.
Here’s the overview video:

Overview of Atomic from Atomic on Vimeo.

I wrote a big article about the racism embedded in Lovecraft’s famous story “The Call of Cthulhu”, and whether you can extract it when you do your follow up Cthulhu thing. (Everybody’s doing follow-up Cthulhu things at the moment. Lovecraft = so hot right now.)

Peanuts – strip out the last panel and all you get is the despair.

The Grauniad has a great interview with wonderful cartoonist Kate Beaton

How did I not know about this December 2014 video by NASA interns, “All About That Space”?

New Ta-Nehisi Coates epic act of journalism to rend your heart and challenge your understanding: The Black family in the age of mass incarceration. Intimately personal to the experience of Black America, but given the way the USA tends to export its cultural discourse, crucial reading all over the place.

Can rice actually save your wet phone?

Why do we admire mobsters? It’s a bit once-over-lightly, but this is something I wonder myself every time I bounce off “The Sopranos”.

And finally, ads for cocaine paraphenalia from the 70s. These seem so strange now, our perception of that drug has changed so much over the years.

Team Ball Player Thing Linky

New Zealand is a very strange country. This will be all over NZ by the time this blog goes live, so I’m including it for international friends – it’s a charity song linking to the Rugby World Cup, featuring All Blacks on unicorns and dressed as wizards and running away from giant ants, and there’s Flight of the Conchords and Lorde and Kimbra and Peter Jackson and all the other usual suspects plus loads of cool NZ creative sorts without big international profiles and just watch it and love it. And then donate!

I love this story about a cute teenage couple in an online relationship in the 90s. So much of this resonates – online was different in the 90s, kids. *makes modem sound*

Are you a famous comedian worried about political correctness? This essay says it’s time to take a lesson from the Beastie Boys.

Deeply weird & fascinating photo essay of the City of London financial district (via George Monbiot)

A Grauniad film reviewer’s two-star review made it on to the film’s poster in a very sly way. Here’s what he has to say about it… (via David Ritchie)

Grab the audio from a legendary 1992 Sonic Youth concert

Why do we suddenly care about Syrian refugees? That photo of course, but what else is going on? An enlightening assessment.

Before you sit a test in a stereotypically male domain, imagine you’re a stereotypical male. (This MIT student blogger is marvellous – thanks Jamie for sending it my way.)

Download the audiobooks of your favourite movie novelizations.

Nabokov gave clear instructions on what should be on the cover of Lolita. YOU’LL NEVAR GUESS WHAT HAPPENED NEXT.

Cool fan art: Disney Princesses, Star Wars style

The new Star Wars novel is being targeted for masses of one-star reviews! The culprits: Star Wars fans.

Vox has an interesting explainer on what the heck is going on in the Republican party right now, including what “cuckservative” means. Spoiler: it makes no sense, they are well out of the zone of reason.

This Atlantic piece says J.K. Rowling’s habit of continuing her fiction in random twitter updates is basically the same as George Lucas writing over his Star Wars films. I link to it as this week’s example of being completely wrong.

Speaking of being completely wrong, an article by Jonathan Chait! But this time I hope he is right: the planet is starting to get on top of the climate change challenge. (If he had just managed to avoid scolding the “despairing left” at the end I might have made it through the whole piece without rolling my eyes. Chaits gotta Chait I guess.)

Fascinating tale of an American who was thrown out of teaching for being anti-government, and ended up coaching the Ugandan basketball team as a spy for the CIA. (If there aren’t a dozen spec scripts being written RIGHT NOW based on this story, I’ll eat a copy of Save The Cat.) Excerpt: “At dinner one night, without warning, he broke into the New Zealand national anthem”.

And finally, a Pinky & the Brain supercut: are you pondering what I’m pondering?

Gremlins 2 Linky

I love Gremlins 2. Don’t you love Gremlins 2? You should love Gremlins 2. But even if you love Gremlins 2 you must have wondered: HOW Gremlins 2? WHY Gremlins 2? Key and Peele finally reveal the truth:

The Atlantic has a great, readable overview of the psychology study reproductions controversy.

Also at the Atlantic: everyone knows the decline in cursive handwriting is because of new technology – but instead of the iphone, perhaps the culprit is… the ballpoint pen?

This Vox article on how tech nerds just don’t get politics, and how they should make the effort because if any system needs to be disrupted it’s this one, kept turning up in my streams. When I finally clicked on it I saw it was by David Roberts, who was the best thing at Grist and is now the best thing at Vox. You should read it too, it’s great.

Ten fascinating minutes on the making of the Masters of the Universe movie (which is weirdly good considering how bad it is):

And fifteen fascinating minutes on the making of the Blair Witch sequel (which, as a reminder, was made by the guy who did the legendary Paradise Lost documentaries). I really liked this film when I watched it, even though it’s obviously a mess – this video really helps make sense of exactly what was going on there. I’d love to see the director’s cut one day.

Smart little vid comparing three filmed versions of the same Hannibal Lecter scene.

Tribute to Wes Craven: his many film screams.

Why can’t our camera capture that image we’re looking at? Interesting look at how the camera technology works differently to the eye and how this affects what we photograph and what we think we photograph.

And finally… unconvincing stock photos of punks.

Oral History Linky

Are we at peak oral history? This week: legendary weirdo flop Theodore Rex and the Space Jam website.

An NYT article has been circulating about how today’s creative class are no worse off even though no-one pays for anything any more. I wasn’t convinced by it; Salon has a counterpoint that seems more compelling to me.

Short history of breaking the fourth wall:

This was probably inevitable: Kermit’s TED talk

The AV Club has a link to an analysis of a Star Trek leadership test; they also embed the key movie scene it arises from.

Upheaval continues in my home discipline and in science more generally thanks to a reappraisal of statistical methods and a deeper question about how we establish knowledge at all. Psyc lecturer and stats guru Ron Fischer pointed me at this Nature article: problematic p-values are just the tip of the iceberg; and Retraction Watch has an interview with a methodology prof: Yes, may psychology findings may be too good to be true, now what?

The 1982 DC Comics style guide – lots and lots and lots of lovely clean illustrations by Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez.

And finally, a parental response form for an unusual school fundraiser.

Taken Linky

Cuz-in-law Jessica Grace Smith is kickstarting her short film, Everybody Else Is Taken. She’s fresh out of the Australian soap mines (Summer Bay variety), and raring to go on a very personal project. It’s looking pretty sweet. I particularly like her commitment to build a crew of women to help chip away at gender imbalances in film & TV industries. Take a look at the video, and think about kicking in a couple of bucks. Come payday, we will be!

The Jemaine Clement song from Rick & Morty, in its entirety

Simon C has written some Anne of Green Gables fan fiction. (“Fanne fic.”) I haven’t read it yet, but I am so looking forward to doing so. NB: “Graphic Depictions Of Violence”

Jenni sent me this: “Ryan North, creator of Dinosaur Comics got stuck in a hole with his dog. Twitter users suggested various ways to manipulate his inventory and eventually he got out

Topical references in Looney Tunes, explained!

Guess Wu: a Wu-Tang version of Guess Who

A look at the Star Wars toys Kenner pitched just before they abandoned the line in the 80s. Some of this is wildly overambitious, some of it is ridiculously half-assed. (The returning villain is a particularly dumb surprise.)

Interesting article on Christian Slater cult classic “Pump Up The Volume”, talking to the many kids who went into radio right afterwards.

That time Fonzie jumped the shark: actually not so bad?

Via Matt C: Alien Kiwi

This Vox piece on Google’s charity/altruist group is fascinating. Their decision about priorities feels like a 1st year philosophy tutorial discussion topic, rather than something real humans would do in the real world, but real humans are endlessly capable of being ridiculous. (via Pearce)

And finally… this fan-made video for the D&D segment of “Harmontown” podcast makes a scary amount of sense. Even non-Harmenians might understand. Might.