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Provided by: boingboing.net462010-09-08 15:06:41blogs / boingboing.net /: A 1949 film that reveals the inner workings of a wristwatch. They use a giant watch to demonstrate the function of the various parts. (Via onfocus)...

Provided by: boingboing.net472010-09-08 14:13:21blogs / boingboing.net /: From NPR, a list of 5 common parental worries that are extremely unlikely, and the top five risks for kids: the gap between the two is the source of much anguish, bad policy, and danger: Based on surveys Barnes collected, the top five worries of parents are, in order: 1. Kidnapping 2. School snipers 3. Terrorists 4. Dangerous strangers 5. Drugs But how do children really get hurt or killed? 1. Car accidents 2. Homicide (usually committed by a person who knows the child, not a stranger) 3. Abuse 4. Suicide 5. Drowning 5 Worries Parents Should Drop, And 5 They Shouldn't (via Schneier) Free book on Free Range kids Kick-ass 4m kid-built treehouse to be knocked down "because of ... Britain will subject everyone who works with kids to multiple ... 13-year old boy becomes youngest to summit Everest Hallowe'en is safe, your kids are safe, the only scary thing is ......

Provided by: boingboing.net482010-09-08 13:31:55blogs / boingboing.net /: Here's another barn-burner of a speech by rogue archivist Carl Malamud, addressing the Gov 2.0 Summit 2010. Carl sez, "Washington, D.C. has become a vast wasteland of computer contracts. The U.S. government spent $81.9 billion in 2010 on information technology and much of that money is misspent, crippling the ability of government to do the jobs with which it has been entrusted. How can we deal with a global environmental crisis or a renegade financial industry or rescue the vast works that lie fallow in our national libraries when the basic machinery of government does not work?" The Currents Of Our Time (Thanks, Carl!) Yes We Scan! Carl Malamud for Public Printer of the USA Carl Malamud, rogue archivist, in Wired Carl Malamud's "10 Government Hacks" Malamud's "By the People" - stirring history of the Government ... 10 Rules for Radicals: Lessons from rogue archivist Carl Malamud ... Watch America's public domain video treasures, rescue the public ... Watch America's public domain video treasures, rescue the public ... Public Resource demands the source code to America's operating ......

Provided by: boingboing.net492010-09-08 13:32:11blogs / boingboing.net /: HappySmurfday has dug up and scanned some printouts of the login screen from Penn and Teller's circa-1987 BBS, Mofo Ex-Machina. They are nerdgasmic and glorious. Mofo Ex-Machina (Thanks, HappySmurfday, via Submitterator) Penn and Teller make thousands of bees appear out of "nothing ... Penn & Teller's Invisible Thread: lost comedy magic special ... Teller and the neuroscience of magic A tour of magician Teller's house Penn Jillette's video rant show Penn Jillette on artistic satisfaction and magic Long-lost Penn and Teller videogame for download...

Provided by: boingboing.net502010-09-08 12:53:42blogs / boingboing.net /: Michael Geist writes in with more analysis of the recently leaked draft of ACTA, the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, a secret treaty being negotiated among rich countries whose entertainment lobbyists have decided that the United Nations is too open and balanced to be used for future copyright negotiations. I posted yesterday on the updated Internet chapter in the latest version of ACTA, which features a major change on secondary liability [ed: e.g., holding ISPs and web-sites liable for copyright infringement if they don't surveil and censor their users] and the U.S. attempt to clawback on recent domestic DMCA changes by arguing against linking circumvention and copyright infringement [ed: that is, the attempt to broaden the reach of the US law that prohibits breaking "copy-protection" even if you're doing so for reasons that don't violate copyright, such as loading unauthorized software onto locked mobile devices like iPads]. While there remains a number of issues to be determined in that chapter (and a great deal to be addressed in the other IP enforcement chapters on criminal provisions, civil enforcement, and border measures), the rest of ACTA has largely been decided. As in the Internet chapter, where compromise was needed it was the U.S. that did most of it, as it becomes increasingly apparent that the USTR is willing to agree to almost anything in order to bring home an agreement before the next round of elections in November. Most interesting is the U.S. decision to cave on border issues. The U.S. had sought a provision requiring that each party shall adopt and maintain appropriate measures that facilitate activities of custom authorities for better identifying and targeting for inspection at its border shipments that could contain pirated goods. The article then specified a range of activities including consultation, information exchange, and a mandatory audit power. Moreover, there was an additional article on information exchange between customs authorities. All of that has been dropped, leaving only a provision where a party may consult with stakeholders or share information. ACTA's Enforcement Practices Chapter: Countries Reach Deal as U.S. Caves Again New ACTA leak: It's a screwjob for the world's poor countries ... ACTA "internet enforcement" chapter leaks Delusional EU ACTA negotiator claims that three strikes has never ... Biggest-ever ACTA leak: secret copyright treaty dirty laundry ... ACTA leak: Now we know who is against transparency - USA, Korea ... Secret ACTA fights over iPod border-searches Secret copyright treaty leaks. It's bad. Very bad. ACTA goes public...

Provided by: boingboing.net512010-09-08 12:56:37blogs / boingboing.net /: Last year, Boing Boing reader Cory Dodt responded to my request for a bookmarklet to make it easy to add attribution information for Creative Commons-licensed photos from Flickr. When Flickr updated its layout, the bookmarklet broke, but Cory was good enough to update it so that it works -- and now it's better than ever, with links to the relevant Creative Commons license text. Thanks, Cory!...

Provided by: boingboing.net522010-09-08 12:55:32blogs / boingboing.net /: From Wired's Raw File, a gallery of a creepy Ukrainian salt mine that has been converted into a convalescent home for recovering asthmatics. It's something called Speleotherapy: breathing in salt-saturated air as a means of soothing respiratory problems: "Kuletski describes the atmosphere among patients as 'calm and relaxed' despite the 'appallingly unsafe conditions. ... The presence of kids wearing safety helmets and cheap plastic sheets to protect them from dripping water from the ceiling makes being there even more surreal,' says Kuletski." Eerie Ukrainian Salt Mines House Convalescing Asthmatics (Image: Kirill Kuletski/Wired)...

Provided by: boingboing.net532010-09-08 05:53:34blogs / boingboing.net /: As predicted last week in the Boing Boing agricultural almanac, Apple this week releases three new varieties of iPods for the fall crop. All three bear improvements over earlier generations of this familiar fruit, but some of the new additions—and in some cases, what's missing—may surprise you. Following are snapshots of the new iPod Shuffle, iPod Nano, and iPod Touch, with taste-test notes. You can find them all in your local farmers markets soon, or order them now at the online Apple store....

Provided by: boingboing.net542010-09-08 05:07:19blogs / boingboing.net /: As predicted last week in the Boing Boing agricultural almanac, Apple this week releases three new varieties of iPods for the fall crop. All three bear improvements over earlier generations of this familiar fruit, but some of the changes—including what's missing—may surprise you. Following are snapshots of the new iPod Shuffle, iPod Nano, and iPod Touch, with taste-test notes. You can find them all in your local farmers markets soon, or order them now at Farmer Jobs' online apple store....

Provided by: boingboing.net552010-09-08 01:35:15blogs / boingboing.net /: Apple this week releases three new varieties of iPods for the fall crop. All three bear improvements over earlier generations of this familiar fruit. Following are snapshots of the new iPod Nano, iPod Shuffle, and iPod Touch, with notes from our taste-test. You can find these in your local farmers markets soon, or order them now at the online apple store....

Provided by: boingboing.net562010-09-08 00:11:54blogs / boingboing.net /: Look at this squid's eye. Just look at it. See anything eerily familiar? Squid, along with the rest of the family Cephalopoda, haven't shared a common ancestor with us vertebrates in some 500 million years—long before the evolution of our camera-like eyes. And yet, there the cephalopods are, flagrantly swimming about with eyes that use a lens to project an image onto a retina. Call it Squid Eye for the Vertebrate Guy. So, how's it work? Convergent evolution, my friends. Convergent evolution. We happened to hit on similar solutions to the same problem of sight, even though the eyes of vertebrates and cephalopods evolved separately, in very different ways, at different times. Today, we can see that legacy in cephalopod and vertebrate fetal development. With vertebrates, the eyes grow on stalks, reaching out from the brain. In cephalopods, the eyes start as a clumping of cells on the surface of the skin and reach backwards, into the head, to make brain contact. Similar destinations. Very different road maps. This lovely illustration—featuring dissections of the head, funnel, mantle and eye of a Thaumatolampas diadema—comes from The Cephalopoda Part I: Oegopsida and Part II: Myopsida, Octopoda Atlas written in 1910 by zoologist Carl Chun following a German expedition to the Indian, Atlantic and Great Southern oceans. You can see more of Chun's detailed, passionate illustrations at the BibliOdyssey blog. Image: Some rights reserved by peacay...

Provided by: boingboing.net572010-09-07 23:12:05blogs / boingboing.net /: The ACLU today announced that together with the New York Civil Liberties Union (NYCLU), and the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, it has filed a lawsuit "challenging the [US] government's claimed authority to search, detain, and copy electronic devices -- including laptops, cell phones, cameras, etc. -- at the country's international borders without any suspicion of wrongdoing."...

Provided by: boingboing.net582010-09-07 22:54:39blogs / boingboing.net /: Video Link. (via BB Submitterator, thanks Antinous!)...

Provided by: boingboing.net592010-09-07 22:59:19blogs / boingboing.net /: I find this site, full of coloring-book images of dinosaurs altered into pretentious cool kids, incredibly charming. Thanks to the awesome Ashley Stubblefield!...

Provided by: boingboing.net602010-09-07 23:08:31blogs / boingboing.net /: Here's a service that takes Google maps satellite views and converts them into print-and-fold envelopes you can use for your correspondence, creating a kind of handsome, 21st-century stationery. MapEnvelope (via Make) Civil War mail art: envelope illustrations from mid-1800s - Boing ... Paper and envelopes that look like icons Peri Peri keychain emulates envelope tear-off strips ......

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