July 28

• Renewable energy: Engineering algae to turn sunlight and C02 into fuel.(link)
• Astronomy: Methane lakes on southern Titan are receding(link)
• Health: Federal law requires you to be able to access your own health records, but it's still a pain. The article made me want to always get a copy of my records.(link)
• Health: Treating nightmares through cognitive-behavioral practice of changing the dream to something neutral/positive while you're awake (dream mastery/scripting). Interestingly, Jungian therapists want you to learn from the nightmare and confront the issues causing it (so they don't want it to go away). 4-8% of adults suffer nightmares as frequently as 1/week. For combat veterans and rape victims the rate reaches up to 90%. Some clinical studies show that these methods are useful.(link)
• Tech tip: In Windows Vista/7 you can rename files by editing the first file name, then hitting tab, or bulk select and then edit the first file name.(link)
• Site: Fwix aggregates extremely local news(link)
• Psychology/space: How ceiling height affects mood / social interactions. Low = ranges from cozy/intamate to claustrophobic, high = creative, formal. Personal space distance needs increase with lower ceilings. (link)
• Art: Brainstem, Spinal Cord Images Hidden in Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel Fresco(link)
• Send a message to the world by putting giant letters on your roof so google satellites pick them up on their next pass. (link)
• IR: Russian corruption youtube video is very popular, but officials do nothing. (link)
• Travel histories of a trip through Colombia. Notes on why to go with old friends.(link)
• Renewable energy: building batteries for storing wind power and regulating energy supply. One battery claims 90% efficiency (higher than existing methods by 10%). (link)
• Art: Going to a play where you're the only one in the audience.(link)
• Tech tip: See the actual signal strength on your blackberry by holding ALT+NMLL. Worked for me!(link)
• Chemistry: Strongest known acid = 20 quintillion (2^19) times stronger than 100% sulferic acid. Whoa! Have to store it in teflon containers.(link)

July 26 Linkdump

• Quirky: A site for submitting product ideas, submitting feedback on those products, and shopping. Go crowdsourcing. Example: The Broom Groomer is a sweeping improvement in dustpans. Here is what makes this dustpan so awesome: - A row of rubber teeth protruding from the back end of the dust pan to clean the broom's bristles when you're done sweeping. $10.(Site)
• Researching animal individualism using traits like neophobia (fear of novelty) and willingness to explore. Could be based partially on differences in sensory processing speed. (article)
• Pros and cons of induction cooking. Instant heat, very precise. Very little heat leak into the kitchen space. Induction is fast. It can boil water in a snap and shave minutes from the time it takes to cook dinner. Cons - new cooking technique, can burn things, only works on pots a magnet will stick to. Traditional woks or rounded pots don’t work well. Pull the pot off the surface and the heat stops immediately.(article)
• Optimistic article about American demographics. "In 2050, only a quarter [of Americans] will be over 60, compared with 31 percent in China and 41 percent in Japan." Driven by larger families and immigration. Efficient workers, producing high-end products are good for a global system becoming richer. A giving people (over $300B in 2007). (article)
• Yay for trees. "They cover 30% of Earth's landmass and account for as much as 80% of [land] biomass [(an estimate)]." Up to ~300 feet tall. "The oldest living tree — which is also one of the oldest living beings — is thought to be a bristlecone pine, Pinus longaeva. It is certainly more than 4,600 years old, and by some reckonings, it celebrates its 4,842nd birthday this year. But however you count, when it was a sapling, the great pyramids of Giza had not yet been built." (article)
• "The Obama administration has taken the extraordinary step of authorizing the targeted killing of an American citizen, the radical Muslim cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, who is believed to have shifted from encouraging attacks on the United States to directly participating in them, intelligence and counterterrorism officials said Tuesday."(article)
• Article about wikiLeaks as journalism. Most interesting quote from the article was about something totally different - they asked for and got from somewhere ("research institutions" are mentioned) enough computer time to decrypt the encrypted video file.(article)
• The original leak source for the wikiLeaks video smuggled the documents out by pretending his rewritable CD was a music CD (Lady Gaga). Note: No media (including CDs) should be let out of a secure environment.(article 1)(article 2)
• "Airline bag fees rose from $464M in 2007 to >$2B in first 9 months of 2008. In addition, the airlines now have more space available for cargo, which sells at a higher rate than a checked bag. “Freight makes a significant contribution to the bottom line of passenger airlines,”"(article)
• Thom Yorke (of Radiohead) twitches around stage for project 'Atoms for Peace', which for him is a lot of movement.(article)(video(Thom Yorke Echoplex))
• "Eight-story egg-shaped museum addition provides exhibition space and scientific-research facilities." Free tours available for seeings ome of the 13 miles / 22 million specimens preserved in spirit jars. 200 scientists work there with an additional 20M different specimens and can be glimpsed through Windows in the museum. (article)
• Video game review of Bad Company 2. Reviewer kind of funny. Mentions playing on a 3-monitor setup for peripheral vision. Whoa.(article)
• Organization 'Home Food' allows you to eat in the home of trained-chef Italians (with their families) for a fee. Since family is critical to Italian food, this gives you the best experience.(article)
• Nuclear disarmament: Destroying (or converting for use in Uranium reactors) the existing 34 tons of US material will not even start until 2016. That doesn't count any of the material that will be decommissioned from latest US-Russian arms talks. (article)
• Getting past cultural / local barriers finally allowing progress in eradicating Polio in Nigeria and India. Yep, there are still people out there getting paralyzed by Polio. (article)
• New generation of cleaner incinerators turning trash into electricity. No waste-to-energy plants underway or planned in US despite NYC sending "10,500 tons of residential waste each day" to other landfills with similar garbage output throughout the country. (article)
• Notes and video of a "tetris-playing robot which is build with LEGO Mindstorm pieces. The setup is actually pretty complicated. A Texas Instruments DM6437 video development board watches the computer screen via a webcam and calculates the next move. It then outputs that to a grid of LEDs which the Mindstorm watches using a light sensor." Then the lego hand punches keys on the keyboard. Building machines to play games against computers. Woo.(article)
• 6-month photograph exposures showing the sun's path arcing. Pretty cool.(article)
• Same artist (Justin Quinnell) as above, but with super-disturbing images taken from inside his mouth with a tiny camera. (article)
• 2008: World Robot Population Reaches 8.6 Million, or more people than live in New Jersey. (article)
• Review of social networking services. "Foursquare [1M+ users] is essentially an urban network of hipsters, their favorite haunts, their favorite food and drinks" Others include Meetup, Yipit (sends you daily deals based on your location and preferences, Venmo (payment by text message), and Hot Potato. Also mentioned is grad-program in NYC Interactive Telecommunications Program (ITP) is about new tech. Plants that text you to water them. Web-payment vending machines. Art.sy (online art service to connect galleries with collectors), kickstarter ("community funding for creative projects"), SpeakerText ("If you copy and paste a section of a SpeakerText transcript onto your blog, the link will take people back to that exact portion of the video.")(article)
• Information forum on ending poverty (NJ-based).(site)
• Info on buying/selling timeshare second hand(article 1)(article 2)
• Instructions and video on how to tie a sheepshank(article)
• Flexible circuitry designed for use in tissue for medical interventions(article)
• 3D printer that can use multiple materials at once.(article)
• Overhead projector + webcam + speakers = color on the transparency to get sounds. Roll back and forth for loops.(article)
• Delicious looking cake recipe.(article)
• BYU team produces hand-press to "mass produce inexpensive housing blocks – like bricks, only bigger – for many rural Kenyans who live in huts made from sticks and mud."(article)
• Breastfeeding: author explains why to phrase 'not breastfeeding' as harmful rather than 'breastfeeding' as beneficial.(article)
• Breastfeeding saves lives. Note: Author is militant.(article)
• Hacking your keyboard so you can type with one hand. Commercial products available but with large price tags ($600). (article)
• Try an online demo of typing with one hand. It's much easier than it sounds (although it still requires practice), since your brain can map muscle memory from one side to the other.(article)
• Multi-touch without a surface (using webcams). Video of early Japanese product. (article)
• You can unlock your garage door from the outside by hooking the release cord with a hanger. Add a zip tie to prevent this. (article)
• Precision quad-copter acrobatics. Pretty neat.(article)
• Now the quadcopters can cooperate to lift stuff(article)
• Lock-picking speed record videos. Twist the blank in the lock and file down where the marks appear.(article)
• Lending books to the homeless to empower them. Footpath library project (Australia).(site)
• Dropbox. Online file sync / large file transfer. First 2GB free.(article)
• New business model about 'collaborative consumption' which just means sharing both the product and the price in various ways. Example businesses at the bottom.(site)
• Research site about connecting people in new ways. (site)
• Sculpture art show. I enjoyed 'Hippie Ghost' article)
• Temporary artist commune on Governors Island while they build art installations.(article)
• Solving Rubik's cube using nothing but Legos (although it uses the basic human algorithm rather than a computer algorithm) (article)
• Building a printer out of legos and felt-tipped markers(article)
• Donation funding site indieGoGo for music.(site)
• 100,000 piece lego chess set with automatically self-moving pieces.(article)
• Early article about the ineffective Russian sleeper-spies. Best quote: "Jessie Gugig, 15, said she could not believe the charges, especially against Mrs. Murphy. “They couldn’t have been spies,” she said jokingly. “Look what she did with the hydrangeas.” (article)
• Man sells hand-painted hand-axes as art. They're popular.(article)
• Being among plants boosts your immunity.(article)
• Next generation of wheelie-shoes. They're battery-powered. Video shows their evolution (which was cool).(article)
• Google builds "for dummies" toolkit for Android software development. Drag-n-drop code modules.(article)
• Bare-foot bandit caught.(article)
• Heroin addicts typically inject the heroin, draw some blood back into the syringe, and then reinject it (to make sure they get all of the drugs). Now, in a new practice known as "Flashblood", one addict gives another addict the drawn out blood in the syringe (~1 tsp) to inject into themselves to ease their withdrawl. Noticed so-far among destitute sex-workers in Tanzania and Kenya. Represents a very-high probability AIDS vector for anyone not yet infected. Plus, super-creepy.(article)
• Woman keeps notebook of every evening meal for 5 years. Record, accomplishment, proof of all the cumulative work that went into the meals.(article)
• House-fan on medium or high can keep mosquitos away because it dissapates your carbon dioxide and minimizes sweat, both of which attract mosquitos from far away.(article)
• Sitting for long periods of time is unhealthy, *even if* you exercise regularly otherwise. Get up regularly from your computer or TV.(article)
• Standing room airline plans being developed by Ryanair, as well as other extreme cost-cutting measures.(article)
• Review of more websites extending the couchsurfing idea. AirBnB.com, iStopOver.com, crashPadder.com(article)
• Principal fired despite doing a great job in order to qualify for more funding under the "after X time, one of your options is to fire your prinicpal" rule. Non-partisan, since both parties have made rules like this. (article)
• The mental health damage of being a screener for uploaded web-content, some of which is truly horrific.(article)
• Snopes disproves a myth I bought into. Truth: Humans use 100% of their brains, not just 10%.(article)
• Repo'd buildings that NYC bought, ran, then sold to mostly non-profit groups are now falling again into unlivable decay. (article)
• Description of new game-show 'Minute to Win It'. Stack 5 apples high. Stack metal nuts on edge by sliding them off a chopstick. Keep 3 balloons in the air.(article)(List of games and rules.)
• How to Play Rock Paper Scissors Lizard Spock (with video) - a 5-object version of rock-paper-scissors.(article)
• Morph 2 images together.(article)
• World horseshoe champion achieves > 90% ringers during competition. (article)
• Anti-poverty: Grassroots business fund.(site)
• New guidelines encourage vaginal births after cesarean birth (VBAC).(article)
• Running shoes based on arch-height have no benefit. Motion-control shoes led to high incidents of pain in study. (article)
• Noticing ADHD in marriage.(article)
• Nothing is ever forgotten on the web. Many employers now Google you before hiring. Framed as existential debate.(article)
• How to give good feedback to your author spouse on their written work. Minimum 10 praise before any constructive criticism (limit 3). (article)
• Federal report criticizes banks receiving bailout funds for huge bonuses with little justification to executives but has no power to do anything about it. (article)
• European Union allows petitions to change EU laws. Requires 1M signatures. Trying to get right balance between verification and access.(article)
• Wooden stonehenge remnats found near original.(article)
• Museum exhibit about the changing styles for wedding dresses.(article)(museum site)
• Tandem bike with a robotic backseat rider. Surprisingly graceful. (article)
• Some cities giving away land to get future property / income tax revenue. Homesteading for the 2010s.(article)
• Neutral site dedicated to vaccines - pros and cons. I've found it very useful.(article)
• It's now legal to jailbreak your phone and defeat DRM on DVDs and games for fair use purposes. Corey Doctorow probably just went into a coma of happy delirium. (article)

June link-dump

Trying to clear out backlog of stuff I've emailed to myself.

• New progress in engineered life still requires making use of pre-existing cells. "Considered together, the modern cell is dauntingly complex, which is why most researchers in the youngish field of synthetic biology address only one or two pieces of it at a time." Extremely advanced cell-biology, yet another prerequisite for godhood. (article)
• Telephone survey of 340k people reveals that: "On the global measure, people start out at age 18 feeling pretty good about themselves, and then, apparently, life begins to throw curve balls. They feel worse and worse until they hit 50. At that point, there is a sharp reversal, and people keep getting happier as they age. By the time they are 85, they are even more satisfied with themselves than they were at 18." (article)
• New subway map of NYC. The struggle to convey complex geographical overlays into instantly understandable images. It's harder than it looks. (article)
• Interesting review of "The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest" by Stieg Larsson. (article)
• Art review of new and upcoming artists in NYC. Installations, interactive pieces, standard art. (article)
• Difficulties in regulating high-tech biotech labs. (article)
• Requiring ultrasounds before abortions. Mixed results: it doesn't dissuade people, makes some people feel like its ok if its early enough to not appear human-shaped (still more egg than preson). (article)
• Highly overweight police force leads Mexico City to restrict some cops' calories. (article)
• Oxford "all souls college" stops giving their many-hour one-word entrance essay (write for several hours on a single word like "death", "water", or "bias"). (article)
• California deciding whether to move away from primaries to a general two-round vote for legislators. You could end up with two democrats against each other or even two independents. (article)
• The strange and bitter struggles among Russian chess masters and politicians to control chess federation (article)
• Treating sleep disorders by adjusting the body's clock. "An unbalanced circadian rhythm can be returned to equilibrium through the application of light to a sleeper’s retina near the end of a person’s “internal night.” ... "You can estimate internal night with a quick chronotype questionnaire" ... "Second, we administered a minute dose (0.2 milligrams) [far less than in sleeping pills] of sustained-release melatonin about five hours before bedtime, mimicking the action of the pineal gland, before it begins its nightly cycle." (article)
• Some new cancer therapies treat based on certain proteins, but the tests to identify who needs them / will benefit are not yet very precise. Further, organs differ in where and how consitently they manifest the proteins. (article)
• Financial firms lobbying senate hard to prevent financial overhaul (largely unsuccesful, although they may have set the agenda more than is apparent). (article)
• Article and video of how marines reacted to an enemy sniper (rare for them). (article)
• Web is default entertainment medium for China. (article)
• Immigrant stereotype: only low-wage work. "In 14 of the 25 largest metropolitan areas, including Boston, New York and San Francisco, more immigrants are employed in white-collar occupations than in lower-wage work like construction, manufacturing or cleaning." (article)
• Another article about the impacts of the April Icelandic ash cloud. (article)
• The library of congress will now save tweets. From intentionally ephemeral to permanently recorded. It just goes to show that nothing digital is ever temporary unless you need it and then it can be hard to find. (article)
• Meth labs built inside cars. (article)
• Extreme solitude: stories of a few people who live apart from everybody else. (article)
• U.S. pulls back from Korangal Outpost called the "valley of death" (article)
• Trying to end whale hunting by Japan, Norway, and Iceland. (article)
• Nude performance art at MoMa (and related difficulties). Public nudity, generally legally restricted, here "ok" because its "art". (article)
• NSA official Thomas Drake charged with leaking classified information to a reporter via email. (article)
• "A clinically tested program, in which losing 5 percent of body weight cut the risk of Type 2 diabetes by more than half, will be expanded to Y.M.C.A.'s in seven cities." Upfront costs for preventing disease are so much less than life-long treatment that it's worth it even when you can't guarantee the participants will stay in your programs. One area where a nationwide program would provide benefits. (article)
• A portrait of Obama as a very realpolitik president. Compare with perception as concerned with human rights and democracy. (article)
• Genetics explain why a minority of people hate cilantro while others think it is good. (article)
• Nebraska passes law preventing abortions after 20 weeks on grounds of that being when fetuses can feel pain. (article)
• Big banks moving in on microfinance turf, charging higher rates to justify the risk. Corporatizing loan sharks. (article)
• Home-made salami, pickles, and pastrami at a new generation of Jewish delis. (article)
• World-wide, maternal deaths have decreased markedly for the first time. Education, skilled attendents, higher incomes. (article)
• Controlled studies show that coughing before and during an injection actually reduces pain moderately. (article)
• Counting sheep doesn't help you sleep, but thinking of relaxing scenes does. (article)
• Milk does NOT increase mucus when you have a cold, except for some people (particularly those with chronic lung conditions) and some types of milk (from cows producing protein beta-CM-7). (article)
• Redeveloping Governors Island as a single architectural piece (now empty island near statue of liberty). (article)

Late May Link Dump

• 1200 National guard troops sent to Mexican border to watch for illegal entries and drug traffic. The excessive focus on finding and deporting undocumented immigrants detracts from reducing drug demand, building a great nation of hard-working people, and actually finding criminals or terrorists. (article)
• Woman goes into a coma after eating 3 pounds of raw bok choy daily for months as a home cure for diabetes. All health regimens in moderation, please. (article)
• Relieve sleep apnea by strenghtening throat muscles via exercise. "swallowing and chewing motions, placing the tip of the tongue against the front of the palate and sliding it back, and pronouncing certain vowels quickly and continuously" (article)
• Photos of people while they're jumping are immediate and interesting. Try it out. (article)
• Performance artist (Marina Abramovic) sits down all day in the MoMA. People can sit in the chair across from her for as long as they like. A big advance in interactivity from performance art that has typically been very isolated; people are excited to participate. I thought it interesting that everyone who got photo'd across from her looked solemn, thoughtful, or like they were about to cry. Except for a kid who just looked interested. (article)
• Put a server farm in a rural area and you can build a manure processing plant to power it. The manure processing requires lots of heat, which the servers produce in abundance. (article)
• Young people in America are much more open to immigrants and immigration than older people. Contains an excellent graphic - shows top cities where (percentage of adults who are white minus percentage of children who are white) is large. These are areas where adults are likely to feel strongly that they are being invaded while children are likely to see immigration as a fact of life, leading to a large generational gap. (article)
• Basic cotton long pajamas are socially accepted outdoor clothing in Shanghai. Now the Chinese government is trying to ban them. (article)
• US relies heavily on private companies that do their own spying for human intelligence in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Daily briefings from these companies to top defense officials, who use the data to plan strikes. Current contract with them $22 million. Hiring private spies is controversial. (article)
• In 2009 in the U.S., data traffic on cell phones was larger than voice traffic for the first time ever. (article)
• Military leader of Madagascar sleeps with a knife and a grenade under his pillow to fight anyone who might try to stage a coup like the one that brought him to power last year. (article)
• Article examining controversy around recent government action to "execute an American-born cleric far from a combat zone, with no judicial process". Man was a US citizen who was living abroad who advocates attacking the U.S. Paradoxically, a court order would be required to listen to tap his foreign cell phone, but no court order is seen to be required to order his assassination. (article)
• State laws requiring adequate nurse to patient ratios save many lives. These laws are not widespread. (article)
• New federal funding for sex ed programs "meant to encourage teenagers to delay sexual activity but to use protection if they are already active — as half of all high school students are. Lessons on healthy relationships, financial literacy and other life skills are also woven into the program, called PREP for Personal Responsibility Education Program" ... "A 2007 study commissioned by Congress found that students in abstinence programs were just as likely as those in a comparison group to have sex over the next four to six years; 49 percent in both groups remained abstinent. Those who had become sexually active had a similar number of partners, whether they had been through abstinence education or not" (article)
• Article on possible biological/genetic and gender factors influencing fidelity in marriage. In addition, simple pre-planning such as "when X opportunity for infidelity occurs, I will do Y to protect my relationship" leads to dramatically better fidelity indicators. Interesting relationship questions: How much does your partner provide a source of exciting experiences? How much has knowing your partner made you a better person? How much do you see your partner as a way to expand your own capabilities? If you're not happy with any of the answers, consider whether you need to improve rather than your partner. Interesting study: The Stony Brook researchers conducted experiments using activities that stimulated self-expansion. Some couples were given mundane tasks, while others took part in a silly exercise in which they were tied together and asked to crawl on mats, pushing a foam cylinder with their heads. The study was rigged so the couples failed the time limit on the first two tries, but just barely made it on the third, resulting in much celebration. Couples were given relationship tests before and after the experiment. Those who had taken part in the challenging activity posted greater increases in love and relationship satisfaction than those who had not experienced victory together. I wonder if artifically doing that regularly with real-life experiences would be beneficial? (article)
• David Belt, innovative experiential artist. Last year he turned large, clean dumpsters into covert party swimming pools in NYC. This year he built a secret installation where you can break bottles prior to recycling by throwing them at a big plexiglass wall (with pressure sensing lights that go off when bottles hit). Your friends, enemies, significant others can stand behind the wall and you can work out some of your aggression if that's your thing. Supposedly very theraputic, even though it's not my style to throw at someone, I'd dig the idea of the throwing in general. (article)
• If the bailout's goal was to help big banks be profitable, it worked. 4 large banks had a usually rare "perfect quarter" where they ended up profitable on every single day of the quarter. If the bailout's goal was to help teh economy overall rather than the specific shareholders and executives of those banks, then it likely didn't succeed as well. (article)
• Discussion about the differencese between food allergies and food intolerance and how many people think they have food allergies even though they don't. (article)
• Interesting sounding documentary on Finland's plans to bury its nuclear waste deep in bedrock for > 100,000 years (3000 generations, twenty times the current age of the pyramids), essentially so long that the place will likely be totally forgotten and any possible warnings we could leave would be misunderstood or destroyed by then. The film team joked that maybe they would dig the big tunnel and find out that someone 100,000 years ago had already buried their radioactive waste and we were just about to find it. It seems like we ought to figure out how to deal with energy-generation by-products before we build more power plants (nuclear fuel, coal pollution, incinerator rock/goo) or go with renewable alternatives that have fewer byproducts (wind, solar, geothermal, hydroelectric). (article)
• Article showing that tall, slim, attractive people are convicted less often than short, obese, unattractive people. Author seems a bit confused about causality though. (article)
• High-resolution 3D map of NYC based on multiple fly-overs by sensor equipped planes. Plans to use the data for emergency response and environmental planning (including sunlight / shadows from large buildings across seasons, times of day). Plus, it's kind of awesome. article)
• Indoor vertical gardens require lots of attention, but make a wall look stunning. You can buy kits for it. (article)
• Brain + age: Mid-aged brains (40-65) have decreased short-term memory recall and slower processing speed. However, brain is better at many things: "Inductive reasoning and problem solving — the logical use of your brain and actually getting to solutions. We get the gist of an argument better. We’re better at sizing up a situation and reaching a creative solution" ... plus better social expertise and better financial judgments. Physical exercise is the one thing that is a sure-thing to help brain health (less solid evidence for mental puzzles, etc.). Brain continues to grow, change, develop during middle-age unlike previous theories that thought it was just in decline. (article)
• Study correlates more TV time for 2 to 5 year olds with lower grades later in school, less healthy. Controlled for parental education, single-family households, etc. Take-home message is less TV for developing brains. (article)
• Over half of studied university students went tanning and 20% showed classic signs of addiction to their tanning. (article)
• Article on 50 years of birth-control pill, focusing on how its introduction changed the regulatory landscape for medicine. article)
• Missing parts of silent film "Metropolis" found in Argentine film archive, leading to first release of the complete film since it originally played. I'm pretty sure that even having the missing pieces won't make the film make sense for a first-time viewing. (article)
• Location-aware social media software first used to track political violence in Kenya now being used to track the BP oil spill. Eventually, this sort of location/behavioral tracking will be common.(article)
• Children's Tylenol and other meds recalled. (article)
• Ironically, but understandably, the previous generation of immigrants in Britain (including Muslim, black, and Asian immigrants) are likely to oppose new immigration from other EU countries, including Poland. (article)
• Awesome house in Costa Rica. Land cost $72k, construction of the house was $135k. Backyard is primal rain forest. (article)
• Marketing + surveillance / data collection. Web coupons with embedded information about how you found them (sometimes including your facebook info and name) didn't surpise me. Location-targeted ads that show up when you're next to a certain clothing rack also not surprising (although further along than I had thought). Amazon keeping track of everything you've ever bought and everyone you've ever sent something to and everything you've even looked at - not a big surprise. The fact that you can't get a copy of that for yourself or get a copy of your phone transcripts with customer service (they're always recording and they keep the transcript), or your flight history or your book purchases using your discount card except for legal reasons was a bit more interesting. The fact that all data collection is essentially unregulated also more interesting (most regulations are suggestions at this point). Most surprising: that stores routinely track your movements through the store, what you look at, how long you stand where, and everything you touch. Whoa. (article)
• Proliferation of vending machines for non-typical items: beauty products, hair straighteners, gold coins, Proactiv skin medicine, Bestbuy / Apple products, movies (redBox). Takes the self-checkout at the grocery store to a new level. Minimal human staff and footprint keep costs very low. They also have less theft than traditional stores. They can be easily moved. Customers like that they don't have to interact with any humans to buy things. Also, the fancy displays can lure customers and improve the user experience by tracking what is typed / clicked. Predict the trend that these will become much more prevalent. Each machine costs between $3k and $20k+. Japan has one vending machine per 23 people. (article)
• New study shows that it's not how much you actually exercise that impacts how well you sleep, but rather whether you think you are exercising enough or a lot. (article)
• Article on truly good pretzels vs. meh pretzels. (article)
• List of tips for refunds / compensation based on poor quality: Take and show pictures, discuss the issue with the manager in private rather than screaming, list your complaints but don't offer a remedy - the manager will usually offer something more than you'd request, have your credit card company stop the charges if you've been outright cheated, stay on the line with phone reps - they usually can't hang up on you and are tracked based on # calls completed, ask phone rep for advice on how they would do it to get useful tips, call or write the CEO or other high-level people. (article)
• Horrific account of violent attack suggests running, fighting, screaming rather than cooperating with some attackers (avoid this article if you don't want to read the detailed, specific account of the attack) (article)
• Too much time on your hands when: you follow a celebrity's tweets and then criticize them for grammer / spelling. (article)
• Paying for goods / services via cellphone(article)
• Extreme adventure races, this time by "Tough Mudder" include $100 race across 7-mile obstacle course of "muddy hills, cold water, and flaming bales of straw" (article)
• Why many D.O.D officials hate / ban powerpoint. What's accurately identified as bad: when people use it to address a problem only on the surface or focus on things that don't clarify the situation, or when it displaces discussion. Where I think they overlook benefits: Breaking down a very complex situation into a more basic, understandable concept allows you to then build back up to complexities. My opinion: train people how to use powerpoint better (and generally communicate better) rather than banning it altogether. article)
• Saving endangered world languages: by talking to immigrants in NYC(article)
• Some of the difficulties associated with electronic medical records(article)
• Slushies lower your core temperature, allowing you to endure exercise longer. Apparently, one major cause of exhuastion is the heart working extra hard to cool the skin AND power muscles after the core warms up too much. Slushies rather than cold water since they can be below freezing due to the extra sugar, although the general idea is just to lower your core temperature before the race / exercise. (article)
• Decreasing pay for cultural / art executives (article)
• Paying low-wage humans to defeat the anti-bot pictures on web pages called captchas. (article)
• Museums going into schools rather than the other way around. Done via traveling programs, video conferences, internet. (article)
• First steps in dealing with poverty in Japan after years of believing in lack of inequality(article)
• More details on December network attack on Google - one target was the source code for their password / authentication system. (article)
• Immigration, radicalization, and tough legislation as a way to force moderates out or to the right.(article)
• "The world's largest long-term study of the health of children aims to track 100,000 babies [from before delivery] until they turn 21."(article)
• Some Palestinians advocating non-violent protest for their cause. I'm in favor.(article)
• Photo-documenting everything you eat. I admit to having taken pictures of food before, but in moderation please. And don't disturb the other patrons. (article)

April 6 - Linkdump

More limits on nuclear weapons - I'm all in favor.
If you're working for a for-profit company, your internship is probably required to be paid.
Major philanthropy: Ford foundation $100M for art spaces in the US. If it were me, I'd target small installations / locations throughout unused urban and rural spaces rather than a couple of big galleries.
Gizmo emits vibrations that break in a stringed instrument faster
Site that translates planetary rotations into sound so you can listen to the symphony of the planets
Studying literature's effect on brain activity and coming up with theories about evolution+stories
Periodic table that lists other periodic tables - fairly clever, let me browse to some interesting tables.
Tapping on your arm as an input device, reminds me of sixth sense system. Based on vibrations in skin / bone / muscle picked up by an armband.
Online course in positive psychology (mix of self-help and academia; not for credit).
The benefits of hiring overqualified personnel, despite the risks they'll move on quickly
Exfiltrating information on life, government, and society in North Korea - by training those who temporarily leave to transmit information via cell phones.
Genome and surprising reproductive info on the famous truffle.
Underground hangouts, eateries in Paris.
Passover in the White House
Tongue-in-cheek competition for art-handlers who do all the lifting and positioning for works in museums - I had never thought about how hard it would be to put some abstract works together without instructions.
Pay caps don't cause massive talent flight (85% of executives still around after 2 years of pay caps).
The Catholic church accepts some Eastern Orthodox style congregations under its umbrella. In some of those, marriage for clergy is acceptable.
In depth look at early in-vitro scientist pioneer.
Results only work environment - ROWE. I'm a strong believer. Paying attention to what people get done rather than how long you have people "present" at work.
If you have a genuine windows box, Microsoft will give you free antivirus coverage. Trying to reduce their image as flaw-prone, which works out well for us monopolized consumers.
Towns go to extreme lengths to attract Google to build their free high-speed internet demo at their location. Stunts, youtube videos, renaming of towns, etc.
U-2 stealth spy plane gets new cameras that make it an ongoing key technology for providing imagery for warzones.
http://www.thelivingplanet.com/ - now with penguins!
Sculptures of a man on different rooftops lead people to think he's a jumper.
Small nuclear reactors coming online to power cities. As soon as someone figures out how to deal with radioactive waste awesomely, I can't get behind really large nuclear power generation capacities.
Sleep deprivation among doctors. System has improved a bit, but is still pretty extreme.
Those who talk about important topics tend to be happier than those who just shoot the breeze. Perhaps because substantive discussions lead to connections with others, while talking about the weather doesn't.
LDS-oriented -blog- pseudo publication dealing with IR. This article is about Mormon thoughts on war and peace. In-depth, well written, academic-ish.
Life-style audits on South African officials who appear to live beyond their means. Basic anti-fraud sleuthing combined with political hunts.
Making everything a one-touch kitchen appliance sells well. Sure, they're convenient, but it's not much fun, is it? (I like cooking).
Op-ed on steadily increasing demand for government services. Understandably, tax increases to pay for it lag behind.
Drug treats permanently clenched fingers can now be used for other bent organs that cause pain / problems. After 50 years of looking for something else it could do.
Words and emotions related to cancer. Battle? Triumph? Grind?
States pass legislation saying that particular issues are state issues. Somehow it seems ineffective.
One governor slashes spending rather than increasing taxes to pay for deficits.
Imputing names, ages, and social security numbers from information publicly available on social media sites. Remember - set your privacy settings to the minimum necessary and don't put information on the web you don't want certain people to see. Oh yeah, and we need some cryptographically robust standards that everyone can adopt for dealing with personal or sensitive information.
The line of command at the Pentagon if people die no longer points to personal friends, but is restored to its traditional order.
Transmitting power underwater along rivers / canals instead of overhead or underground. Seems like a good idea from the brief discussion.
How to make your own organic light-emitting diode with a basic chemistry lab.
You can now paypal someone money by bumping your smart phone against theirs. This is a nice step forward toward making it easy to squirt money, text, images, etc. at people you are in physical proximity to. Needs security to prevent putting a reader under the subway seat.
Fixing insanely broken CDC bureaucracy (introduced over 7 years during Bush tenure) in one quick push.
3d printers now able to build buildings - fuse sand with epoxy
Preserving digitally created content is a major challenge for archivists. You feel this pain any time you find an old floppy disk lying around. It gets much worse the longer the time gap is.
C-span now available online for all of archives.
Particular article about corporate bonds up for refinance leading to further economic pressure. Shows that timing is important as far as who gets bailed out and who learns to plan.
Final Fantasy 13 reviewed. Beautiful but overly scripted and sequential.
Driver ignores road warnings and follows google map instructions into a lake. D'oh!
Volunteers take it upon themselves to transfer mucho old federal video online.
Small business leader suggests that at some point after other options, you just have to fire particularly negative employees.
Some technical schools intentionally misrepresent job prospects to attract people during hard economic times.
Use much less detergent in your clothes washer.
Structured recess involves kids, eliminates fights, and is relatively inexpensive.

Sites about charitable giving
http://wisegiving.org/help_for_donors.html
http://charitynavigator.org/
http://www.legal-aid.org/en/home.aspx
http://www.endhomelessness.org/

Food Sites
This one tells you what to make based on what's in your kitchen: http://www.supercook.com/
This one has a list of recipes: http://allrecipes.com/Recipes/Main.aspx
Here's another one with recipes, but you can only access some for free: http://www.americastestkitchen.com/recipehome.asp
Awesome food chart that tells you which items to store where. Print it and put it on your fridge.