Hauling the unbelievable amount of junk out of rivers

 Posted by on 2 September 2010  Everything Else
Sep 022010
 

Mitchum deodorant held a contest to find the “hardest-working _______ in America.” The winner, as featured on the Good News Network site, is Chad Pregracke.

According to the story, he’s hauled over 6 million pounds of trash from rivers over the past 12 years — including an astonishing 775 refrigerators. I don’t know if he cleaned up the site of an abandoned fridge factory at one time, but that’s an average of more than 60 fridges a year — a fridge every week, and sometimes two! That’s too many fridges in the river.

Here’s his nomination video — click pause at the very last second to read the fine print. It’s worth it.

You can see more nominees at the contest website.

100% organic Gulf oil

 Posted by on 26 August 2010  Modern Life
Aug 262010
 

James Martin, at Cardinal & Company, mocked up this fake product (using, I think, real Gulf of Mexico sand, soiled with real Gulf of Mexico oil) as a way to bring the impact of the oil hemorrhage home to people.

Each quart jar, according to the label, contains enough oil mixed into the sand to ruin 150,000 gallons of water. Yikes :(

I also appreciated the back label, which reads:

This unlimited edition Gulf of Mexico sand and oil concoction is made possible through the tireless determination of people like you. It it weren’t for your constant consumption of this remarkable product, we wouldn’t even have this collector’s item for sale. So thank you, America & God bless.

Zing.

Honestly, this is the kind of tchotcke that you probably could sell to people as a fundraiser, but it depresses me to think that most people would display it on their shelves as a cocktail party conversation piece for a year or so, then put it away, and, eventually, just toss it in the trash, which doesn’t help anything, really.

Watch out on Thursday!

 Posted by on 24 August 2010  Vintage/Retro
Aug 242010
 

Oh dear:

Events in the life of Welsh coal miner David Wilson, born 1846:

  • Aug. 26, 1857: Fractured the forefinger of his right hand.
  • Aug. 26, 1859: Fell from horseback and broke his left leg below the knee.
  • Aug. 26, 1860: Broke both bones of his left forearm.
  • Aug. 26, 1861: Broke his left leg above the ankle.
  • Aug. 26, 1862: Broke both legs, the right one so badly that it had to be amputated.

Seeing a pattern, he renounced for 28 years doing any work on Aug. 26, but in 1890 he forgot the date, went to work, and broke his left leg for the fourth time.

(via Futility Closet)

A camera that does away with the photographer

 Posted by on 22 July 2010  Modern Life, Photography
Jul 222010
 

If you thought that being an artist would protect you from having a computer do your work, think again:

Yes, that’s right — eschewing the view screen, a computer in this point-and-shoot camera calculates what makes a good photograph using some kind of algorithm and rates it for you.

FastCo Design says it’s really not that difficult:

Consider this: Much of what makes a picture artistic could actually be programmed into a camera. Diagonal compositions, color contrasts, foreground/background? All of these are pretty simple things for a computer to vet.

I’ll add to that, the golden photographic rule of thumb, the Rule of Thirds, is really just an approximation of a derivation of the Fibonacci sequence which has been simplified to make it easier for humans to understand. Computers would have the advantage.

Designer Andrew Kupresanin, who came up with the camera prototype, called the Nadia, says that it makes use of the Acquine engine.

Now, for debate: Is this more about computers getting smarter? Or humans getting dumber?

What Calvin looks like to other people

 Posted by on 26 June 2010  Vintage/Retro
Jun 262010
 

Thankfully, Calvin & Hobbes is a comic strip. Because when it’s just a lonely boy talking to his stuffed tiger, well there’s nothing comic about that.

Calvin Minus Hobbes is an obvious riff on Garfield Minus Garfield, but its creator says he’s given up:

I won’t be posting any more of these. They’re too sad. If any brave soul wants to take up the project … have at it.

Oil hemorrhage, the worst-case scenario

 Posted by on 17 June 2010  Modern Life
Jun 172010
 

Imagine a leaky garden hose. Once you shut off the nozzle, all the leaks in the hose itself spray more, right? Now imagine that the leaky garden hose is actually the underground part of the Deepwater Horizon.

So, the more we try to cap or plug or slow the flow of oil from the gushing wellhead, the more oil might be spraying and spurting into the rocks of the seafloor — but where we can’t see it.

Like a leak in a dam, these oil leaks could erode away underwater portions of the seafloor until — worst-case scenario — the whole thing erupts in oil.

Rather than gushing from one pinprick (the well), imagine the whole oil reservoir billowing out like a popped water balloon.

(I know — too many metaphors.)

Viewed in this light, all of BP’s actions seem to take on more clarity. Rather than getting right at the top-kill and plugging the well, they hesitated — because that would dramatically increase pressure on the underground leaks, and make things infinitely worse.

That’s the worst-case scenario envisioned in a scary comment on the blog The Oil Drum. It’s well-reasoned, and well-sourced, although I am not a geologist.

Gawker also points to a science blogger who thinks the worst-case scenario is worth talking about.

Is it barrels of oil? Or gallons?

 Posted by on 14 June 2010  Modern Life
Jun 142010
 

One of the things that has persistently annoyed me about the BP oil hemorrhage has been that we just don’t know how much oil is gurgling out. Partly, that’s because it is inherently difficult to measure the volume of an oil-and-gas mixture at the bottom of the ocean. But, frustratingly, there’s been no consistency on units.

As a British company operating in American waters, I suppose I’m not surprised to hear it described in Imperial units. So the Washington Post, for example, reports that:

BP’s latest plan calls for capturing 1.2 million gallons of oil a day by the end of the week. The company’s current capacity is 756,000 gallons a day …. BP has outlined plans to capture 2.1 million gallons per day by the end of the month.

But, being that this is oil, I’m also not surprised to hear it described in barrels. So Reuters, for example, reports that:

Under its new collection plan, BP hopes to increase its capacity to capture oil from around 15,000 barrels a day now to 40,000-53,000 barrels by the end of this month and 60,000-80,000 by mid-July.

Sigh. Are those numbers equivalent? Luckily, WikiAnswers has, um, an answer:

There are 55 gallons in a drum and 42 gallons in a barrel. Originally there were 40 gallons to a barrel. However, that was changed in the mid-19th century to give a little extra so consumers wouldn’t feel “cheated.” A little over 23 gallons of gasoline can be refined from a barrel of oil. Other products (jet fuel, lubricants, etc.) make up the rest.

Therefore, 40,000 barrels is about 1.7 million gallons. So I guess it’s roughly the same, but there’s still no good way to compare the numbers.

Also, since there are a little less than 3.8 litres in a gallon, you can do the math and figure that each barrel contains about 160 litres of oil.

If you’re interested, then, you can take some of the latest estimates and calculate the metric equivalent. So if the oil hemorrhage under the Gulf of Mexico is spewing 40,000 barrels per day, then that would work out to be be about 6.4 million litres of oil per day.

A day is a long time. That’s more than 74 litres of oil each and every second.

Since April 20.

New terror tactic: “Stop hitting yourself”

 Posted by on 8 June 2010  Modern Life
Jun 082010
 

I can’t figure out if this is hilarious or depressing:

Yes, that’s right — the “War on Terror” is now so overwhelming that terrorists have apparently started using it instead of actual terror. By leaving innocuous but suspicious-looking bags around, they get to have actual genuine authorities of the state do all the dirty work of shutting down huge swaths of a city, evacuating buildings, and arresting or interrogating innocent people.

In one way, it’s the ultimate in asymmetric warfare, but in another, it’s a lot like AIDS — which tricks the body’s immune system into attacking itself.

And, just like AIDS, I’m not too sure there’s an easy cure. Too many people are so afraid of OMGterrorz!!1! that they’ll allow the guv’mint to do just about anything in the name of “security.”

(via BB)

What if the BP oil hemorrhage had happened where I live?

 Posted by on 2 June 2010  Modern Life
Jun 022010
 

So, based on a column I read a week ago and can no longer remember where, I’ve decided that I shall no longer refer to the what’s happening in the Gulf of Mexico as an “oil spill.” Language can define how you think about something. “Spill” doesn’t really encapsulate what’s going on, and it minimizes how you think of it. I’ll call it an “oil hemorrhage” from now on.

(That column also suggested “financial tumors” instead of “financial bubble” to better convey both their uncontrolled growth and their malignancy.)

Anyway, grasping the full magnitude of the oil hemorrhage is difficult — we’re just not built to fully imagine abstract concepts that large. One-third of the Gulf of Mexico is closed to fishing now — that’s over 75,000 square miles. But how big is the hemorrhage really?

Well, that’s where If It Was My Home comes in. Just pop in an address, and it’ll show you how large an area the spill would cover if it were centred on your home. Here is the depressing map of it around my home:

Try your own home here. And, remember that maps are two-dimensional, but this hemorrhage is in glorious 3-D — take this map, and superimpose mile-high plumes of oil droplets reaching into the sky. Hurray!

Safe, stylish and fuel-efficient. Of course the government destroyed it

 Posted by on 28 May 2010  Vintage/Retro
May 282010
 

Jalopnik has a great story up detailing the sad history of the RSV. It just might be the best car that the world never saw.

Built for the U.S government, it demolished (sorry) its competitors in safety tests, had ridiculous fuel economy, and actually looked kind of cool. The gullwing doors helped.

Technologically, it was miles ahead of any other car on the road, featuring anti-lock brakes, air bags, and a crumple zone. This in the 1970s, by the way, when even seat belts were sort of an afterthought.

What kills me is this ad. The company that designed and built them for the Department of Transportation, Minicars, obviously wanted to market these wonder vehicles. So they tried to drum up public support:

Unfortunately. It didn’t work. The government — under new administration — decided to scrap the cars, calling them obsolete.

Luckily, two survive.

Read the whole story — it’s equal parts inspiring and depressing.

New Heinz, coming soon

 Posted by on 14 May 2010  Modern Life
May 142010
 

Apparently, Heinz ketchup is about to change its recipe — for the first time in 40 years. The biggest change? A 15 per cent cut in sodium:

But fear not, ketchup connoisseurs. The new recipe has been thoroughly taste tested.

Company spokeswoman Jessica Jackson says tests were conducted in Pittsburgh and other cities across the country.

Jackson says there won’t be a splashy graphic on the labels to announce the new recipe. Consumers will have to check the nutrition panel instead.

I am left with just one question — if consumers won’t even notice a 15 per cent drop in sodium, why the hell was there so much salt in there in the first place??

Seriously, I wonder — was it just because it was so freaky-salty that dropping 15 per cent leaves it still really salty? Or was there some reason for the salt four decades ago, and they’re now replacing it with other, saltier-tasting chemicals, so they can use less of it? Other preservatives?

I’m going to have to check two labels and make a comparison.

As a side note, I am absolutely indebted to Coudal for suggesting that this makes a good time to re-read this piece, on the attempt to make a “Grey Poupon” of ketchups.

This is what we call cognitive dissonance — too bad it’s in Congress

 Posted by on 7 May 2010  Modern Life
May 072010
 

I like Gail Collins normally, but this time she really nails it: Apparently Congress is ready to strip suspected terrorists of their Miranda rights, their citizenship, their right to fly and their privacy — but not their right to buy guns.

“I think you’re going too far here,” said Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina at a hearing of the Senate Homeland Security Committee on Wednesday. He was speaking in opposition to a bill that would keep people on the F.B.I. terrorist watch list from buying guns and explosives.

Say what?

Yes, if you are on the terrorist watch list, the authorities can keep you from getting on a plane but not from purchasing an AK-47. … People who are perfectly happy to let the government wiretap phones go nuts when the government wants to keep track of weapons permits.

*head-slap*

Read her full column here.

Sure, you have the option, but we’re going to make it difficult to figure out

 Posted by on 2 May 2010  Modern Life
May 022010
 

Have you ever been confronted by a choice that you had to read three or five time in order to figure out?

If you suspect that sometimes, the question is deliberately confusing, so that you might make the “wrong” choice by accident, you are probably right.

Now there’s a term for it: An Evil Interface.

An evil interface means “the act of creating deliberately confusing jargon and user-interfaces which trick your users into sharing more info about themselves than they really want to.” according to this post on the EFF site.

Facebook is notorious for confusing and misleading “privacy” options — options that you have to check and re-check every time they alter something. Other examples of evil interfaces may include “aggressive pop-up ads, malware that masquerades as anti-virus software, and pre-checked checkboxes for unwanted “special offers”" says the EFF.

Do I have plenty to say about this? Yes. But for now I just wanted to throw that term out there.

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