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Miscellaneous
Hitler’s British Girl
Dug this out after the last of the Mitford sisters died last week. Fascinating stuff.
✩ Want You To Know: Title TK
Monday Monday
It's a Bank Holiday, so a few less links than usual
Firstly, dear reader, be not afraid, your 100 million pounds per annum of Sriracha sauce is secure.
In not-really-news, print editions of newspapers are still screwed. Amazing that more of them haven't sunk already.
12,000 people demanded their 'right to be forgotten' from Google in the first 24 hours of availabilty. That is a lot less than the amount of copyright takedown requests, mind you.
Larry Page, not surprisingly, has reservations.
Incidentally, have you ever heard of any of these companies? Me neither, but they know more about you than Google or Facebook.
Topical Ireland
As an unpleasant story emerges from Galway, 'Sex In A Cold Climate' is worth watching, but grim. It's a Channel 4 documentary about the Magdalene asylums in Ireland. Made and broadcast in the UK in 1998, it has never been officially been broadcast in Ireland.
Totally Confused
Design your own steamship, understand Beats, discover the worst waiter ever, find out where Psy is and some cats, obviously.
Football Corner
No quote today, but, deep breath, ahahahaha! Who, exactly, is surprised?
Please also enjoy this wonderful own goal by Nigeria.
Finally, 'Round up, holler girl'
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✩ Want You To Know: Let’s Twist Again
Hola, folks
After a break for the month of May, this newsletter is back! Here’s a quick roundup of what happened on the Internets in May that was of vague to mild interest.
The Atlantic wrote a eulogy for Twitter. They weren’t exactly the first journalistic outlet to get there, were they? However, Twitter stock did take a bit of a hammering when employees were allowed cash out a few days later.
A street in Baltimore fell into a hole. Wait for it.
The App.net founder and CEO announced that the company actually has plenty of cash. In the same announcement he fired all the full time staff. Oh brave new world of Silicon Valley.
Mlkshk sadly passed on to wherever decent Web services go. SnapChat had to admit that messages sent through its service didn’t actually disappear.
Advanced emoticons
The Daily Dot provided us with the ultimate guide to creating elaborate emoticons. If you see anyone using these, it’s probably best to reply with ಠ_ಠ …
What did Google do to Metafilter?
Something unfortunate, although as Google doesn’t explain its workings to anybody it is unclear exactly what. It does cast doubt on whether Google search results are in any way as reliable as they once were. Some even went so far as to suggest Google Is Breaking The Internet. If concerned about this, you could always use a different search engine that does more searching and less user tracking.
As a testament to Metafilter and its community of users being the best of the Web, many have pledged to support the site themselves. Note that this was entirely driven by the users, who located a years-old PayPal donation link and immediately started donating in droves. As of today, almost 3,000 have donated, the majority of those being recurring monthly subscriptions.
Now, back to the future.
Worth Pondering
Winter Is Still Coming
After a strange one week break, Game of Thrones is back today. If you haven’t seen the honest trailer for this season, you should watch it. It’ll give you a giggle.
Related – chimp wars.
Documentary for the day
As Bear Island is in the news at the moment, this documentary on HMS Belfast came to mind. If you’re ever in London and you’re in anyway interested in things nautical, she’s well worth a visit.
Eye Candy. In Space
Here’s what Earth looks like from the International Space Station. Depending on where the ISS is, it may be a tad dark and not all that exciting.
Totally Confused, Animal Video Edition
How A Raccoon Became An Aardvark, Keyboard Playing Otters, Basketball Playing Otter, Jenga Playing Cat and Bucket Playing Dog.
Football Corner
In honour of the impending World Cup, a new series of memorable, motivational and inspirational quotes from the world of soccer. First up, it’s Terry Venables.
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This.
Handily the most prescient vision of the future I've ever seen: pic.twitter.com/lI9GxEZk6k From a German magazine c. 1930. Via @mrkocnnll
— Kathryn Schulz (@kathrynschulz) April 27, 2014
☆ Want You To Know: More Cats Than Expected
Somehow, this ended up with much more feline involvement than originally planned. Guaranteed not to happen again until at least some time next week.
Well Played, Metro, Well Played
Medical first as cats are found to pass TB on to their owners
This Can’t Possibly End Well
Things To Ponder
Relevant: long list of facts about cats, compiled by (who else) Buzzfeed.
Why did this sad remix of Pharrell’s ‘Happy’ take so long to appear?
Inscrutable To Most, Headlines Department
It occurred to me that plenty of the headlines I scan daily would probably have made no sense twenty years ago. Here’s a selection (which are all worth reading, I hasten to add).
Mobile Malware Mines Dogecoins and Litecoins for Bitcoin Payout
The coin-mining apps discussed above were found outside of the Google Play store, but we have found the same behavior in apps inside the Google Play store. These apps have been downloaded by millions of users, which means that there may be many Android devices out there being used to mine cryptocurrency for cybercriminals.
Lichdom: Battlemage’s powerful spells channel Borderlands and Dark Souls
Xaviant’s vision for Lichdom is to deliver a game in which the mage isn’t always the “glass cannon” in the back, the fellow that’s capable of doing massive damage but then gets fragged if something dangerous so much as looks his way.
Facebook recruits NASA boffins for robot drone fleet, laser comms lab
The Connectivity Lab plans to use solar-powered drones and satellites fitted with communications gear to relay internet access to areas of medium and low population density, along with new laser-based technologies to create a high-bandwidth transmission network.
Good stuff, right?
Longer Reads
‘Cos it’s almost the weekend.
‘Billionaire Ball’ by Matt Hinton. The excesses of sports departments in US universities. The figures involved are staggering.
Malcolm Harris skewers what he describes as “Actually Journalism”. FiveThirtyEight.com and Vox.com are his primary targets. More criticism of FiveThirtyEight from climate scientists.
What Seems To Be The Problem Here? is the latest instalment in n+1’s series of investigative pieces on Amazon. Ruth Curry of Emily Books gives a lot of insight into what Amazon has done to not just the publishing business but the entire online retailing industry. The prospect of the drones becomes ever more terrifying.
If you’re a millionaire model, YOU TOO can get government funding for your barely fleshed out charity idea. Lily Cole managed to get £200,000 from the Cabinet Office in the UK for a goods and services exchange website whose only currency is love, or thanks, or rainbows, or something.
It’s not unusual for wealthy celebrities, particularly in the fashion world, to support good causes or have whimsical hobbies. What makes Impossible.com highly unusual is that it received support from the taxpayer. And nobody seems quite sure why.
House ♫
The trailer [YT] for forthcoming documentary The House That Chicago Built is worth a look if you enjoy seeing a lot of normally garrulous types lost for words. The film itself is directed by Lil Louis incidentally.
Totally Confused
We demand a hot dog emoji, an end to chemical warfare in the swimming pool, no more bling bishops, less rubbish on the mountain and more bad Reddit AMAs.
☆ Want You To Know: Smoke ‘Em If You Got ‘Em
Smoke Fairies
Listen to this. Because it's damn good.
Vapid
Seems we're now selling one of the most powerful known natural toxins over the counter, mostly unregulated. In packaging that's attractive to children for good measure. Poison centres are issuing warnings.
Whilst e-cigarettes may help some to quit conventional cigarettes, it seems the law of unintended consequences has also kicked in
"E-cigarettes are likely to be gateway devices for nicotine addiction among youth, opening up a whole new market for tobacco," says lead author Lauren Dutra, a postdoctoral fellow at the UCSF's Center for Tobacco Control Research and Education.
General Internets
Rather than copying Facebook and buying something called Octopus Raft or similar, Twitter is taking a different approach. Photo tagging is being rolled out. Because everybody loves being tagged in photos, and those trendy startups like Secret and Whisper aren't all about anonymity (real or imagined).
Fortunately the Wire has put together a guide showing how to turn the damn tagging off. Take that, taggers!
Retweet may be becoming share. To retain users who were having great difficulty figuring out what retweeting did.
Regarding Oculus Rift, Rusty Foster summed it up rather nicely
It was initially underwritten by thousands of suckers via Kickstarter, who got oculus stiffed by this deal and who are, to put it mildly, oculus miffed. "Where's our stockulus!?" they wail. "This is just a big oculus grift!"
via Today In Tabs
Lithium Technologies has acquired Klout. Remember Klout? When people's Klout score was going to determine whether they were hip enough to be allowed into clubs or influential enough to deserve discounts? Good riddance.
Local Edition
Actually not so local any more. The Garda whistleblower / bugging / ombudsman / call recording / resigning commissioner / stubborn Minister affair is now getting international coverage. The Guardian mentions what the most Irish media hasn't, the work of Gemma O'Doherty on the penalty points story and her subsequent dismissal.
Foreign attention has a knack of moving these kind of things on from the heel-dragging stage. Fun times ahead for Minister Shatter.
Rolling Gum-Chewing Game Of The Day
Totally Confused
Giant rat in your kitchen, an entire universe in your kitchen, diplomacy in your International Space Station, hidden Super Earth in your solar system and lunatic charlatans in your Wikipedia.
☆ Want You To Know: Reality TV Revelations?
An article widely circulated recently was billed as being revelatory. The big reveal was that a generous proportion of reality TV is actually scripted.
Had this genuinely not occurred to a lot of people before now? It’s decades since The Real World debuted on MTV. The unreality of the reality of these shows has become more obvious with every passing year.
Charlie Brooker explains how a lot of it is done. Editing.
Meeja Pondering
This has been pretty apparent for the last while. There’s less decent reporting being done. Pretty soon there may not be much left to aggregate and curate that’s of any quality. Thus squeezing the market for aggregation services.
Of course, in future all news is going to be written by robots.
In fact, the BBC may already have deployed some robot sub-editors.
Quote Of The Day
Imagine being described as a wanker by Bono. I do not believe I am exaggerating when I say it would be like your dog standing up on its hind legs in your kitchen one day and suddenly laughing at you for being a dog.
Totally Confused, Somewhat Sartorial Edition
Kim Jong-Un haircuts, smart watch chic, Facebook for your face, homeopathy may contain traces of medicine and cartoon faces
Weekend edition
Video menagerie: Magic for dogs. Molting tarantula. Puzzled penguins.
Whilst mostly ignoring all the media brouhaha about flight MH370, I found this piece fascinating. There’s remote and then there’s remote. “There are two bicycles to ride, a soccer field and a slow Internet connection.” If you fancying reading one other piece about lost planes, make it this one by Michelle Read.
Interested in knowing what teenagers are doing online and whether it will bring about the downfall of society as we know it (hint: no it won’t, just like rock ‘n’ roll didn’t)? Danah Boyd thinks about this and other interesting things a lot, and here’s a Q&A she did with Nick Bilton.
The New Yorker does a brief history of techno. Definitely wouldn’t have expected to see that a decade ago. Perhaps two decades ago, considering how long techno has been around now. Still, artists and audiences alike continue to innovate.
Protip of the day: if you’re leaking your employer’s confidential information, it is best not to use their email service to do so.
Somewhat related, Cloak is an anti-social network, or something like that. It uses Instagram and Foursquare location data to let you know when your contacts are nearby. You can then take the appropriate measures to avoid them if you so wish.