DIY: Millennium Falcon Theater

"DIY Millennium Falcon Theater" by The Beardless Man

YouTuber Beardless Man has uploaded a video of the Millennium Falcon-themed tablet stand he and his son made for watching movies.  He notes that the Millennium Falcon shape is not only ideal for watching as you lie down and look up, it’s also makes for good acoustics so both people inside the theatre can hear the tablet.  Plus, I have to think that it looks pretty cool sitting in a corner when not in use.  Now that I've seen one made, I may try making one of these for myself.

"Rogue One: A Star Wars story comes out today, and it inspired me to do a Star Wars DIY build. A Millennium Falcon theater, a place to lay back and enjoy watching the newest Star Wars movie without having your arms fall asleep from holding the tablet up, or having it drop on your face.

For a behind the scenes look at my projects, and other general randomness, follow me on Instagram:  https://www.instagram.com/iamthebeardlessman/"

Humor: Internet of Randomware

"The Internet of randomware things..." The Joy of Tech by Nitrozac & Snaggy

After having upgraded to Windows 10, I find this comic chillingly prescient.  It took me a month to shut off all of the Microsoft services running in the background to restore my computer's performance to normal.  The thought of all the appliances in my house running on a Microsoft platform makes me want to become Amish... you know, if there was such a thing as someone Amish who never goes outdoors.

Humor: Nooooooooo

"Nooooooooo" by Adam Ellis for Buzzfeed

Remember back in the eighties when we had to answer the phone without knowing who was on the other end like a bunch of friggin barbarians?

Link Round-Up: November 27, 2015

"CYBER suicide" by KonstantinBratishko

This 3D Printed Chess Set Was Designed to Teach Users How to Play Intuitively

The Atlantic recently ruffled some feathers when it argued that computer programmers shouldn’t call themselves engineers. “When it comes to skyscrapers and bridges and power plants and elevators and the like, engineering has been, and will continue to be, managed partly by professional standards, and partly by regulation around the expertise and duties of engineers. But fifty years’ worth of attempts to turn software development into a legitimate engineering practice have failed.”

I loved the Lord of the Rings movies but thought that the first Hobbit movie, which was a mess, albeit a slightly enjoyable mess. I’ve had little desire to watch the rest of the Hobbit series, though. And now, Peter Jackson confirms what we’ve always suspected: “Because Guillermo Del Toro had to leave and I jumped in and took over, we didn’t wind the clock back a year and a half… to design the movie, which was different to what he was doing… [A]s a result of it being impossible I just started shooting the movie with most of it not prepped at all.”

Jim Henson's early journals reveal some surprising back stories. 

Video: World's Brightest Flashlight

"1000W LED Flashlight - Worlds Brightest (90,000 Lumens)" by rctestflight

Daniel Riley of Stratus Productions has built an intensely bright 1,000W LED flashlight capable of putting out 90,000 lumens. Riley posted a video explaining how he built the light and included a number of impressive examples of his light compared to other light sources like a commercial flashlight and car headlights.

Video: Tech Tats

"Chaotic Moon Studios - Tech Tats" by Chaotic Moon Studios

Tech Tats are a new category of biowearable technology that are applied directly to the skin like a temporary tattoo. Designer Eric Schneider explains the Tech Tat wearables being developed at Chaotic Moon Studios in a video produced by the company.

Humor: Too Much Computer

"Too Much Computer" by Gregor Czaykowski of LoadingArtist.com

In high school, my parents used to complain about my computer-rooted obliviousness non-stop. About two years back, my parents got a matching pair of tablets, though, and ever since, they don't hear anything that hasn't been repeated at least three times.

Humor: Internet-aholic

"Internet" by Wes of The Gentleman's Chair

Saw this on Facebook while I was eating dinner with my family this weekend, and I could help but re-post it.  Of course the worst part of Internet addicts anonymous is that you can't encourage people to share, because it's inevitably taken as a reference to social media.

Quick Pic: iPhone 6 Billboard

Source: Tom (@taknil)

"I went to check, the bent iPhone 6 poster in Berlin is real an hilarious."

I'll say this for Apple: They are hella quick to turn a flaw into a feature.

Posters: Sysadmin Posters from the 1980s

Sysadmin Posters from the 1980s from Redditor Evandena

Source: Imgur via Redditor

These authentic 80's sysadmin warning posters look like dystopian parodies.

Video: Kindle Readers Show Off

"New Kindle Helps Readers Show Off" by The Onion

The Onion reports on the new Amazon Kindle Flare, a device that loudly and repeatedly announces the title of books users are reading.

Amazon says the Kindle Flare’s repetitive shouting will appeal to fans of print, who miss the ability to display a book’s cover to strangers.

Photography: Deconstructed

"Deconstructed" by Toronto-based photographer Brandon Edgar Allen

"Deconstructed" is a series of photographs of dissected controllers collected from the gamers who owned them. Each controller was used and often played until it was no longer operable. Some have been physically altered, and others were damaged in attempts to fix them. These photos makes visible their inner workings, beautifully displayed, piece by piece, as reinterpretations of the tools we use to game.

Sculpture: Technological Mandalas

"Technological mandala 30" by Leonard Ulian

Electronic components, copper wire, and paper

Leonard Ulian offers a modern interpretation of the classic mandala.  While a mandala is traditionally formed from sand, Ulian has assembled his from electronic components, such as resistors, copper wire, and capacitors.

The mandala is a traditional spiritual symbol in both Hinduism and Buddhism meant to represent the universe, but through his deep interest in how systems can be applied to the process of art making, Ulian has adopted mandala patterns to create symmetrical networks.

Photography: WiFi Signals

"Digital Ethereal" by Luis Hernan

With the help of the mobile app Kirlian Device mobile, designer Luis Hernan, an Architecture and Interaction PhD at UK’s Newcastle University, captures long exposure photos that are both ghostly and extraordinarily colorful in an attempt to create a visible representation of this WiFi signals of the technology that surrounds us every day.

"This project came about as design discourse on digital technologies, and the invisible infrastructure underpinning it," he explained via his website. "I believe our interaction with this landscape of electromagnetic signals, described by Anthony Dunne as Hertzian Space, can be characterised in the same terms as that with ghosts and spectra."

Hernan developed the Kirlian Device that, by no coincidence, is named after Russian engineer Semyon Kirlian, who mastered the art of Kirlian photography much to the excitement of the parapsychology world. The device exposes the quality of digital transfer protocols – such as WiFi networks, mobile phone networks, Bluetooth, GPS, NFC – translating the strength of these signals to colour LEDs, which are then captured with long exposure photographs.

Video: Addicted To The Internet?

"Are You Addicted To The Internet?" by Buzzfeedvideo

Yup.

Crafts: ARPANET Embroidery

ARPANET Embroidery by Debbie Millman

This map of ARPANET, forerunner of the internet, was embroidered by Debbie Millman, whose most recent book of hand-crafted artwork, Self-Portrait as Your Traitor, was among the best art and design books of 2013.

Fresh Take: Emoji Nation

"Emoji Nation" by Kiev-based Nastya Nudnik

Ukrainian artist Natasya Ptichek was toying around on her phone recently when she had a revelation of sorts: many of the emojis she’d been using had begun to resemble well-known works of art. She began to mash up classical works of art with modern elements.  She overlaid Windows-style dialog boxes and social media notifications and icons over paintings to create ironic commentaries.  Ptichek's first emoji-nation series paired emoticons with iconic artwork, whereas her third one reimagined famous artwork as movie posters. Below are selected work from Ptichek's second, fourth, and fifth installments of emoji-nation.

"I adore playing on contrasts and try to put dualism in every work, no matter it is an illustration, a painting or a collage. Emoji-nation is big a complex of different projects united by one idea. And I don’t know whether it is already done, because the further development of Emoji-nation depends on my mood and some ‘sudden clarity.’"

Fresh Take: Paintings as Street View Maps

"Paintings as Google Street View Maps" by  James Lileks

James Lileks turned two classic paintings, Boulevard Poissonnière in the Rain by Jean Béraud and River Landscape with Horseman and Peasants by Aelbert Cuyp, into Google street views. They’re so convincing that we tried to navigate both of them as you would an actual street view map.

"Paintings as Google Street View Maps. Took me a long time, so what was to be “first examples in a series” ended up as “why the hell am I doing this, really.”"

Video: Newest Honda ASIMO

"Newest Honda ASIMO Robot Moves Like A Human" by Mashable

Honda just celebrated the fourteenth anniversary of ASIMO, its tiny mobile robot.  The robot has been slowly evolving over the years, but in honor of ASIMO's birthday, Honda has rolled out a whole new batch of upgrades.

"The Asimo’s latest edition, unveiled on April 16, can run briskly, climb stairs with ease, dance like Travolta, kick a ball and jump up in down in what can only be described as a robot tantrum.

The 4 feet tall, 115-pound robot now features five dextrous fingers on each hand with force feedback sensors. As we saw in its first North America demonstration on Wednesday, ASIMO can pick up a sealed container filled with orange juice, unscrew the top, pick up a paper up with its other hand, pour the juice and carefully set both cup and container back on the table."

Tech: Homemade Webshooter

"Electromagnetic Spiderman "Webshooter", made from scratch" by AnselmoFanZero

German laser specialist Anselmo Fan Zero created his very own "webshooter" in honor of the new Spiderman film debuting in Germany. The impressive device is worn on the wrist and fires a small retractable harpoon in place of a spider’s webbing.  There are three buttons under the device — for charging, the aiming laser and the trigger, and the whole thing runs on a single lithium-polymer battery.   The guy who made the spidey shooter also runs an online storefront that specializes in steampunk-style weaponry.