Thursday, August 25, 2011

This guy is a riot. I read about his slingshot channel in this month's issue of 'Wired'. Here's one to get you started:



I remember my father making me a 'machine gun' slingshot when I was a boy. It only fired one rubberband at a time, but it looked like a machine gun, including a removable 'clip'. :-) I wish I'd kept it!



Monday, August 08, 2011

Fountain of imagination and joy in the hand - Opinion - Editorial - General - The Canberra Times

File photo: Getty


"It's true that fountain pens are anachronistic: relics of an age before television and radio, let alone internet and mobile phones. Moreover, they have acquired a certain status. For my parents' generation, they evoke ink-spills, exercise books and schoolroom whippings. Nowadays, they are a mark of wealth or style, particularly if they are topped by Mont Blanc's white snowflake. But my pen is not primarily a status symbol. It is a simple, useful tool..."

Click the title to read the rest of the editorial

When Data Disappears

When Data Disappears
By KARI KRAUS
Published: August 6, 2011
To avoid a “digital dark age,” we have to rethink preservation.

LAST spring, the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas acquired the papers of Bruce Sterling, a renowned science fiction writer and futurist. But not a single floppy disk or CD-ROM was included among his notes and manuscripts. When pressed to explain why, the prophet of high-tech said digital preservation was doomed to fail. “There are forms of media which are just inherently unstable,” he said, “and the attempt to stabilize them is like the attempt to go out and stabilize the corkboard at the laundromat.”

Click title to read full article