Fresser.

"…Scanners can capture millions of data points at a crime scene within a few minutes and..."

Fri, 04 Dec 2009 14:27:50 -0500

“…Scanners can capture millions of data points at a crime scene within a few minutes and recreate highly detailed virtual crime scenes.

“The game world will be embedded within a Web page also containing data in the form of text and 2D graphics,” said Dr. Michael Young, associate professor of computer science and an expert in serious gaming at NC State.

“We’ll be building an easy-to-use interface on top of the game environment that will allow CSIs and other investigators to link locations in the crime scene to external sources of data, such as hair and fiber databases, finger print images and investigator notes.”

Young said the simple interface will also allow users to create scripts, or virtual scenarios, for “what if” animations.

This will allow in-game computer characters to act out different variations of the crime, allowing users to share hypotheses about the crime with other investigators and juries within the game world.

“Game technology allows us as developers to create highly interactive and adaptable virtual environments,” said Young.

“The game world will support multiple concurrent users, allowing several CSIs to interact with each other while exploring the virtual crime scene.””

- Videogames find ways to help real CSI solve crimes | Reuters

aaronmeyers: YES chriswoebken: via www.teaser.fr

Thu, 03 Dec 2009 10:43:17 -0500

aaronmeyers:

YES

chriswoebken:

via www.teaser.fr

Years ago there was a company called Fault Analysis Associates...

Tue, 01 Dec 2009 18:38:40 -0500

Years ago there was a company called Fault Analysis Associates (fault.com was their URL) and their business was in simulating crimes using forensic evidence and 3D modeling. I thought surely that was the future — not of justice, but of entertainment. They were, like most futures, a) ahead of their time and b) outdone by China when it came time.

This is worth watching through. Fifty seconds in is especially good.

telia:

Chinese news uses CGI & avatars to re-enact what went down at Tiger Woods’ house. It’s like the new James Cameron movie, but better. (thx epak)

I wish I had a word for the complex and contradictory set of...

Tue, 01 Dec 2009 00:53:00 -0500

I wish I had a word for the complex and contradictory set of feelings that this video produces. It’s like watching an adorable kitten, an adorable kitten smoking crack.

telia: shesayshi: andrewromano: The steamer trunk where...

Tue, 01 Dec 2009 00:48:00 -0500

telia:

shesayshi:

andrewromano:

The steamer trunk where Stanley Kubrick kept scripts and treatments for his long-planned dream project, Napoleon. New York has more:

“It’s impossible to tell you what I’m going to do except to say that I expect to make the best movie ever made,” Stanley Kubrick wrote to an associate in October 1971.

"The shared intentionality lies at the basis of human society, Dr. Tomasello argues. From it flow..."

Mon, 30 Nov 2009 20:36:00 -0500

“The shared intentionality lies at the basis of human society, Dr. Tomasello argues. From it flow ideas of norms, of punishing those who violate the norms and of shame and guilt for punishing oneself. Shared intentionality evolved very early in the human lineage, he believes, and its probable purpose was for cooperation in gathering food. Anthropologists report that when men cooperate in hunting, they can take down large game, which single hunters generally cannot do. Chimpanzees gather to hunt colobus monkeys, but Dr. Tomasello argues this is far less of a cooperative endeavor because the participants act on an ad hoc basis and do not really share their catch.

An interesting bodily reflection of humans’ shared intentionality is the sclera, or whites, of the eyes. All 200 or so species of primates have dark eyes and a barely visible sclera. All, that is, except humans, whose sclera is three times as large, a feature that makes it much easier to follow the direction of someone else’s gaze. Chimps will follow a person’s gaze, but by looking at his head, even if his eyes are closed. Babies follow a person’s eyes, even if the experimenter keeps his head still.

Advertising what one is looking at could be a risk. Dr. Tomasello argues that the behavior evolved “in cooperative social groups in which monitoring one another’s focus was to everyone’s benefit in completing joint tasks.”

This could have happened at some point early in human evolution, when in order to survive, people were forced to cooperate in hunting game or gathering fruit. The path to obligatory cooperation — one that other primates did not take — led to social rules and their enforcement, to human altruism and to language.”

- http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/01/science/01human.html

I forgot a) how fucking good this was and b) that in its own way...

Mon, 30 Nov 2009 00:21:00 -0500

I forgot a) how fucking good this was and b) that in its own way — colors muted to the bright colors here — this is kind of the New York at the edges of my memory. I remember the Fordham Baldies, the Decepticons, the Johnson Avenue Boys. Someday, there should be a reunion for all of them. I would like to be in the band that plays there.

"INTERVIEWER: The supernatural keeps cropping up in practically everything you write, particularly..."

Sun, 29 Nov 2009 15:56:00 -0500

“

INTERVIEWER: The supernatural keeps cropping up in practically everything you write, particularly your short stories. Why this strong concern with the supernatural? Do you personally believe in the supernatural?

SINGER: Absolutely. The reason why it always comes up is because it is always on my mind. I don’t know if I should call myself a mystic, but I feel always that we are surrounded by powers, by mysterious powers, which play a great part in everything we are doing. I would say that telepathy and clairvoyance play a part in every love story. Even in business. In everything human beings are doing. For thousands of years people used to wear woolen clothes and when they took them off at night they saw sparks. I wonder what these people thought thousands of years ago of these sparks they saw when they took off their woolen clothes? I am sure that they ignored them and the children asked them, “Mother what are these sparks?” And I am sure the mother said, “You imagine them!” People must have been afraid to talk about the sparks … [but] we know now that they were real, and that what was behind these sparks was what drives our industry. And I say that we too in each generation see such sparks which we ignore because they don’t fit into our picture of science or knowledge. And I think it is the writer’s duty, and also pleasure and function, to bring out these sparks. To me, clairvoyance and telepathy and … and devils and imps … all of these things.

INTERVIEWER: Ghosts?

SINGER: Ghosts and all these things which today people call superstition are the very sparks which we are ignoring in our day.

”

- The Paris Review - The Art of Fiction No. 42

From Steven Soderbergh’s ”The Girlfriend...

Sun, 29 Nov 2009 15:33:00 -0500

From Steven Soderbergh’s ”The Girlfriend Experience”. Set in the weeks immediately following the unravelling of the Economic Crisis.

Left, Zizzo (Financier). Right, Chris (Personal Trainer).

Chris: “But. Let me ask you a question. You know, not to pry, but you guys… you guys are hurting right now. Everyone’s hurting right now. How do you … you’re going to spend money … you’re going to do this.”

Zizzo: “Sssself. Medicating.”

"With food stamp use at record highs and climbing every month, a program once scorned as a failed..."

Sun, 29 Nov 2009 15:08:30 -0500

“With food stamp use at record highs and climbing every month, a program once scorned as a failed welfare scheme now helps feed one in eight Americans and one in four children.

It has grown so rapidly in places so diverse that it is becoming nearly as ordinary as the groceries it buys. More than 36 million people use inconspicuous plastic cards for staples like milk, bread and cheese, swiping them at counters in blighted cities and in suburbs pocked with foreclosure signs.”

- The Safety Net - Across U.S., Food Stamp Use Soars and Stigma Fades - Series - NYTimes.com

heyitsnoah: Ivan Puig Art | Trend.Land -> Fashion Blog...

Sun, 29 Nov 2009 09:45:55 -0500

heyitsnoah:

Ivan Puig Art | Trend.Land -> Fashion Blog & Trend Magazine

"A typewritten list which appears to be a list of photographs is as follows: “15. The crew of..."

Wed, 25 Nov 2009 23:04:35 -0500

“A typewritten list which appears to be a list of photographs is as follows:

“15. The crew of a German bomber.

18. London during a bombardment.

19. A new way of earning money: poor folks stand in line before the Subway stations (in London), to sell their place in the shelter.

22. Labor police in the Ruhr territory.

36. The dead in the Libyan expedition.

38. Motorized German field churches.

42. BEVIN in the election campaign.

49. An American soldier meets two Japanese soldiers in the jungle.

50. Shipwrecked pilgrims (emigrees) on their way to Palestine.

54. Papuan-Negro leading American soldiers, which have become blind in the war, to the hospital.

55. A soldier frees a Negro in Detroit, Michigan.”

”

- Unabridged. Transcribed from FBI field agents, as recorded on page 20 in section two of Bertholt Brecht’s FBI file, available here.

Watching a BBC doc about the buildings of Berlin (screenshots,...

Wed, 25 Nov 2009 19:42:00 -0500

Watching a BBC doc about the buildings of Berlin (screenshots, above).

I never knew that the West, atop of the rubble of Teufelsberg, built a listening station — a tower to eavesdrop on conversations 300 miles away (! + ?) So claims the narrator, standing in the carcass.

Like the rest of the cold war, it’s fallen to disrepair. But I wonder exactly how that worked. And I wonder too, what they heard, beyond + besides what they listened for.

Clients From Hell, where have you been all this time?

Wed, 25 Nov 2009 19:31:35 -0500

Customer: Our budget is $4,000 but it is not so complex what we want. Have you used Outlook?
Me: Yes
Customer: We exactly that functionality in our site plus some other stuff.

heyitsnoah: keithobrien: Apologies for not sourcing the...

Wed, 25 Nov 2009 15:10:33 -0500

heyitsnoah:

keithobrien:

Apologies for not sourcing the creator, but this just wins 2010, which, I remind you, has not even started yet.

"State authorities are testing a plan that would see the Emergency Management Office issue alerts..."

Wed, 25 Nov 2009 12:13:30 -0500

“State authorities are testing a plan that would see the Emergency Management Office issue alerts over online gaming networks in addition to regular channels.

The goal, said New York State Deputy CIO Rico Singleton, is to reach younger residents who spend more time on the Xbox, PlayStation, or Wii than with television or radio…

Under the state’s plan, authorities would tap [Microsoft’s, Nintendo’s, Sony’s] networks to broadcast warnings about natural or man-made disasters.” Singleton it was logical, “considering the amount of time our youth spend on video games.””

- Interop: New York Tests Xbox-Based Alert System — InformationWeek

"If you allow players in an online world to penalize each other, you open the door to extortion: One..."

Wed, 25 Nov 2009 11:12:01 -0500

“If you allow players in an online world to penalize each other, you open the door to extortion:

One of the features that supported user socialization in the game was the ability to declare that another user was a trusted friend. The feature involved a graphical display that showed the faces of users who had declared you trustworthy outlined in green, attached in a hub-and-spoke pattern to your face in the center.

[…]

That feature was fine as far as it went, but unlike other social networks, The Sims Online allowed users to declare other users untrustworthy too. The face of an untrustworthy user appeared circled in bright red among all the trustworthy faces in a user’s hub.

It didn’t take long for a group calling itself the Sims Mafia to figure out how to use this mechanic to shake down new users when they arrived in the game. The dialog would go something like this:

“Hi! I see from your hub that you’re new to the area. Give me all your Simoleans or my friends and I will make it impossible to rent a house.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I’m a member of the Sims Mafia, and we will all mark you as untrustworthy, turning your hub solid red (with no more room for green), and no one will play with you. You have five minutes to comply. If you think I’m kidding, look at your hub-three of us have already marked you red. Don’t worry, we’ll turn it green when you pay…”

If you think this is a fun game, think again-a typical response to this shakedown was for the user to decide that the game wasn’t worth $10 a month. Playing dollhouse doesn’t usually involve gangsters.”

- Schneier on Security: Virtual Mafia in Online Worlds

"6:58:58 PM. 1) my nephew’s ok, 2) there’s a dead body at the main gate, 3) US denies..."

Wed, 25 Nov 2009 00:29:05 -0500

“6:58:58 PM. 1) my nephew’s ok, 2) there’s a dead body at the main gate, 3) US denies responsibility for bombing in Afghanistan. Over and out.”

- WikiLeaks to release over half a million 9/11 intercepts

More brilliance from "Clients from Hell"

Tue, 24 Nov 2009 18:05:21 -0500

Prospective client: $400 for a logo?! Why are you so expensive? My nephew has Photoshop—I can just get him to do it.
Me: Does your nephew have Microsoft Word?
Prospective client: Yes.
Me: Then have him write you a novel while he’s at it.

FORD TO CITY: DROP DEAD. At the edge of my consciousness as a...

Mon, 23 Nov 2009 12:10:00 -0500

FORD TO CITY: DROP DEAD. At the edge of my consciousness as a native. full image