Just Landed: Processing, Twitter, MetaCarta & Hidden Data I have a friend who has a Ph.D in bioinformatics. Over a beer last week, we ended up discussing the H1N1 flu virus, epidemic modeling, and countless other fascinating and somewhat scary things. She told me that epidemiologists have been experimenting with alternate methods of creating transmission models – specifically, she talked about a group that was using data from the Where’s George? project to build a computer model for tracking and predicting the spread of contagions (which I read about again in this NYTimes article two days later). This got me thinking about the data that is hidden in various social network information streams – Facebook & Twitter updates in particular. The idea is simple: Find tweets that contain this phrase, parse out the location they’d just landed in, along with the home location they list on their Twitter profile, and use this to map out travel in the Twittersphere (yes, I just used the phrase ‘Twittersphere’). Just Landed – 36 Hours from blprnt on Vimeo.
Israel, Malaysia leapfrog NZ for global competitiveness By Esther Goh, New Zealand has been named the 25th most competitive economy out of 142 countries, conceding two places from last year's ranking after being leapfrogged by Israel and Malaysia. Switzerland placed first for the third year in a row in the Global Competitiveness Report – produced annually by the World Economic Forum – followed by Singapore which overtook Sweden to claim second position. The competitiveness index consists of 111 indicators categorised into 12 pillars of competitiveness in three sub-indices: Basic requirements such as institutions and infrastructure; efficiency enhancers such as market efficiency and size; and innovation and sophistication factors. While New Zealand continues to do well in in the first two areas, rated 17th (14th last year) and 18th (same as last year) respectively, our infrastructure ranking falls short – particularly in quality of electricity supply, mobile telephone subscriptions, rail and road. Share this on See also Tagged as
Kickstarter of the Week: Plant-In City Offers an Internet of Vegetation | Wired Design Plants are the best. They’re pretty, they clean the air, they’re good listeners, and they don’t eat your furniture. On the downside, they need regular care, and they’re lousy communicators. Plant-In City is a modular series of frames that can be combined to create a customized plant habitat. Click to Open Overlay Gallery “It started from a simple idea: Can we water our plants remotely with our iPhones while traveling or off site?” But as the team dove deeper into the design, their vision grew. Even as budding horticulturalists, de Llarena admits there was a period of learning as they developed the project. They’ve fostered better communication by beaming the levels of light, humidity, moisture and temperature to the Internet, which will be accessible via Plant-In’s website or through mobile apps. The modular box system is key to creating a pleasing space. Despite the geometric regularity of the right-angled frames, the construction as a whole has a natural feel. Go Back to Top.
In the Air 2011 September 7 - J102815: A Star That Should Not Exist Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer. 2011 September 7 SDSS J102915+172927: A Star That Should Not Exist Image Credit: ESO, DSS2 Explanation: Why does this star have so few heavy elements? Stars born in the generation of our Sun have an expected abundance of elements heavier than hydrogen and helium mixed into their atmospheres. Tomorrow's picture: a sharper image Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)NASA Official: Phillip Newman Specific rights apply.NASA Web Privacy Policy and Important NoticesA service of:ASD at NASA / GSFC& Michigan Tech.
5 Ways Modern Men Are Trained to Hate Women Photos.com I don't know what it's like to be a woman, so it's not easy for me to describe what it's like to be a man, because I don't know what you're using for context. I'm going to do my best: Did you ever watch old cartoons where a character is starving on a desert island, and when another character approaches, he's so hungry that he imagines the other character as a talking piece of food? Via TV TropesThird panel omitted due to graphic content. It's like that for most men, most of the time. Right now I'm reading a book from mega-selling fantasy author George R. "When she went to the stables, she wore faded sandsilk pants and woven grass sandals. That's written from the woman's point of view. Do you see what I'm getting at? Photos.comWe also assume you have the taste of a pimp. Go look at a city skyline. All those wars we fight? It's all about you. Photos.comNope. This is really the heart of it, right here. Which brings us back to where we started. Via Wikipedia Via Caglecartoons.com
Movie Clips | The Emergence Project [QT: NTSC 16:9 720 x 480 px, 5:51, 410MB] [QT small: 320 x 240 px, 5:51, 24MB] The Emergence Project, documentation video clip [QT: NTSC 720 x 480 px, 120MB] [QT small: 320 x 240 px, 24MB] Movie clip describing the Emergence Project. The screen capture resolution represents ~5% of the installation at Hyde Park Art Center.
Astronomy Photographer of the Year 2011 9 September 2011Last updated at 09:44 From giant oval storms on the surface of Jupiter to colourful wispy remnants from a supernova explosion and the dazzling green curtain of the Northern Lights - nearly 800 images were submitted for the latest Astronomy Photographer of the Year competition. Take a look at some of the winning photos with two of the judges from the Royal Observatory Greenwich, public astronomer Marek Kukula and astronomy programmes manager Olivia Johnson. Continue reading the main story Click the bottom right of the slideshow for detailed captions. The judges' choice of the best images can be seen in a free exhibition at the Royal Observatory Greenwich, London, until February 2012. Astronomy Photographer of the Year is run by the Royal Observatory Greenwich and Sky at Night Magazine. Music courtesy KPM Music. Related: National Maritime Museum - Astronomy Photographer of the Year 2011 Royal Observatory Greenwich Sky at Night Magazine More audio slideshows: Probing plasma
My dead hard drive story - StumbleUpon Books Processing: A Programming Handbook for Visual Designers and Artists Casey Reas and Ben Fry (Foreword by John Maeda). Published August 2007, MIT Press. 736 pages. Hardcover. » Order from Amazon.com Downloads: Table of Contents and Index (PDF, 500 KB) Sample Chapters with Contents and Index (PDF, 7.6 MB) All code examples in the book (ZIP, 24 MB) Errata (Updated 8 January 2014) This book is an introduction to the ideas of computer programming within the context of the visual arts. It targets an audience of computer-savvy individuals who are interested in creating interactive and visual work through writing software but have little or no prior experience. The majority of the book is divided into tutorial units discussing specific elements of software and how they relate to the arts. Essays by Alexander R. If you are an educator, you can request a desk/exam copy from the MIT Press website.
Lightweight Cable Made of Braided Nanotubes Could Replace Copper Wires Cables made out of nanowires could be just as efficient as the copper cables we've been using for more than a century, but at a fraction of the weight, according to a new paper. Braiding billions of carbon nanotubes into a nanowire cable can efficiently replace copper in a light bulb circuit. Traditional cables are made by braiding or twisting together two or more wires or optical fibers, usually metal or silicon, to carry a current or signal. In a new study, Rice University researchers instead used double-walled carbon nanotubes, made of concentric rolled-up sheets of graphene. To make the cable, the team grew billions of nanotubes and spun them with a polymer into tiny wires just a few centimeters long. To prove it worked, Rice doctoral student Yao Zhao built a circuit that directed power through the nanocable, replacing copper wire. The work appears in the journal Nature Scientific Reports. [via PhysOrg]
Get Internet Access When Your Government Shuts It Down These days, no popular movement goes without an Internet presence of some kind, whether it's organizing on Facebook or spreading the word through Twitter. And as we've seen in Egypt, that means that your Internet connection can be the first to go. Whether you're trying to check in with your family, contact your friends, or simply spread the word, here are a few ways to build some basic network connectivity when you can't rely on your cellular or landline Internet connections. Do-It-Yourself Internet With Ad-Hoc Wi-Fi Even if you've managed to find an Internet connection for yourself, it won't be that helpful in reaching out to your fellow locals if they can't get online to find you. Advanced freedom fighters can set up a portal Web page on their network that explains the way the setup works, with Daihinia instructions and a local download link so they can spread the network even further. Back to Basics Always Be Prepared In the land of no Internet connection, the man with dial-up is king.