Baby Giraffe!
The Woodland Park Zoo just welcomed their latest addition, a baby giraffe. It’s pretty adorable. But really, most baby animals are. As proof, have a look at the baby section of the zoo website. You’ll find otter pups, jaguar cubs, baby sloth bears, the red-crowned crane chick, lion cubs, penguin chicks, and much more.
That takes stones!
Check out this penthouse! Now… this would be very cool if an architect had designed it, and it was all part of the plan for the building. Strangely, that is not the case. It seems the owner of the top floor of this high rise in China just decided to create a giant stone fortress on top of the building and his neighbours are not pleased. There have been complaints of cracked walls, leaks, noise, and a general fear (not too far fetched I’d say) that the whole building could collapse. The authorities are now involved (finally?!), and it’s possible that the professor will have to demolish his fortress. At least, that’s what I’m getting from the translated Chinese news story.
It’s Bigger On The Inside!
A fun treat from the Google maps, thanks to Jalopnik. As you see, in the screenshot from street view of Earl’s Court Road in London, the Doctor has left the TARDIS hidden in plain sight. But it gets even better. You can go inside and poke around. Click this link to go to Earl’s Court Road. Once there, look for the double navigation arrows. Clicking those will take you inside the TARDIS, where you can roam around. Here’s a shot from the balcony overlooking the controls.
Sony’s Solution to Cell Phone Camera Quality
Occasionally, something comes along and you think, “That is a really neat idea.” But then, if you think about it in practical terms, it really doesn’t hold up. Such is the case with the new announcement from Sony. They have come up with a rather clever way to get better photos using your cell phone. The solution is a camera lens with a built in sensor, processor, and memory that will connect magnetically to your cell phone. There are two versions: The DSC-QX10 and the DSC-QX100.
With the appropriate software, your cell phone screen becomes the viewfinder for the ‘lens’. It’s a cool idea, but have a look at that picture. Is that something you are going to want to use with any regularity? It creates a whole production out of taking a simple photo. And given the cumbersome nature of transporting that lens everywhere, you could just be carrying a proper camera.
I am all for pushing the envelope where mobile photography is concerned, but count me in the camp that is looking for slightly thicker bodies that provide extra room for the camera bits but remain pocketable. My current phone could actually be twice as thick as it is with no noticeable difference in the day to day use. And if all that extra space was taken up with a better camera and more battery I would be quite the happy camper. You can find more info about the DSC-QZ10 and DSC-QX100, and more pictures, at Sony Alpha Rumors.
Blink and you’ll miss it
If you don’t count yourself as a follower of Formula 1, you might not know that they no longer refuel the cars during pit-stops. Every car has to start the race with enough fuel to finish it. Along with being safer, it also means that the cars get increasingly faster as the race goes on. Burning all that fuel sheds an awful lot of weight. In addition, not having to wait for the tank to be filled means that pit-stop times have become amazingly quick. We’re now on the verge of seeing the first sub-2 second pit stop. Yes, that’s changing all four tires in under two seconds. Red Bull has produced a video showing how they manage such a thing. It all looks very cool in slow motion, but hang around for the end to see it in real time.
Marilyn Monroe – Builder of drones!
If you are any sort of pop-culture aficionado you have seen the above picture before. It’s of little-known factory worker Norma Jean Dougherty, who would later go on to become Marilyn Monroe. I bring it up because there are a few fun bits to link you to.
First, that’s Norma Jean with a drone! The word drone has a lot of negative connotations in present day parlance, but in reality it is just an unmanned aerial vehicle. What you see Norma Jean working on, or posing with at least, is the OQ-2 Radioplane. The OQ-2 was used to train anti-aircraft gunners. The man behind the OQ-2, Reginald Denny, has an interesting story as well.
Getting back to the picture, the story of how it came to be, and how it served to start Norma Jean’s transition to becoming Marilyn is an interesting one. There is a good version of it on The Pop History Dig.
Dirty, dirty, disk
Despite how many times I’ve seen it, I am still occasionally surprised when I crack open an old server and see just how much dirt there is caked on everything. This latest example came out of a 9×9 that has been in service, most likely without ever being opened, for years.
Missed it… by ‘THAT’ much
We’re all very excited to have Raul back in Seattle!
Windows Phone App Studio
Microsoft is clearly playing catch-up in the phone game. In both hardware sales and app catalogs, Apple and Android have a large lead. Today brings another arrow aimed at both of those shortcomings. The Windows Phone App Studio sets out to lower the bar for entry to the app building game. Using a web-based template, users can use a variety of templates to get started creating their first app and then side-load it on their phone.
Of course, with the addition of a dev account, that app can also be submitted to the Windows Phone Store. That could open the floodgates that swell available app numbers. Granted, a lot of those will not be of the best quality, but have you had a good look around the Apple and Android app stores? It wouldn’t be anything any different.
The more interesting bit though, and possibly what could lure users away from their iPhones and Android devices, is the ability to make your own personal app, with no intention of every making it available to the public. If Microsoft can develop the web based studio to the point that useful one-off apps are reliable and reasonably easy to get up and running, it could be a very attractive feature of the Windows Phone system.
At the moment, the interface is pretty slick, but there are some growing pains. Logos can only be png, and while there are feed reading bits built into the system, it seems an atom feed isn’t supported. Still, it is certainly an interesting idea.
Oh… Discovery Channel…
I don’t think those words mean what you think they mean…
The latest in an ever-growing line of disappointments from the Discovery Channel took place Sunday night as they kicked off the yearly Shark Week. The big event was Megalodon: The Monster Shark That Lives. The “documentary” was supposed to reveal evidence that the long-extinct creature was still out there in the oceans. They had “scientists”, on an “expedition”, “eye-witness accounts”, “photographic evidence”… If you are wondering about my sudden penchant for putting things in quotes, it’s because every last bit of this thing was fiction. There was no sunken boat. No whale bitten in half. The scientist was an actor. Etc.. etc… etc… There’s a great open letter to Discovery by Christie Wilcox at Discover Magazine’s website that breaks it all down.
And that’s either sad, or infuriating, depending on how you look at it. Even more so if you take a hop over to the Discovery Corporate page and check out the description of what the Discovery Channel is intended (or claims) to be.
Discovery Channel, one of the most widely distributed cable networks in the U.S., is dedicated to creating the highest quality non-fiction content that informs and entertains its consumers about the world in all its wonder, diversity and amazement.
Quality non-fiction they say. In all seriousness, Megalodon was just slightly less fictitious than Sharknado. It’s so absurd at its core that my ridiculous image opening this article could have been used as ‘proof’ that giant sharks are roaming the Seattle waterfront. And when you add it to the sad likes of Amish Mafia, Devil’s Ride, and Saint Hoods it doesn’t paint a very nice picture of how far the channel has fallen from its original vision.
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