Phillip Torrone made this great video about the stuff in the new issue of CRAFT vol. 4. (My wife, Carla Sinclair, is editor-in-chief) Link

Mick sez, "Carnegie Mellon University and The Mattress Factory sponsored a community-based robot art class called 'Robo250.' For the opening--final exam as wine and cheese art reception--a few of us (the students) decided to build robots entirely made of food so that they could be eaten at the reception. See the results (including a 5 minute how to make your own robot food sculpture) at MAYA's make site." Link (Thanks, Mick!)

Dan sez, "In my ongoing search for people more obsessed with Disneyland than I am, I found pictures of former teen idol Bobby Sherman standing in his backyard with his scratchbuilt, 1/5 scale model of Main Street, USA. Who knew he was such an Imaginerd?" Link (Thanks, Dan!)

Pam Samuelson is one of the most important copyright scholars in the world, someone respected by players on all sides of the debate, and she has just published a paper modestly entitled "Preliminary Thoughts on Copyright Reform." "Preliminary Thoughts" is a brisk and readable 16-page paper that traces the origin of the present, 200+ page copyright frankenstatute, a law that has been amended 20 times since it was codified in 1976, so that it can barely be understood by experts, let alone by laypeople. However, laypeople are ever-more under its jurisdiction, since practically everything we do on the Internet involves making copies.

So Pam wants to revisit copyright, redraft it from the start, refactoring it like a Wikipedia article that has grown too large and weird to be properly understood. This is a capital idea, and her very concrete suggestions set out both a plan of attack and a set of principles that would make copyright safe for the age of the Internet.

By focusing on these core elements of copyright, I do not mean to suggest that nothing but these elements should be in a model copyright law or principles document. Yet perhaps anything else nominated for inclusion in the model law or principles should have to be accompanied by a justification as to why it needs to be there, and why it should not be achieved through common law evolution of copyright law by judges or delegated to an administrative rule-making process.102

A model copyright law should also be written in plain English so ordinary people, and not just the high priests of copyright, can understand what it means and the normative reason that it should be part and parcel of the basic statutory framework.103 A model copyright law should also articulate the purposes that it seeks to achieve and offer some guidance about how competing interests should be balanced, perhaps through a series of comments on the model law or principles.104

PDF Link

Lisa Jo Rudy, the About.com guide to Autism, writes about recent studies that suggest autistic kids are especially attracted to Thomas Tank Engine.

The study suggests that children with autism are engaged by the simple emotions on the faces of the characters. I'm not buying it. In fact, MOST TV and toys intended for preschoolers is focused on simple emotions and exaggerated facial expressions and body language. You don't need an antiquated steam engine to show "I am sad" - it's in every "educational" show on the air.

My personal belief is that Thomas is especially interesting to kids with autism because (1) the trains do a great deal of falling, crashing, and smashing - something that appeals to our kids and is tough to fun on other PBS or Disney programs for preschoolers and (2) the toy trains line up beautifully, and our kids love to line things up. They can even be lined up according to color, something that can be very soothing to kids with autism.

Link

Reader comment:

David says:

My mother has worked with autistic children (along with other children with special needs) for over 15 years. She first told me that she spotted a connection between autistic children, especially non-verbal kids, and Thomas about five or six years ago. While the thought of lining toys up, etc. are all probably valid, my mother has always told a deeper, though anecdotal connection.

If you've ever been around a reasonably high-functioning, non-verbal autistic child, you can usually tell that their minds are up to something, but it's just about impossible to get them to externalize those thoughts in a way that most of us can understand--e.g words or even facial expressions. Thomas the Tank Engine characters may be happy, sad, or angry, but even though you hear what they "say," they never actively talk and their faces are still.

It's not exactly empirical evidence, but she has seen it in nearly every autistic child she has worked with.

Just a different angle... Not from personal experience, but I trust the source

Keep up the exemplary blogging and making.

Michael says:

I'm a long-time boingboing reader, and I have a fair bit of experience with this phenomenon.

The younger of my two sons, (8), is autistic and a Thomas the Tank Engine fan of epic proportions.

My wife and I have invested approximately 13 ba-friggin-jillion dollars (conservative estimate) in Thomas paraphernalia: Engines, VHS tapes, DVDs, wooden track, play-sets, train tables, birthday party supplies, stickers, clothing etc.

He is rather non-communicative, but definitely NOT non-talkative. Most of his speech consists of lines that he repeats from episodes of Thomas, as well as from a few other shows.

Thomas was also the prime motivation for him to teach himself how to read, how to type (touch-type, no less), and how to search and browse the internet.

Although Lisa Jo Rudy's experiences with autistic children are quite a bit broader than my own, I think that she may be a bit hasty in discounting the appeal of the emotions which the engines on the show display, and more specifically, HOW they are displayed.

HUGE DISCLAIMER:Bearing in mind that making broad statements concerning autism is not always the most well-advised of choices, especially for someone in my position (i.e. not a psychologist, therapist or special education teacher, only a parent) I'll limit my observations to my child alone.

The appeal of Thomas to my son is, I believe, multi-faceted in nature:

1) a large cast of readily recognizable characters. They are colorful, have unique shapes, and it's fun having their names committed to memory.

2) quite a bit of dialogue. This too is fun to memorize. One of Nicholas' favorite things to do is to recite long stretches of dialogue, and to have me repeat it back to him. Also, now that he's memorized every episode, they no longer contain surprises for him, and he anticipates every action and line of dialogue. When he was much younger, he used to enjoy turning light switches off and on. Now, he rewinds and replays certain parts of an episode. I believe these are behaviors which are based in the desire for predictability, and for the power to effect 100% predictable results.

3) the action of the shows is readily re-enactable with materials at hand, and when you do, it looks ALMOST EXACTLY like it does on the show.

4) the faces that the characters make when displaying emotions: The important difference between Thomas the Tank Engine, and almost every other show geared for children is the manner in which various emotions are evinced by the characters. The faces of the characters, owing to the way in which the show is produced (live-action and stop-action), are completely static and non-animated. There are no slow progressions from one emotion to another with these characters. They are either happy, or angry, or surprised, or tired, or scared, with no middle ground or in-between-ness.

Moreover, the emotional state of the character in question is usually reinforced by explicit statements from the narrator, i.e. "Thomas was surprised" or "Bill and Ben were angry", etc. For a very long time, Nicholas' repertoire of expressions (and the ones which he had me replicate for him on demand) were: happy, sad, and surprised. He and I have played this particular game countless hundreds of times, which is more than enough for me to be aware of the fact that this holds a special appeal to him.

Never trust robots. YouTube Link to Andrew Thompson's xlntawesomehilarious electropop "We're in Business." This is the greatest thing ever in the last 30 minutes of my life. Get the song: iTunes, lewisrecordings.com, myspace, and more myspace. (thanks Sean!)

Videos of talks from the TED's first conference in Africa are now online. "Africa: The Next Chapter" took place in Tanzania this June, and brought together a number of very interesting thinkers from around the continent, with counterparts from around the globe.

Above, faces from some of the newly uploaded videos this week:

* LEFT: Ghanaian economist George Ayittey talked about "Hippos" (older-generation, slow-thinking) versus "Cheetahs" ("a new breed of Africans"). His speech is a firey condemnation of corrupt leaders and the complacency that allows them to thrive. Video Link.

* CENTER: 19-year-old Malawian inventor William Kamkwamba, who built a an electricity-generating windmill from spare parts for his family at age 14. He created the generator from rough plans he found in a library book. Video Link.

* RIGHT: Ms. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, the former Finance Minister of Nigeria, who gave a talk about aid versus trade. Video Link.

Link. (Thanks, Emeka Okafor!)

Previously on BoingBoing:

Kid in Malawi homebrews a windmill generator

Deconstructing Vanity Fair's "Africa" issue

Cloth cult: "Why Congolese men rather starve to death than look cheap."

Femi Kuti: Don't pity Africa, visit it and trade with us

Stop trying to "save" Africa

China's humanitarian efforts in Africa

How to write about Africa

James Lileks is having a grand old time poking fun at old comic book covers in a new section of his website called "Funny Books: Dubious Moments in Comic History."

The POPular Teen-agers go the beach, where the sand is GRANular, then get on a tiny boat about seven feet long. After heading into the open waters with no training whatsoever, followed by birds who expect they will pick the corpses clean soon. They fish. A ”snicker-filled story” presumably follows. If you want to give yourself a headache, attempt to figure out the sequence of events that led to Honey Bunn holding Butch in a posture that defies gravity, the rules of the sea, and basic common sense.

Note that Butch appears to be afraid of tuna.

Link

The International Rocketbelt Convention is taking place at Niagara Falls Air Reserve Station, Niagara Falls, New York on August 11-12 2007, 09:00 A.M. to 4:30 P.M.

Rocketbelt test-pilots, builders, and enthusiasts from around the world will be in attendance.

Original Bell Aerosystems Rocketbelt Pilots Harold Graham and William Suitor will recount their humorous and harrowing tales of the early 1960s when they traveled the globe, demonstrating the world’s first personal propulsion system, invented by Bell Rocket Engineer Wendell F. Moore. In the spring of 1963, Rocketbelt Pilots Robert F. Courter, Jr. and Peter L. Kedzierski flew before a million spectators at the International Aviation and Space Exposition in Paris, where they were hailed as “The Bird Men.” Current day rocketbelt builders will tell how to build your own rocketbelt, and display their own creations. There will be a rocketbelt static test demonstration, and on Saturday and Sunday morning, GoFast! Rocketman Eric Scott will open the Airshow with actual JETPACK flight demonstrations.

Link