Image: a snapshot I took in 2006 of ethnic Tibetan nuns praying in a temple in Lhasa, Tibet. This small temple is very close to the site of large protests taking place this week. Some of the women in this temple told me that fellow nuns had been jailed, tortured, or "disappeared" for expressing spiritual allegiance to the Dalai Lama, and to the notion of Tibetan sovereignty.
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The Chinese government this week dispatched military troops and police to important monasteries in Tibet to crack down on the largest protests by ethnic Tibetan Buddhist monks in the Himalayan region in 20 years. Witnesses are reporting that trucks full of troops have surrounded Drepung monastery in Lhasa, as police surround nearby Sera monastery. Snip from the Independent:
These two sites have strong symbolic significance, as they were the training grounds for the monks who led Tibet before the People's Liberation Army came in 1950 and ousted the Dalai Lama.
Protests began on Monday as monks marked the 49th anniversary of the failed uprising against Chinese rule that culminated in the Dalai Lama's exile. The protests are the biggest since the late 1980s, when riots led to martial law. Back then, China's current President, Hu Jintao, was the Communist Party chief in Tibet.
Signs of defiance in Tibet come just five months before the Olympic Games in Beijing, when the eyes of the world will be on China. Tibetan activists are expected to use the extra attention to highlight their cause.
Among the many reports today, this sad and symbolic story: two of the protesting monks from Drepung are in critical condition after stabbing their wrists and chests as a form of protest.
The two monks were identified as Kalsang and Damchoe, both originally from Kirti monastery in Sichuan province and now resident at Drepung monastery. Sources said the men had stabbed themselves in the chest, hands, and wrists. Both refused to be moved to hospital but were taken instead to the monastery clinic, the sources said.
"There are many other monks who hurt themselves in desperation, and protests are going on inside the monastery as of March 12 and 13," one source said. Another source described the two monks' condition as critical and said they were not expected to survive.
In English, "The heroes are tired," by a photographer on flickr whose name, in turn, translates to "heart of latex." There's also a blog (which contains adults-only material). (thanks, Susannah Breslin)
Here's Raphael's "Lady with a Unicorn," for those who were grossed out by the zit popping art film. It looks to me like the unicorn watched the video and the lady is peeved that her pet had been subjected to such trauma.
Nik Mercer says: I thought you BB guys would like this Q&A I -- along with another Anthem Online writer -- did with [Love and Rockets co-creator] Jaime Hernandez.
How do you feel about the characters you’ve created? Is there anything you wish you had done differently with them?
I think I would have had some of them settle down and create families at an earlier stage in their lives. It sounds corny, but that’s what a lot of people do eventually, even the deranged ones.
Aside from Maggie and Hopey, what character or characters are you most proud of? Which ones are the easiest to work with and why?
I really love two of my newer characters, Angel of Tarzana (above) and Vivian the Frogmouth. Vivian I can write blindfolded. Her sassy, spontaneous, obnoxious, difficult, sort of loser type of character has nothing to lose and those are always the easiest and funnest to write. Angel is easy to write as well, but on a different level. In her case, I needed someone more agreeable and supportive. Sort of like a Maggie that is more physically able.
Over on Boing Boing Gadgets our Joel has located one of the true shards of the holy dodecahedron of the original church of happy mutanthood: an ornate, steampunk mecha made from Legos. Life is sweet.
This model, by "Morgan19," is called the "Dardenbahst," a mecha with custom-painted golden touches which just gets better the more I look at it. It's far more functional and possible-looking than most. He even made a nice schematic image which you can see at the link below.
Now I understand why we have to do away with that pesky Bill of Rights -- there are over 900,000 names on US soil on a U.S. government terrorist watch list. The ACLU has a counter to show the latest number.
"At the current rate of growth, the U.S. watch lists will contain a million records by July. If there were a million terrorists in this country, our cities would be in ruins" said Barry Steinhardt, director of the ACLU's Technology and Liberty Program. "The absurd bloating of the terrorist watch lists is yet another example of how incompetence by our security apparatus threatens our rights without offering any real security."
The new counter features a rolling, odometer-style display with a real-time readout showing how many individuals are on the list at a given moment. The figures are extrapolated from a September 2007 report by the Inspector General of the Department of Justice, which reported that the Terrorist Screening Center had over 700,000 names in its database as of April 2007, and that the list was growing by an average of over 20,000 records per month. As of today, the list stands at approximately 917,000 names.
A gnome is walking the streets of Salta, Argentina at night, and he scaring the town's children.
A town in South America is living in fear after several sightings of a "creepy gnome" that locals claim stalks the streets at night.
The midget -- which wears a pointy hat and has a distinctive sideways walk -- was caught on video last week by a terrified group of youngsters.
... "One of my friends was so scared after seeing that thing that we had to take him to the hospital."
We believe these kids when they say it's not a prank, right?
Link(Via Arbroath)
I've just posted the first installment of a podcast reading of a new novella that I co-wrote with Hugo- and Nebula-nominee Benjamin Rosenbaum. The story's a big, 32,000-word piece called "True Names" (in homage to Vernor Vinge's famous story of the same name), and it involves the galactic wars between vast, post-Singularity intelligences that are competing to corner the universe's supply of computation before the heat-death of the universe.
Ben and I will be reading the story in weekly installments, taking turns as our schedules allow. The reading is Creative Commons licensed -- Attribution-ShareAlike-NonCommercial -- and the story itself will be published this fall in Fast Forward 2, Lou Anders' followup to his knockout 2007 anthology, Fast Forward (regular Boing Boing readers will remember Paul Di Filippo's Wikiworld story from that volume). Lou's given us permission to post the story's text simultaneous with the book's publication, under the same Creative Commons license.
I had a nearly illegal amount of fun working on this story with Ben, who is a gonzo comp-sci geek with a real flair for phrasing, and I hope you'll enjoy hearing it as much as we enjoyed writing it!
Link, Podcast feed
Bestselling author Terry Pratchett has donated $1,000,000 to fund Alzheimer's research. Pratchett announced that he had a rare form of early-onset Alzheimer's last December, and he's since discovered that there's an enormous gap in the science of Alzheimer's, noting, "I'd eat the arse out of a dead mole if it offered a fighting chance."
“I am, along with many others, scrabbling to stay ahead long enough to be there when the Cure comes along. Say it will be soon – there's nearly as many of us as there are cancer sufferers, and it looks as if the number of people with dementia will double within a generation. In most cases, alongside the sufferer you will find a spouse suffering as much. It is a shock to find out that funding for Alzheimer’s research is just 3% of that to find cancer cures.”
Mr Pratchett’s donation is in recognition of the urgent need to provide funding for research into the disease, which affects an estimated 700,000 people in the UK. For every person with Alzheimer's, £11 is spent each year on UK research compared with £289 for each cancer patient, even though similar numbers of people are affected.
Xeni speaks with author and Wired editor in chief Chris Anderson, and "airplane geek" Jordi Munoz, about the quest to create the ultimate sub-$100 aerial drone. One design involved the use of a Nintendo Wii controller. UAVs are often associated with military combat or police surveillance, but what "friendlier" uses might we put them to, in civilian hands? Shot at the O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference in San Diego, California.
Link to Boing Boing tv blog post with discussion thread, more about the project and related blimp ventures, and downloadable video.
From rootkits to hair-metal, from suing Neil Young to ditching Bob Dylan, from nuking Napster to passing on the Beatles, Blender Magazine rounds up the 20 worst gaffes of the record industry, going all the way back to Tom Edison's dismissal of Jazz.
#2 Decca Records A&R exec tells Fab Four, “No, thanks”
Dick Rowe was not the only record-label executive who passed on the Beatles in the early ’60s, but he was the only one who brushed off their manager, Brian Epstein, with the astute prediction that: “Groups with guitars are on their way out.” Epstein begged Rowe to reconsider, so Rowe hopped a train to Liverpool to check out the band live. When he arrived at the Cavern, he found a mob of kids trying to force their way into the club in the pouring rain. Annoyed, he smoked a cigarette, went home and signed Brian Poole and the Tremeloes instead.
Unintended consequence: The Monkees
Stabo makes men's "Bivvy Trousers" out of surplus WWII British military tents, turning the thick, lightly waxed canvas into comfortable pants. I bought a pair on Sunday and they're incredibly comfortable and look great. I feel like the canvas is going to last for years, and the stitching and construction is both thoughtful and thorough (I love the grommeted back pockets, too!).
After many attempts to find the perfect recycled material, we finally found a pair of World War II era Bivouac tents languishing in a dusty warehouse. Luckily they make fantastic trousers and because they are individually cut and sewn each pair is unique.
The cut evolved through a process of making and remaking till we eventually developed this relaxed fit. The legs were really long so we rolled them up and that became part of the look….although we are happy to shorten them.
The trousers are either dark brown, tan, dark green or faded green, but we don’t have every size in every colour. As these trousers are made from used tents there are inconsistencies, marks and even patches where they were mended and which all add to their charm.
Subterranean Press has produced a free MP3 audiobook of Charlie Stross's comic science fiction novella "Trunk and Disorderly."
Charles Stross is damned funny, both in person and on the page. You’ll have to take my word on the first count. As to the second, here’s a P. G. Wodehouse meets Robert A. Heinlein as filtered through Mr. Stross’s sensibilities. In other words, it’s funny and indescribable as hell, and probably my favorite story this year.
Here's Raphael's "Lady with a Unicorn," for those who were grossed out by the zit popping art film. It looks to me like the unicorn watched the video and the lady is peeved that her pet had been subjected to such trauma.
