Here's a gem from William Gurstelle's Notes from the Technology Underground blog. After newspapers reported that the U.S. military accidentally sent four nuclear-missile detonators to Taiwan in 2006 without until just now realizing it, Gurstelle looked into the history of the Mark 12 missile and found out it was retired in 1962.

The triggers were for Mark -12 nuclear weapons. The Mark 12, nicknamed "Brock" by those who have pet names for atomic bombs, hasn't been part of the nuclear arsenal since 1962. These things have been outdated for 46 years. I think (this is no joke) that a Mark-12 trigger uses vacuum tubes.

So, my question is, why are we keeping so much junk in our nuclear attics? Even my mom finally cleared out her basement (throwing away my collection of vintage Archie comics, but that's another issue.)

No doubt there are still a thousand crates of horse liniment for the cavalry or a million sticks of slowmatch for flintlock rifles piled next to the Mark-12 triggers as well.

Link

Mott tells a story in the comment thread on Adoption and corruption: human trafficking busts in Guatemala.

For those of you (and I count a couple among the posters here) who appear willing to condone or turn a blind eye to human trafficking in the name of some “higher good,” allow me to share a story which, in a sense, may put the proverbial shoe on the other foot. For this could have happened to you.

It is a story that my wife and I have told practically no one. At first, in the wake of the incident, because it was too horrible and unsettling to talk about, and, much later, because the horror had thankfully receded into the distant past. But it definitely happened, and it definitely colors my views today on Guatemalan adoptions.

I am an American. Back in the 1980s I worked for several years in Guatemala as a development worker with a well-known NGO with projects all over the country, though I was based in the capital city. In 1984 my Guatemalan wife and I were blessed with a beautiful baby girl (biological offspring).

Like many people in my line of work we had a paid housekeeper. One day when our little girl was maybe seven months old our housekeeper had to walk down the street about five short blocks to get some small sundry, like milk or something, at a little store there. She asked my wife for permission to take the baby with her, and my wife said of course. (You must understand that we trusted our wonderful indigenous housekeeper implicitly, and besides, Zone 10 of the city was far more tranquil back then, notwithstanding the war in the countryside.) As for me, I was at work 15 blocks away in the office.

Scarcely a block from the little store, the housekeeper carrying our daughter swaddled in a colorful peraje was accosted by a microbus which sped up to her from behind and cut her off. Inside (I am told) was a male driver and 4-5 “well-dressed women.” (Bear in mind, this is our housekeeper’s account.) Through an open window of the microbus a woman deftly squirted the contents of what looked like a large syringe into our baby daughter’s face. Not injected, but squirted through the air. And indeed, it appeared this would have been an abduction, had not something miraculous and ironic happened in that instant. An army jeep with 3-4 soldiers came around another nearby corner and stopped in front of the tienda! They did nothing, really, except that one or two of them went into the tienda to buy something -- but the mere sight of them on this very tranquil street must have spooked the people in the microbus, for they suddenly sped off as quickly as they had approached.

Our housekeeper came back home in a panic with our baby. Police were called, and about three of them showed up very quickly in a patrol car, including one female officer who took down our report. I had just arrived home from work, and was quickly apprised of the situation. Our baby, swaddled and deeply asleep in the same peraje, smelled vaguely of rotten eggs, and both the housekeeper and the police officer said that was from the liquid they had squirted in her face – evidently some sort of chemical with a tranquilizing effect. The police had evidently seen or heard of this before; in fact, they seemed unsurprised by any of the details recounted to them.

Well, the moment passed, and we eventually all returned to normalcy. We’ve been back in the States for many years now (except for the housekeeper, of course). Our little girl is fully grown, graduated from college, and on her own now working at a wonderful job in DC. But we might well have lost her forever, and there is not a shadow of doubt that our daughter might have become one more statistic in the horrible saga of human trafficking and illegal adoptions.

Folks, there is NO PRINCIPLED MORAL DISTINCTION that can be made between kidnapping for adoption or selling a child for adoption. It is human trafficking, and it is wrong. If a child is sold, it doesn't matter if you are the seller or the buyer, and if the latter, it matters not a whit whether you paid the cash yourself or paid someone else to pay the cash.

Moreover, I agree wholeheartedly with the poster here who noted that those who adopt because they want to “save” a child should really consider how many more children they could save by devoting the same resources to vitally needed community development efforts in the country where the children live.

Link.

In 1990 Gary Weaver of Ohio was alleged to have bought $21.64 cents worth of merchandise from a store, using a roll of dimes to pay for part of the bill. After he left, a store employee discovered that the roll was filled with pennies, and that roll was capped with a dime on each end.

The long arm of the law caught up with Mr. Weaver on Wednesday and Municipal Court Judge Richard Bernat set a $1 million bond on the case.

That means Weaver is in the jail – that officials say is overcrowded and in need of replacement – on a bond that is $999,978.36 higher than the amount he is accused of stealing 18 years ago.

Link (Thanks, Beryllium on #boingboing IRC!)

A TSA agent told a woman she would have to remove her nipple rings if she wanted to pass the security checkpoint. The woman has retained Gloria Allred as her attorney.

A woman was forced by the Transportation Security Administration to remove her nipple rings before she was allowed to board a flight, an attorney said on Thursday.

"The woman was given a pair of pliers in order to remove the rings in her nipples," said Los Angeles attorney Gloria Allred. "The rings had been in her nipples for many years."

Link (Thanks, BadSneakers on #boingboing IRC!)

Here's a video of Fadhel Al-Said, a "researcher on astronomy," sharing his surprising findings about the shape Earth and the physics of the solar system with Iraqi television viewers.

Statement by a round-earther physicist: When you watch a ship sailing towards the shore, all you see at first is the mast. Then you see the bow, and eventually the entire ship.

Fadhel Al-Said: When you stand on the beach and look into the distance, everything you see is in the visible distance. In the blurred distance, you cannot see a thing. Later on as the ship gets closer to the shore or the harbor, you see the upper part. How do you see it? The eye, as I have said, no doctor has succeeded in understanding how the eye works.

Link

The Telegraph reports that 70 students from the Queen Elizabeth School in Kirkby Lonsdale, Cumbria, were joined by over 100 other youths to celebrate an end of term party by "having unprotected sex in a village square."

Alison Hughes, the deputy head of the Queen Elizabeth School in Kirkby Lonsdale, Cumbria, was so concerned that she detailed the "catalogue of disasters" in a two-page letter to parents, warning them about the sexual activity, violent behaviour and alleged drug abuse that took place.

She wrote: "We have had to help a disturbingly high number of girls through the aftermath of having unprotected sex that evening, most of whom have told us they were too drunk to be in control of themselves. The risks are real. Assume the worst."

Neil Taplin, the landlord of the nearby George and Dragon pub, said that youths had urinated against his wall and sworn at him when he refused to sell them cigarettes. "They were a law to themselves," he said. "It was upsetting for people in the village. We are all quite close and look out for each other."

A resident involved in the clean-up said that she saw evidence of drug use, blood stains and broken glass and said that a newly fitted sink had been smashed.

Link (Via Arbroath)

Clean Air Gardening sells this purple-tinted glasses that are supposed to help you identify unhealthy, chlorophyll-deficient plants before it's too late.

The lenses block out the green reflected by chlorophyll in the healthy areas of your lawn and garden, causing those areas to show as black or gray. Any unhealthy spots, deficient in chlorophyll, will show up as pink, red or coral colors. It's the plant equivalent of full-body MRIs that detect problems before their symptoms surface.

Link

A kit to help you solve Rubik's Cube in 9.18 seconds or less. From Tokyomango:

Speed cubing is a serious serious sport, and there are certain tricks of the trade that help you with it--you can loosen the screws holding the cubes together, or dissect and lubricate the moving parts. This Speed Cubing Kit by MegaHouse comes with screwdrivers, lube, and a little manual (in Japanese) on how to become a professional cuber.

Link

As part of the ramp-up to the Maker Faire Bay Area 2008 (May 3 and 4), the Alameda County Computer Resource Center (ACCRC) is hosting an electronics recycling day this Saturday, March 29, from 10am to 4pm, at its Berkeley warehouse. Take your old gear and reuse, recycle, and remake it! And say hi to the "head" of ACCRC that will also be on hand at Maker Faire! From the ACCRC announcement:

Saturday, 3/29 – Electronics Recycling Day (open to the public)
Time: 10am – 4pm
Location: ACCRCM
1501 Eastshore Hwy
Berkeley, California, 94710
Phone: (510) 528-4052

Got old computers or other electronics?
ACCRC will take it! They will recycle anything that you can plug into a power outlet. This means your computer, VCR, television, copy machine, and even your microwave and toaster, but not your large appliances such as a washing machine or refrigerator. And when you bring them your computer, you will receive a tax write-off, and they will attempt to fix your equipment and then give it away to someone who is unable to afford to buy a computer. If they are unable to reuse your equipment, it will be recycled in an environmentally friendly manner. And, given that we are 5 weeks out from Maker Faire – there is a good chance that some Makers will be able to use some of these donations for their Maker Faire projects. Please spread the word on the Saturday event and encourage your businesses, friends, neighbors and families to bring their donations to ACCRC on Saturday.

Link ACCRC, Link to MAKE: post

Incredible pop surrealist painter James Jean, known also for his covers for comix series like Fables, Umbrella Academy, and others, worked with Prada to design fabrics for the fashion company's Spring line. Beautiful stuff, 'natch. Comics212 has more.
Link (via Drawn!)

Previously on BB:
• James Jean: Pressure Printing art print sale Link

Our pal Gary Wolf profiled famous scientist and singularitarian Ray Kurzweil for Wired.

Kurzweil does not believe in half measures. He takes 180 to 210 vitamin and mineral supplements a day, so many that he doesn't have time to organize them all himself. So he's hired a pill wrangler, who takes them out of their bottles and sorts them into daily doses, which he carries everywhere in plastic bags. Kurzweil also spends one day a week at a medical clinic, receiving intravenous longevity treatments. The reason for his focus on optimal health should be obvious: If the singularity is going to render humans immortal by the middle of this century, it would be a shame to die in the interim. To perish of a heart attack just before the singularity occurred would not only be sad for all the ordinary reasons, it would also be tragically bad luck, like being the last soldier shot down on the Western Front moments before the armistice was proclaimed.

Link

Reason reports that a 53-year-old Amarillo man who smokes pot to relieve his HIV-induced cyclical vomiting syndrome was acquitted on a possession charge.

His attorney, Jeff Blackburn, says this appears to be the first time the defense, which argues that breaking the law was necessary to prevent a harm worse than the one the law is aimed at preventing, has been successful in a Texas marijuana case.

Stevens, whose vomiting has been so severe that he was hospitalized and received blood transfusions, was arrested last October after an anonymous tipster saw him sharing a joint on a friend's porch in Amarillo and called the police. He had about a twelfth of an ounce of marijuana, resulting in a Class B misdemeanor charge that carries a penalty of up to six months in jail and a $2,000 fine. He probably could have gotten off with a fine or a year's probation, Blackburn says, "but he didn't want to; he wanted to take a stand." The trial lasted about 10 hours on Tuesday, and the jury came back after 11 minutes with a "not guilty" verdict.

Link

(Note: This document is subject to change. What moderation policy isn't?)

Q. Why does Boing Boing have to have a moderator?

A. First answer: Because every general-interest online forum that's worth reading has some kind of moderation system in force.

Second answer: Because four years ago, Boing Boing's first, unmoderated comment system went so septic that it had to be shut down. The Boingers want to never go through that again.

Third answer: Because Boing Boing gets enough traffic to attract non-automated scams.

Q. All the vowels have disappeared from a paragraph I wrote! What's going on?

A. We did it. Someone (a moderator, one of the Boingers) was expressing displeasure at your remarks. The technique is called disemvowelling. It deprecates but does not delete the remark. With work, the disemvowelled text should still be readable.

Q. You disemvowelled a very polite comment of mine that happened to mention a current presidential candidate. That means you're biased against that candidate, right?

A. Wrong. It means you shouldn't throw in mentions of presidential candidates unless they're mentioned in the main entry or are highly relevant to it. This rule will apply until the next president is elected.

Q. Something has happened to the link back to my website that I put at the bottom of my comment.

A. There's an answer to this problem: please don't put links in your comments that aren't relevant to the entry. We'll just have to remove them. Instead, put a link to your site in your user profile.

Q. My link-free .sig lines keep disappearing too.

A. We aren't big on .sig lines either, though they're a lesser offense. Rationale: first, your name is already there in your message header. Repeating it a few lines later is redundant.

Second, .sig lines eat up vertical space to no good purpose. The more messages you can see at one time, the easier it is to understand how they relate to each other. Pointlessly using up vertical space reduces the number of messages per screen without conveying any benefit in return.

If your .sig lines keep disappearing, it's because the moderators are removing them. Please take the hint and stop using them, because deleting them is bleeping tedious.

Q. Are you changing people's comments in any other ways?

A. Not really. We'll occasionally fix HTML errors or zap duplicate comments, if we feel like doing it and have the time. Once in a while we'll remove excess line returns in order to conserve vertical space.

Q. There's an old comment of mine I want you to delete.

A. Drop us a note, if it's really important; but the default answer is "no."

Q. One of my comments has disappeared!

A. There are several possibilities. One is that we may be having technical problems. It never hurts to write and ask. Another possibility is that someone thought your comment would be better gone.

Q. I can't believe that Boing Boing, of all places, would be using censorship. What happened to freedom of speech?

A. Boing Boing is steadfast in its support of your freedom of speech. We believe that you, O Reader, should be able to have (or refuse to have) anything you want on your own website, as long as it doesn't deprive others of their rights. Yay, freedom of speech!

By that same token, freedom of speech also means that the people who write and edit Boing Boing have the right to have (or refuse to have) anything they want on their own website. If one of the things they don't want is a comment that you have posted, they aren't depriving you of your freedom of speech. You're free to put that comment up on your own webpage.

Q. Why can't you just tell everyone to ignore the trolls?

A. Because they can't. Everyone automatically reads the text that's there. If it's nasty or unpleasant, they get a dose of that. If there's too much of it, they stop participating. There's far more internet discourse lost to trollage and casual rudeness than is ever lost to moderators.

Q. Isn't the moderator just enforcing compliance with her own political views?

A. Not at all. You couldn't reconstruct her personal views from a list of the times she's intervened in a discussion. The time she invented disemvowelling, it was so she could deal with a flaming leftist.

Q. Isn't the moderator just enforcing compliance with the Boing Boing party line?

A. There is no Boing Boing party line. The Boingers have varied political opinions.

Q. What's with all the [steampunk, outsider art, papercraft, other Boing Boing obsessions]?

A. One or more of the Boingers likes it.

Q. Aiiiiiiieeeeeeeeee! Boing Boing has advertising! Doesn't that mean you've become hopelessly corrupt?

A. You mean, unduly influenced by whatever advertisers are the source of the site's revenue? Don't worry about it. Boing Boing's editorial content is unaffected by its ads.

Q. But--but--those people are giving them money! How can they not be affected?

A. (The moderator speaks solo: "In order for the Boingers to be unduly influenced by who advertises on their site, they'd first have to reliably remember who those advertisers are. Trust me: this is not an issue.")

Q. But you take ads from Microsoft!!! Aren't they the root of all evil?

A. This is rank Manichaeanism. Go lie down with a cool wet cloth on your forehead until you feel better.

Q. The moderator disemvowelled one of my comments, supposedly because I had violated some rule of debate. Doesn't that just mean she doesn't agree with me?

A. No. Online discussions are not formal debates, but the usual rules for what constitutes valid argument and legitimate rebuttal, and who's responsible for proving what, still apply. They are independent of content.

Q. I thought I was being reasonably polite when I got into an argument with Bonzo, but two of my comments got removed entirely, and he just had a couple of paragraphs disemvowelled. Why me? Why not him?

A. There are many possibilities. The biggest one is that you were insufficiently polite. In the heat of an argument, your own remarks are going to seem more justifiable, and Bonzo's arguments are going to seem shabbier and more malicious. This temporary distortion is best addressed by being more polite than you think should be necessary.

Another possibility is that Bonzo has an established history of posting clear, well-informed, apposite, and entertaining comments, whereas you're posting for the first time. Or you're posting for the third time, but the first two times you did it, you posted snarky and unilluminating remarks. Or Bonzo posts under his real name,* but you don't. Under those circumstances, Bonzo is going to have more credibility with the moderators and editors.

Life is an unending series of auditions. Get used to it.

A possible explanation that's guaranteed to be wrong: we're not going to delete or disemvowel your comments because we simply can't deal with the vast swoop and majesty of your hard-hitting opinions. If we tell you it was due to your behavior, believe us.

Q. One of the people in our comment thread is behaving abominably. Does Boing Boing flame trolls, or just ignore them?

A. Neither. See the little one-eyed icon in the top right-hand corner of messages? That's the lookitthat button. Clicking on it tells the moderator that she should come look at that particular message. Be sure to explain what it was about the message that prompted your action. If you include your name, you may get a thank-you note. You can also use the lookitthat button to point out comments you think are particularly good.

Please don't use the lookitthat button to post comments. The moderator's the only one who'll see them.

Q. It's obvious that you won't tolerate anything but supportive comments from brown-nosers and yes-men--right?

A. I'll venture a guess that you responded to a new entry on Boing Boing by announcing that it was hopelessly lame and boring, and then came back later to discover that your comment had disappeared.

Q. Yes! Why did you remove it?

A. This is another one of those questions that has multiple answers.

First: you didn't explain why it bored you. Without an explanation, announcing that you're bored is neither useful or entertaining. Also, it's a real bringdown for readers who lack confidence in their own opinions.

Second: because frequently the "I'm so bored" thing is just attitudinizing. There's a whole big internet out there, and it's full of people who, if they don't like what they're currently reading, move on and read something else. They don't post about how bored they are just to have something to say.

Third: maybe that entry just isn't your thing. It could be someone else's. Why drag down their conversation?

Q. So we're not allowed to say something's boring?

A. Of course you're allowed. You just have to explain why.

Q. How come the moderator nailed me for a comment that didn't contain any swearing or personal attacks?

A. It's remarkable how many people believe that "you're good as long as you don't swear or launch personal attacks" is a universal rule. We'll actually tolerate both those things -- but only if you do them perfectly. Few people can manage that, so it's best not to try.

Note that a couple of words are deprecated far more severely than other naughty words.

The specific rule on crude language and obscenities is that they're only permitted if you can use them as well as Joel Johnson does.

Q. What's likely to land me in your bad graces?

A. Since you've asked, here's a nowhere-near-exhaustive list:

1. Spamming. Linkwhoring. Re-posting text you've already posted on a dozen other sites.

2. Making supercilious and unpleasant remarks in a civil liberties thread about how the victim had it coming. This is not to say that victims never have it coming; but there's a species of internet demi-troll that appears to specialize in posting such comments. Try not to look like you're one of them.

3. Making snide comments and insinuations about the editors. That's right out. You don't like one of the editors? Take it up with them in e-mail. If you're going to comment on an entry, talk about the entry.

4. Being nasty to no purpose. (This is the catch-all.)

5. Using unnecessarily exciting language. Making an argument is fine. Making your argument in language guaranteed to make your hearers see red? Bad idea. It practically guarantees that you're going to have a dumb (and therefore boring) argument. And if the argument's not going to be interesting, we don't see the point.

6. Jeering, sneering, condescending, or one-upping when there's been no provocation. Telling people they're naive idiots for caring about whatever-it-is. Like the "I'm bored" pose, it's empty attitudinizing, and it's remarkably unpleasant.

7. Failing to notice that there are other people in the conversation. Posting a remark that's already been made five times and answered six. Coming back and re-posting essentially the same material after a twenty-message thread has discussed your previous comment. Trying to forcibly wrench the conversation onto one of your own pet topics. Posting a stale, canned rant you've posted a dozen times before at other sites. Not coming back to see how others have responded to you.

Why post comments at all, unless you expect to be read? And if you expect to be read, you must know you're part of a conversation. Therefore, you should act like it. Engage with what the other commenters are saying. Read the thread before you add to it.

8. Posting a snotty but otherwise worthless anonymous comment. It's a lot easier to get away with snotty comments if you're a registered user.

9. Dragging in one of those topics that's guaranteed to generate a huge thrash that goes nowhere, like gun control, abortion, or Mac vs. PC vs. Linux. You're only allowed to discuss those if (a.) they're relevant to the entry; and (b.) everyone in the discussion is doing their level best to say something new.

10. This list will undoubtedly get longer.

Q. It's not fair! You've misunderstood me and disemvowelled or removed me because you mis-read what I posted. Can't we talk about this?

A. Sure. If one of your comments is disemvowelled or removed from its thread, you're welcome to write to the moderator.

Q. I can't register or post a comment. Does this mean I've been banned?

A. If you didn't get into some kind of fracas, it's highly unlikely that you've been banned. It's moderately unlikely even if you did. We're probably just having technical problems again. Drop us a note describing what happened.

Q. I was told my comment posting privileges were suspended for a week, but they never came back on. Am I permanently banned?

A. Probably not. If you were given a specific period and it's expired, drop us a note.

Q. What happens if I re-register and come back under another name while I'm suspended?

A. If we catch you, all the comments made by that false identity will be unpublished, and your suspension period will be re-started from the point at which the false identity was caught. It's okay to change your username when you aren't suspended, though we'll look askance at you if you do it too often.

Q. Is it okay for me to have more than one userid at a time?

A. No.

Q. What happens if I use someone else's userid?

A. You mean you use their identity without their say-so in Boing Boing's forums? We throw the book at you.

UPDATES:

08 May 2008:

There's a new rule about not mentioning presidential candidates unless the main entry mentions them first. That rule will remain in effect until the next president is elected.

08 May 2008:

We believe in community-based moderation. In theory, anyone can momentarily act as a moderator, as long as their action is warranted and they get it right.

However, Boing Boing also has Assistant Moderators. It's like having a deputy sheriff's badge. Currently, the Assistant Moderators are AVRAM, as in Avram Grumer, and ANTINOUS.

So now you know. If one of them should suggest an alteration in your behavior, or ask what you're hoping to accomplish with your current behavior, you'll no longer need to ask who the bleep they think they are. You'll know who they are: they're the Assistant Moderators.

14 May 2008: The rule on obscene language has been modified. Crude language and obscenities are now permitted only if you can use them as well as Joel Johnson does.

24 June 2008: Added to the list of circumstances that can increase a commenter's credibility: using one's real name.

Also added an explanation of the local prejudice against .sig lines and excess line returns.

The Musical Rumba Series tables contain interchangeable percussion instruments that are played by banging on the table top. As someone who must resist the annoying urge at Chinese restaurants to use chopsticks at drum sticks, I know I'd enjoy this. Joel has more info and a video at Boing Boing Gadgets.
Link

Portland, Oregon's Casa Diablo Gentlemen's Club is a strip joint where only vegetarian food is served and the look is pleather and lace. Today's New York Times looks at ways sexuality is now used by some as a marketing gimmick for veganism and animal rights. As you might expect, some vegans are not too pleased about that. From the NYT:

Casa Diablo is just the latest example of selling veganism with a “Girls Gone Wild” aesthetic to draw the ire of vegans who complain that such tactics may get people to pay attention to animal cruelty, but for the wrong reasons. In Los Angeles, some frown at the scantily clad Vegan Vixens — a kind of animal-loving Pussycat Dolls — who perform songs like “Real Men Don’t Hunt” at fund-raisers for animal welfare groups.

And many vegans who want to publicize cruelty within the fur industry are nonetheless dismayed by the new “Ink, Not Mink” advertising campaign from peta2, the youth arm of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. It features members of the Internet-based pinup group the Suicide Girls, sporting little more than tattoos and body piercings.

Link (Thanks, Carlo Longino!)

UPDATE: In the comments, GBV23 points to an item in the Willamette Week reporting that the Casa Diablo is up for sale. Link

My latest Thinkernet column is live: "The Pleasures of Uninterrupted Communication," about the difference between technologies that let us do a lot of things at once and those that interrupt us over and over again:

The mature information worker is someone who can manage his queues effectively, prioritizing and re-prioritizing as new items crop up, doing the fast-context-switching necessary to respond to an email while waiting for a file to download or a backup to complete. It's a little like spinning plates, and when you get the rhythm of it, it can be glorious. There's a zone you slip into, a zone where everything gets done, one thing after another clicking into place.

But once you add an interruptive medium like IM, unscheduled calls, or pop-up notifiers of mail, flow turns into chop. The buzz, blip, and snap of a thousand alerts turn plate-spinning into hell, as random firecrackers detonate over and over again, on every side of you, always there in your peripheral vision, blowing your capacity to manage your own queue as they rudely insert themselves into your attention.

Link

Two sisters, 19 and 16, were rescued from an Italian circus where they were forced to swim with piranha and have snakes draped across them. The Bulgarians sisters, and their parents, were allegedly held as "slaves" by the Marino Circus. From The Guardian:

A spectator tipped off the police after watching, Giusi, the elder girl, try to escape from the piranha tank as her head was allegedly held down.

Her sister Olga was bitten by snakes that she was forced to drape on her body, and she had injuries to her stomach where the snakes had wound themselves too tightly around her...

According to reports, Giusi had a tumour on her ear and was told to never submerge it in cold water. But the piranha tank was kept at almost freezing temperatures to make the fish lethargic.

Link (via Fortean Times)

If you'd like to join other Happy Mutants on an ancient, non-web-based protocol, we have registered a new channel on Freenode in which to discuss, you know, stuff. Standard rules apply: If you're unruly or rude, don't stop by! Otherwise, I look forward to wasting far too much time chatting to you all in one big yappy forum. We may do lots more fun things with the channel in the near future, but let's start with the basics. (Update: Like giving away the gift certificates we were just provided from '80s Tees, for instance! Still not bots, though.)

If you've never used IRC before, you'll need a client. On Windows I've used mIRC, on OS X or Linux I prefer X-Chat Aqua (although many like Colloquy on OS X). Connect to any of the Freenode servers and join the channel #boingboing for maximum chat.

Ross sez, "The State Department is making a profit on every passport ordered by a US citizen because it has outsourced printing to Asia, including a Thai company that has had had problems with Chinese espionage. Not only is this stupidity from an administration supposedly committed to keeping the USA safe, it may also be illegal since Congress requires such activities to be break-even rather than to profit from the citizens it supposedly serves."

But GPO Inspector General J. Anthony Ogden, the agency's internal watchdog, doesn't share that confidence. He warned in an internal Oct. 12 report that there are "significant deficiencies with the manufacturing of blank passports, security of components, and the internal controls for the process."

The inspector general's report said GPO claimed it could not improve its security because of "monetary constraints." But the inspector general recently told congressional investigators he was unaware that the agency had booked tens of millions of dollars in profits through passport sales that could have been used to improve security, congressional aides told The Times

Link

The internet service provider has been under investigation for blocking file-sharing among subscribers, but announced a change of heart today, promising to treat all apps equally -- but they'll still slow down traffic for customers who consume larger amounts of bandwidth than others.

Since user reports of interference with file-sharing traffic were confirmed by an Associated Press investigation in October, Comcast has been vigorously defending its practices, most recently at a hearing of the Federal Communications Commission in February.

Consumer and ''Net Neutrality'' advocates have been equally vigorous in their attacks on the company, saying that by secretly blocking some connections between file-sharing computers, Comcast made itself a judge and gatekeeper for the Internet. They also accused Comcast of stifling delivery of Internet video, an emerging competitor to the cable company's core business.

Comcast has said that its practices were necessary to keep file-sharing traffic from overwhelming local cable lines, where neighbors share capacity with one another. On Thursday, Comcast said that by the end of the year, it will move to a system that manages capacity without favoring one type of traffic over another.

Link.

Update: here's a press release issued by Comcast about a hollow, face-saving, baloney-scented deal with BitTorrent announced today. The bit about "a capacity management technique that is protocol agnostic" effectively means that heavy P2P users will still be throttled, they just won't be identified by protocol.

Previously on Boing Boing:

*Is Comcast really blocking P2P? EFF + SF Weekly conclude: yeah.
*FCC may do-over Comcast Net Neutrality hearing due to presence of paid Comcastards
*UPDATE: Comcast paid for people to fill seats at FCC Net Neutrality hearing
*Comcast also screwing with Gnutella and Lotus Notes (!?!)
*Comcast actively blocks P2P traffic
*(BB-Gadgets) AT&T to Filter Internet Traffic; Comcast Investigated by FCC for Filtering Internet Traffic
*How the AP busted Comcast for blocking BitTorrent
*EFF proves Comcast is screwing with BitTorrent, releases instructions for testing your own ISP
*Why Comcast's BitTorrent-fux0r is bad for quality of service
* Modest proposal for Comcast's net-filtering

Brock Thiessen at Exclaim reports on the anti-emo backlash said to be sweeping through Mexico:

According to Daniel Hernandez, who’s been covering the anti-emo riots on his blog Intersections, the violence began March 7, when an estimated 800 young people poured into the Mexican city of Queretaro’s main plaza “hunting” for emo kids to pummel. Then the following weekend similar violence occurred in Mexico City at the Glorieta de Insurgents, a central gathering space for emos. Hernandez also reports that several anti-emo riots have now also spread to various other Mexican cities.

Via the Austin American Statesmen, several postings on Mexican social-networking sites, primarily organising spot for these “emo hunts,” have been dug up and translated. One states: “I HATE EMOS!!! They are not even people, they are so stupid, they cry over meaningless things… My school is infested with them, I want to kill them all!”

Another says: “We’ve never seen all the urban tribes unite against one single tribe before… Emos, their way of thinking is for crap, if you are so depressed please do us all a favour and kill yourselves!”

Link (via Jesse Walker at Reason, thanks Coop!)

Transport For London's brilliant "Do the Test" cycling safety video invites you to pay close attention to a video of some basketball players, then demonstrates just how little you really saw, ending with a voice-over that explains how easy it is to miss things you're not looking for, like cyclists:

This phenomenon is known as "change blindness" - only a tiny fraction of all the information going into your brain enters your consciousness. People often fail to see a change in their surroundings because their attention is elsewhere.

Even stranger, if you are concentrating on something, you can become blind to other events that you would normally notice. This "inattention blindness" is possibly the reason why motorists collide with cyclists.

Just as it is important for road users to keep an eye out for cyclists, cyclists must also take steps to ensure they are seen by motorists.

Link (Thanks, Mr Jalopy!)

Antonio Lupi's Biblio free-standing bathtub incorporates a generous book-case for your bathroom reading. I do much of my best reading in the littlest room -- the tub, in particular, is conducive to productive reading. Link

See also:
Bench with integrated bookcases
Armchair incorporates 5m of bookcase
'Magnetique' Adjustable Shelf; 'Storyline' Sound Wave Shelf
HOWTO make a secret bookshelf door
HOWTO make a bookshelf out of books
Bed built into an "igloo of books"
Equation Bookshelf with nesting parens
Xmas tree made from books
Hang your books from the rafters
Giant freestanding letters with bookshelves inside
Invisible bookshelf - floating stacks of books for your walls
Coffee table with integrated book-shelves like hanging files
Library built into a staircase

Today on Boing Boing tv, a double shot of animation from Michael Mouris, whose work you may recall from the epic Diddy/Bjork conversational gif.

First up, the classic "Fight Fight," a Mortal Kombat spoof in which the director performs the role of both vanquisher and vanquished. Next, an all-new exclusive for BBtv -- "Blingee IRL," in which all is pimped out and glamtabulous.

Link to Boing Boing tv post with discussion and downloadable video.

Over on Boing Boing Gadgets, our Joel takes note of a Reuters story on Ben Heckendorn, a supermodder who earns his living hacking his pals' game systems:

Often someone will ask me to combine five different video game systems in one box, which is of course ridiculous. One guy wanted me to build an Xbox 360 controller attached to his rowing machine at home so he could row and play 'Uno' with his friends online. It sounded so weird I did it.

Link, Discuss on Boing Boing Gadgets

I'm one of the guests of honor at this summer's Pi Con, the annual science fiction convention held Aug 22-24 in West Springfield, MA, appearing alongside of Randall Munroe, the creator of the brilliant geek webcomic XKCD. I'm really looking forward to this -- I've never met Randall and I'm an ardent admirer of his work. Discount registration is open until May 31.

This year Pi-Con, the convention located in the belly button of the universe (or more specifically, The Pioneer Valley) is lucky enough to have both Cory Doctorow and Randall Munroe as guests of honor.

Pi-Con has a lot to offer. We have a gaming (both table top and electronic), panels of all types (including virtual and pool panels) and flavors (from hard science to gaming, web comics to polyamory, and quite possibly everything in between), and vendors to fit all your geeky needs.

Link

I've just finished reading Rolling Thunder, John Varley's wonderful sequel to Red Thunder and Red Lightning, his ongoing series of tributes to the golden age of Heinlein's juvenile sf novels.

The Thunder and Lightning books are fantastic, action-packed, science-packed homages to Heinlein's best work, and Rolling Thunder is no exception. In this volume -- set decades after the action concluded in Red Lightning -- a descendant of the story's original heroes named Podkayne (due to a vogue among Mars residents to name their kids after fictional Martians) finds herself embroiled in several kinds of adventures, including a musical encounter with vast, unstoppable, deadly crystalline lifeforms; a military hitch; musical stardom, and more. She is at the center of the saga of the ongoing collapse of poor old Planet Earth, laid to waste by security paranoia, religious fervor, greed, and environmental catastrophe.

Through Poddy's eyes, we watch the action unfold on an interplanetary scale, re-visiting the best characters from the previous books (the stasis fields from Rolling Thunder are an effective means of indefinite life-support, so practically everyone is still alive and chumming about, as in Heinlein's Cat Who Walked Through Walls), and the action skips seamlessly from the micro-scale (Poddy's familial and romantic entanglements) to the macro (interplanetary war!).

I can't recommend this stuff too highly. Varley is clearly bent on reviving everything that made the Heinlein juvies great, and he's doing a hell of a job with it. These books are fond without being nostalgic, reverent without being old-fashioned. Everything about them is utterly contemporary, but it's easy to believe that Heinlein would have written them (more or less!) today. Link

See also:
Varley's Red Thunder qualifies for preliminary Nebula ballot
The novel Heinlein would have written about GW Bush's America

Bryan sez, "Rockbox, the open source jukebox firmware project has been accepted as a mentoring organization to this year's Google Summer of Code. We're looking for students to come along and help us spend Google's money and move the project along for all our users. So if you're a university student with a passion for improving your iPod, or sanitising your Sansa, then please by all means get in touch, and submit an application! One of the ideas we've put forward this year is the 'Rockbox as an application' which would allow it to run on some devices without the need to completely replace the parent firmware. This could mean Rockbox on the iPhone or the Playstation Portable!" Link (Thanks, Bryan!)