“Arty is a dope producer so I wrote this song to ‘Rebound’ this last year,” he said. “I got in touch with Arty and showed it to him, did a different version to it ’cause I asked him [to] make it newer ’cause I don’t just wanna take your song and rap over it.”

Says Will.I.Am.

Hearing the original song reminded me of this fantastic piece of video-art, which, in contrast to everything the Black Eyed Peas have ever done, is hugely original and entertaining:

 After a typically engaging talk, and an equally entertaining on-stage conversation with Salman Rushdie, Hitchens milled about among fans and friends off-stage. I caught him there and introduced myself. “It’s an honor to meet you,” I quivered. “If you say so,” he quipped. I went on to explain that I was from Denmark and wanted to thank him for his very vocal support of the Danish cartoonists back in 2006. He leaned in and put his hand on my shoulder. “Don’t let them fuck you around,” he said, before wandering off.

Read the whole thing here.

Kinetic Edinburgh from walid salhab on Vimeo.

The pleasure of from Vitùc on Vimeo.

Google is celebrating with a Turing machine in their doodle, here’s a haunting letter from Turing on Letters of Note and finally here’s a funkily designed but informative website detailing everything about Alan Turing.

Happy Birthday, old chum!

It’s a metal form that—when inserted into an opening and turned—draws back a bolt or latch. But the metal key is marked for extinction. Electronic access controls—keycards, keypads, biometric scanners, and the like—are already common in hotels, office buildings, and cars, and they’re gaining ground. What will we lose when the metal key, a form that has endured for centuries, disappears? And what will we gain?

It’s one of those illustrated slideshow-esque articles, but still worth it. Read it!

It’s good, clean fun. Well, not clean.

All credit for this picture goes to: NASA/GSFC/SDO. Click the picture to see a hi-rez version.

As particle physics revolutionizes the concepts of “something” (elementary particles and the forces that bind them) and “nothing” (the dynamics of empty space or even the absence of space), the famous question, “Why is there something rather than nothing?” is also revolutionized. Even the very laws of physics we depend on may be a cosmic accident, with different laws in different universes, which further alters how we might connect something with nothing. Asking why we live in a universe of something rather than nothing may be no more meaningful than asking why some flowers are red and others blue.

It’s fascinating and you should read it.

Well, it’s five years later and I can’t find anything about the thing. Not on Mangold’s and not Bomback’s IMDB page. Which looks to me like it’s been shelved, but maybe someone out there knows more about it?

I had nearly given up on the question of the original manuscript until a year ago when I interviewed Lynda Martin, the sister of Toole’s best friend in high school. “The manuscript?” she said in a soft southern accent. “Yes, well I have it in my closet here at home.” I nearly dropped the phone as she explained Toole’s mother had given it as a gift to her brother after the novel was published. When her brother passed away in 2008, she acquired it. It had a few penned-in edits, she explained, but not drastic revisions. “I don’t know what to do with it, really” she said. “I considered selling it at auction.” Christie’s estimated its value up to $20,000, if deemed authentic. She hadn’t called Sotheby’s yet. “Please” I begged, “just hold on to it. I’m on my way down.”

It’s a charming little story about the value of memories. Read it here.

For more on Burroughs, Salon released a good piece on him today:

For occasional entertainment Burroughs read the early pulp magazines, especially All-Story. Named after the cheap newsprint upon which they were printed, the pulps supplied adventure and romantic fiction to the masses for half a century. By the 1920s and ’30s newsstands around the country would display the lurid and spicy covers of Weird Tales, the Shadow, Amazing Stories, True Confessions, Dime Detective, Astounding, and Black Mask. Pulp writers would include such important literary figures as H. P. Lovecraft, Robert E. Howard, Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, Robert A. Heinlein and scores of others. But in 1911 most of the writers weren’t of this caliber, and Burroughs was convinced he could write better adventure stories and maybe even make a living at it.

In fact he rather underestimated himself.

The reason I’m writing about it now is that via the magic of Google Maps’ Street View, you can actually walk the length of the whole park. It’s a charming exploration of an urban oasis, slightly elevated above the hustle and bustle of Chelsea. Click the image to have a look yourself.