Isaiah's shared items in Google Reader

New cover designs for Oliver Sacks’ books, by Carbon Web....

2011-08-08T22:04:00Z

New cover designs for Oliver Sacks’ books, by Carbon Web. (Via The Beautiful Brain)

U.S. data consumption in one day. UCSD/ Fast Company

2011-10-21T19:33:00Z

U.S. data consumption in one day. UCSD/ Fast Company

The Farming Systems Trial (1981-2011)

2011-10-05T16:29:39Z

Metafilter reports that The Rodale Institute has just published the results of a 30-year study that claims that - in terms of yields, economic viability, energy usage, and human health - organic farming is better than conventional farming.

With results like these, why does conventional wisdom favour chemical farming? "Vested interests. Organic farming keeps more money on the farm and in rural communities and out of the pockets of chemical companies. As the major funders of research centres and universities, and major advertisers in the farm media, they effectively buy a pro-chemical bias."

peasants. free from DEBT

2011-10-27T10:54:19Z

This blog post analyzes the texts posted to Tumbler by We are the 99% / Occupy Wall Street protesters. It finds that the concerns voiced by the protesters are consistent with pre-modern demands by peasants living in feudal conditions. The blogger doesn’t use the word “feudal” but he does reach the conclusion that people today have been put in positions more similar to peasantry than to the historic American working class or any other contemporary senses of social strata.

https://rortybomb.wordpress.com/2011/10/09/parsing-the-data-and-ideology-of-the-we-are-99-tumblr/

Filed under: Essays & Articles

The New York Times covers our Public Restroom Project

2011-09-06T21:46:41Z

Here is the NYT version, that got physically printed:

http://goo.gl/gnHnP

And here is the BETTER Bay Citizen Version the graphics we produced:

http://goo.gl/noGHq

the hyphae journal

The Most Immersive Video Game to Date.

2011-10-21T23:55:40Z

Video courtesy of The Gadget Show.

What do you get when you mix Battlefield 3 with an omni-directional treadmill, full dome projection screen, motion tracking, wireless gun controller, 12 paintball markers, and surround sound? YOU GET THE MOST IMMERSIVE VIDEO GAME TO DATE!!!!

Some of the top technology experts in Europe got a hold of a pre-release copy of Battlefield 3 to make this beast of a system. The simulator drops you in the actual battle zone where every bullet fired by the enemy might actually make contact. This adds a hell of a lot more anxiety before you decide to rush that bunker!

If you are in the UK, make sure to catch them on The Gadget Show, Channel 5 at 8pm on October 24th. I truly hope that this is a feat of engineering and not one of good marketing, I look forward to seeing it in action live.

Web Semantics: Zuckerverbs

2011-10-24T12:07:47Z

http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2011/09/the-rise-of-the-zuckerverb-the-new-language-of-facebook/245897/

(…)

“As Web developers jump on the Open Graph bandwagon to create new social apps, Facebook is saying good-bye to the old days when people simply “liked” things, moving to a much wider verb-space to promote different activities. You’ll now be able to announce to the world that you are “watching” (a television show), “listening” (to music), “eating” (a meal), and so forth. And as the verbs shift from present tense to past, all of these activities can then be stitched together with your status updates and photos to create a reverse-chronological autobiography of sorts in your Timeline. The Timeline, Zuckerberg submits, is nothing less than The Story of Your Life.

“On seeing the f8 presentation, Alexis Madrigal had immediate qualms about the verb-driven self-narrative that feeds into the Timeline: it’s “technically complex but grammatically simple,” “multimedia, but not rich,” “autobiography without aesthetic effort,” “a story without words.” All activities in the Open Graph are funneled into the bare-bones syntax of “X (user) Y (verb of action) Z (object of action).” Stitching together these simple declarative statements into an autobiographical timeline creates a pale simulacrum of personal story-telling, no matter how much Facebook presents it as a way to “tell your story.”

“This is what happens when language is optimized for social data-mining rather than natural communication. “Mark read a book.” “Mark listened to a song.” “Mark hiked a trail.” “Mark reviewed a movie.” The sentences flashed on the big screen behind Zuckerberg as he laid out his verb-y vision. Though these sentences are technically in the active voice, they present us with an oddly cramped kind of “activeness,” in which we the users engage with a world of commodified objects through verbs of consumption.

“And to see one’s “life story” reduced to a series of such prefab activities in a personal timeline? …”

Design Fiction: the Philips Microbial Home

2011-10-26T13:28:31Z

*Aw man lookah that. That is just super.

http://www.yankodesign.com/2011/10/21/the-microbial-home/

“The Microbial Home is viewed as a cyclical biological machine where wastes like sewage, effluent, garbage, wastewater are filtered, processed and recycled to be used as inputs for the various home functions. The project includes various aspects like a Bio Digester Island and Larder in the kitchen, Urban Beehive, Bio-light, Apothecary, Filtering Squatting Toilet and Paternoster Plastic Waste Up-cycler.”

seeding the future – tomorrow!

2011-10-22T19:04:49Z

Shared by Isaiah
This was awesome.

The Greenhorns and Internet Archive Present: Seeding the Future – A Town Hall meeting for Small-Scale Agriculture

Tuesday, October 18th • 6:30pm

300 Funston St. San Francisco+++Fall Harvest Potluck+++
Meet and mingle with farmers green and seasoned. Bring your thinking cap and favorite dish.

+++Screening of “The Greenhorns”+++

+++Panel and Roundtable Discussion+++
Debate and collaborate on 2012 Farm Bill action strategies, decentralized food production, and new strategies for urban farming. Panelists: Severine Von Tscharner Fleming, Director, The Greenhorns. Rick Prelinger, Founder,

Prelinger Archives. Ned Conwell, Farmer, Pescadero, CA. Ed Garrett, Found of Fresh Spin Farms, Davis, CA.

MUSIC: Ed Masuga and Friends

Thanks to our generous sponsors —>
Thirsty Bear Brewing Co. (www.thirstybear.com)
Four Barrel Coffee (www.fourbarrelcoffee.com)
Poster Design: Andrew Nimmo (andrewnimmo.com)

Filed under: Greenhorns Mixers, Greenhorns Screenings Tagged: California

we’re hooked

2011-10-20T04:40:04Z

Farmstead Meatsmith have been busy. See here.

Filed under: Education, ideas + models Tagged: farmstead meatsmith

farm jobs

2011-10-21T07:55:36Z

put your wool thinking cap on and make it HAPPEN: www.growfood.org

Filed under: Job Posting, Work + Land opportunities

Could Digital Badges Replace Traditional Degrees for DIY Learners? - Education - GOOD

2011-10-18T04:50:11Z

Roadkill his sole diet

2011-10-20T19:28:00Z

"English taxidermist Jonathan McGowan has made roadkill his sole diet for the past 30 years. At the age of 14, he tried a dead adder and while it didn’t taste very good, it made him curious to try other roadkill finds.

The taxidermist lists fox, venison and deer among his favourite meats – but he has eaten everything the countryside has to offer over the years.

With thousands of animals being found dead at the roadside every year, Mr McGowan has varied if – on the face of it – slightly unedifying pickings.

He has eaten mice, moles, hedeghogs, squirrels, rats, foxes, badgers, hares, rabbits, deer, stoats, weasels, polecats, otters, wildcats, pheasants, finches, thrushes, ducks, geese, pigeons, owls, crows, gulls, blackbirds and cormorants.

He says many animals taste much better than people would expect."

From: http://laughingsquid.com/english-taxidermist-chooses-to-live-on-exotic-roadkill-diet-for-30-years/

Thanks to Kevin Kelly

Dedicated Project Visit: Ian Midgley

2011-09-26T07:07:29Z

Howdy, I arrived on the Factor E Farm a few days ago for a three week stay. I’ll be making instructional videos on the function and fabrication of the Global Village Construction Set from right here in the cozy HexaYurt. We’ve got a lot of documentation on our plate and I’m planning to take a few big bites out of it and leave a system in place for future documentarians to continue the process.

In addition, I’ll be filming with the team here to include a segment in my ongoing feature length documentary You Are God, a film about free thinkers and free doers creating their own realities all over the country. I’ve been traveling around the USA for the past year getting involved and documenting radically creative and revolutionary peoples and projects. Today is actually the year anniversary of when I drove out of Los Angeles to start filming. What better place to celebrate than Factor E Farm?

Thus far we’ve completed two instructional videos on the Power Cube and the Hall Effects Sensor used in the CEB press:

Plenty more to come. These videos will make it possible for the novice and expert alike to get a thorough sense of what goes into fabricating each part of the GVCS, the significance of each element, and a few essential tips on fabrication from the folks who did it first.

Next up: Open Source Tractor. Check back for more videos!

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LifeTrac Frame Construction – Instructional Video

2011-09-30T18:14:45Z

I just completed this full instructional on fabrication and assembly of the LifeTrac III frame, a little happy friday gift to DIY world. All measurements are accurate and up to date, so take this video and run with it! As mentioned in the video, we are working to further simply the process of fabricating the steel tube frame pieces by developing a simple jig to mark where the holes are drilled on either side of the tubing. It’ll make measuring approximately 2xs easier than riding an escalator, eating ice cream, and breathing.

Coming soon, instructional videos on the rest of the LifeTrac construction process including: loader arms, wheel motor mounts, and hydraulic system.

Cheers!

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Need help with Funicular Study

2011-10-07T17:01:41Z

We are considering arches in our CEB construction:

I need some help with a funicular study – thats the math that calculates the forces and force lines in an arch or vault! If you can help me learn how to do this, you can join the discussion on our forum. I made a video to ask too here

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Kickstarter: Going the Last Mile

2011-10-10T16:36:15Z

Friends, we are finally kicking off our Kickstarter to go The Last Mile on the construction part of the Global Village Construction Set:

Here is a direct link to the Kickstarter page. These are exciting times as our resources continue to increase towards rapid deployment and growth.

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LifeTrac All Terrain Tracks – Instructional

2011-10-12T16:07:30Z

Thorough explanation of the fabrication and assembly of the LifeTrac wheel tracks.

Extreme Traction post from development stages of tracks.

See other completed LifeTrac videos on the wiki.

Rebbeca Rojer just arrived as a new addition to the documentation team at Factor E Farm. She’ll be starting today on another instructional video on soldering parts for the CEB controller box.

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Instructional Video on Documentation Procedure

2011-10-17T06:35:05Z

As my dedicated project visit comes to an end I am passing on my process for creating instructional videos on the GVCS fabrication and assembly procedures. I hope this information is useful to future documentarians at Factor E Farm and for videos editors all over the globe interested in working on this revolutionary project.

It would be great if others could further refine the format I have developed. I think a start would be to make an animation of the logo to stamp on the beginning of each video with an original sound bite. I like the music style we have established and the quick editing pace. With each video I have been incorporating more still frames and diagrams with measurements, that is also an excellent feature to further incorporate in future videos.

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CEB Controller Box Wiring Instructional Video

2011-10-19T06:31:02Z

Video of CEB controller box electronic boards hookup:

(See transcript at the wiki)

Hi, I’m Rebecca Rojer, and I’m one week into my month-long stay at Factor e Farm for a Dedicated Project Visit in documentation. I’ll be picking up where the talented Ian Midgley left off, working on documentation for the Christmas Gift To The World as well as a recruitment video for the OSE Dream Team.

The two videos above are the first deliverables of my DPV. I’ve also put the transcripts of the videos on the wiki, for those of you who prefer to follow along with text. Being an image person myself, when helpful I will try to make diagrams to supplement these instructionals. Here’s my interpretation of the CEB Controller Box wiring:

Stay tuned for more videos!

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