Smoke Break #956: Cool Animation Of How Scientists Measure The Vastness Of Space
May 23, 2012
Narration and space nerditude by the lovely and talented Dr. Olivia Johnson. Cool (via). Of course Flyer’s goalie Ilya Brygalov still does a better job.
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Smoke Break #955: Dr. Michio Kaku On The Dark Side Of Modern & Future Technologies
May 22, 2012
So it turns out that our kids will be able to create new life forms from their phones and play cooties with home laser-enriched uranium in the not so distant future. Thanks, Dr. Kaku. You have a great day, too (via).
Smoke Break #954: If You Value Life, Do Not Disturb Alan Rickman During Epic Tea Time!
May 15, 2012
Alan Rickman never needs to audition again. The BAFTA is his at 3:48.
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Smoke Break #953: How To MRI Your Own Brain & Turn It Into A Chocolate You Can Eat
May 14, 2012
(via) Because of course that’s something you would totally love to do on a Monday.
Andy Millins, co-founder at Inition said: “I’ve been involved in some weird and wonderful 3D projects over the years at Inition, but eating my own brain was certainly one of the most bizarre…”
Ya think?
Smoke Break #952: New Yorkers Remind Us To Say “Thank You Mom” This Mother’s Day
May 11, 2012
(via) As if we needed a reminder, but still…thank you, Mom, for “getting me out of trouble when I burned down that forest.” Pass it on…
Smoke Break #951: “A Grain Of Sand” Details A Newspaperman’s Idyllic Seychelles Escape
May 2, 2012
“Brendon Grimshaw was editor to some of the most important newspapers in Africa. But in 1972, he gave it all up to go and live on Moyenne Island, which he purchased for ten thousand pounds. In the thirty-six-years that he has lived on the island, Brendon and his friend, Rene Lafortune, planted sixteen-thousand trees, built 4,8 kilometres of nature paths, and brought and bred 110 giant land tortoises, creating an island of incredible beauty now worth 34 million Euros. Come with us on this journey and discover why an 82-year-old man fears his island will one day be destroyed by the ever-expanding reach of our insatiable desires…” (via). Watch the hour-long documentary here.
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Smoke Break #950: The “Anthropocene” Is A New Geological Epoch Dominated By People
May 1, 2012
Welcome to the Anthropocene is “a 3-minute journey through the last 250 years of our history, from the start of the Industrial Revolution to the Rio+20 Summit.” Tracing roads, shipping lanes, railways and flightpaths, it charts “the growth of humanity into a global force on an equivalent scale to major geological processes.” Gnarl.
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Smoke Break #949: Oregon’s “Churchkey Can Co.” Offers A Beer Experience From The 50′s
April 28, 2012
Earlier this month from the Department of the Inevitable came Churchkey Can Co., a craft beer company that packages its product in a way that only your grandparents will remember. Each can has a thin, flat metal top through which drinkers must puncture a hole with an old-school churchkey (on account of the modern pull tab not being cool enough). The partners behind it are from Brooklyn and Portland (because of course they are), and we’re told the craft Pilsener within is actually pretty good. Ask any grandfather what they think and they’ll probably say “What? I thought we fixed that?” But nevermind him. He’s old and nutty. As the video promo above attests, it’s the “most original beer can experience you’ve ever had!”
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Smoke Break #948: ETT Technology Could Send Us Around The Globe In Just Six Hours
April 26, 2012
I’ve seen messages whip around an old-school newsroom before by evacuated tube (very steampunk), but I never imagined it as a form of transport:
Evacuated Tube Transport is an airless, frictionless, maglev-like form of transportation which is safer, cheaper and quieter than trains or airplanes. Six-person capsules travel in the tubes and can reach a maximum speed of 6,500 km/h, and provide 50 times more transportation per kwh.
That’s New York to Los Angeles in just 45 minutes! Imagine a future where you could wake up in Vancouver for a breakfast in Los Angeles, a lunch in New York, and a dinner in Paris. Theoretically, you could be back home in time for last call without any jet lag. Of course, the video also posits that an ETT could get you to Beijing from New York in just two hours, but I imagine the Atlantic Ocean would have something to say about that. Still, paging John Galt…
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Smoke Break #947: Wherein You Decide To Drop Everything To Be A Tanner In Portland
April 24, 2012
We’re not of the vegan persuasion, so everything about this beautifully made short film detailing Tanner Goods in Portland, Oregon is downright awesome (except for the dude’s shirt).
