Weekend Reading

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  • Think defamation law is boring? You won’t if you find yourself in court
    So, now we can get on to why it all matters. If you use social media or blog online, you are now a publisher just the same as any journalist.
    Yikes *scours ALL blog posts*

  • Google Memory Loss
    I think Google has stopped in­dex­ing the old­er parts of the We­b. I think I can prove it. Google’s com­pe­ti­tion is do­ing bet­ter. Ev­i­dence · This isn’t just a proof, it’s a rock-n-roll proof.
    Duck Duck Go (a better search engine). Do it people!

  • The hidden beauty spots within driving distance of Glasgow you have to visit
    Now the snow is beginning to thaw we can go back to spending our weekends exploring the great outdoors. With Glasgow aptly named the Dear Green Place the city is not short of beautiful parks and view points offering stunning scenery.
    Mostly bookmarked for myself but a nice way to show how lucky I am to live in this wonderful area of the world.

  • Questions to Ask Yourself Before Giving Up
    Are you hydrated? When did you last glut your thirst with a handful of spring? languishing on your butter shelf? Are you dressed? If so, does your skirt strike matches alight as you walk by? Can you melt it a little around your waist and ribcage?
    Because sometimes just getting out of bed is the achievement.

  • Will There Ever Be an Anglerfish Emoji?
    Consider the anglerfish. It’s a type of bony fish that has been around since the early Cretaceous. It is best known for the fleshy protrusion on its head, which it uses to entice prey, and which sometimes is inhabited by glowing bacteria, for extra luring power.
    If you like this, listen to this episode from 99% Invisible.

  • A comparison of the visual similarities between Blade Runner and Blade Runner 2049
    Blade Runner 2049 takes place in the same location 30 years after the events in the original Blade Runner film, so it’s natural that the two movies share a visual style.
    *moviegeekgasmtastic*

  • Sandi Toksvig and Humanists UK launch a free massive open online course on humanism aimed at UK’s non-religious majority
    Writer and broadcaster Sandi Toksvig is the face of a new introductory ‘massive open online course’ (MOOC) on humanism from Humanists UK, the national charity representing the non-religious in the UK.
    Because we didn’t love Sandi enough already?

  • Own Your Content
    “We are in the “Internet Two” phase as Steven Johnson called it. Internet One was an open network, open protocols, open systems. Internet Two is closed platforms that increasingly dominate the market and own and control our content and us.
    Welcome to blogging y’all, it’s great! I remember when it were nowt but fields round here….

  • A Fateful Hunt for a Buried Stash of the Greatest LSD Ever Made
    Two months ago I was standing in a pub in south London on a Saturday afternoon, having a conversation with a photographer. While desperately dredging my mind for a half-decent anecdote, I decided to re-tell a story I’d read on the internet the day before.
    It’s good to talk. Those pink elephants on parade… not so much…

  • Mary Lee Berners-Lee obituary
    The computer scientist Mary Lee Berners-Lee, who has died aged 93, was on the programming team for the computer that in 1951 became the first in the world to be sold commercially: the Ferranti Mark I.
    You would not be reading this without this amazing person.

  • Can Planet Earth Feed 10 Billion People?
    Humanity has 30 years to find out. All parents remember the moment when they first held their children—the tiny crumpled face, an entire new person, emerging from the hospital blanket. I extended my hands and took my daughter in my arms. I was so overwhelmed that I could hardly think.
    Yikes. STOCKPILE!! ohhh wait no, the opposite of that

  • When Your Eyes Move, So Do Your Eardrums
    Without moving your head, look to your left. Now look to your right. Keep flicking your eyes back and forth, left and right. Even if you managed to keep the rest of your body completely still, your eyeballs were not the only parts of your head that just moved. Your ears did, too.
    What the… like an article on fleas I’m pretty sure I’m now aware of this happening… *looks left* *looks right*

  • Learn How to Do Nothing With the Dutch Concept of Niksen
    Between hygge, the Danish concept of coziness, and Sweden’s lagom, which encourages living a balanced life, there are plenty of buzzy Nordic lifestyle methods that proponents claim will make you a better person.
    Finally a trend I can get with.

  • The NSA’s voice-recognition system raises hard questions for Echo and Google Home
    Suppose you’re looking for a single person, somewhere in the world. (We’ll call him Waldo.) You know who he is, nearly everything about him, but you don’t know where he’s hiding. How do you find him? The scale is just too great for anything but a computerized scan.
    Articles like this make the (expensive but secure) Apple HomePod more appealing.

  • “Eggcorns” Are Language Mistakes That Somehow Still …
    Not to get nitpicky and accusatory, but you’ve probably used a whole bunch of words incorrectly throughout your life.
    Ain’t the English language great.

  • Why Judge Rosemarie Aquilina is my style – and everything – icon
    Judge Rosemarie Aquilina of the 30th Circuit Court for Ingham County.
    Not had much coverage in the UK but throughout this brutal trial, this Judge has been inspirationally uncompromising.

  • Germany was once the witch-burning capital of the world. Here’s why
    In 1572, the killings began. That year, authorities in the tiny settlement of St Maximin, in present-day Germany, charged a woman named Eva with using witchcraft to murder a child. Eva confessed under torture; she, along with two women she implicated, were burned at the stake.
    Wow. Humanity really is a shit show.

  • A Review of the Delirious New Diet Coke Flavors
    Caity Weaver taste tests the newest flavors in the pantheon of diet cola.
    Not yet coming to the UK but…

  • Watch Animated Scores to Music by Radiohead, Talking Heads, LCD Soundsystem, Photek & Other Electronic/Post-Punk/Avant-Garde Musicians
    A few weeks ago, we told you about Stephen Malinowski and the Music Animation Machine, a popular and pretty expansive YouTube channel that features scrolling, color-coordinated animated “scores” for classical works from Debussy to Bach and Stravinsky.
    No comment needed.

  • All Good Magazines Go to Heaven
    When James Hyman was a scriptwriter at MTV Europe, in the 1990s, before the rise of the internet, there was a practical — as well as compulsive — reason he amassed an enormous collection of magazines.
    Read for the first paragraph mention of Bowie, stay for the fascinating geekdom on display.

  • Robert Burns: was the beloved poet a ‘Weinsteinian sex pest’?
    Ahead of this year’s Burns Night, the 18th-century bard has come under harsh scrutiny from Liz Lochhead over his treatment of women.
    Ugh. I knew some of this yet still ‘celebrated’ (I posted an Instagram pic, that was about it) our ‘beloved Bard’. Such a part of Scottish culture but a lot of this is true. Ugh. MEN!

  • The female price of male pleasure
    The world is disturbingly comfortable with the fact that women sometimes leave a sexual encounter in tears.
    (Unfortunately) Eye opening article.

  • Why Did Two-Thirds of These Weird Antelope Suddenly Drop Dead?
    The mass death of 200,000 saiga provides a dark omen for what might happen to wildlife in a changing world. It took just three weeks for two-thirds of all the world’s saiga to die. It took much longer to work out why.
    FAKE NEWS! Climate Change isn’t real! They all actually had a pact and… nope I can’t do this conspiracy stuff.. this is terrible.

  • Jennifer Tilly: The gay interview
    Queer-film icon dishes on Chucky’s LGBT identity, the franchise’s groundbreaking trans doll and her legendary lesbian neo-noir ‘Bound’ Chucky, with his fiery red hair and frighteningly loyal pledge to be “your friend till the end,” was never gay by design.
    Because who doesn’t love Jennifer Tilly, right?