Tom Sawyering the Corps.

-  Last night I made the mistake of beginning to watch the Lance Bangs Pavement documentary “Slow Century”.  A mistake because I should have known it would’ve been too fascinating to turn off, no matter how late the hours got.  If you’ve got the time, here it is:

-  Sage Francis has resurrected the Tumblr Hello There, Racists after an apparent shut down.  I think it’s outrageous to say it isn’t fair to publicly chastise these people, knowing full well that Twitter and Facebook are publicly viewed domains (they’re basically the 21st Century “public square”).  It also serves to remind us of some very important things, two of which: you’re not invisible on the Internet, and if you want to say outrageous shit you’d better damn well be posting anonymously (then again anyone with half a brain can trace an IP address), and yes… racism definitely still exists.  Some of this shit is just disgusting.

-  Very interesting article, that very well might go over your head a little (went over mine at least), on the nature of dark energy.  Is it static or dynamic in its existence.  If it’s dynamic… yeesh, the philosophical implications of such a thing are astronomical; a form of matter whose density and composition and structure changes as it shifts though space time??

While hypothesized dark energy can explain observations of the universe expanding at an accelerating rate, the specific properties of dark energy are still an enigma. Scientists think that dark energy could take one of two forms: a static cosmological constant that is homogenous over time and space, or a dynamical entity whose energy density changes in time and space. By examining data from a variety of experiments, scientists in a new study have developed a model that provides tantalizing hints that dark energy may be dynamic.

The results are still far from conclusive, but the scientists hope that future data might narrow down the models with greater accuracy. They hope that observations by the Planck spacecraft (launched in 2009; first data available in April 2013) and the Euclid spacecraft (launch date is 2019) could help pinpoint the dark energy models that most closely describe our expanding universe.

-  Great piece of street art (graffiti, if you prefer that term; I really could care less what it’s called) from GOIN, who I believe works out of the UK:

-Sonny

Massive Dreams of Secrecy.

-  I should really start reading/following Centauri Dreams a lot closer, and you should too.  The site examines and dicusses the next phase of human space travel and exploration while at the same time shedding some light onto the mysteries of the universe (as in, say, this article on the nature of Dark Matter).  Their latest article talks about the robotic Voyager 1 reaching interstellar space:

“An indication that interstellar space looms near is that Voyager 1, in the period from early 2009 to early 2012, has measured a 25 percent increase in galactic cosmic rays, with an even more rapid increase in the spring of 2012. The science team will now be watching for a change in the intensity of energetic particles generated inside the heliosphere, a kind of ‘bubble’ of charged particles inflated by our star’s solar wind. A sharp dropoff will be another flag for leaving the system, as will a major change in the direction of magnetic field lines around the spacecraft.”

-  I’ve just read Brian Wood’s newest creator-owned project The Massive for the third time through and I’m thinking it will quickly evolve into a new favorite comic of mine.  There’s really nothing to complain about; it’s a smart, passionate, engrossing, beautiful comic book.  The criticism I’ve seen floating around the net is that the characters aren’t “fully realized”… which, when you’re reviewing the first issue of a brand new book without established characters or setting or anything previously, is another way of saying “I have nothing to complain about”.  Obviously we will learn more about the characters… this isn’t Superman here, with some 70 years of character history.  What happened to the world in this book is relevant, due to what the main characters are, but not overtly so.  Wood explains a year-long series of cataclysmic events that have led to where the story is today in this issue, though one gets the feeling the themes of the book will stem not from the cataclysm itself, rather the aftermath (ala DMZ).  And I can’t say enough good things about the art team, Kristian Dolandson on pencils and Dave Stewart on colors.  Everything is so clean and crisp.  Combine that with the cold, muted colors and it fits together perfectly with a ship trolling the vast (more now than before, even) oceans of the world.  Lots of talent creating this thing, and I cannot wait to see where it goes.

-  Bletchley Park: Codebreaking and the Lost Art of Secrecy

“Bletchley Park was home to Ultra, an intelligence operation involving the interception and decryption of German wireless messages based on the legendary Enigma throughout the war, using pioneering early computing machines such as The Bombe and Colossus. Ultra essentially gave the Allies an insight into the German plans ahead of their implementation — an insight unparalleled in history, and one which allowed us to prepare retaliation, reinforcement or complete avoidance. Such strategies however needed to be made without jeopardising the source of the information — the “Most Secret Source” as Churchill dubbed Ultra.“

-  Kevin Wada re-imagined Magneto recently on his art blog:

-Sonny

New FF/Marimba Zelda.

That Stephen Wiltshire is really something.  Wow.

I’m starting today with three people playing theLegend of Zelda theme on Marimba’s from YouTube:

(“Triforce” is my fantasy football team name; yes… insinuating that I don’t give a shit about fantasy football [it's a work thing])

I’ve just searched the terms “zelda mashup” on Deviant Art and found this amazingly nerdy rendition of the Fantastic 4 (Dhalsim as Mr. Fantastic is probably my favorite):

1.  Prince Zuko (avatar last air bender) as Human Torch
2. Dhalsim (Street fighter) as MR Fantastic
3. Princess Zelda (Legand of Zelda) as invisible woman
4. Alphonse Elric (Full Metal alchemist) as The Thing

Also, I’ve got the obligatory, fascinating BBC article discussing dark matter:  Dark Matter Hinted At Again At Cresst Experiment.

“Scientists may have seen more hints of the dark matter purported to make up a majority of the mass in the Universe.  Researchers at the Cresst experiment in Italy say they have spotted 67 events in their detectors that may be caused by dark matter particles called Wimps.  The finds must be reconciled with other experiments that have recently hinted at the detection of Wimps.  The results were revealed at the Topics in Astroparticle and Underground Physics meeting in Germany on Tuesday.”

-Sonny