Google Brings Massive LIFE Photo Archive to The Web

in Art | November 18th, 2008

A good days for fans of open cul­ture: Google is bring­ing the mas­sive LIFE pho­to archive online. 2 mil­lion pho­tos are already uploaded, and anoth­er 8 mil­lion will be com­ing online soon. The cur­rent archive moves from The Amer­i­can Civ­il War to present, and it includes a large num­ber of pho­tos nev­er seen before. Here’s one of MLK Jr, anoth­er of Pablo Picas­so, and then one of FDR. All of these images will be added to Google Image Search, but if you want to peruse the col­lec­tion, you can sim­ply access it here. You can also read more about this ambi­tious under­tak­ing on Google’s cor­po­rate blog.

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Revisiting the Depression in The Grapes of Wrath (The Film)

in Film | November 18th, 2008

Over at The New York Times, film crit­ic A.O. Scott revis­its John Ford’s 1940 film based on John Stein­beck­’s clas­sic nov­el about the Great Depres­sion. Putting fore­clo­sures and eco­nom­ic strain front and cen­ter, it’s sud­den­ly a film for our age.  Scot­t’s video seg­ment runs about three min­utes, fea­tures footage from the film itself, and takes a look at Hen­ry Fon­da’s lead­ing role. Have a look.

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Einstein the Talking Parrot

in Random | November 17th, 2008

No com­men­tary real­ly need­ed. Just watch. Filed under “Ran­dom” and added to our YouTube playlist.

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Fire Ants Create a Living Lifeboat in the Amazon

in Science, Video - Science | November 13th, 2008

Yet fur­ther proof that ants are end­less­ly fas­ci­nat­ing, and, on a relat­ed note, see our ear­li­er piece: Cen­tral Intel­li­gence: From Ants to the Web.

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Vintage Nabokov

in Literature, Video - Arts & Culture | November 12th, 2008

Tak­en from a French tele­vi­sion pro­gram, this vin­tage clip fea­tures Vladimir Nabokov (1899–1977) read­ing from Loli­ta and reveal­ing his list of the most impor­tant nov­els of the 20th cen­tu­ry, among oth­er things. Nabokov speaks in Eng­lish here. So don’t let the ini­tial French throw you off. We’ve added this gem to our YouTube playlist.

Loli­ta, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta: the tip of the tongue tak­ing a trip of three steps down the palate to tap, at three, on the teeth. Lo. Lee. Ta.

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Oxford Scholars Name Top Ten Irritating Phrases

in Random | November 11th, 2008

What are some of the most annoy­ing phras­es in the Eng­lish lan­guage? In a new forth­com­ing book, A Damp Squid: The Eng­lish Lan­guage Laid Bare, Oxford researchers list the com­mon phras­es that we use incor­rect­ly or just all too exces­sive­ly. Here’s the list (and if you have your own dis­liked expres­sions, list them below in the com­ments).

1 — At the end of the day
2 — Fair­ly unique
3 — I per­son­al­ly
4 — At this moment in time
5 — With all due respect
6 — Absolute­ly
7 — It’s a night­mare
8 — Should­n’t of
9 — 24/7
10 — It’s not rock­et sci­ence

via The Tele­graph

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Joss Whedon: The Death of Orson Welles, The History of Women and Beyond

in Film, Television | November 10th, 2008

One of my friends from way back, Sheer­ly Avni, has just post­ed an inter­view with Joss Whe­don, who has now dom­i­nat­ed in four media cat­e­gories: film (Seren­i­ty), tele­vi­sion (Buffy the Vam­pire Slay­er), comics (Run­aways, The Aston­ish­ing X‑Men) and final­ly the inter­net. (Dr. Hor­ri­ble’s Sin­ga­long Blog). The inter­view was con­duct­ed for Moth­er Jones, so there’s a lot about pol­i­tics, gen­der, the writ­ers’ strike, and, yes, TV and film. It runs about 38 min­utes. Have a lis­ten.

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This American Life: Another Frightening Show About the Economy

in Current Affairs | November 6th, 2008

Back in May, This Amer­i­can Life (iTunes — Feed — Web Site) aired an episode called The Giant Pool of Mon­ey (stream here). The show, which demys­ti­fied the mort­gage cri­sis in an unsu­al way, became a major hit. Now, they have aired a sequel: Anoth­er Fright­en­ing Show About the Econ­o­my (stream here), and it explains the rip­ple effects of the orig­i­nal mort­gage cri­sis that have pushed the Amer­i­can finan­cial sys­tem to the brink. How did com­mer­cial paper freeze up, and why does this paper mat­ter? What exact­ly are cred­it default swaps, why was­n’t this mas­sive mar­ket reg­u­lat­ed, and how does this poor­ly under­stood mar­ket threat­en our eco­nom­ic well being? It’s all answered here. Give a lis­ten.

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Volcano Eruption Captured By Satellite

in Science | November 6th, 2008

A NASA satel­lite caught Alaska’s Mount Cleve­land in the act. An amaz­ing image. For more bril­liant vol­cano action pho­tos, have a look here.

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The African-American Freedom Struggle & Barack Obama’s American Dream (Free Stanford Course)

in Current Affairs | November 6th, 2008

I men­tioned this free course back in July, but, giv­en the his­toric nature of Tues­day’s elec­tion, it seems worth giv­ing it anoth­er men­tion.

On Stan­ford’s YouTube channel, you’ll find a com­plete series of lec­tures from an under­grad­u­ate course called “African-Amer­i­can His­to­ry: Mod­ern Free­dom Strug­gle.” Taught by Clay­borne Car­son, a promi­nent his­to­ry pro­fes­sor who has edit­ed and pub­lished the papers of Mar­tin Luther King, Jr., the course overviews the strug­gle for lib­er­ty and com­plete equal­i­ty, mov­ing from W.E.B. Du Bois (ear­ly 20th cen­tu­ry), to MLK and Mal­colm X, down to Barack Oba­ma today. The lec­ture below, enti­tled “Barack Oba­ma’s Amer­i­can Dream,” sit­u­ates Oba­ma with­in the larg­er sweep of African-Amer­i­can his­to­ry. It’s rather con­ver­sa­tion­al in style, and it does a good job of get­ting into Oba­ma’s per­son­al biog­ra­phy. The com­plete lec­tures can be watched in their entire­ty on YouTube here, or down­loaded in video via iTunes. And be sure to see our larg­er col­lec­tion of 250 Free Online Cours­es from Lead­ing Uni­ver­si­ties, where you’ll also find this course.

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