The Latest from Boing Boing

Gingerbread Enterprise Blackmarket Bakery sends us, "a gingerbread recreation of the Starship Enterprise from 'Star Trek,' created by us and on display at our store in Costa Mesa, CA." Read the rest... Otis and Dorothy Shepard: exemplars of mid-20th century design Anyone with even a passing interest in mid-20th century design has heard of Charles and Ray Eames, but Otis and Dorothy Shepard were arguably the more influential designing couple. Read the rest... Advertising characters exhibit at the SFO International Terminal Warren Dotz is the author of several excellent books about graphic design and advertising art. The SFO International Terminal is holding an exhibit of his collection of advertising characters. Read the rest... Worst US airlines for baggage loss and mishaps The latest DoT Air Travel Consumer Report ranks America's airlines by "mishandled" baggage incidents as a fraction of passengers carried -- the worst is Envoy Air, the best is Virgin. Read the rest... A Conversation with Wil Wheaton A splendid time with the actor-writer-blogger-geek-champion turned host of TableTop Read the rest... NY DA gives unlicensed driver who killed senior in crosswalk a $400 fine Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance brokered the $400 penalty for Kristin Rodriguez, an unlicensed driver who struck and killed 66 year old Keiko Ohnishi as she was crossing the street. Read the rest... Ayn Rand reviews children's movies The New Yorker's "Ayn Rand Reviews Children’s Movies" is less funny than it should be (most of the jokes are pretty obvious), but it's not bad. Read the rest... Donald Duck promoting birth control? Sex ed history Collector's Weekly presents Slut Shaming, Eugenics and Donald Duck: The Scandalous History of Sex-Ed Movies, exploring the strange, often awkward and puritanical history of education about birth control and disease prevention through the years. Read the rest... The day I met a creationist at the science conference The last place you expect to meet a creationist is at the annual American Geophysical Union conference. I don't know how I got so lucky. Read the rest... Adventurers can help science by sharing their data By adding a little sampling to their adventures out in the wild, explorers in hard-to-reach locations could lend a big hand to scientific research. Read the rest... Find more queer women of color on Netflix Sistah Sinema aims to offer a wide selection of films by and about queer women of color. It's via a partnership with Indieflix which hopes to add about five titles per month to the platform while showcasing global diversity. Read the rest... Scientists track water locked hundreds of miles underground The Earth is full of water. Not just lakes, river, streams, and oceans on the crustal surface, or even aquifers close to the surface—the planet literally holds water inside itself. Read the rest... Dark mornings: tool to help you calculate gloomy commutes The toughest part of the Winter season isn't the cold, the blues, or December's annual cramming of a full month's work plus last-minute whatevers into three actual work weeks (are you on Boing Boing pre-holiday procrastinating? Read the rest... Painted portraits of juggalos UK born, South African educated painted visited America and produced a series of beautiful portraits of Juggalos. These are the initial Juggalo paintings and drawings I made before visiting America, at the time the working title was “Papermen” because the impetus to creatively investigate this subculture came from the Twiztid lyrics quoted here, and the unexpected soft underbelly that they reveal. Papermen | onlylucyowen (via Neatorama) Read the rest... WATCH: Funny videos about weird apartment neighbors Jackie Jennings makes and stars in these videos about nutty apartment neighbors who come by to bug her. Read the rest... LISTEN: The Thunder Stone In 1768, Catherine the Great ordered her subjects to move a 3-million-pound granite boulder intact into Saint Petersburg, a task that seemed flatly impossible with the technology of the time. Read the rest... Tldrbot: great works of literature in seconds Tldrbot is the latest bot from Shardcore (previously, previously, previously) that slurps up great novels, algorithmically summarizes them to 1% of their length, then spits out audio files of a synthetic Scottish woman's voice reading those summaries aloud. Read the rest... Integrity For Sale: Sword and Laser Podcast This week we almost wrap up The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern, discuss the intricacies of eBook DRM and try to decide just how high a price our integrity would fetch. Read the rest... Report: U.S. planning “proportional response” to Sony hack, blamed on North Korea If we go to war over this thing, that does it: I'm really going to dislike Seth Rogen. Read the rest... Things you do that really piss me off Available at knockknockstuff.com [via thisisnthappiness.com] Read the rest... Pulp Nintendo A series of Nintendo-themed pulp fiction covers by Ástor Alexander, an artist based in San Diego, CA. Super Mario, Zelda, and Metroid Prime. Read the rest... Report: Google building new Android OS for use in cars, with no smartphone required Reuters reports that Google is developing a version of Android “that would be built directly into cars” to allow drivers to use the Internet without having to use a smartphone as an intermediary device. Read the rest... Maker-themed "Few of my favorite things" remix Legendary maker Becky Sterns is in top form as she waltzes around the Adafruit offices singing about her favorite things in this holiday video. Read the rest... Minecraft: The Complete Handbook Collection The beautiful packaging for Minecraft: The Complete Handbook Collection isn't the only wonderful thing about this box set. The four books it contains (Essential Handbook, Redstone Handbook, Combat Handbook, Construction Handbook) are equally beautiful and loaded with excellent information for kids and grownups on how to become a master of Minecraft. My daughter, an avid Minecrafter, got a couple of the books individually through the Scholastic school catalog service, but this set is just $19 so I bought it for her for Christmas. Read the rest... Mars burps methane. Scientists want to know why. NASA scientists reported results from the Mars Curiosity roving science lab at the American Geophysical Union to a packed room of press chomping at the bit for a big story. Read the rest... Humanity at night NASA scientists, at the American Geophysical Union’s annual meeting, revealed images from space of humanity—and our wonderful cultural behaviors. Read the rest... Why is Arctic ice melting so fast? Right now, it's cold in the Arctic. Days are dark, and ice grows to cover the dark sea. Come summer, lengthening days and warming temperatures will reverse that process. Read the rest... Visual Aid - a book of charts that explain how the world works Visual Aid and Visual Aid 2 are collections of colorful images and diagrams explaining, depicting and comparing elements from a wide range of topics. Read the rest... Momma cat nurses orphan pit bull puppy This pit bull puppy was abandoned at birth. An unlikely foster mom gave the doggie a second chance at life. [video link, via Reddit] Read the rest...