After 230 years, the US Mint has ended production of new pennies. One of the very few things that incompetent stopped clock in the White House has gotten accidentally right.

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The Northern Lights Put on a Show. “A powerful geomagnetic storm brought spectacular light displays to night skies across the Northern Hemisphere, with sightings of pink, red, and green lights as far south as Florida and Oklahoma.”

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Put wings on your car. “We call it a private jet for tax reasons really. Private jets don’t pay duty on fuel, so by adding wings to the vehicle, we should qualify for the same exemption.”

Recently discovered 55-million-year-old crocodile eggshells perhaps belong to “drop crocs”, a species that “perhaps [hunted] like leopards — dropping out of trees on any unsuspecting thing they fancied for dinner”. Drop crocs!

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More women are riding the streets of Tehran on motorbikes, in violation of the law & social restrictions. “There is not any political manifesto or social agenda here. It’s just that since my workplace is downtown and I had to commute every day…”

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For his Yakuza project, photographer Anton Kusters spent two years documenting some members of the Japanese mafia. A limited edition of a book containing the photos is available. Steward Mag recently did an interview with Kusters: The values were almost comparable to ge...

A group of archaeologists has proposed “applying a model of how humans expanded to the different islands across the Pacific Ocean during their early migration to glean insights into how humanity should manage our colonization of space”.

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“The reason there are no weird blogs anymore is that it’s more fruitful to drive them out of business.” Private equity is ripping media into shreds.

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22 Thanksgiving Main Dishes That Are Better Than Turkey. I’ve been trying to get the fam to pivot from turkey to chicken (with all the usual sides in place), but no dice.

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Just as You Feared — Life in Zohran Mamdani’s New York. “Breakfast is sugar-free pea fibre from the state-run ZohranMart. I wish that I could give my son something better — it’s his birthday. But he doesn’t mind. School has turned him very woke.”

Operation Space Station is a two-part PBS documentary series on the International Space Station. Here’s a very short teaser trailer: A synopsis: The size of a football field, the International Space Station hurtles around Earth at 17,000 mph, shielding its astronauts fro...

Meet the 2025 National Book Award Finalists. “Literary Hub caught up with the finalists to ask them a bit about their books, their reading habits, and their writing lives.” Some great stuff in here.

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Bill Wurtz’s History of Japan is the most entertaining history of anything I have ever seen.

[This is a vintage post originally from Feb 2016.]

Tags: Bill Wurtz · Japan · timeless posts · video

Mattias Krantz bought an octopus from the fish market and taught it how to play piano.

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The trailer for Train Dreams, a film adaptation of the novella by Denis Johnson. “In select theaters November 7 and on Netflix November 21.”

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Jamelle Bouie: “I’m gonna make a case to you that no matter what you’ve heard about the filibuster, you should want the filibuster to be sent to the ash bin of history.”

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Jessica Guo: “If there’s something out there that calls to you, I hope you listen. Give yourself permission to do the thing.” Guo just finished hiking both the the Continental Divide Trail and the Great Divide Trail, solo. 3500+ miles!

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Here’s the trailer for The Age of Audio, a feature-length documentary about the invention and popularization of podcasting, from Adam Curry to Ronald Young Jr.

I ran across this movie via a clip on Instagram that explains how the word “podcast” came to be; here’s the same clip from YouTube:

Every time there’s a new technology, it always has to be named the dumbest thing.

Whoever came up with the name podcasting, like what a dumbass name.

It’s so funny cuz the podcast community gets very heated about these issues.

Whoever invented the word podcast, I’m going to punch him in the throat.

See also blogging. 🫠

Tags: movies · podcasts · The Age of Audio · trailers · video

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Fonts based on the type generated by the Epson MX-80 dot matrix printer (1980).

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For a More Creative Brain, Travel. “New sounds, smells, language, tastes, sensations, and sights spark different synapses in the brain and may have the potential to revitalize the mind.”

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“China’s carbon dioxide emissions have been flat or falling for 18 months, analysis reveals, adding evidence to the hope that the world’s biggest polluter has managed to hit its target of peak CO2 emissions well ahead of schedule.”

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High Horse: The Black Cowboy is a three-part documentary about the culture of Black cowboys & cowgirls and their erasure from the history of the western United States.

From executive producer Jordan Peele and Monkeypaw Productions, the pop culture and historical documentary confronts and reclaims the Wild West while revealing the story of the Black cowboy — a history that has largely been untold. It rides into the forgotten corners of history, shattering myths and celebrating the Black cowboys, farmers, jockeys, musicians, and rodeo champions who built the West — and now takes back their place in the saddle, sitting high atop the horse.

High Horse: The Black Cowboy starts streaming Nov 20th on Peacock.

Tags: High Horse: The Black Cowboy · trailers · TV · USA · video

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Going to Art Galleries Can Improve Wellbeing. “Enjoying original works of art in a gallery can relieve stress, reduce the risk of heart disease and boost your immune system, according to the first study of its kind.”

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A zoomable, fully searchable archive of every single page of every single issue of BYTE magazine from 1975-1998. “I hope seeing everything in single, searchable place offers a unique perspective.”

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Notes on Harold Brodkey’s 1992 essay Notes on American Fascism, which was dismissed at the time but now seems prescient.

A two-hour version of the music played in the Wellness Center in Severance. “Please try to enjoy each listening session equally.” See also Severance: Music To Refine To.

✅ Added to my Underscore collection.

Tags: music · Severance · TV · video

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A Journey to Vietnam to Uncover the Origins of Phở. “If you want to find the origins, you must go to Nam Ðịnh province and a village called Vân Cù.”

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From Freestyle: The Art of the Rhyme, a short clip of a 17-year-old Christopher Wallace (aka Biggie Smalls, aka The Notorious B.I.G.) freestyle rapping on a street corner in Bed Stuy, Brooklyn in 1989.

It’s all there…the talent, the confidence, the skills. Compare with a 17-year-old LL Cool J rapping in a Maine gymnasium in 1985. (via ★interesting)

Update: Biggie was rapping on Bedford Ave between Quincy St and Lexington Ave in Bed-Stuy. Check it out on Google Maps. (thx, debbie)

[This is a vintage post originally from Nov 2013.]

Tags: music · NYC · The Notorious B.I.G. · timeless posts · video

If you’re looking for a typeface with Radio Shack logo vibes, try Megazoid.

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Coulou’s vinyl cafe (no. 2). “Even though we’re traveling from jazz to funk to middle eastern and Indonesian 70s disco then hip hop, then folk and even more genres, to me this felt like a cool experience of finding the throughline in music…”

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