Sunday 4 August 2013

10 useless but interesting items I happened across

How to Bed a Balloon: 1942
via Shorpy Historical Photo Archive – Vintage Fine Art Prints by Dave
How to Bed a Balloon: 1942
May 1942. Continuing the series last seen here.
“Parris Island, South Carolina. Special Marine units learning how to bed down a big barrage balloon”
Photos by Pat Terry and Alfred Palmer for the Office of War Information.
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Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
Ira B. Arnstein explained his failure as a songwriter like this: Cole Porter and Irving Berlin were plagiarising him. So Arnstein sued, again and again. He lost – his cases and his sanity… more




How Economic Austerity Costs Lives
via Big Think by Orion Jones
What's the Latest Development? A pair of British authors is set to release a new book next month detailing the adverse health consequences of economic austerity on the citizens of nations who implement such programs. In The Body Economic: Why Austerity Kills, political economist David Stuckler and the physician-epidemiologist Sanjay Basu cite examples from recent history and longer ago of where government reaction to economic shocks has had a positive and negative impact on health.
Continue reading



Perpetual Motion Test Could Amend Theory of Time
via 3quarksdaily by Robin Varghese
View-into-ion-trap-apparatus_web
View-into-ion-trap-apparatus_web
Natalie Wolchover in the Simons Foundation (via io9)
Clear description but my physics is really not up to it!

Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
Those who knew the novelist Richard Brautigan didn’t invite him to parties. He brought uninvited guests, he was drunk, and he had a .357 Magnum… more



Which is more painful? Childbirth vs. Getting kicked in the nuts
via Boing Boing by Maggie Koerth-Baker

Science has the answers. Or, anyway, science has a fascinating look at why this particular question cannot be satisfactorily answered.
Also, being 16 weeks pregnant, this is relevant to my interests. I look forward to the subjective debate in the comments.



25 Vintage Photos of Librarians Being Awesome
via Flavorwire
Librarians, in case you hadn’t heard, are essential members of society — likely to expand minds wherever they go — and, as such, are fully worthy of hero worship (whether they’re among the coolest librarians alive or just pretty cool).
Read More
It took me ages to scroll through all the images, up and down and down and up again until i settled on just one to give you a flavour of what you will miss if you don’t click through!
index

Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
Wikipedia and women. Ninety percent of the editors are men. And it shows. There are fewer articles on female poets than on porno actresses… more

The County Surveys of Great Britain 1793–1817
Exploring how the creation of a virtual collection can release the potential of these historical surveys for discovery.
Continue reading from Edina News


Quantifying the interdisciplinarity of scientific journals and fields
an article in Journal of Informetrics Volume 7 Issue 2 (April 2013)
I did not understand very much of the article but simply love the graphical abstract
Full-size image (29 K)
More pretty pictures here if you want to check

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