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1 July 2010
[kubrick] Go Look: BeaucoupKevin just very much likes this photo of Stanley Kubrick at work. [Previously: Wonderful Pic Of Stanley Kubrick on set of 2001]
2 July 2010
[comics] The Dark Knight Operates‘You don’t understand, boy. This isn’t an operating table…’
[comics] Go Look: Philip Bond’s Wonder Woman Costume Redesign.
3 July 2010
[funny] Communists Now Least Threatening Group In U.S.‘The Red Menace has been surpassed by militia groups, religious extremists, ecoterrorists, cybercriminals, Hollywood producers, and angry drivers.’
4 July 2010
[funny] Hi, I’m Troy McClure. You may remember me from… ‘Preacher with a Shovel’
5 July 2010
[science] The Undead Henrietta Lacks And Her Immortal Dynasty … Adam Curtis has posted his BBC documentary on the story of Henrietta Lacks on to his blog‘Henrietta Lacks’ cells are immortal.’
[funny] Go Look: Jason Donervan [from Cleanskies’ Photostream]
6 July 2010
[comics] Marvel Editors…you are the droppings of the creative world … the text of a letter that Vinnie Colletta wrote to Marvel’s editorial staff after editor-in-Chief Jim Shooter was fired in 1987 … ‘Displaying more class and poise in defeat than all of you did in victory… Jesus had one Judas… Jim had many, those that speared him and worse, those that watched…’
[movies] The 100 Greatest Movie Insults of All Time … be warned: extreme swearing. NSFW … ‘Fuck you, fuckball!’
7 July 2010
[movies] A Religion for Toys … a movie review that describes the theology behind Toy Story 3 … ‘In the theology of Toy Story, Andy is God and Woody is his prophet. He is more Moses than Jesus. For one thing, he is orthodox. In the theology of toys, the ideal is to be owned and to be played with. Of these two, it is more important to be owned, and to be owned by one God only. Andy’s room is heaven…’
8 July 2010
[comics] 10 Things You Need To Know Before You Read ‘Shadowland’ … Chris Sims tells you everything you need to know about Marvel’s newest cross-over … ‘Daredevil’s been having a pretty rough time since about 1981.’
[blogs] The Evolving Blogosphere: An Empire Gives Way … The Economist on the decline of blogging …‘Blogs are a confection of several things that do not necessarily have to go together: easy-to-use publishing tools, reverse-chronological ordering, a breezy writing style and the ability to comment. But for maintaining an online journal or sharing links and photos with friends, services such as Facebook and Twitter (which broadcasts short messages) are quicker and simpler.’
9 July 2010
[comics] Crackpots In Computer Security … an example of the nutty emails sent to the Microsoft security team …‘HE CAN INTRUDE AT WILL. HE COULD BE VERY DANGEROUS. LAST FRIDAY YOUR DEPT HAS GPS SEARCHING, BUT THE HACKER CUT US OFF. THEN TRASHED 4 OF MY PCS.’
[funny] Ãœnited Stätes Toughens Image With Umlauts‘In a move designed to make the United States seem more “bad-assed and scary in a quasi-heavy-metal manner,” Congress officially changed the nation’s name to the Ãœnited Stätes of Ämerica Monday.’
10 July 2010
[funny] Columbo Box Set‘I bring pornographic pictures… and the opinions of angry children!’
11 July 2010
[comics] Vinnie Colletta’s Exit ‘Conversation’ … a fascinating (and raw) interview with Vinnie Colletta apparently days after Jim Shooter was fired from Marvel in 1987. ‘… and I read the beeper and it said, “I’ve been fired”. Jesus Christ! He usually calls me on the beeper because he gets me anywhere I am. He calls me on the beeper and says, “I’ve been fired,” I nearly had a heart attack and I called him straight back. The only thing I can do to stand by him is give him sound advice because sometimes when you’re in the middle you don’t see the truth, you know?’
12 July 2010
[comics] J. Jonah Jameson is on Twitter

THE ONLY POSSIBLE “UP SIDE” TO THIS MISERABLE HEAT AND HUMIDITY IS THAT SOMEWHERE IN THIS TOWN, SPIDER-MAN IS DRENCHED IN HIS PERVERT SUIT.Mon Jun 28 16:05:08 via web


[comics] Go Look: Chester Brown’s Movie Poster For Year Of The Canivore … also: here’s the movie trailer on YouTube to provide some background on the movie … (more…)
13 July 2010
[moore] Hipster Priest … yet another great interview with Alan Moore

In the past I’ve tried to say, ‘Look, we are all crappy superheroes,’ because personal computers and mobile phone devices are things that only Bat Man and Mr Fantastic would have owned back in the sixties. We’ve all got this immense power and we’re still sat at home watching pornography and buying scratch cards. We’re rubbish, even though we are as gods.

[comics] The Determination to Be an Artist … R. Fiore Sums Up Harvey Pekar … ‘He struggled with indifference until indifference began to give way, as if to say, okay, I’ll pay attention to you if you’ll just leave me alone. By the end they were making movies about him. In the end his integrity became so manifest that his comic became a badge of prestige to publishers seeking credibility.’
14 July 2010
[comics] Harvey Pekar’s testament to life — with no apologies … Dean Haspiel on Harvey Pekar … ‘Yes, Harvey Pekar was a certified curmudgeon who became a cultural icon, but he was a true-blue mensch, too.’
[comics] Gary Groth interviews Harvey Pekar in 1993‘It’s a real uphill struggle, and it may go on for a really long time. I don’t know. I’ve been at this for 20 years now, and it’s certainly enriched my life, from a personal standpoint. It’s made it far more interesting and enjoyable, so I have no regrets. But I certainly would like to see comics in general be taken more seriously, because it would benefit me, you know?’
[comics] Bob Wachsman – Tummler … Alan Moore draws a one-page story for a Harvey Pekar comic.
15 July 2010
Effectively manage your Facebook privacy settings with three simple lists … if you’ve got OCD and time to spare this is probably an effective how-to on dealing with friends, work colleagues, family and acquaintances on Facebook.
[comics] Go Look: He Will Find You – He’s Batman!
16 July 2010
[crime] The Untold Story of the World’s Biggest Diamond Heist … great true crime story from Wired … ‘Next, the King of Keys played out a hunch. In Notarbartolo’s videos, the guard usually visited a utility room just before opening the vault. When the thieves searched the room, they found a major security lapse: The original vault key was hanging inside. The King of Keys grabbed the original. There was no point in letting the safe manufacturers know that their precious key could be copied, and the police still don’t know that a duplicate was made.’
18 July 2010
[comics] An interview with Harvey Pekar from 1984 conducted by Gary Groth [Part One | Part Two] … ‘Some comic book fans don’t know what to make of American Splendor. They think a normal comic book should be about superbeings who can fly, that a comic dealing with everyday people doing everyday things is weird. Ordinary is weird to them. Wow, that’s really ironic.’
19 July 2010
[weird] Go Look: No Big Deal – Just Dodging Traffic
[news] The News … Charlie Brooker on the news coverage about Raoul Moat‘The hunt for Raoul Moat got the news so flustered, it shrieked its reports at a pitch several hundred octaves above satire. Beneath a photograph of Britain’s Most Wanted Man as an infant, The Sun ran the caption “Cute baby … but two-month-old Moat clenches his fists”. On the front page, his estranged mother apparently wished him dead.’
20 July 2010
[comics] When It Comes To Comics, You Just Can’t Beat A Drunken, Violent Aardvark … Sam Leith on comics … ‘The genre end of comics has actually diversified a lot: from hardboiled noir in Sin City or 100 Bullets, to punk psychedelia in The Invisibles, to jaunty post-apocalyptic soap opera in Preacher. It’s at the literary end of comics you sense a narrowing of the range, the main strand being a sort of studied Pekarian drabness. You could call it mundane realism. Direct or oblique autobiography is the mode, neurosis and alienation the dominant tone. Their archetypal hero is a morose and ill-socialised writer or collector of comics, often subject to sexual humiliation, sometimes sharing a name with the author. These are frequently comics, in one way or another, about comics.’
[headlines] Meanwhile, in Durham: Police Hunt Norman Wisdom Lookalike.
[comics] The Moon Hoax … a great comic strip from Darryl Cunningham debunking some of the moon landing conspiracy theories

Panels from The Moon Hoax By Darryl Cunningham

21 July 2010
[comics] The Unwanted … a new comic from Joe Sacco on African migrants in Malta.
[comics] Jonathan Ross Meets Jim Steranko, His Comic-Book Hero‘Spend an hour with Jim Steranko and, if he’s in the mood, he’ll regale you with the most extraordinary tales. Are they true, I have asked myself more than once, or is he a fantasist? Has his love of storytelling and the creation of modern myths bled into his own life story until he can no longer tell the two apart? Well, now that I’ve met him, I believe them all to be true, just as I believe it when he tells me he still runs miles every day, pumps iron, and fornicates blissfully like a man a third his age. He is unique. He is Steranko. He is the greatest.’
[funny] Go Look: America’s Joyous Future.
22 July 2010
[philosophy] The Philosophy Of Immanuel Kant in Three Minutes‘Kant. It’s a German name and I’m quite happy to sit here in silence until you’re mature enough to get over it…’
23 July 2010
[comics] For Sale on eBay: Cerebus: High Society #1-25 Reprints by Dave Sim.
[music] Go Look: Photograph of Rick Astley and Morrissey‘Taken Backstage at Top Of The Pops in London, February 1989’ [via Boundr]
25 July 2010
[brain] Why Minds Are Not Like Computers … a long article on the history of artificial intelligence research and why it might not be possible to create a thinking computer … ‘People who believe that the mind can be replicated on a computer tend to explain the mind in terms of a computer.’
[kubrick] Go Watch: A Brief Interview with Kier Dullea on Kubrick’s 2001: Space Odyssey. [via Daring Fireball]
26 July 2010
[press] Overheard in the Newsroom

Editor to no one in particular: “Can’t we just have a normal murder?”

[lists] A List Of Common Misconceptions‘There is no evidence that Vikings wore horns on their helmets.’
27 July 2010
[world] The Most Alien-Looking Place on Earth … some amazing pictures from Socotra Island. ‘…for this island, which is part of a group of 4 islands, has been geographically isolated from mainland Africa for the last 6 or 7 million years. Like the Galapagos Islands, this island is teeming with 700 extremely rare species of flora and fauna, a full 1/3 of which are endemic, i.e. found nowhere else on Earth.’ [via Sore Eyes]
[comics] Lady Gaga Kidnaps Commissioner Gordon‘While the kidnapping occurred at stately Wayne Manor, home of playboy jet-setter Bruce Wayne, the eccentric billionaire was not available for comment.’
28 July 2010
[life] What Makes Us Happy? … engrossing article on a long-term study of (what appeared to be) successful, happy American men and what factors might have contributed to that …

Indeed, the lives themselves-dramatic, pathetic, inspiring, exhausting-resonate on a frequency that no data set could tune to. The physical material-wispy sheets from carbon copies; ink from fountain pens-has a texture. You can hear the men’s voices, not only in their answers, but in their silences, as they stride through time both personal (masturbation reports give way to reports on children; career plans give way to retirement plans) and historical (did they vote for Dewey or Truman?; “What do you think about today’s student protesters, drug users, hippies, etc.?”). Secrets come out. One man did not acknowledge to himself until he reached his late 70s that he was gay. With this level of intimacy and depth, the lives do become worthy of Tolstoy or Dostoyevsky.

29 July 2010
[magazines] The Best Magazine Articles Ever … great reading list of links from Kevin Kelly.
30 July 2010
[comics] My Favourite Medical Graphic Novels … a list of comics exploring health and medical themes … On Epileptic by David B: ‘In Epileptic there are no happy endings, no miracle cures, but we are left with a deeper understanding of how illness can affect a family. Not recommended for newly diagnosed epileptics. An upsetting masterpiece.’