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Monday Links from the Bench vol. CDXLIV

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    Monday Links from the Bench vol. CDXLIV

    It's too hot for moving around, so find some shade and read this lot instead
    • “I Was Devastated”: Tim Berners-Lee, the Man Who Created the World Wide Web, Has Some Regrets - "From the beginning, in fact, Berners-Lee understood how the epic power of the Web would radically transform governments, businesses, societies. He also envisioned that his invention could, in the wrong hands, become a destroyer of worlds… Berners-Lee has, for some time, been working on a new software, Solid, to reclaim the Web from corporations and return it to its democratic roots."

    • The lost standing stones of Devon are still hiding from archaeologists - A set of standing stones vanished under silt due to changing water flow patterns, and now archeologists are trying to find them again: "Some people that I work with here in Lampeter used to take field trips down to the estuary to look at these stones in the early 1980s and early 1990s… they were already being buried by the late 1980s, and only the larger stones were still visible in the early 1990s."

    • The Young Milky Way Collided With a Dwarf Galaxy - "Astronomers have found stars dating from a long-ago collision between the Milky Way and another galaxy. The crash helps to explain why the Milky Way looks the way it does." So basically, our galaxy is two galaxies

    • Below The Surface - Construction of a new underground line in Amsterdam led to a chunk of the Amstel river being blocked off and drained, so archeologists have collected every single bit of junk that's been thrown in there since the city began to develop around 1300, and here they all are: "The yield of 465,536 finds from the riverbed at Damrak is double that of the 229,943 finds from the entire excavation at Rokin… the two locations show the same pattern between 1600 and 1900, with a similar (slight) peak around 1650-1725 and 1800-1875. This dating pattern may well mirror major economic cycles, such as the blossoming of trade and the city in the seventeenth century, the stagnation and decline in the eighteenth century, and the renewed opportunity and growth brought by the industrial revolution in the nineteenth century."


    • Study Suggests Dolphins and Some Whales Grieve Their Dead - "For years, there’s been anecdotal evidence that whales and dolphins experience grief similar to humans… a new study tries to get a handle on this grief-like behavior to determine if cetaceans—dolphins and whales—really do experience the emotion."

    • Drums in the Deep: Estimating Test Yields Based on Seismic Signal - Explanation of the maths behind calculating the yield of North Korea's nuclear weapons.

    • Early Modern Memes: The Reuse and Recycling of Woodcuts in 17th-Century English Popular Print - "Expensive and laborious to produce, a single woodcut could be recycled to illustrate scores of different ballads, each new home imbuing the same image with often wildly diverse meanings." The seated king below turns up as Charles II, the biblical David, and numerous others.


    • What did ancient Babylonians eat? A Yale-Harvard team tested their recipes - "The ancient Babylonians favored recipes of stews filled with savory meats, herbaceous herbs, and earthy vegetables. Unlike today, the recipes for these dishes were not presented alongside colorful photos in a hardbound book, but rather were impressed into the surface of clay tablets using reed styluses." And apparently they're quite tasty.

    • This Guy Served His Friends Tacos Made from His Own Amputated Leg - Speaking of lunch, when this guy lost a leg in a motorcycle crash, there was clearly an opportunity for a culinary experiment: "On Sunday, July 10, 2016, three weeks after the accident, Shiny, who prefers to remain anonymous, invited 10 of his most open-minded friends to a special brunch. They ate apple strudel, quiche puff pastries, fruit tarts, and chocolate cake. They drank gin lemonade punches and mimosas. And then the main course came out: fajita tacos made from Shiny's severed human limb."

    • Animated Knots - "Better to know a knot and not need it, than need a knot and not know it." Useful guide to tying knots, regularly updated. And if knots aren't your thing, how about Animated Napkins?



    Happy invoicing!

    #2
    The animated napkins link does not include how to fold one to resemble a, umm... gentleman in a happy mood.
    …Maybe we ain’t that young anymore

    Comment


      #3
      I can get anyone a human leg for the right price.

      Comment


        #4
        Originally posted by WTFH View Post
        The animated napkins link does not include how to fold one to resemble a, umm... gentleman in a happy mood.
        That's what feminism does for you!

        Remember chaps, they don't want equality, they've had that for years - it's revenge they're after now!
        Old Greg - In search of acceptance since Mar 2007. Hoping each leap will be his last.

        Comment


          #5
          Originally posted by Old Greg View Post
          I can get anyone a human leg for the right price.
          You are Walter Sobchak and I claim my 5 free in-and-out burgers.

          Comment


            #6
            Originally posted by barrydidit View Post
            You are Walter Sobchak and I claim my 5 free in-and-out burgers.
            There's no such thing as a free in-and-out burger.

            Comment


              #7
              Originally posted by Old Greg View Post
              I can get anyone a human leg for the right price.

              Don't go and sell your other one too! You need that to hop around
              Work in the public sector? Read the IR35 FAQ here

              Comment


                #8
                Originally posted by OwlHoot View Post
                Don't go and sell your other one too! You need that to hop around
                I was thinking of something a bit more gammony.

                Comment


                  #9
                  •This Guy Served His Friends Tacos Made from His Own Amputated Leg - Speaking of lunch, when this guy lost a leg in a motorcycle crash, there was clearly an opportunity for a culinary experiment: "On Sunday, July 10, 2016, three weeks after the accident, Shiny, who prefers to remain anonymous, invited 10 of his most open-minded friends to a special brunch. They ate apple strudel, quiche puff pastries, fruit tarts, and chocolate cake. They drank gin lemonade punches and mimosas. And then the main course came out: fajita tacos made from Shiny's severed human limb."
                  Oh my. That's just not right. Every time I think I've seen everything on the internet something else pops up. I'm not normally the queasy type but no way am I clicking the link to all the photos.

                  This is going to pop back in to my mind every time I have fajitas for a very long time to come
                  'CUK forum personality of 2011 - Winner - Yes really!!!!

                  Comment


                    #10
                    Originally posted by northernladuk View Post
                    Oh my. That's just not right. Every time I think I've seen everything on the internet something else pops up. I'm not normally the queasy type but no way am I clicking the link to all the photos.

                    This is going to pop back in to my mind every time I have fajitas for a very long time to come
                    And what exactly do you think those cocktail sausages were made from?

                    Comment

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