An animated music video for Quebecois band Corridor by Jonathan Robert and Gabriel Favreau in which we ascend via stairs, lifts and cable cars though a bewildering structure toward an encounter with the almighty computer that controls all.
Author Archives: Chompsky
An entertaining short by Seth Porges and Chris Charles telling the true story of New Jersey’s huge, poorly managed and extremely dangerous Action Park, aka ‘Traction Park’, aka ‘Class Action Park’.
The 20 year heyday of the park was the subject of Johnny Knoxville’s semi fictitious tribute film ‘Action Point’ and Matt Robertson’s 2013 documentary, which inspired it: ‘The Most Insane Amusement Park Ever’.
Hot Wheels
at
Behold: the Scania AXL – the Swedish manufacturer’s concept for an autonomous dump truck.
An actual prototype rather than a render, the AXL’s cabless chassis is driven by a biodiesel engine, using seven cameras, multiple radars, and a laser to navigate its environment.
Quarrries and gravel pits – being remote and largely free of pesky humans – might well be the first place autonomous vehicles start full time work.
Related: the Volvo Vera and the GM Surus.
Keith
at
YouTube brainbox GGP Grey investigates efficient and not-so-efficient ways to board commercial airline flights.
Random boarding is better, it seems, but as physicist Jason Steffen showed in 2008, there is a precise order which minimises the delay caused by other passengers stowing their luggage in overhead compartments.
Behold the centre of the Milky Way galaxy – a mere 26,000 light years away (as the photon flies) toward the constellation of Sagittarius. To wit:
Even on a dark night, you can’t really see it though. Gaze in that direction, and your sight-line is quickly obscured by intervening interstellar dust. In fact, dark dust clouds, glowing nebulae, and crowded star fields are packed along the fertile galactic plane and central regions of our galaxy. This annotated view (top pic), a mosaic of dark sky images, highlights some favourites, particularly for small telescope or binocular equipped sky-gazers. The cropped version (second pic) puts the direction to the galactic centre on the far right. It identifies well-known Messier objects like the Lagoon nebula (M8), the Trifid (M20), star cloud M24, and some of E.E. Barnard’s dark markings on the sky. A full version extends the view to the right toward the constellation Scorpius, in all covering over 20 degrees across the centre of the Milky Way.
Huge view here.
(Image: Miguel Claro (TWAN, Dark Sky Alqueva)
Hot Keels
at
Behold: the LeVen 90: a 28m luxury yacht with just 1.4 meters of displacement, specifically designed for the shallow waters of South Florida.
Topside: sun deck, main salon and ‘lanai’ top deck. Below: four ensuite staterooms, twin MTU 12V2000 engines and a low noise linear propulsion system pushing the vessel along at an impressive top speed of 26 knots.
Price on application.
A fascinating sequence taken from an upcoming PBS documentary ‘Octopus: Making Contact’ (you may have seen BBC2’s ‘Octopus In My House’) in which a sleeping octopus is observed by marine biologist Dr David Sheel who theorises that her colour changes are caused by cephalopodic dreaming.