Showing posts with label ted talks. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ted talks. Show all posts

Tuesday, December 22, 2009



Maleficent's Castle ("Forbidden Fortress"), sculpted by Larry Nikolai and available April 2010. See also: The Pegasus Family ("Mythic Menagerie") from Fantasia.

And a few more links:

1. Interesting TED talk: While living and working as a marine biologist in Maldives, Charles Anderson noticed sudden explosions of dragonflies at certain times of year. He explains how he carefully tracked the path of a plain, little dragonfly called the globe skimmer, only to discover that it had the longest migratory journey of any insect in the world.

2. And here's another good TED talk: Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian tells the story of Mister Splashy Pants.

3. Zombie in love.

*Previously: Maleficent transforming into a dragon sculpture.

*Buy Maleficent collectibles at eBay.

Maleficent’s Castle (link roundup)



Maleficent's Castle ("Forbidden Fortress"), sculpted by Larry Nikolai and available April 2010. See also: The Pegasus Family ("Mythic Menagerie") from Fantasia.

And a few more links:

1. Interesting TED talk: While living and working as a marine biologist in Maldives, Charles Anderson noticed sudden explosions of dragonflies at certain times of year. He explains how he carefully tracked the path of a plain, little dragonfly called the globe skimmer, only to discover that it had the longest migratory journey of any insect in the world.

2. And here's another good TED talk: Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian tells the story of Mister Splashy Pants.

3. Zombie in love.

*Previously: Maleficent transforming into a dragon sculpture.

*Buy Maleficent collectibles at eBay.

Maleficent’s Castle (link roundup)

Saturday, February 7, 2009



Here's Bill Gates' mosquito speech. It's stunningly boring, includes a comically complicated graph, and an impressive amount of forgettable words to say "malaria is bad." If you didn't know he was going to release mosquitoes five minutes in, there's no way you'd make it that long into his speech. In all, I gave up after seven minutes - - less than half of the speech. However, you can play a fun mosquito-swatting flash game here.

In more interesting TED news, here's a short interview with Jason Hackenwerth (I've mentioned his terrific balloon creatures before). As recently as last January, he "had to go out to Times Square and twist balloons in freezing weather for grocery money."

Finally, I don't think his talk has been posted online yet, but Evan Schwartz apparently gave "a massively fascinating deconstruction of the origins of the character of the Wizard of Oz." Here's the official description of his book Finding Oz:
Finding Oz tells the remarkable story behind one of the world’s most enduring and best-loved books. Offering profound new insights into the true origins and meaning of L. Frank Baum’s 1900 masterwork, it delves into the personal turmoil and spiritual transformation that fueled Baum’s fantastical parable of the American Dream.

Before becoming an impresario of children’s adventure tales, the J. K. Rowling of his age, Baum failed at a series of careers and nearly lost his soul before setting out on a journey of discovery that would lead to the Land of Oz. Drawing on original research, Evan Schwartz debunks popular misconceptions and shows how the people, places, and events in Baum’s life gave birth to his unforgettable images and characters, from the Yellow Brick Road to the Emerald City to the dual view of witches that reflected the life of Baum’s mother-in-law, the radical women’s rights leader Matilda Joslyn Gage.

A narrative that sweeps across late-nineteenth-century America, Finding Oz ultimately reveals how failure and heartbreak can sometimes lead to redemption and bliss, and how one individual can ignite the imagination of the entire world.
It's available for preorder for 32% off at Amazon.

*Previously: Reggae-style Wizard of Oz.

*Learn how to give a good speech with these books at Amazon.

Bill Gates' mosquito speech and other TED news

Wednesday, February 4, 2009



Download a desktop wallpaper featuring evil robot Maximilian from The Black Hole.

And a few more links:

1. Photos of a koala taking a bath.

2. To make a bs point about fighting malaria, Bill Gates released mosquitoes during his TED talk. His schools are apparently a big failure, by the way. Probably why he has to resort to scary stunts to try to intimidate his audience.

3. William Gibson continues to publish what seem to be small snippets of a sequel to Spook Country.

4. Seems like only yesterday I mocked the garbage posted at Barry Diller's new blog. Traffic has apparently fallen significantly since then. Via.

*Previously: Why you never see Disney's The Black Hole on tv.

*Buy plush koalas at eBay.

Maximilian from The Black Hole desktop wallpaper (link roundup)

Monday, August 4, 2008





A dizzingly complicated talk appropriately accompanying mindblowingly complicated origami creations. The talk is interesting enough when it's just covering paper creations like the double preying mantis above, but then Lang moves on to discuss origami being applied to telescopes, heart stents, and more.







Here's Lang's site.



And here's Bruno Bowden folding one of Lang's incredible creations in under two minutes, blindfolded, while Rufus Cappadocia plays a custom five-string electric cello. It's a good surprise to see the finished creation:







*Find origami books at Amazon.

Robert Lang explains how modern origami artists create astonishing works of art