A recently declassified Sandia National Lab report published by the National Security Archive offers new details about a 1961 nuclear weapons accident in Goldsboro, North Carolina. Read the rest

http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/qDI3aOYFaz8/new-truths-revealed-about-1961.html

BBC presenter Kate Russell's first science fiction novel is Elite: Mostly Harmless, a novelization of the classic video game Elite, whose production was successfully kickstarted last year. One of the backer rewards was to have yourself gruesomely murdered in the pages of the book, and six lucky fans are now enjoying their deaths: Read the rest

http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/20b38vpTwrw/backers-get-gruesomely-murdere.html

Rob Beschizza gets a sneak peak at Warpo's new imemmorial-abysms-of-madness-based line of toys. Read the rest

http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/8paU4IfreJw/cthulhu-retro-action-figures-i.html

Hayley Campbell (who, at age seven, worked side-by-side with her father Eddie Campbell on the graphic novel classic "From Hell") has recently published a gorgeous, authoritative book on the myriad artworks created to accompany Neil Gaiman's many works. We proudly present several extracts from her book here. Read the rest

http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/pylulsaVOg0/the-art-of-neil-gaiman.html

The theory of Big Data is that the numbers have an objective property that makes their revealed truth especially valuable; but as Kate Crawford points out, Big Data has inherent, lurking bias, because the datasets are the creation of fallible, biased humans. For example, the data-points on how people reacted to Hurricane Sandy mostly emanate from Manhattan, because that's where the highest concentration of people wealthy enough to own tweeting, data-emanating smartphones are. But more severely affected locations -- Breezy Point, Coney Island and Rockaway -- produced almost no data because they had fewer smartphones per capita, and the ones they had didn't work because their power and cellular networks failed first.

I wrote about this in 2012, when Google switched strategies for describing the way it arrived at its search-ranking. Prior to that, the company had described its ranking process as a mathematical one and told people who didn't like how they got ranked that the problem was their own, because the numbers didn't lie. After governments took this argument to heart and started ordering Google to change its search results -- on the grounds that there's no free speech question if you're just ordering post-processing on the outcome of an equation -- Google started commissioning law review articles explaining that the algorithms that determined search-rank were the outcome of an expressive, human, editorial process that deserved free speech protection.

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http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/qmCcRBlNbQ8/inherent-biases-warp-big-data.html

Boing Boing suggests that you buy these things for your father, paternal figure, manly individual, or person of ironically inappropriate gender or familial status for Father's Day. Read the rest

http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/JxIewhjwtOM/fdgg.html

John Biggs presents a vignette from the world of Mytro, his new young-adult novel about a secret train system that can take you anywhere in the world. [5m read time] Read the rest

http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/wLHMjiqfZKE/the-cold-dark.html

Serbia has been battered by two storms: first there were mass floods; then a wave of terrifying Internet censorship, which has included denial-of-service attacks, arrests over Facebook discussions of the flood casualties, and ISPs mysteriously shuttering websites critical of the government. We're proud to present an open letter from BlogOpen-BlogClosed, announcing a netcast strategy conference on Tuesday, June 10 at 1PM CET. Read the rest

http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/fMXfDbWdlbs/letter-from-serbia-we-are-dro.html

David Weinberger's Would a Google car sacrifice you for the sake of the many? explores many philosophical conundra regarding self-driving cars, including the possibility that the rich and powerful might literally buy their way into the fast-lane. This is the premise of my 2005 story "Human Readable," which appears in my collection With a Little Help (there's also a spectacular audio edition, read by Spider Robinson). Read the rest

http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/osa4qnPo_To/network-neutrality-for-self-dr.html

One year ago today NSA whistleblower goes public: Edward Snowden, a 29-year-old NSA contractor and ex-CIA employee, has revealed that he is behind the series of leaks that have appeared in the Guardian and Washington Post this weekend, which detailed top-secret, over-reaching, and arguably criminal surveillance programs run by America's spies with the cooperation of the Obama administration.

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http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/9hcqrv9b0XQ/blogging-history-snowden-goes.html

Thinkgeek sells a line of Star Wars loungers (Boba Fett, Stormtrooper, Darth Vader, $70 each) made of 60% cotton/40% polyester blend -- they're basically Star Wars kigurumis, with two front pockets and a drawstring hood. Stylish loungewear for the Star Wars geek in your life! Read the rest

http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/mIoru8yY2do/star-wars-kigurumi.html

"You can ring my bell."

Video Link

http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/_-ltiaO_1fA/ring-my-bell-by-anita-ward.html

Spotted at the Contemporary Craft Fair, the amazing teapots of Rylatt of Wales: improbably shaped ceramics with metallic, dark glazes. I wheedled my wife into getting me one for my upcoming birthday, and it is destined to be a favorite and a source of joy around my office. Read the rest

http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/vN9ME2UPOIE/improbable-beautiful-ceramic.html

Solidwool is a company from Devon, England that mixes traditional Devon wool with bioresins to make a wool-based, fiberglass-like composite that can be use in furniture construction.

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http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/RZlC9_RjqNg/solidwool-mid-century-modern.html

Caroline Siede reviews the latest episode of the BBC’s clone drama Read the rest

http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/CDJoagNGIJk/a-new-character-shakes-up-the.html

Carl Malamud sez, "This 1966 military film on good style in sending Morse Code is a real hoot. 38k views on YouTube and another 3.6k on the Internet Archive.

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http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/W06eChckqcs/morse-code-instructional-film.html

London's property bubble has got people energetically expanding their property, digging out sub-basements -- and the insane bubblenomics of London housebuilding are such that it's cheaper to just bury the digger and abandon it than to retrieve it. London's accumulating a substrate of entombed earthmoving machinery. Read the rest

http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/A3GHdUdy6Vw/london-property-bubble-entombs.html

Dystopia Tracker collects the "predictions"* of science fictional dystopias and examines the ways in which they've come true. You can add your own, or suggest ways in which they've come to pass.

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http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/detPpwUlroI/dystopia-tracker-science-fict.html

One year ago today Another Top Secret leak: Obama's cyber-war hit-list: Glenn Greenwald and the Guardian have published details of another Top Secret US surveillance/security document.

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http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/nGySUxymGrQ/blogging-history-obamas-cyb.html

More than 90% of Americans believe that the US government is unduly influenced by money, and the Mayday.US super PAC is raising $5M to fund the election campaigns of politicians who'll pledge to dismantle super PACs and enact other campaign finance reforms.

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http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/Y929gnmdCLw/help-raise-5m-in-30-days-to-s.html