A growing community of music fans and makers love the old iPods that Apple discontinued years ago. When their devices die or need better batteries or more storage, they send them to people like Manuel Mantecon (aka Pichi) who refurbishes them in his North Carolina bathroom workshop. From OneZero:

Pichi said that he’s not that technical or “geeky” but got into iPod modding after his own iPod Classic’s battery died. He couldn’t find anyone to replace it for an affordable cost and felt like he was getting ripped off, so he figured he could do it himself. “I got my iPod wide open there looking like busted spaghetti with wires poking up everywhere,” he said. “So I just started messing around with it and changed the battery myself..."

The more popular modifications are relatively simple: updates like adding more storage or battery life, or installing firmware that allows for customization of the user interface or downloading games outside of Apple’s ecosystem. Few iPod modders are injecting the music players with wild features or stark new aesthetics...

They want to play an old game. Return to a better digital sound. Or just to preserve a time when your playback device didn’t also store thousands of unread work emails, a million pings from the group chat, hourly spam risk calls, and targeted ads.

"Classic iPod Hackers Say There’s No Better Way to Listen to Music" by Melanie Ehrenkranz (OneZero)

image credit: Chris Harrison (CC BY-SA 2.0) Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/03/03/why-theres-a-cult-market-for.html

https://boingboing.net/2020/03/03/these-boxes-arent-rotating.html

Nobody wants to be caught with a dead phone. Usually, your poor planning is no more than a matter of momentary inconvenience. But what if your phone is dead at the wrong time?

And we mean a very wrong time. Like if you’re in desperate need of emergency help. Or when you absolutely have to connect with someone immediately. In just a handful of moments, the seemingly minor act of failing to charge up can have some very real and lasting consequences.

The AtomXS 3+ Hour Emergency Keychain Charger is engineered to be the ultimate failsafe when you fail to handle your charging duties.

At less than 2.5 inches across and weighing only a few ounces, the ergonomic AtomXS slips unobtrusively into your pocket or can connect easily to a keychain or bag so it can always be with you for the right occasion.

If your phone is running out of power, the 1,300mAh of power stuffed conveniently into this tiny high-density battery cell can be a real lifesaver. Just pop out the retractable Lightning, USB or Micro USB connector, plug it directly into your phone and you’ll immediately have an extra three hours of battery life to assure you never lose touch.

The unit springs to life with a touch of the sensor and even powers off after 40 seconds of inactivity. The AtomXS holds a charge for up to three months so as long as you can remember to keep this trusty little e-charger powered up every once in a while, you’ll never find yourself with a dead device again. Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/03/02/this-ultra-portable-charger-gi.html

It's a sad day for those who enjoy watching flecks of spittle appear on the mouth corners of bloviating news personalities. Chris Matthews (74) has "retired" from MSNBC after over 20 salivary years as a hot take opinion spewer and conductor of condescending interviews with women. The straw that broke the blonde camel's back was likely to have been this recent article in GQ by Laura Bassett that describes a number of incidents highlighting  Matthews' sexist behavior, putting him in the league of misogynists like Bill O'Reilly:

Matthews has a pattern of making comments about women’s appearances in demeaning ways. The number of on-air incidents is long, exhausting, and creepy, including commenting to Erin Burnett, for example, “You’re a knockout...it’s all right getting bad news from you,” while telling her to move closer to the camera. Behind the scenes, one of Matthews’s former producers told The Daily Caller in 2017 that he allegedly rated his female guests on a numerical scale and would name a “hottest of the week,” like a “teenage boy.” In 1999, an assistant producer accused Matthews of sexual harassment, which CNBC, the show's network at the time, investigated. They concluded that the comments were "inappropriate," and Matthews received a “stern reprimand,” according to an MSNBC spokesperson.

https://boingboing.net/2020/03/02/good-riddance-chris-matthews.html

Take as much money as you want, at $7.25 an hour (current Fed minimum wage). All you have to do is turn the crank, which dispenses one penny every 4.97 seconds. Easy money, right?

This brilliant art piece by Blake Fall-Conroy provides a visceral demonstration of just how little $7.25 an hour really is. If cranking this handle starts to quickly feel not worth the effort, imagine doing an actual job and making this little. Nearly two million Americans know the feeling daily.

Details here.

Image: Used by permission of the artist Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/03/02/minimum-wage-machine-dispenses.html

Back in August 2019, a female komodo dragon named Charlie gave birth to three little dragons at the Chattanooga Zoo. The zookeepers had previously tried to hook her up with a sweet dragon fella named Kadal, but the two never really seemed to hit it off — not that the staff could observe, anyway. And now that they've tested the DNA of young Onyx, Jasper, and Flint, it's finally confirmed: Charlie and Kadal did not hit it off at all, so Charlie took it upon herself to bring the kids into the world. From the Chattanooga Times Free Press:

The DNA results showed the babies were the result of parthenogenesis, which is a type of reproduction where the female produces offspring without male fertilization. […] Female Komodo dragons carry WZ sex chromosomes, while males carry the ZZ type. When parthenogenesis happens, the mother can only create WW or ZZ eggs. Since eggs with the sex chromosomes of WW aren't viable, only ZZ eggs are left to produce all male hatchlings. Parthenogenesis is considered very rare, with the first case of a successful parthenogenesis reproduction in Komodo dragons recorded in 2006.

I was personally fascinated to learn that there are so many different categorizations of asexual reproduction, and that it can indeed occur spontaneously in vertebrates without any fertilization. In 2007, there was apparently a bit of a scandal involving a lab-grown human embryo that was allegedly cloned, but turned it to be a productive parthenogenesis. There are also living human beings with some unique chimeric complications in which they were both fertilized by a male, but also underwent some kind of parthenogenesis at the same time, resulting in a male offspring with Y-chromosomes in his skin, but not in his blood. Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/03/02/female-komodo-dragons-dont-n.html

Rizwan Fadnis and Rajesh Surve, both 33, were arrested outside a bus depot in Mumbai for being in possession of 7 kg of whale vomit valued at over $275,000 reports The Hindu. The substance, also known as ambergris, is unlawful to possess without a license.

From the article:

“The accused tried to sell the whale vomit by claiming that its consumption helps increase the libido. Ambergris is mainly used in perfumes and cosmetics and fetches a handsome price based on its age. It has an unpleasant smell soon after it is secreted, and as it ages, starts producing a sweet smell,” an officer said.

https://boingboing.net/2020/03/02/two-arrested-for-possession-of.html

Woody Guthrie originally wrote "This Land Is Your Land" as a kind of screed against the exploitations of private property ownership. When he submitted the song for copyright, Guthrie allegedly wrote that it was, "Copyrighted in U.S., under Seal of Copyright # 154085, for a period of 28 years, and anybody caught singin it without our permission, will be mighty good friends of ourn, cause we don’t give a dern. Publish it. Write it. Sing it. Swing to it. Yodel it. We wrote it, that’s all we wanted to do." Although the copyright should have expired in 1973, the actual ownership of the rights has long been contested.

More recently, the lawyers who successfully returned "Happy Birthday" and "We Shall Overcome" into the the Public Domain tried to take a similar approach to win back "This Land Is Your Land" for the people. Unfortunately, it didn't go as well. From The New York Times:

In the case, a young musical group called Satorii sued the song’s publishers, Ludlow Music and the Richmond Organization, after paying $45.50 for a license to release a cover version of “This Land Is Your Land,” which Guthrie wrote in 1940. In their complaint — filed by the same lawyers behind the “Happy Birthday” and “We Shall Overcome” suits — the group used a detailed timeline of decades-old paperwork and Guthrie’s own hand-decorated songbooks to argue that Guthrie had essentially forfeited his copyright to the song decades ago by failing to renew it properly.

https://boingboing.net/2020/03/02/a-federal-judge-declared-that.html

There’s a school of thought that change and innovation is always inevitable in software programming. By that logic, a coding language like Java, which has been a backbone of the discipline since the 1990s, would be poised to give way to Python or Ruby or one of the host of newer, flashier programming languages currently en vogue with creators.

Yet, Java persists. Easy to learn, highly adaptable and a conveniently jumping-off point to learn lots of other coding protocols, Java remains a very in-demand skill set. And with Java developers still average salaries in the six-figure range, it’s still an easy call to look into adding Java to any coder’s bag of tricks.

The 2020 Complete Java Master Class Bundle is assembled to help students of any skill level, even first time Java users, get comfortable with the basics and start creating with this heritage language almost immediately.

Across seven courses and more than 62 hours of training, this package covers everything, from foundational learning to all the specialized Java uses that can make your resume truly sing.

Courses like Java: Beginning to Expert and What’s New in Java 9 get first-time users up to speed or core Java elements as well as the latest iterations of the constantly growing language.

As you get into more Intermediate and Advanced Java Programming, your training will spotlight how Java works with other coding tools, like the web automation testing process with Selenium WebDriver with Java: Novice to Ninja; and understanding Java’s most practical building tool in Apache Maven: A Practical Introduction. Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/03/02/java-is-still-the-cornerstone.html

A few hours after Madison L'Insalata, the 23-year-old Miss Staten Island for 2020, publicly said she was bisexual, organizers of Staten Island's St. Patrick's Day parade removed her from the parade, which took place on Saturday.

From CBS  News:

Jim Smith, the director of Miss Staten Island Scholarship Pageants, broke the news to L'Insalata late Saturday night. He said parade organizer Larry Cummings called him saying L'Insalata and another pageant queen who supported her were banned.

https://boingboing.net/2020/03/02/miss-staten-island-banned-from.html

Electronic music equipment maker Behringer deleted a bizarre video (above) of a fake device called the Kirn CorkSniffer, named after tech journalist Peter Kirn, founder of CDM, a digital music magazine. The fake device has a caricature which depicts Kirn as having an unusually long nose.

From MusicTech:

Behringer has seemingly launched a cruel and unusual attack on a widely respected music technology journalist who has previously criticised parent company Music Tribe’s legal practices. In the crosshairs is veteran industry commentator Peter Kirn, founder of CDM and co-creator of MeeBlip synths.

Behringer’s attack comes in the form of a video and social media posts, which showcase a satirical product, that apparently aim to undermine the journalist’s credibility. The company has also trademarked the journo’s name for the purposes of making any products related to electronic music-making. [Editor’s note: Since publishing, Behringer has deleted the video and all social media posts related to the video]

https://boingboing.net/2020/03/02/behringer-synthesizer-maker-wa.html

Dallas, the prime-time soap opera that ran from 1978-1991 and 2012-2014, is as famous for its catchy theme tune as for J.R. Ewing's machinations. In France, I today learned, that theme tune was modified so that it could include lyrics.

Dallas, ton univers impitoyable dallas, glorifie la loi du plus fort dallas, et sous ton soleil implacable dallas, tu ne redoutes que la mort

Dallas, patrie du dollar du p'etrole dallas, tu ne connais pas la piti'e dallas, le revolver est ton idole dallas, tu te raccroches `a ton pass'e

Dallas, malheur `a celui qui n’a pas compris dallas, un jour il y perdra la vie dallas, ton univers impitoyable dallas, glorifie la loi du plus fort

Dallas, malheur `a celui qui n’a pas compris dallas, un jour il y perdra la vie dallas, ton univers impitoyable dallas, glorifie la loi du plus fort

Dallas, malheur `a celui qui n’a pas compris dallas, un jour il y perdra la vie dallas, ton univers impitoyable

Below, see it being "performed".

Paula Bosse translates and offers context.

Dallas, your ruthless world, Dallas, where might is right, Dallas, and under your relentless sun, Dallas, only death is feared.

Dallas, home of the oil dollar, Dallas, you do not know pity; Dallas, the revolver is your idol, Dallas, you cling to the past.

Dallas, woe to him who does not understand, Dallas, one day he will lose his life. Dallas, your ruthless world, Dallas, where might is right.

BONUS: Below, enjoy the disco remix of the original and correct Dallas theme. Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/03/02/dallas-theme-tune-had-french-l.html

David Byrne (67) was in top form Saturday night when he performed "Once in a Lifetime" on SNL. The song was first released in 1980 on Talking Heads' album Remain in Light.

Image: YouTube Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/03/02/david-byrne-performed-once-i.html

The lucky apes — Ganyeka, Yakini and Motaba — currently live at the Werribee Open Range Zoo in Melbourne, Australia. According to PRI, one of the zookeepers discovered that the silverback gorillas responded quite positively to Bubl'e's dulcet tones:

When we play Michael Bubl'e's CDs, the boys will instantly start pleasure grumbling and sit nice and calm and relaxed. Our theory is it’s the beautiful low tones that he sings with kind of mimics their pleasure grumble. And they’ve even been shown to hum little food songs when they eat, and we think [Bubl'e] must really resonate with that sound.

So as long as Bubl'e was in Australia anyway, they got him to stop by the zoo and surprise the silverbacks with a little private croon.

Canadian singer delights his gorilla superfans with Christmas songs [Mar'ia Elena Romero / PRI]

Image via NeedPix (Public Domain) and Eva Rinaldi / Flickr (CC 2.) Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/03/02/michael-buble-performed-a-priv.html

Democratic party candidate Tom Steyer is quitting the race after blasting through an estimated $250m of his own money without significant progress. His spendthrift advertising earned a third-place finish in South Carolina, but with rivals Bernie Sanders and Joe Biden surging -- not the mention the presence of even-richer Mike Bloomberg -- billionaire Steyer's campaign has no-where left to go.

None of it was enough. Steyer didn’t manage to win a single delegate to the national convention. And he was largely overshadowed by Michael Bloomberg once he entered the race — another billionaire who took a similar electoral strategy as Steyer but was better-positioned to execute it. Unlike Steyer, Bloomberg had previous experience in elective office, as New York’s mayor. Bloomberg had a bigger network of relationships in the Democratic Party — that resulted in lots of major endorsements — and significantly more wealth (an estimated $60 billion) than Steyer ($1.6 billion), allowing Bloomberg to spend a staggering amount on television commercials. And it’s still not clear that Bloomberg’s comparative advantages will do much for him either.

https://boingboing.net/2020/03/02/tom-steyer-quits-democratic-ra.html

Democratic party candidate Amy Klobuchar is quitting the race after failing to capitalize on a surprise third-place finish in the New Hampshare primary. With Joe Biden's strong showing in North Carolina, the senator for Minnesota joins Pete Buttigieg in yielding the center. According to CBS News, Klobuchar will endose Biden at a rally this evening in Texas. Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/03/02/amy-klobuchar-quits-democratic.html

This aluminum egg is called a phi top, and when you spin it, it stands on end. According to the Action Lab Man, "This is the same procedure that [Nikola] Telsa applied to a copper egg in his famous Columbus egg demonstration."

If you don't have an aluminum egg on hand, an egg laid by a hen that has been hardboiled will do the trick. (In fact, this is a good way to determine if an egg is raw or boiled.)

Image: YouTube Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/03/02/demonstrating-a-cool-spinning.html

Leave it to John Oliver to cut through the bullshit and give you 20 minutes of high quality information about Covid-19, and what you should do about it. Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/03/02/john-olivers-segment-about-c.html

I need a theory of semantics that accounts for this pic.twitter.com/PQjKV0bSSO

 Joshua Raclaw (@joshraclaw) February 28, 2020

Ignore the fact that only 9 percent of the items on the Fish and Chips menu here include both fish and chips, I'm still trying to figure out the costs. Chips seem to add lb1.90 to every other Fish & Chip option (regardless of its fishiness), but if you order chips without the chips, then they only cost lb1.90 — yet, if you add chips to your chips (which is presumably one whole order of chips, rather than 2), then it only adds lb0.50 to the standard cost that you would otherwise pay for the null set of chips.

Am I doing this right?

Top Image: LearningLark / Flickr (CC 2.0) Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/03/02/how-much-does-it-cost-for-an-o.html

Watching these clips from The Dick Cavett Show has become an obsession of mine lately. I daresay he's a better talk show host than anyone plying the trade today, with the possible exception of Colbert. In this episode, Cavett interviews the grandiose surrealist Salvador Dali, who brings along his "pet" anteater and handles the frightened beast somewhat roughly, plopping it in the lap of actress of an astonished Lillian Gish (after which it hides behind Satchel Paige). He then goes on to lecture Ms. Gish about the pronunciation of "butterfly" in a way that can only be described as obnoxious. Cavett, sensing an interview that's headed off the rails, warns Dali: "Watch yourself." Dali launches into a spiel about English as "foggy and imprecise" language, to which Cavett says, "I think I'll talk to the anteater now."

Image: YouTube Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/03/02/watch-salvador-dali-mistreat-a.html