Highest Resolution Single-Shot Photo of the Earth by Russian Weather Satellite

May 23, 2012

NASA scientist Robert Simmons sniffs, “They’re not any better or worse than NASA images, but they show different things.”

That sounds like sour grapes over this amazing image of Planet Earth captured by a Russian weather satellite, Electro-L. The satellite is in orbit 22,369 miles above the equator and takes a picture every 30 minutes at a resolution of 121 megapixels.

The picture displayed above was taken in a single snap shot. NASA’s wonderful, inspiring shots of the Earth are generally composites of several images. Click here for a scalable image and a video version of this cutting edge off-the-planet photography.

 

 


“In 3-D: How Mariano Rivera Dominates Hitters” – The New York Times

May 23, 2012

As a child of the 1960s I understand that there are no sacred institutions in American life and no matter how they strive to do good work, things sometimes go horribly wrong. There was an age, long ago, when The New York Times was considered the national newspaper of America and its coverage believed, by most, to be definitive.

But institutions are made up of people, and so can fail prey to all the standard human weaknesses, demonstrated by the Jayson Blair plagiarism/fabrication scandal of a decade ago. Also, given the explosion of media and content provided by the InterWebs the former dominance  and power of individual newspapers, magazines and broadcasters has been eroding. I’m no futurist but it’s clear to everyone that journalism must change to accommodate these new realities.

Still, I would say that the Times gets far more things right than they do wrong. I’ve often linked to their articles in the past and will continue to do so. Today I’d like to show a little love to Times for exploring new ways to inform their readers. Take a look at this 3D anaglyph video breaking down the technique of New York Yankee’s pitcher Mariano Rivera’s “Cut Fastball” by Graham Roberts, Shan Carter and Joe Ward. (You’ll need red-cyan glasses to view it). It’s an example of how information can be delivered to an audience that was never before possible in the context of daily journalism. Click on image for larger size.

 

URGENT! Dog Food Recall – Diamond Pet Food – Salmonella Warning

May 4, 2012

Friday, May 4, 2012 – 9:00 pm

We’ve just received word of a dog food recall from our local Costco Distributer. Diamond Pet Foods are recalling all Kirkland Signature Dry Food with the following production codes:

If your production code has a 2 or 3 in the 9th or 10th position AND an “X” in the 11th position, your product is affected by the recall. If the product you have does not include a 2 or 3 in the 9th or 10th position AND an “X” in the 11th position, your product is not affected by the recall, and you can continue to feed it as usual.

Please pass this information on to anyone you think may have recently purchased dry dog food.

Other affected brands include

  • Chicken Soup for the Pet Lover’s Soul
  • Country Value
  • Diamond
  • Diamond Naturals
  • Premium Edge
  • Professional
  • 4Health
  • Taste of the Wild
For more information call 866-918-8756  or go to the recall website diamondpetrecall.com
This is leading.
UPDATES on the Diamond Food Recall from Reuters, Dog food salmonella recall expanded in U.S., Canada and Snopes, Diamond Dogs.

 

 

Pictaculous – Free Color Palettes Based on Your Images

May 4, 2012

Here’s a nifty little service brought to you by the fine folks at mailchimp, the free email marketing service. It’s called Pictaculous and it does one thing wonderfully well. You upload an image and it spits back a color palette based on it. I find this sort of thing very useful in the early stages of a design project for limiting my color selections to a range of compatible choices. (It’s also a nice way to jump-start a project you may be stuck on).

Restrictions are file formats of png, gif & jpeg only and a file size of 500k. You can download an Adobe Swatch File (.aco format), view the HTML color codes or see what COLOURlovers suggests. BTW, COLOURlovers is a great site to get color inspiration from. They’ve got  over 2 million user-created palettes to scan through.

Dogs Watch Humans for Clues and Help, Wolves Don’t

May 3, 2012

Recent studies are showing what has long been claimed: canines are the only animals that not only meet our gaze, but they actively seek us out when confronted with problems.

Even so-called domesticated wolves, raised by humans, don’t seek us out as social partners for interaction. For the details on this research, see this article in Scientific American by Jason G. Goldman, “Dogs, But Not Wolves, Use Humans As Tools.”

One of the authors of this study, Adam Miklósi has also written an excellent book for the Oxford Biology series, Dog Behaviour, Evolution, and Cognition which I highly recommend. Be forewarned that this is a detailed, technical review of the most recent canine research. It’s not a light read but is well worth the effort if you want to gain deep insight into how your dog thinks and behaves.

This one is not for the casual reader or fan of say, the unthinking sentimentality of Marley & Me or the under-educated and sometimes dangerous methods of Cesar Milan.

In my opinion Marley was not the ‘world’s worst dog,’ John Grogan was simply an inept owner with a knack for spinning colorful anecdotes. Mr. Milan’s methods are more likely to get you bitten and do little or nothing to ‘improve’ your dog. He’s a personality that plays a dog trainer on TV, just like Hugh Laurie plays Dr. House.

Both Grogan and Milan have perfected a formula for making a mint but that’s really about marketing, not canine research or expertise. My opinion: your view might be opposite.

« Previous Page