Why doesn't this exist?! I would absolutely purchase, if only to shout out sheeeeeeeeeit! every time someone landed on City Hall.

Recent passage of a ballot initiative clears the way for the Squared Seven's new stadium in Santa Clara. The plan is for a $937 million structure -- a bargain compared to the $1.7 billion Monstrosity in the Meadowlands -- with $114 million paid directly by the city of Santa Clara, $330 million loaned by the city and the rest raised by the team and league. Backers of the plan say the city could receive $155 in rent and profit sharing, plus the city would receive $150 million in new revenue for the Santa Clara municipal utility. (Many California cities own power plants.) What's the plan -- leave the stadium lights on all night? California politicians and public-service commissions have for years been pressuring consumers to reduce electricity use. Suddenly, Santa Clara thinks it's good that a new stadium would increase fossil-fuel consumption. Here is the story behind the story behind the story of why the Niners are leaving San Francisco.

Ay yo. AyyyyyY YOooooo!

Michael K. Williams, who played Omar Little in The Wire, as Hamlet for a photoshoot by Terry Richardson for Vice magazine.

Hamlet: Alas, poor Yorick, I knew him well.
Horatio: A fellow of infinite jest.

Does Schrödinger's cat really exist? You bet. The first ever quantum superposition in an object visible to the naked eye has been observed.

Aaron O'Connell and colleagues at the University of California, Santa Barbara, did not actually produce a cat that was dead and alive at the same time, as Erwin Schrödinger proposed in a notorious thought experiment 75 years ago. But they did show that a tiny resonating strip of metal – only 60 micrometres long, but big enough to be seen without a microscope – can both oscillate and not oscillate at the same time. Alas, you couldn't actually see the effect happening, because that very act of observation would take it out of superposition.

"We talk about quantum weirdness and things being in two places at once, but it all involves atoms and molecules, stuff we don't normally interact with."

Via Warren Ellis.

Update: Kottke, of course, has more.

In Tarantino's world, this is the last thing a Nazi should ever see.

Quentin Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds was one of his very best films. When a friend of mine disagreed and, shockingly, told me he hated it (emphasis his), I thought it might be worthwhile to explain why I loved the movie so much.

To illustrate, I noted that every / single / line / by Brad Pitt, in the role of Lt. Aldo Raine -- the Gentile leader of a special group of American Jews tasked with raising terror and killin' Nazi's -- was dominant.

Specifically, I loved his lines in the Tavern Scene.

Lt. Aldo Raine: You didn't say the goddamn rendezvous was in a fuckin' basement.
Lt. Archie Hicox: I didn't know.
Lt. Aldo Raine: You said it was in a tavern.
Lt. Archie Hicox: It is a tavern.
Lt. Aldo Raine: Yeah, in a basement. You know, fightin' in a basement offers a lot of difficulties. Number one being, you're fightin' in a basement!

Why is that so funny, you might ask. Well, I can explain, (quite nerdily, I'm sure), in three steps.

First, lots of f-bombs. Always a plus.

Second, Pitt says he's going to list off a bunch of problems, but then only gets to problem number one, which is circular and is just a restatement of the situation.

Third, starting the sentence by saying "Number one" points to the fact that Brad Pitt starred in Fight Club, where of paramount importance was the First Rule of Fight Club: you DO NOT talk about Fight Club. While Tarantino is following this rule here, in this alternative-history film, and not talking about it, he is directly referencing Fight Club by having Pitt himself, who played a second personality -- an unreal persona in an alternate, anarchic, revolutionary future -- in Fight Club, talk about how awful it is to fight in a basement... which, of course, is the location of the bare knuckles exhibitions central to the referenced film.

In other words, Tarantino's more meta than anyone outside of Charlie Kaufman (Adaptation, Being John Malkovich, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Synecdoche, New York, etc.) ... and he knows it.

But where Kaufman works within the always-hilarious confines of loneliness and despair, Tarantino laughs manically, drops another f-bomb and hits you in the head with a baseball bat.

Socially Generated, Machine Filtered, Hand Polished, Electronic Newspaper for Geeks, Designers & Venture Capitalists

TPUTH lists as its captains of industry four stalwart icons of the modern era: Eric of Google, Bill of Microsoft, Steve of Apple and The Jesus of Lebowski. Niiice.

Pullin' the trigger till it goes *click*.

via Daring Fireball.

Thusly The Dude doth abide.

A brilliant adaptation of The Big Lebowski, including couplets to end each section. Can't wait for the zombie version...

THE KNAVE
Good sir, speak plain. I know not these villains, surely would I ne’er traffic with this man of Orient birth who so abused my rug. I have not the facility to present him with the rate of usance and demand money in kind for that which he has spent upon’t; so I entreat you, speak plain.

WALTER
I speak the truth; my words are straight and true.
The man of Orient birth is not the issue.

DONALD
The Orient, Sir Walter?

WALTER
I speak, old friend, of truths in desert land.
The hour is nigh to draw line in the sand.

THE KNAVE
Deserts? I had made it plain that he was Orient-man.

WALTER
Though words in haste be only human nature,
‘Orient-man’ is not preferr’d nomenclature.

THE KNAVE
Give me no further counsel; my griefs cry softer than advertisement.

WALTER
I speak of this other man, Sir Geoffrey of Lebowski. Is not thy name, sir, Geoffrey of Lebowski? To be or not Lebowski, that is the question; I see we still did meet each other’s man. Shall we not make amends? A gentleman of high sentence ought to be of unsequestered location, possessed of resources fit to restore a thousand rugs from vile offence. He’s not well married that lets his wife a borrower be, such that men gravely offended bespoil another man’s rug. Be I wrong?

THE KNAVE
No, but verily—

WALTER
Be I wrong?

THE KNAVE
Yea, but verily—

WALTER
That rug, in faith, tied the room together, did it not?

THE KNAVE
By my heart, a goodly rug.

DONALD
And in most miserable tide did this rogue besmirch it.

WALTER
Prithee, Donald! Thou too eagerly hold’st the mirror up to nature.

THE KNAVE
My mind races; I might endeavour to seek this gentleman Lebowski.

DONALD
His name is Lebowski? Verily, ope thine ear; that is thy name, Knave!

THE KNAVE
On good authority; and his nobleness must oblige. His wife taketh up quarrel and borrows, and they bespoil my rug.

WALTER
Marry, sir, my heartstrings do you tug;
They urinate upon thy damnèd rug.

[Exeunt severally]

The thing about criminal lunatics who live like God’s just keeping their chairs warm is that, well, they do know how to put on a show.

via Warren Ellis » Coming Anarchy.