STUFF: News, Technology, the cool and the plain weird

[MIKA27]

A Ridiculously Expensive Remote-Controlled Car That’s Powered by a Rubber Band

Rubber-band powered race cars are a staple of Cub Scout jamborees and third-grade science classrooms, but a group of students at the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena have managed one that would make any gear head growl in approval.

Made of 3-D printed nylon, carbon fiber, and machined aluminum, and dubbedCirin, it combines the distinctive profiles of 1960s Formula 1 race cars with shapes inspired by the cellular forms seen in the pneumatized bone structures of a bird’s wing. Dubbed a “bio-truss” by it’s creators, this approach yields a striking look, a surprising weight-to-strength ratio, and a near total absence of screws and fasteners.

The car is powered by a single 16-foot-long rubber band, wound into eight-inch loops between a pair of eye-bolts that are contained within a carbon fiber tube. The car is “charged” by removing the nose cone, which contains one of the eye-bolts, and twisting it, either by hand or using a power drill. When wound up, a servo motor holds the gears steady until the green race flag drops and a neodymium magnet allows the nose to snap back into place. Once released, Cirin can cruise for 500 feet and reach speeds of up to 30 miles per hour.

Teams have 13 weeks to devise and fabricate a design that must feature an elastic powertrain and two servo motors to control steering and breaking

Designers Max Greenberg, Ian Cullimor, Sameer Yeleswarapu were all former engineers pursuing second degrees at Art Center and brought their technical skills to bear on the project, but were careful not to be overly formal in their application. “This allowed us to approach problems using our intuition in a way that yielded holistic solutions, not confined to some box labeled engineering or sculpture,” says Greenberg.

The Cirin race car in motion

Their first prototypes, made from a rigid, yet brittle, plaster-like material did well in the first heats, but couldn’t go the distance. “There are pretty immense torsional forces being put on the frame when the band is fully wound, which turned our starch car into a ticking bomb,” says Greenberg. “Any small cracks in the body would culminate in a huge explosion as the frame tore itself apart, often mid-way down the track.” When the team printed a new chassis in nylon, the frame deformed under the pressure, decoupling the gears which provided the power.

The team bounced back and forth between Solidworks for the precision work and Rhino, a 3-d modeling tool, which allowed more freedom of exploration in the design

These technical challenges prevented Cirin from capturing the checkered flag. “Unfortunately, our car did not perform as expected on race day,” says Greenberg. With another week, the team thinks they could have printed a frame using a glass-reinforced nylon that would have withstood the strain and won the race, but alas, Greenberg and company had to settle for other recognition. “We did pick up the design, build, and approach award.”

Cirin comes with a bit of sticker shock. The precision gears, electronics, and carbon fiber components cost over $500—not including frame which was sponsored bySolidConcepts, a 3-D printing service bureau. The frame is too complex to manufacture in a more cost effective fashion, though if any deep pocketed auto enthusiasts are interested, Greenberg is open to building a small run of collector’s editions.

[MIKA27]

Photographer Stalks the Woman Who Stole Her Identity and Turns Her Into Art

If you’ve ever had your wallet stolen, you know what a pain it can be (and if not, just imagine it). For most people, canceling a few cards and losing some cash is the end of it. But for Jessamyn Lovell, losing her wallet was the beginning of a long and unsettling process to recover what was taken—her identity.

IDs, 2011. All the various IDs Lovell dealt with throughout the case, including a copy of Hart’s California driver’s license. Lovell was first alerted to the identity theft when the San Francisco Police Department Financial Crimes Unit called one morning in 2011 and asked if she had given a woman named Erin Coleen Hart permission to use her New Mexico State driver’s license.

A thief stole Lovell’s wallet in San Francisco five years ago, but it wasn’t until 2011 that she learned someone had used the information within it to assume her identity and commit a series of petty crimes. Police identified the suspect who was using her identity as Erin Hart, and Lovell soon found out that the woman had been masquerading under her name while shoplifting, checking into hotels, and renting cars. To help cope with the shock and bring a measure of closure to the ordeal, Lovell decided to find Hart and document the journey in Dear Erin Hart.

“When I thought of this project, I didn’t have in my mind that I was going to find her and beat her up, but I did want to try and figure out who she was and try to figure out why she did this to me,” Lovell says. “And I made it into a photo project because that’s how I make sense of things.”

Mug shot, 2012. Lovell decided to hire Pete Sirigusa, a private investigator and former San Francisco police officer, to help find Erin Hart. Within just a few days he was able to locate Hart in jail. This is Hart's booking photo for various crimes, including Lovell's case.

Lovell searched for Hart on her own but came up blank after finding nothing more to photograph than empty crime scenes and a few apartments where her quarry once lived. So she hired a private investigator, who immediately found Hart in jail on multiple charges including one related to Lovell’s case. In 2013, Lovell travelled to San Francisco and photographed Hart walking out of city lockup after serving eight months of a one-year sentence. Lovell and the PI, plus two of his assistants, then spent the day following and photographing Hart as she wandered about the city—buying cigarettes, riding the bus, and shopping at Goodwill. They eventually lost Hart after she wandered into an alley near a taqueria.

Stake out, 2013. Waiting for Hart’s release from county jail in March 2013

During their surveillance, Lovell thought about confronting Hart, but eventually ruled against it. She worried the conversation might escalate into something she wasn’t at all prepared for. “I had been debating it up until that very day but ultimately decided to wait,” she says.

That day with the PI cost several thousand dollars, so he didn’t accompany Lovell on any more stakeouts. But he did continue helping her track Hart, and Lovell found her one more time the next year. By this point she’d amassed enough photos for a show, which opened in September of 2014 at SF Camerawork—where her wallet had been stolen. A book is slated for this March.

The last time Lovell had anything to do with Hart was this past December. She wrote a letter telling Hart why she’d been photographing her. The woman’s probation officer told Lovell that a condensed version of that letter, sent as an email, had reached Hart. In the letter Lovell asked Hart to contact her, but never received a return email or phone call.

Surveillance (jail release), 2013. When Hart was finally released from county jail, Lovell photographed her leaving the release point.

“I just wanted her to know that she impacted a real person,” Lovell says.

The photographer says she made peace with the incident over the course of her project and feels some kinship with Hart. Lovell grew up poor and has always been conscious about poverty and class, and although she doesn’t know for sure, she suspects Hart has had her own struggles with money. Lovell has no desire to befriend Hart, yet wishes her the best.

Police report request, 2014. Lovell attempted to request a copy of Hart's most recent police report, but was told she had to send it up the chain of command because her name was not mentioned. Lovell is still waiting for them to send a copy of the report and hopes it provides information about Hart and her whereabouts

“I don’t think that we share a lot of emotional similarities,” Lovell says. “For example, I think she’s way less empathetic than I am, but I do think we’ve been through similar struggles.”

Email confirmation from Hart's P.O., 2014. A probation officer confirmed that Hart had received Lovell's letter (shortened in an email). Lovell asked Hart to call but she never did.

Surveillance (smoking), 2013. Months later, Lovell learned Hart is now homeless but in compliance with her probation. The two never met

[MIKA27]

Jordan pilot hostage Moaz al-Kasasbeh 'burned alive'

Jordan has confirmed the death of pilot Moaz al-Kasasbeh after a video published online by Islamic State (IS) claimed to show him being burned alive.

The video shows a man standing in a cage engulfed in flames. Officials are working to confirm its authenticity.

Jordan's King Abdullah hailed Lt Kasasbeh as a hero, saying Jordan must "stand united" in the face of hardship.

The pilot was captured when his plane came down near Raqqa, Syria, during a mission against IS in December.

The video posted on Tuesday was distributed via a Twitter account known as a source for IS propaganda.

The highly produced 22-minute film includes a sequence showing the Jordanian pilot walking at gunpoint amongst rubble apparently caused by coalition air strikes that targeted jihadists.

BBC security correspondent Frank Gardner says that in a world already shocked by the calculated cruelty of Islamic State's actions, the horrific video is aimed primarily at Arab populations in Jordan and the Gulf states.

Jordanian state TV reports that Lt Kasasbeh, 26, was killed a month ago. Jordan had tried to secure his release since then.

The country has vowed "punishment and revenge" for his death, and the king described IS as a "deviant criminal group".

Jordan's King Abdullah: "It is every Jordanian's duty to stand together"

Jordan, which has joined the US-led coalition against IS, had been attempting to secure Lt Kasasbeh's release as part of a prisoner swap, offering to free Iraqi militant Sajida al-Rishawi in exchange.

She is a failed suicide bomber now on death row in Jordan for her role in attacks in the capital, Amman, that killed 60 people in 2005.

IS had sought Rishawi's release as part of a deal to free captive Japanese journalist Kenji Goto. A video that appeared to show Goto's dead body appeared three days ago.

Relatives had gathered around Lt Kasasbeh's father (centre) in Amman

Jordanians greeted the news with horror. Many have seen the gruesome video, barely edited, played over and over on television.

Hundreds gathered in the streets after dark, demanding revenge against Lt Kasasbeh's killers. Some also wanted to know why Jordan was involved in this fight at all.

The pilot's father was among supporters when the news came through. He and other family members have left the capital to mourn at home.

King Abdullah said Lt Kasasbeh had died defending his beliefs and homeland. The defence ministry said the pilot's blood would not have been shed in vain. It is promising a fitting punishment.

For many Jordanians, this has to begin with the quick execution of Sajida al-Rishawi, the failed al-Qaeda suicide bomber, jailed 10 years ago for her part in a spate of bombings against hotels here.

A spokesman for the Jordanian armed forces, Mamdouh al-Ameri, said Lt Kasasbeh had "fallen as a martyr".

"His blood will not be shed in vain," he said. "Our punishment and revenge will be as huge as the loss of the Jordanians."

Jordanian officials were quoted as saying Rishawi would be executed imminently, along with three other convicted militants.

Late on Tuesday, supporters of the pilot expressed their anger at a rally in Amman

Analysis: Jonathan Marcus, BBC diplomatic correspondent

One thing is clear from this video - Islamic State never had any intention of releasing the young Jordanian pilot. According to Jordanian state media he was killed on 3 January, well before the supposed prisoner exchange talks moved into high gear.

The cynical manipulation of this episode by IS shows the importance it affords to information warfare - here an attempt to create problems for the Jordanian authorities and to weaken the Arab-Western coalition, at a time when it appears to be struggling to make dramatic headway against IS on the ground.

This is the problem for the coalition. Its air campaign is in many ways a stop-gap intended to halt the progress of IS, but requiring effective troops on the ground to significantly turn back its advance.

Jordan's King Abdullah is cutting short a visit to the US after news of Lt Kasasbeh's death, but he met President Barack Obama on Tuesday evening before flying home.

Mr Obama earlier said in a statement that if the video was real, it would be "one more indication of the viciousness and barbarity" of IS.

"I think it will redouble the vigilance and determination on the part of the global coalition to make sure they are degraded and ultimately defeated," he added.

The Jordanian king has already met US Vice-President Joe Biden who "reinforced America's ironclad support" for Jordan, the White House said.

[MIKA27]

Harper Lee to publish Mockingbird 'sequel'

An unpublished novel by Harper Lee is to finally see the light of day, 60 years after the US author put it aside to write To Kill a Mockingbird.

Go Set a Watchman, which features the character Scout Finch as an adult, will be released on 14 July.

Lee wrote it in the mid-1950s but put it aside on the advice of her editor.

"I thought it a pretty decent effort." said Lee, now 88. "I am humbled and amazed that this will now be published after all these years."

Set in the fictional southern town of Maycomb during the mid-1950s, Go Set a Watchman sees Scout return from New York to visit her father, the lawyer Atticus Finch.

According to the publisher's announcement: "She is forced to grapple with issues both personal and political as she tries to understand her father's attitude toward society, and her own feelings about the place where she was born and spent her childhood."

Lee's editor persuaded her to rework some of the story's flashback sequences as a novel in their own right - and that book became To Kill a Mockingbird.

"I was a first-time writer, so I did as I was told," the author revealed.

The manuscript was discovered last autumn, attached to an original typescript of To Kill a Mockingbird.

"I hadn't realised it [the original book] had survived, so was surprised and delighted when my dear friend and lawyer Tonja Carter discovered it," Lee continued.

"After much thought and hesitation, I shared it with a handful of people I trust and was pleased to hear that they considered it worthy of publication."

Harper Collins plans an initial print run of two million copies.

To Kill a Mockingbird was published in July 1960 and won a Pulitzer Prize. Two years later it was adapted into an Oscar-winning film starring Gregory Peck.

Lee has rarely spoken to the media since the 1960s and is unlikely to do any publicity for her "new" book.

'Extraordinary gift'

In a statement, Harper Collins' Jonathan Burnham called Go Set a Watchman "a remarkable literary event" whose "discovery is an extraordinary gift to the many readers and fans of To Kill a Mockingbird".

He said: "Reading in many ways like a sequel to Harper Lee's classic novel, it is a compelling and ultimately moving narrative about a father and a daughter's relationship, and the life of a small Alabama town living through the racial tensions of the 1950s."

Go Set a Watchman will be published in the UK by William Heinemann, the original UK publisher of To Kill a Mockingbird.

Tom Weldon, of parent company Penguin Random House, said its publication would be "a major event".

"The story of this first book - both parent to To Kill a Mockingbird and rather wonderfully acting as its sequel - is fascinating," he continued.

"Millions of fans around the world will have the chance to reacquaint themselves with Scout, her father Atticus and the prejudices and claustrophobia of that small town in Alabama Harper Lee conjures so brilliantly."

To Kill a Mockingbird - abridged

In the small fictional town of Maycomb in the Depression-ravaged American South, a black man named Tom Robinson is falsely accused of raping a white woman.

A lawyer named Atticus Finch defends Robinson in court. The frenzy stirred up by the case and her father's quest for justice are seen through the eyes of Finch's six-year-old daughter Scout. The book explores issues of race, class and the loss of innocence.

"You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view… until you climb into his skin and walk around in it." - Atticus Finch to Scout.

"It was times like these when I thought my father, who hated guns and had never been to any wars, was the bravest man who ever lived." - Scout Finch.

[MIKA27]

Russia: Vodka minimum price cut over economic woes

Russia has cut the minimum price of vodka in order to try and stop people turning to moonshine, it's reported.

Half a litre of the spirit can now cost as little as 185 roubles ($2.70; £1.80), a reduction of 16% on the previous minimum price of 220 roubles, The Moscow Times website reports. Authorities are hoping the move will stop people consuming illegally distilled spirits, which often have a higher alcohol content. Russia first introduced a minimum price for vodka in 2010, in an attempt to cut binge drinking. But as the economy worsened and prices rose in 2014, more people took to buying illegal alcohol, the website says. Russia's economic woes continue despite government efforts to stabilise the currency. The rouble's value plummeted 41% against the dollar during 2014, pushing inflation up to 11.4%.

The new minimum vodka price has been met with some wry responses on Russian social media, with some users complaining that vodka is the only thing that's falling in price. "When the really hard times come, they will be distributing vodka for free and making sure that you drink it," says Twitter user Dyadushka Shu. "Price of a metro ticket has gone up, price of vodka has slumped. No money for a ride? No problem!" Dmitry Balkunets tweets. "Get vodka, get drunk and forget about your plans."

[MIKA27]

Australian Postman Wins Over Ferocious Dogs With His Kindness

http://youtu.be/ljSIpiK0ZlU

One of the biggest perils of being the local postman, is navigating the local guard dog when delivering the mail.

It’s often a case of making a lightening quick delivery to avoid incurring the wrath of an over protective canine.

At the very least you can expect to get barked at incessantly.

But one Australian postman has found the solution to being able to deliver the mail without getting bitten or barked at.

Along with distributing letters and packages, he’s also armed with a stack of delicious dog treats and chew sticks.

[MIKA27]

Mysterious Orange Snow Falls on Russian Town

I've survived European winters by abiding by these three simple rules: enjoy the white snow, drive carefully in the grey snow and don’t eat the yellow snow. I don’t know what to do if orange snow falls and neither did the residents of the Russian city of Saratov when it was blanketed this week with a deep covering of orange flakes.

Saratov is a major port (population over 800,000) on the Volga River, 858 km (533 miles) from Moscow, and has a moderate (for Russia) climate with an annual snowfall of about 163 centimeters (64 inches) which, until now, has never been orange.

The orange snow was widespread and of various shades of orange along with patches of yellow and brown. Saratov’s residents were rightly skeptical to avoid eating snowflakes or jumping in the juice-colored banks until finding out what caused it. The most likely reason, according to Saratov weather forecast service director Mikhail Boltukhin, was a cyclone that blew colored sand from Africa’s Sahara desert into Siberian snow clouds.

The air coming from the West contains tiny particles of sand, which give the falling snow an orange hue. Similar phenomena have been observed recently in various districts of the region and in other parts of the country, particularly in Crimea.

Officials said the orange snow was “harmless” to humans and animals

Well, the second part is true. In 2007, an orange snow covered over 1500 sq km (570 sq miles) in the Omsk region of Russia. That stuff was oily and smelled rotten and was blamed on the area’s oil industry, although it also contained four times the normal level of iron ore.

Colored snow can have other causes. Red-and-pink watermelon snow is common in alpine regions and gets its colors and telltale smell of watermelon from an algae (Chlamydomonas nivalis). So-called blood snow falls near Blood Falls in Antarctica’s Taylor Glacier for a different reason. Iron-rich saltwater leaking from an ancient reservoir under the glacier oxidizes when it hits the air and turns the waterfall and snow blood red.

Saharan sand, algae, oxidation … or something else. What do you think was the real cause of Saratov’s orange snow?

It’s just some sand … trust us!

[MIKA27]

Jordan to Avenge Pilot by Killing Bomber

Hours after ISIS released a video showing Jordanian pilot Muadh al-Kasasbeh being burned alive, Jordan announced it would execute a female terrorist in reponse.

Sajida al-Rishawi, a would-be suicide bomber who's been on death row since 2005, will die tonight.

ISIS had demanded Rishawi's freedom last month in exchange for Kasasbeh and Japanese hostage Kenji Goto's lives. (Turns out ISIS killed Kasasbeh while it was barganing with Jordan, anyway.)

“The revenge will be as big as the calamity that has hit Jordan,” a Jordanian army spokesman said in a televised statement.

Another spokesman said that Jordan will deliver a “strong, earth-shaking and decisive” response. King Abdullah made a televised address to his country from Washington, D.C. where he was visiting Congress and President Obama.

[MIKA27]

ISIS Ranks Grow as Fast as U.S. Bombs Can Wipe Them Out

The extremist group keeps attracting new adherents—never mind the American-led air war. ‘The numbers are not moving in our favor,’ a senior senator tells The Daily Beast.

The American-led bombing campaign is doing little to stem the tide of foreign fighters joining the war in Iraq and Syria. Four thousand of these fighters have joined the conflict since the allied airstrikes began, U.S. intelligence officials tell The Daily Beast.

That’s nearly as many combatants as coalition forces claimed to have killed, raising fears that if ISIS can continue to withstand a sustained air campaign, it could keep its ranks restocked for years, if not decades, to come.

“The numbers are not moving in our favor,” Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Corker (R-TN) told The Daily Beast last week, after emerging from a secret briefing at the Capitol with retired Marine Gen. John Allen, presidential envoy in the campaign against ISIS.

Corker added that when the strength of the U.S.-backed Syrian rebels is compared to the fighters supporting ISIS, “we are losing now in numbers.”

The Pentagon has said it has killed 6,000 fighters since coalition strikes began five months ago; the intelligence community estimates 4,000 foreign fighters have entered the fray since September. (A higher estimate, made by The Washington Post, holds that 5,000 foreign fighters have flowed into the two countries since October.)

Either way, the tally doesn’t count the suspected thousands of local Iraqi and Syrian combatants who’ve joined the conflict. So when combined, the figures paint a worrisome picture: that even without counting the number of in-country recruits, the Islamic State is able to substantially replenish its manpower on the battlefield.

“Unless we do stop something to stop the flow of foreign fighters, this conflict has the potential to go on indefinitely,” Rep. Adam Schiff, the top-ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, said in an interview with The Daily Beast.

Schiff said he couldn’t discuss specific figures, but he made the point that “the key indicator is how many people continue to join ISIS’s ranks. Because if we can’t stop that, this conflict is going to be neverending.”

Pentagon officials privately acknowledge that despite the number of Islamic State fighters they’ve killed, they have also seen ISIS adjust to the strikes, particularly in places where there are no strong ground troops to fight them. U.S. officials have refused to estimate how many new fighters have come into Iraq and Syria, but there are quiet concerns that the terror group isn’t significantly smaller than when the coalition airstrikes began. It may have even grown.

“Foreign fighters keep coming in, even though we are killing many of them,” Sen. Bob Menendez, the top Democrat on the foreign relations committee, said. “So one of the key issues you’ve got to [address] is stopping foreign fighters.”

The Pentagon has said airstrikes cannot defeat an ideology and that the war cannot be measured in numbers. But in an opaque war like this, many are leaning on such statistics to assess the air campaign.

Some question the reliability of the Pentagon count. Christopher Harmer, an analyst with the Institute of the Study of War, said drones and other kinds of air power cannot accurately estimate the number of ISIS fighters that have been killed.

“There’s just no way for the U.S. can do this accurately… When it comes time to killing people, the only way to really confirm it, you need boots on the ground or eyeballs on the target,” Harmer said. “As long as ISIS shows the ability to continue to recruit foreign fighters, and regenerate lost manpower, then it’s an irrelevant metric. I don’t know how long ISIS can sustain battlefield damage… but so far they haven’t collapsed.”

Harmer also pointed out that the United States has no ability of tracking how many internal recruits ISIS is able to attract.

“Good, we’re killing ISIS fighters,” he said. “Just don’t dislocate our shoulders patting ourselves on the back. What matters is: Have we broken their will or ability to fight? … So far they haven’t collapsed.”

Some argue if the Islamic State is gaining new fighters at a similar rate to which it is losing fighters, it’s a possible worst-case scenario: Airstrikes turn local opinion against the American-led coalition, while simultaneously failing to reduce the net strength of ISIS.

“If ISIS fighters are merely being killed at which they’re being replaced by foreign fighters, then you have a situation where ISIS has not lost numerical strength and has also gained public sympathy,” said Evan Barrett, a political adviser to the Coalition for a Democratic Syria, a Syrian-American opposition umbrella group.

If the foreign-fighter flow problem is to be fixed, said Rep. Schiff, two things need to happen: Turkey needs to take a leading role in stopping the flow—many foreign fighters travel through its porous border. And the United States needs to empower those in the Muslim world who are speaking out against radicalism.

“We need to put additional pressure on Turkey to get serious about controlling its border… and redouble our efforts to prevent people from becoming radicalized at home,” Schiff told The Daily Beast. “The bottom line is notwithstanding the demonstrated brutality of ISIS, and maybe because of it, foreign fighters continue to flow to the region. We have not been nearly successful enough in stemming that flow.”

[MIKA27]

Randy Quaid Is Still Looney Tunes: Actor Rips Rupert Murdoch and Hollywood In Bizarre NSFW Rant

The Oscar-nominated actor rails against Rupert Murdoch, Warner Bros., the New York Post, and more in a strange homemade video—before simulating sex with his wife while she wears a Murdoch mask.

It seems Randy Quaid may not have been acting in the movie Independence Day—he may just be that crazy.

The conspiracy theorist and his wife, Evi, took a spare moment from being their kooky litigious, bill-jumping pseudo-celebrity fugitives from justice selves to record a new video PSA filled with – what else? – brand new paranoid rantings against “The Man.”

It’s hard to believe it’s only been five years since the Quaids first claimed a shadowy group of Hollywood spooks they dubbed “star whackers” were out to get them, triggering and justifying an increasingly bizarre series of legal shenanigans and felony charges ranging from stiffing a Southern California luxury hotel for $10,000 to resisting arrest in Marfa, Texas, and, most recently, being rejected by the government of Canada.

Quaid, who hasn’t let his fugitive status stop him from live-tweeting old episodes of CHiPs, has been relatively quiet of late by Randy Quaid standards since he and Evi have been stuck in Canada and unable to return to the United States, where felony warrants are out for their arrests. (Fear not: the couple is reportedly suing Secretary of State John Kerry to come home.)

In the video posted today, Quaid wears the very same palm tree-adorned Hawaiian shirt he sported as a schizo pilot who believes he was abducted by aliens in 1996’s Independence Day, one of the blockbusters he says he helped congloms like Rupert Murdoch’s NewsCorp. and Warner Bros. make billions from, getting only personal persecution in return. The Golden Globe-winning actor rails against Murdoch, Warner Bros., Village Roadshow Chairman/CEO and ex-WB exec Bruce Berman (who “stole my house”), the New York Post, and TMZ, which he’s renamed “#PMC - police media corruption.”

And that’s all before the now-bushy-bearded Quaid screams, “Rupert, you wanna f**k me? I’m gonna f**k you,” hands Evi a Murdoch mask, and energetically simulates sex with her yelling, “I’m baaaack!” (his Independence Day line) as a dog howls in agreement by his feet.

Watch the insanity here:

http://youtu.be/846GUsHDKbs

[MIKA27]

This 183-year-old Tortoise Is the Oldest Living Creature on Land

Back when this elderly turtle was born, in 1832, electric lights weren’t common in homes, the Titanic was still nearly 100 years away from being built and penicillin hadn’t been discovered.

His name is Jonathan and he is a testudinidae cryptodira who journeyed to the British island of St. Helena in 1882 from a place most people think was the Seychelles.

He’s been there ever since and is taken care of by the island’s most senior vet— Jonathan Hollins, his namesake.

Jonathan the tortoise may be the last living land creature we can see that physically connects us to those who came nearly 200 years before us.

[MIKA27]

2016 FERRARI 488 GTB

The beloved Ferrari 458 Italia is no more after this year, but fret not fellow prancing horse fans, the brand already has an entry-level replacement on the way. And we use the words “entry-level” loosely here. Meet the 2016 Ferrari 488 GTB.

The latest 2-door from the stable is packed with a turbocharged mid-engine V8 (the first since the F40), and pumps out a monstrous 660 horsepower and 560 lb-ft of torque. This setup gets the stallion from zero to sixty in just 3 seconds, to 125 mph in just over 8 seconds, and a top speed of 205 miles per hour. To ensure you’re really pushing your GTB to the limits, Ferrari has also improved their Side Slip Control 2 system allowing for more improved cornering and precision handling. The exterior aerodynamics have also been revamped, including a double front spoiler, a 308-inspired intake scallop, and vortex generators running along the underbody. The supercar will make its official debut this coming March at the Geneva auto show.

[MIKA27]

BULL & STASH NOTEBOOKS

It says a lot about where we’ve come technology-wise when the word “notebook” for most people first conjures up thoughts of a laptop computer, then probably the Ryan Gosling the movie, and then, yes, the centuries-old writing pad. But actual physical notebooks still have value for a lot of people. Thing is, you just don’t wanna buy one every six months.

Bull & Stash notebooks promise to be your notebook for life. Bound in long-lasting oiled leather to protect your notes, made with sturdy metal hardware, and filled with high-quality paper, these notebooks are designed for easy refills when the pages are full. Choose from monthly, weekly, or daily datebook styles, and the page style options include blank, lined, grid, and drawing paper. Would make a great cigar journal. [Purchase]

[MIKA27]

MACBOOK EDC KIT | BY CARGO WORKS

Our friends over at Cargo Works have introduced the MacBook EDC Kit, a tactical case designed to carry all of your Apple gear plus organization for your everyday carry items such as pocket tools and accessories. Outside, the case features front Molle webbing for attaching pouches and quick accessible items, inside you´ll find elastic webbing for keeping your essentials tightly secured and organized, plus plenty of pockets to store the rest of your gear. Available in either 11” or 13” the case can be carried by hand or worn in sling messenger style with the detachable shoulder strap.

[MIKA27]

FOLDING SLED

Sleds are a lot of fun. But they're also bulky, only get used a few times a year, and take up valuable storage space in the meantime.

The Folding Sled aims to give you this space back while being easier to carry and transport. Its seat is made from a recyclable engineering plastic, cut and scored by a CNC machine, and provides enough room for up to two adults. It's paired with skates made from locally-sourced ash wood, the same material used in sled making for over a century.

[MIKA27]

BOULEVARD CHOCOLATE ALE

The most popular seasonal beer that Boulevard Brewing makes is back, and it's a pretty good bet that it won't stick around for long.

Chocolate Ale hits shelves again this week, just five years after its first release as a part of their Smokestack Series — when it was meant to be a one-time offering. But when Boulevard collaborated with Christopher Elbow Artisinal Chocolates in Kansas City, they got more than just another one-off. It's an American Strong Ale that challenges what you might already think you know about chocolate in beer, as nibs from the Dominican Republic were added during the brewing process, giving it a booming aroma and flavor.

[MIKA27]

Random Special Edition Copies Of Monopoly Will Come With Real Cash

Despite an endless run of electronic versions of the game, there’s still nothing as satisfying as sitting around a table with friends playing the original board game version of Monopoly. Except it turns out there is actually still one thing more satisfying: living in France, buying a new copy of the game, and discovering it comes with around $30,000 in real cash, not fake Monopoly money.

To celebrate the 80th anniversary of the game in France, Hasbro decided to replace the game’s fake currency with actual Euros. And 80 lucky board game enthusiasts will find their copy of Monopoly packed with €20,580 in varying denominations of euros that can be played with or, more likely, immediately deposited at a bank.

Hasbro will also be secretly releasing ten random sets with €300 secretly stashed inside, and 69 sets with €150 hidden away. And while the very special editions of the game aren’t any heavier than the ones with fake money inside, they are actually a little thicker as a result of all that cash. So expect to see news of hordes of people ambushing toy stores in France, squeezing all the copies of Monopoly they can get their hands on. [The Guardian]

[MIKA27]

Watch Ken Block Belt The New 2016 Ford Focus RS Around The Factory

Does Ken Block ever travel anywhere in a straight line? Or is he full-time #slideways? Whatever the answer, Ford decided to lend him a prototype version of the beastly new 2016 Focus RS to do a few fancy tricks around the factory before sliding it out to the assembled media for the unveiling.

Sure, it’s not Block’s modified Ford Fiesta, or that bonkers Mustang from a few months ago, but the 2016 Focus RS sounds amazing.

The new Focus RS is packing the same 2.3-litre engine, 4cyl, turbocharged from the upcoming Ford Mustang EcoBoost model, with roughly 320 horsepower under the bonnet and all the creature comforts you’d expect from a top-of-the-line hot hatch.

It’s packing a manual gearbox (thank sweet, merciful Christ), and tears up the road with 320 foot-pounds of torque.

I can’t wait to see more of it.

[MIKA27]

This Tiny Key-Code Flash Drive PIN Protects Your Files -- For A Price

Tiny capacious flash drives not only make it easy to carry gigs and gigs of data wherever you go, they also makes it easy to lose gigs and gigs of data. So if you’ve had more flash drives go MIA than you prefer to remember, Toshiba will now let you password-protect those lost files with a built-in PIN pad so you don’t have to worry about your data falling into the wrong hands.

That peace of mind comes with a few caveats, though. For starters, the drives are only USB 2.0 so patience is a must when copying large files, and the capacities top out at 32GB which is downright tiny by today’s standards. There’s also a handy Brute Force Hack Defence Mechanism which automatically erases all the data on the drive after ten failed PIN attempts, but that’s also just an annoying prank waiting to happen.

The new Toshiba encrypted drives are also expensive, ranging in price from $US95 for just a 4GB model, to $US200 for 32GB. But you’re not really paying for capacity here, you’re paying for the assurance that the next time your flash drive goes missing you’ll only be out a boatload of cash, not the sense of security that your private files are safe.

[MIKA27]

The Police Are Now Hunting For The 2 Creepy Figures That Appeared In This Video

A couple of friends in Auckland, New Zealand, were filming a skit for a school project when a camera operator noticed a strange pair of figures walking out of the forest. They appeared to be two young people, one male, one female, both wearing bizarre masks to hide their identity. As they emerged closer, the camera noticed that both were armed. Watch as the nefarious looking twosome slowly notices the camera.

The person who uploaded the video says that a police helicopter began circling the area as they were discussing the footage with their tutors. This status was also posted on the Auckland police Facebook page. They urged the two to make their presence known, even if this was just some kind of sick joke. I sure hope they find out who the two really are.

[MIKA27]

Russia May Slap Germany With A $4.5 Trillion Lawsuit For Nazi Atrocities

A workgroup is being set up by deputies of Russia's parliament to calculate the damage that Nazi Germany inflicted upon the Soviet Union during the Second World War. Initial estimates place the figure between $3.43 to $4.56 trillion dollars — but good luck getting Germany to pay.

As Izvestia is reporting, this idea was proposed by Mikhail Degtyaryov, a member of the supreme council of the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (LDPR). His contention is that Germany has hardly paid any reparations for the destruction and atrocities inflicted on the Soviet Union during WWII.

Degtyaryov referred to the Soviet government commission that assessed WWII damages as 30% of the national wealth, adding that the Nazis destroyed 1,710 Soviet cities and towns, 70,000 villages, 32,000 factories, and 100,000 collective farms during the ill-fated Operation Barbarossa.

"What we have now is that Germany repaid compensations over 6 million victims of the Holocaust but ignored the deaths of 27 million Soviet people, over 16 million of which were civilians," he added.

Degtyaryov contends that, under the Yalta agreements, the USSR recouped some damage by taking away a number of German assets in the form of "furniture, clothing, [and] industrial equipment," and that this insufficiently compensated for the damage incurred by the war economy of the USSR. And while an agreement to cease reparations was signed with the Soviet-propped German Democratic Republic, no similar agreement was ever forged with the Federal Republic of Germany (either before or after reunification).

Revealingly, Degtyaryov admitted that the issue remains open and topical because Germany is supposedly inflicting damage on Russia as it presses forward with "unlawful sanctions" on behalf of the European Union.

Should they go ahead with the lawsuit, Russian parliamentarians concede that the chances of winning are extremely low, but that it's important to remind the Russian people about history.

As noted in RT, Russia risks making an already tense situation with the West even worse:

ome lawmakers were extremely critical of the motion. The deputy head of the upper house Committee for Foreign Relations, Vladimir Dzhabarov, said that all reparations issues between the USSR and Germany were settled in 1950s and returning to the issue could only bring problems.

"All we can achieve through bringing up this question is the deterioration of our relations with Germany, which aren't that good at the moment. Russia has enough problems apart from these reparations," the Rossiiskaya Gazeta daily quoted the senator as saying.

The chair of the State Duma Education Committee, MP Vyacheslav Nikonov (United Russia) called the LDPR initiative "utter rubbish" in press comments and noted that the stirring up old conflicts was a stupid thing to do at the moment.

"Germany has paid the reparations, mostly it was done by East Germany. This problem has been solved. They stopped paying in 1953," Nikonov noted.

Germany has already said that it isn't going to pay Russia a single dime. And as Tass reports, "repayment of reparations is possible only upon an interstate agreement and it is practically unrealistic to recover any reparations seventy years after the end of the war."

Russia may or may not hand Germany this lawsuit, but it's clear that some of its more nationalistic elements are using this ploy for propaganda purposes, and as a way to use history to further inflame anti-Western sentiment.

Russia also needs to tread carefully, here — lest it be slapped by countersuits from former Eastern Bloc countries, all of which could argue they suffered tremendous humanitarian and material losses under de facto Soviet occupation.

[MIKA27]

Game Of Thrones' The Mountain Breaks 1000-Year-Old Weightlifting Record

Watch Júlíus Björnsson (AKA The Mountain of Game Of Thrones) carrying a 650 kilogram log on his back and walk five steps with it breaking a 1000-year-old viking weightlifting record.

The record is based on the 1000-year-old legend of Orm Storulfsson, an Icelander that carried a 1433 pounds and 33 feet (10 meters) long Monster Wooden Log. It took 50 men to place it on his back. Right after he took the third step his back couldn’t hold the weight and broke. The legend says Orm Storulfsson wasn’t the same after that.

[MIKA27]

The Craziest Russian Climber Is Back With More Gonad-shriveling Photos

Our favourite Crazy Ivan is back with more photos: Kirill Oreshkin is one of the few people who can make me panic by just looking at his photos climbing onto any building or structure without any safety measures whatsoever. And then hanging there all calm, as if he were just having tea and biscuits.

[MIKA27]

Insane Picture Of An Insane Guy Jumping Over An Insane Abyss

Redditor and adventurer Orenisham took this amazing photo climbing up Ridjim Assaf on Jebel Rum, Jordan. It reminds me of the The Word of God, the second challenge of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade: “Only in the footsteps of God, shall he proceed.” He explains that the local call this siq jump:

A ‘siq’ is what the locals there call these massive ravines that cut through the sandstone mountains – like the one he’s jumping over. ‘Jebel Rum’ means “Mount Rum” and is tallest peak there, and ‘Ridjim Assaf’ is the name of one of the climbing/scrambling routes up the mountain.

[MIKA27]

Expect This Kind Of Giant Drone Gunship In The Next Decade

Feast your eyes on the beautiful concept design work of John Liberto. Cruisers, fighters, or mechas, I like all his work. The Osprey-ish drone gunship above really struck me because it feels so real that I can imagine it coming to a war near you in the next decade. The rest of his designs belong to a faraway future.

John Liberto is a concept artist who has worked for major special effects and game development companies like Lucasfilm, Digital Domain, Microsoft 343 Industries, or Epic Games. Apparently he is now working for OculusVR, which is great news because these are the kind of worlds I want to get lost inside for weeks at a time.

You can follow his work on his website, Artstation, Facebook and Tumblr.