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

[MIKA27]

The Snowy Graveyards Where Soviet Subs and Planes Go to Die

 1. Airplane - amphibia with vertical take-off VVA14. The USSR built only two of them in 1976, one of which has crashed during transportation. Russia, Moscow area, 2013

 

IN THE EARLY 1970S, the Soviet Union built an amphibious airplane designed to skim the sea, searching for US nuclear submarines. It flew, but the Kremlin scuttled the Bartini Beriev VVA-14 after a prototype crashed, the designer died, and a supplier bungled an order. The one remaining plane rusts away in a field at the Russian Air Force Museum outside Moscow.

That ill-fated plane is among 33 Soviet-era relics that Danila Tkachenko photographed for his series and photo book Restricted Areas. Many see them as monuments to the Cold War, a reminder of a time when the world lived under the threat of annihilation. But Tkachenko sees the Soviet Union’s aspirations and failures, and a rejection of the pursuit of political and technological utopias. “My project is a metaphor [for] post-technology apocalypse,” he says.

The series takes its name from the dozens of “secret” cities that housed the government’s most sensitive military and scientific programs. These cities were closed to all but the people who worked in them, and visits required approval from the highest levels. Many of them still stand today, abandoned and falling into ruin.

Tkachenko’s grandmother lives in Ozyorsk, a village built around a plutonium factory. Part of the factory blew up in 1957, irradiating the surrounding landscape. Tkachenko visited her in 2012, and started thinking about the tension between the promise of technology and the havoc it often wreaks. “It was the inspiration for the whole series,” he says.

He worked on the project each winter for three years, traveling more than 15,000 miles through Russia, Kazakhstan and Bulgaria. After identifying a location, Tkachenko would wait for fog or snow before shooting with a Mamiya 7. He favored a small aperature and long exposure to create a dreamy, otherworldly feel. 

Shooting everything in the snow adds to the surreal sight of a submarine beached in a field or an abandoned building that looks like a battlement on Hoth. All of this technology, designed for war and abandoned when that war was lost. “I wanted to show the other side of progress and technology,” Tkachenko says. “It’s not always leading us to better future, but can also be a failure or bring destruction.”

 

Restricted Areas will be showing at the Kehrer Gallery in Berlin from June 4.

[MIKA27]

Molekule Air Purifier

Supposed studies state that indoor air is up to five times more polluted than outdoor air, and that it contributes to a wide variety of health issues for everyone, not just asthma and allergy sufferers. Molekule is the world’s first molecular air purifier, it captures the pollutants that can cause us the most harm such as mold, viruses, bacteria, gaseous chemicals... and converts them into harmless elements that are meant to be in the air. The included app allows you to control the device remotely and seamlessly manage filter replacements

 

 

[Steens]

seems like it only ships in the USA 

[MIKA27]

16 hours ago, Steens said:

seems like it only ships in the USA 

Yeah it seems to be only U.S however if you know anyone on this forum who lives in the states, you could always pay for the device and have them ship it to NZ for you

[MIKA27]

This Might Be The Reason Why Rio Can't Clean Its Shitty Water For The Olympics

It sounded too good to be true. Thanks to the Olympics, Rio’s trash-ringed, sewage-contaminated Guanabara Bay would transform into a pristine watershed as the premiere venue for rowing and sailing. But the cleanup effort never materialised in earnest, and earlier this year, the city said it would actually take 20 more years. A new investigation offers a very simple hypothesis for why the water stayed dirty: Someone stole the money.

A report from Reuters looks at a team of investigators that has been studying widespread corruption around the construction of Olympic venues. The investigation was then expanded to include “legacy” improvements — federal funds which were specifically allocated for projects which would benefit Brazil’s residents long after the games. Like eight sewage treatment plants that might prevent human waste from flowing into the city’s recreational water supply. (Only one facility was built.)

According to federal prosecutor Leandro Mitidieri, there was plenty of money earmarked to clean up Guanabara Bay and several other lakes that will be used for water sports. Yet less than 100 days to the start of the games, the water is still polluted and littered with garbage. In fact, the international governing body for sailing is taking matters into its own hands by removing trash from the water and erecting fences to make sure no additional debris flows into the bay.

It’s not just the water that athletes will be competing in that’s under investigation. The water that people are drinking could also be tainted:

Another team of federal prosecutors, along with federal police, is investigating whether the Rio de Janeiro state water utility company Cedae committed environmental crimes by not properly treating sewage in Rio’s metropolitan area of 12 million people, Mitidieri said.

The list of reasons to cancel the Olympics just gets longer and longer.

[MIKA27]

PEBBLE CORE

Having good tunes while you are running or on your bike is important enough to folks that people actually used to run with CD players. It wasn’t a big deal at the time (besides the whole skipping thing) but now the thought of it seems absurd. What were folks thinking? If everything goes Pebble’s way with their new Core, we’ll be saying the same thing about running with our phones not too long from now.

Essentially a souped-up iPod shuffle, the Core streams music from your Spotify playlists while also preforming all of the tasks you’d want your phone to while out on a run. While using your wireless carriers cellular network, it tracks your pace and distance and will work seamlessly with your preferred fitness apps so you can keep track of your performance over a long period of time. In case you get into trouble – it even has an SOS function that’ll call for help. The best part about it? It only costs $69. [Purchase]

 

[MIKA27]

China's Straddling Bus Allows Cars to Drive Underneath It

Buses, with their frequent stops and penchant for slow speeds, might get some people around, but they cause traffic problems for all the other drivers on the road. As shown off at the 19th International High-Tech Expo in Beijing this past weekend, there may be a solution coming to China—the straddling bus. The bus, which would carry up to 1,400 passengers, allows cars to pass underneath it. Not only would it reduce traffic issues, it would help with serious carbon emission problems. Transit Explore Bus is currently building a life-size model of the clever bus that allows cars under 7 feet to pass underneath, so actually seeing these on the road is still a ways off.

[MIKA27]

FENSENS WIRELESS PARKING SENSOR

Most new cars come with sensors to let you know when you're about to back over something. Unfortunately for owners of older rides, adding that capability to a car that didn't come equipped with it has been an expensive undertaking. Until now. The FenSens Wireless Parking Sensor is both affordable and easy to install. It packs its sensors into a standard license plate holder, installing in as little as five minutes and connecting to your phone wirelessly. Once it's set up you'll get a visual readout of how far any objects are from your bumper, as well as audible alerts that increase in frequency the closer you get to an object, all without running a single cable.

 

[MIKA27]

BLEU DE CHANEL COLOGNE

Yes, it has a patently ridiculous commercial — directed by Martin Scorsese, no less — but that doesn't make Bleu De Chanel Cologne any less appealing. It has an alluring mix of crisp citrus, sandalwood, labdanum, nutmeg, cedar, pink pepper and other notes to give it a clean, woodsy smell that's ideal for warmer weather. Arrives in a handsome bluish-gray bottle.

[MIKA27]

The Live-Action Ghost in the Shell Movie Is Adding Another Asian Actor

The last time we heard about the Ghost in the Shell movie, it was not great news—the one-two punch of immense backlash at the first official image of Scarlett Johannson as Motoko Kusanagi and a follow-up report alleging the film attempted to digitally alter white actors to appear Asian left fans furious. This latest news, however, is an improvement.

The Hollywood Reporter reports that Rila Fukushima, best known to Western audiences for her appearance as Yukio in The Wolverine, or her minor role as Katana on Arrow, has joined the film in an undisclosed role. She’s the second Asian actor to do so, following the announcement earlier this year that Beat Takeshi will play Kusanagi’s boss, Daisuke Aramaki.

Also interesting to note? THR’s report specifically calls Johannson’s character Kusanagi—after Paramoun’ts official comments on the beginning of production only referred to Johannson as playing “The Major,” there was some speculation that Kusanagi would receive a name change to reflect Johansson’s casting. That doesn’t appear to be the case, but hey, at least the film is actively adding the Asian actors it desperately needs.

Ghost in the Shell is expected to come out next year

[MIKA27]

First Trailer For Morgan

The idea of humans being dicks to the advanced technology we make isn’t exactly new, but it’s a story that at least looks as though it’s being used to particularly spooky effect in Morgan, the feature debut from director Luke Scott (son of Ridley Scott).

The titular Morgan is a rapidly-maturing synthetic being, played by The Witch‘s Anya Taylor-Joy, and after the scientists behind her creation suddenly decide that this rapidly-evolving being shouldn’t be treated like a human being, Kate Mara’s “troubleshooter” is called in to investigate. Naturally, things go awry, because when will you learn, supposedly smart scientists!? Still, this looks like it could be a fun ride, despite the similar premise. Morgan hits US theatres September 2. An Australian release date has yet to be confirmed.

[MIKA27]

The Secret History Of Hermits

In nearly every civilisation with historical records, we find stories of people who went off by themselves to live in the wilderness. But not all hermits were the same: some were outcasts, some were holy, and others were extremely fashionable. All their stories are extraordinary.

To the Mountains
All hermits seem attracted to heights. This is never more apparent than in the Far East. Both China and Japan had thriving traditions of mountain hermits, but they weren’t necessarily hermits as we think of them.

In ancient China, becoming a hermit didn’t mean a person was seeking spiritual enlightenment. It meant they were turning away from a corrupt world. People became hermits as a way of declaring their distaste for the state of human society. The more they gave up, the more that declaration meant, so the most famous and revered hermits often came from the upper classes. Nicknames for hermits included “hidden princely ones” and “scholars who fly to withdrawal.” The more a hermit gave up, the more impressed people were, so most hermits did withdraw to mountains and cliffs, but it was the withdrawal, not the location, that was the point. Some hermits simply disappeared into their home, cutting off contact with society.

Japanese hermits were also not quite the hermits most people picture. Hermits could wander on their own, but they could band together in twos, or even live as communities. Unlike China, these hermits did have strong religious traditions. They went to the mountains to spiritually contemplate nature, but they also often studied religious texts and practiced self-defence. (They were isolated, not stupid. Other people lived in those mountains.) They were educated, they were practical, and they were, at first, independent, so people sought them out for advice. Over time, certain reclusive communities grew in prestige and power. Corruption set in, as the communities became tied to landed nobles. Eventually, Japanese hermits picked up the Chinese tradition of abandoning their communities on principle and wandering the wilderness of the mountains. These wandering hermits became spiritual reformers. They cemented the idea of eremitism as a spiritual ideal. If you want to find someone who’s definitely not corrupted by the world, find the guy who’s most isolated.

Climb a Pole

The Byzantine Empire became famous for its special brand of urban eremitism. Hermits, instead of going out into the wilderness, would become isolated where everyone could see them. They built pillars, sometimes right in the middle of towns, and climbed them as young men, never to come down. Saint Simeon Stylites the Elder was the first of these hermits, called stylites. He lived in 432, and was said to have spent 37 years on top of a pillar in Aleppo, Syria.

Stylites lived with the help of the community around them. Simeon got bread and goats milk once a day, hauled up by whatever boy in the town was nimble enough to climb the pillar. Between praying and communing with god, the stylites would loudly preach to the community below them. While stylites were popular through the middle ages, they seem to have disappeared by 1500 AD. The tradition recently revived. There is one living stylite. A monastery in Georgia recently built a small house on top of a rock outcropping. Father Maxim, one of the monks, now lives on the 39.62m tall natural pillar. If that seems cushy for a stylite, consider that for the first two years, the fifty-something man slept in an old fridge to protect him from the weather, and that the ladder ascending the pillar takes twenty minutes to climb.

Look the Part

Europe had a variety of monasteries where men and women could choose to live in different degrees of isolation. Some were simply communities that occasionally prayed. Others had strict rules against speaking, and had no contact with the outside world. Disturbingly some medieval hermits were forced to become hermits as children. It was a tradition, among noble families, to “give” a child to the church. This involved building a room along the wall of a local church, putting the child inside, and bricking it up. The room did have an opening onto the main church, so the child could receive food, send out waste, and hear the priests and the choir. Sometimes, an older hermit was walled up with the child to take care of them. Still, it was pretty grim.

The most famous of these forced hermits, called anchorites, was Hildegard of Bingen. She eventually escaped the room. In her teens she began having ecstatic visions and became the most famous woman of her time. Famous for writing religious treatises and composing music, she travelled, lectured, and corresponded with popes and kings. Eventually she created a convent of her own.

Europe’s need for hermits was so great that, after the monasteries fell, it became fashionable to hire ornamental hermits. Rich English and German nobles with extensive estates would build a little false hermitage and hire someone to live there. The hermit would sometimes come out, usually at dinner parties, and do a little preaching to the nobleman’s guests. The hermit was also expected to be slack in his grooming, sleep on hay, and carry around heavy books. Some ornamental hermits had to tend their own gardens, as well, with picturesque instruments. The job paid well, and not much paid well in the 17th century, so hermits were readily available.

Modern Hermits Get Book Deals

There are modern hermits. One man spent years in China wandering from one shrine to another, finding hermits who lived in the woods nearby. Japan has hikikomuri, young people who never leave their homes, both because their parents are their only support structure and because they see no point in even attempting to win out in what they consider the over-competitive and unrewarding Japanese job market. And, of course, there are people who simply choose to live alone.

But, while those people are hermits, they aren’t the hermits we hear of throughout history. Eremitism, paradoxically, has an important social component. Society seems to want people who turn away from it, either to cleanse themselves of corruption or find a more spiritual way of being. Society seems to especially want people who isolate themselves while doing something random and crazy – like the stylite who never faced west so the sun would never set on his face. And society really, really wants the people who do that to give it advice.

Like it or not, the people who live for a year in a yurt on the roof of their parents’ house, or go trekking through the Andes without any pants on are fulfilling a proud tradition. This Friday, Wild comes out. It’s a film based on a memoir by Cheryl Strayed. At twenty-six, plagued by personal demons and without much money, Cheryl Strayed changed her name, took up a backpack, and despite being totally unprepared, walked 1,770km along the Pacific Coast trail. Afterwards, she became an advice columnist.

Now that is a hermit.

[MIKA27]

The Time To Nuke Mars Is Now

Good news, prospective Martian colonists: that frigid hellscape where you hope to spend out your days alone and in darkness is currently in a “warm phase”. Scientists are now reporting the first observational evidence that Mars recently emerged from an ice age, which can only mean one thing. It’s time to bring out the bombs and terraform that sucker.

Using ground-penetrating radar data collected by NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, a team of scientists at the Southwest Research Institute has unearthed strong evidence for accelerated accumulation of ice at Mars’ north pole in the recent geologic past. This discovery, detailed today in the journal Science, confirms what models have been predicting since the early 2000s: that the Red Planet’s most recent ice age ended about 370,000 years ago.

Like the Earth, Mars fluctuates between glacial and interglacial phases due to variations in the planet’s orbit as it circles the Sun. But on Mars, these so-called “Milankovitch cycles” are far more dramatic. While the Earth’s tilt varies approximately 2 degrees between glacial and interglacial cycles, Mars practically does somersaults, swaying back and forth on its axis by as much as 60 degrees. What’s more, thanks to neighbouring Jupiter’s immense gravitational tug, Mars’ orbit becomes very stretched out, or eccentric, on timescales of about half a million years.

A 2D radar cross section of Mars’ north pole, collected by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. Layers below the blue lines in a and b show stark changes in the accumulation of ice associated with climate change. Image: Southwest Research Institute

When changes in axial tilt and eccentricity combine properly, Mars has an ice age. But it isn’t quite what we’d expect based on ice ages here on Earth.

“During an ice age on Earth, the poles get colder, causing a buildup of ice that flows outward to cover Canada and northern Europe,” Smith told Gizmodo. “The reverse is true on Mars. As the planet increases its tilt, the poles get warmer.”

As a result, ice migrates away from the poles and toward Mars’ mid latitudes. That’s why, when Smith and his colleagues observed an uptick in the rate of accumulation of ice near the surface of Mars’ north polar cap, they knew that an ice age had to have ended recently.

From a human colonisation perspective, this is very good news. Smith’s new study estimates there are approximately 87,000 cubic kilometres of dry ice locked away at Mars’ north pole right now. That’s a heck of a lot of frozen CO2, all buried in one place. If we took Elon Musk’s off-the-cuff advice and nuked the pole, we could probably make the atmosphere much thicker and warmer pretty quickly.

“The quickest way to increase the [atmospheric] pressure is by releasing that CO2 ice,” Smith said. “It won’t be enough for humans to live, but it will be a big start.”

And if terraforming Mars is the goal, there’s no time to waste. Smith reckons we’ve got 150,000 years before the next ice age kicks in.

[MIKA27]

Ghost Recon Wildlands Resurfaces With New Trailer

 

It’s been nearly a year since we’ve heard or seen anything related to the latest entry in the Ghost Recon series, but that should change at E3.

The latest trailer, featuring a guy who sure sounds like but probably isn’t Matthew McConaughey, looks like an actual game. It doesn’t feature a release date, but given that Ubisoft’s also announced a collector’s edition, it wouldn’t be surprising if they’re trying to launch this sometime in 2016.

[MIKA27]

Hybrid “Grolar” Bears Growing In Numbers

A hunter in Churchhill, Manitoba, Canada recently posted pictures to his Facebook account showing off his most recent kill: a grolar bear. Grolar bears, sometimes called “pizzly bears,” are a polar bear/grizzly bear hybrid resulting from inbreeding between the two species. While the existence of this interspecies killing machine was long rumored to exist by denizens of the far north, a DNA test in 2006 confirmed their existence.

Grolar bears typically bear the white fur of the polar bear, but have smaller, rounded shoulders like grizzlies. Many of the grolar bears’ physical characteristics fall somewhere in between those of a grizzly and a polar bear, such as their hybrid head shape. Polar bear hair is hollow, while grizzly bear hair is typically solid; grolar bear specimens have been found with semi-hollow hair, or patches of both solid and hollow hair.

The increasing frequency of grolar bear sightings have some environmentalists worried. One theory about the recent occurrences of the hybrid bears argues that due to shrinking polar ice, polar bears are having to range farther inland in search of food. Once the bears reach grizzly territory far from ice caps, inbreeding occurs. Other theories have argued that perhaps the opposite is happening; as global temperatures rise, grizzlies are more able to venture farther north into polar bear habitats. Due to the fact that female bears ovulate only after spending extended time around males, the possibility is slim that these hybrids are the result of mere chance encounters.

There is some debate over naming the hybrid bears. Based on naming conventions for feline hybrid species, a hybrid bear with a grizzly father would be a “grolar” bear, while a hybrid with a polar bear father would be a “pizzly.” Some Canadian wildlife experts, however, contend that the hybrid should be named “nanulak,” a name produced by combining the Inuit words for polar bear (“nanuk”) and grizzly bear (“aklak”).

The earliest known example of one of these hybrid bears is thought to be “MacFarlane’s Bear,” a yellow-haired cryptid bear shot in Canada’s far north in 1864. While some speculation about MacFarlane’s bear suggests the mysterious bear specimen could be a long-lost ancient species, current theories are that it was an early example of a polar-grizzly hybrid.

 

[MIKA27]

THE GODFATHER NOTEBOOK

You could fill a library with all the papers and articles that have been written about Francis Ford Coppola's mafia masterpiece. All of them together can't give you the insight of The Godfather Notebook. This 700-page publication is a recreation of the notebook Coppola compiled and wrote before filming began. Filled with notes, ideas, and impressions from Mario Puzo's novel, it lets you see inside the film like never before. The notebook is accompanied by an introduction from Coppola himself and photos from both on and off the set.

[MIKA27]

That Scary Antibiotic-Resistant Superbug Is Now In The US

Earlier this month, a frightening report warned of an antibiotic-resistant superbug which might kill as many as 10 million people worldwide by 2050. Now it looks like the first case of that superbug has been documented in the US.

According to a study published today by the American Society for Microbiology, a 49-year-old Pennsylvania woman had a strain of E. coli that did not respond to the antibiotic colistin, which is a powerful drug-of-last-resort for treating particularly stubborn infections. This type of colistin-resistant E. coli has been found in several other countries — namely in the intestines of pigs, though it hasn’t appeared in Australia — but this is the first time it’s been seen in the US. The CDC is investigating the source of the superbug.

There are alternatives to antibiotics, like strains of predatory bacteria that are currently being tested by DARPA, or, surprisingly, more powerful superbugs. But it’s widely agreed among experts that the “antibiotic apocalypse” is impending. As Sally Davies, chief medical officer for England, wrote in a recent report warning of antibiotic-resistant superbugs, “the golden age of antibiotics which the world has taken for granted for well over fifty years has ended.”

“It basically shows us that the end of the road isn’t very far away for antibiotics — that we may be in a situation where we have patients in our intensive-care units, or patients getting urinary tract infections for which we do not have antibiotics,” CDC Director Tom Frieden told the Washington Post.

[MIKA27]

JAYBIRD FREEDOM WIRELESS EAR BUDS

If you’re someone who enjoys music and spending time outdoors in an active setting, which frankly could and should be everyone, then you’re of the notion that to skimp of a pair of wireless earbuds is an amateur mistake. Let’s face it, quality and fit matter, whether you’re running a marathon or biking around the neighborhood. And for these individuals, the Freedom earbuds from JayBird are sure to please.

Freedoms combine sophisticated style, high-quality sound, and increased comfort in their smallest, most advanced wireless earbuds yet. They’re sweat-proof, feature a reduction of 20% in speaker housing for a comfortable, universal fit, and come with on-the-go charging in case eight hours of playtime isn’t long enough. Each set is made from sandblasted metal for style and durability, and syncs with up to two Bluetooth devices, including smartwatches. Also for those romantic types, you can share the same Bluetooth device with two separate pairs of Freedoms. Just make sure you both agree on the music selection first. Available now for $200. [Purchase]

[MIKA27]

Sam Mendes Won't Direct Another James Bond Film

After directing two instalments of the franchise back to back, Sam Mendes is stepping back from James Bond. The director of Skyfall and Spectre confirmed his departure earlier today at the Hay festival, according to the Guardian.

This comes just days after rumours escalated that Tom Hiddleston — or maybe Jamie Bell — would be taking over the title role of of the franchise. Mendes has noted that he was reluctant to take on another Bond film after Spectre back in November, but as of today he’s made that official.

“It was an incredible adventure, I loved every second of it,” Mendes said at the Hay festival, of his five years working on Bond. “But I think it’s time for somebody else.”

The director indicated that he wanted to work on a fresh new story with new characters.

Another Bond film is inevitable, but with the departure of the two move visible figures in the franchise, we have no idea when we’ll see Bond on the big screen again.

Who would you want to see direct a Bond movie?

[MIKA27]

Rally Car Dash Cam Captures Unbelievable Footage Of Flipping Vehicle

 

Driver Martin Kdér is racing in the Podbrdská Rally Legend 2016 competition and flying along without a care in the world. Well, except for keeping his Skoda 130 LR on the road. Who would have guessed that, moments later, his dash cam would capture a truly amazing shot… at the expense of his vehicle.

Just so you can enjoy the clip guilt-free — no one was seriously injured as a result of the crash.

Everything appears to be going fine until the 1:40-mark, when Kdér loses control and the vehicle veers to the left. Unfortunately, he’s unable to correct and the car starts to roll. For a few moments, all we can see is the broken glass of the windshield, followed by pure white as the camera’s auto-exposure adjusts.

And as it does, well, it captures a spectacular shot of the car rolling through the air above it. You’d think it was staged if you didn’t know otherwise.

Photographers can spend hours perfecting the framing and composition of a shot, so I’m sure it boils the blood to see a dash cam pull it off completely by accident.

 

[MIKA27]

How The World's Most Glamorous Ice Bar Stays Frozen In The Middle Of The Desert

The bar is made of 120 tonnes of pure Canadian ice. So are the walls and all the furniture, along with intricately carved ice sculptures, including a replica of the Vegas skyline and an icy Iron Throne just for Game of Thrones fans. Walking into Minus 5 Ice Bar in Las Vegas is like stepping into a real-world scene from Disney’s Frozen.

Elsa would feel right at home in the subzero climate of this winter wonderland. But the rest of the patrons don complimentary parkas, gloves and hats to stave off the cold, the better to enjoy their speciality cocktails, which are served in custom glassware — also made of ice, of course. “We like to say that the drinks come in the rocks instead of on the rocks,” general manager Rupert King told me. There’s even an LED light show every night, inspired by the aurora borealis.

Minus 5 president Noel Bowman got the idea for Minus 5 when he visited a pop-up “ice hotel” in Europe one winter — structures built entirely out of blocks of ice, that melt with the warmer weather and are rebuilt every year. The hotel had a small bar area, and Bowman thought it would be cool to create a more permanent version. So he pitched the idea to Mandalay Bay — “It took about a year to convince them.”

The first Minus 5 was smaller — the idea was to have it be a VIP bar with bottle service. But Bowman quickly learned the concept worked better as a novel attraction rather than as a typical nightclub. Patrons stay in the newly revamped ice bar between 30 and 45 minutes, on average — just long enough to have a drink, explore the ice sculptures and get their pictures taken so they can share them on Facebook (no, you can’t bring in your own phone — more on that in a minute).

Drinking inside a simulacra glacier has proved to be a hugely popular tourist attraction — so much so that there’s now a Minus 5 in New York City, a very different seasonal environment from Vegas, noted Bowman. “In the middle of winter, with the wind chill, sometimes it’s warmer in the ice bar than it is outside.”

Soft blankets, gloves, parkas, gloves and hats are provided to keep drinkers warm.

The engineering challenges of maintaining all that ice are considerable. It’s not as much the heat, as it is the humidity which can be an issue. Kevin Liu — co-owner and chief cocktail maker of The Tin Pan in Richmond, Virginia, and author of Craft Cocktails at Home — pointed out that a subzero space like Minus 5 will have zero humidity in the air. “That can change your perception of the temperature,” he told Gizmodo. But according to Bowman, low humidity is really good for the equipment. “We chose Vegas for a reason,” he said. “It’s so dry here, and humidity can wreak havoc on refrigeration systems, because as soon as you get that moisture in there, it turns to drote. The components and units freeze over.”

The Minus 5 cooling system hails from New Zealand and is fully computerised to take many different factors into account: outside temperature, ambient heat, the number of people inside and the body heat they collectively generate, for instance. The parkas and gloves help a little in that respect, as does the ban on electronic devices like mobile phones in the ice bar. (Ninety mobile phones can generate a significant amount of heat.) But Minus 5 encourages people to touch the ice, and patrons like to remove their warm coats (and often much of their clothing) for photos — because, hey, they’re in an ice bar! “Once you take that coat off, all that body heat escapes,” said Bowman.

Then there’s the issue of sublimation: under those conditions, over time your ice will evaporate into a gas. “If you put large ice cubes into the freezer and leave them there for a long enough time, they will turn into nothing,” said Liu. “So if your furniture is made of ice, it will slowly turn into nothing.”

Bowman readily acknowledges that issue: “Ice is perishable,” especially with patrons constantly taking off their gloves to touch the sculptures. So the ice is carefully maintained by a local ice carver to keep everything as sharp and pristine as possible. Sometimes sections that are especially worse for wear will be rebuilt, and every two years or so, the entire bar is melted down and rebuilt with fresh ice.

How the ice is made matters, too. If you freeze ice too quickly, crystals will form haphazardly and you’ll get cloudy ice, according to Liu. If the water expands too quickly, the resulting ice will have stress lines and cracks. Impurities can also cloud the resulting ice, although Liu said that it’s air bubbles rather than excess minerals that are the culprit in that regard. That’s why Minus 5’s ice is made from distilled water at just the right temperature, using a process that ensures no excess air or bubbles.

ntricately carved ice sculptures and cocktails served in ice glassware at Minus 5

It’s not easy coming up with a solid cocktail menu in a subzero environment, either. Alcohol has a lower freezing point than other liquids, so that’s not an issue. But you can’t salt the rim of a margarita, since the salt will melt the ice glass. Soft drink is out, because the cans would explode. Fresh lemons and limes would freeze, so forget about those traditional garnishes. And while the bartenders do use fruit juices, they have to rotate them out every 20 minutes or so, lest they start to resemble slushees rather than juice.

You’d think this would dramatically limit the kinds of cocktails on offer, but the recent surge in flavoured vodkas has been a godsend in that regard, according to King, providing a broader range of flavour profiles than ever before. “I couldn’t imagine doing this 15 years ago, when all you had was Absolut and their six flavoured vodkas, and Grey Goose and their two flavours,” he said. So most of Minus 5’s specialty cocktails are vodka-based, although patrons can request any kind of liquor they wish.

One longtime signature cocktail is the Snowflake — Minus 5’s version of a Sex on the Beach, with cherry vodka, peach Schnapps, white cranberry juice and orange juice. Another is the Ice Man, a nod to the classic pina colada, with coconut, pineapple and raspberry vodkas. Thanks to a mojito rum infused with mint, you can get a Frosty Mojito, with no need for the bartender to struggle to muddle fresh mint leaves in a frozen environment. And yes, you can also get a beer, stored in a refrigerator outside the bar and served in the trademark ice glass. “We’re proud to say that we’re the only bar in town where the longer you drink your beer, the colder it gets,” said King.

When you’re working with ice glassware, all your liquids — including alcohol — need to be at just the right temperature to avoid damaging that glassware. So the liquor is stored in a separate freezer before they bring it into the ice bar. “If it’s too warm and you add the liquid it will crack the ice glasses,” said King, just like pouring warm soft drink over ice cubes will cause them to pop and crack.

Then there’s the challenge of trying to mix cocktails while wearing a heavy coat and gloves. That’s why Minus 5 has streamlined the process so that a bartender only has to touch four items, at most, in order to make a drink: a vodka, a modifier and two juices, for instance, or a vodka and two juices. This also ensures patrons get their drinks quickly, said King. “The only thing worse than waiting for a drink in a bar is freezing your butt off and waiting for a drink in a bar.”

[MIKA27]

Porsche Is Going Digital

In an age where electric cars are (finally) reaching maturity and vehicles on our roads are getting smarter with how they interact with the objects around them and the people inside them, it’s good to see that even very traditional car companies are getting on board. Porsche has just launched an entirely new wing of its company devoted to in-car connectivity and autonomous driving.

As part of what the company calls “a major innovation offensive”, Porsche Digital will partner with other leading brands in the areas it wants to focus on – things like machine-to-machine wireless and mobile connectivity to let cars communicate with each other and with their owners remotely, autonomous driving systems for the group’s vehicles, and more.

Porsche will even invest some of its money into venture capital holdings, and will pour cash into promising start-ups attempting to build smarter cars. This is almost an unexpected move from a company that has built its credibility on a raw but refined, mechanical rather than electronic driving experience.

Recent cars like the 918 Spyder, which uses a hybrid petrol-electric drivetrain and uses the electric motor’s instant torque to fill in gaps in the petrol engine’s performance — including in between gear shifts — show that Porsche knows the significance of new technologies. The company also recently announced a new modular V8 engine platform destined for its new Cayenne, which can be easily adapted to fit into other Porsche Group vehicles like Audis and Lamborghinis.

[MIKA27]

This Conjuring 2 Featurette Supposedly Contains Real Recordings Of Demonic Voices

 

Here’s a brief new promo for the sequel which contains a snippet of an unknown voice, recorded by Ed and Lorraine Warren (played onscreen by Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga) when they were working on the real-life case that inspired The Conjuring 2. It’s gutteral, angry, growling — and it’s terrifying to listen to, even if you’re a diehard sceptic.

The case that inspired the events of the film is the notorious “Endfield Poltergeist”, and the film will see the Warrens (fresh off their work saving the Perron family from a witchy invader in the first Conjuring) travel to England to investigate yet another haunted family. This time around, there seems to be more possessions and demons, and less creepy clapping games (as seen in the first film).

[MIKA27]

Dragon Quest Builders Is Coming West

 

The Minecraft–Dragon Quest hybrid game Dragon Quest Builders will head West this October, publisher Square Enix said this morning.

It will be out for both PS4 and — remarkably, based on Square’s recent history — Vita. New trailer above.

 

[MIKA27]

FILSON LIMITED EDITION AIR SCOUT WATCH

If you or anyone you know is from the Pacific Northwest, then you know that fire-jumping is not only one of the most dangerous professions a person could do, but it is critical to keeping entire towns from burning up during seasonal wildfires. Filson, a brand based out of Washington, took their inspiration for their new Air Scout watch from the iconic design of the aircraft used to fly those jumpers into the fray.

With a limited run of only 350 being made, this watch features all of the quality and attention to detail that has set them apart as a brand. Sporting a smart coin-edge bezel and bi-directional rotating top ring with a red notch (a nod to the red nose on the planes), it pops on the wrist without being too loud. In addition to these details, the face and hands of the Air Scout has a C-1 Lumi-Nova coating that can glow continuously for up to 15 hours while being continuously powered by the 716 Argonite movement. So you can switch it up, the watch comes with three different straps: Red Nylon, Khaki Nylon, and Bridle Leather. To top it all off – the watch was proudly assembled by hand in Detroit. Prices are set at $1,000. [Purchase]