The Long Tail of Hardware

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Open source hardware is fun for a girl or a boy!

I just read an interesting dissertation by Leah Buechley and Benjamin Mako Hill from MIT about diy culture as it relates to electrical engineering.

“… when media is easy to create, publish and distribute, production and consumption decentralize. While the 20th century was dominated by large companies who mass produced media that was mass consumed by the public, the 21st century is emerging as a time where media is produced and consumed in an increasingly non-homogeneous fashion by niche groups. These niche groups… use the internet to construct, share, find, and consume material that fits their particular (sometimes very particular) interests.”

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Census Day

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Putting the party back in "Deep Sea Research Party" by Daichi Fujita

The census results are in!  Now we know exactly how many seats in congress are needed to fairly represent Bikini Bottom.  OK, you got me.  It wasn’t that kind of census.  I’m talking about the Census of Marine Life, the first attempt to systematically quantify all denizens of the inky deep.  Three main questions guided the direction and scope of this global collaboration: what did live in the oceans, what does live in the oceans, and what will live in the oceans?  Diversity, distribution, and abundance of life have been painstakingly observed, recorded, and now triumphantly reported. Continue reading Census Day →

Fermentation… on Acid!

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lactic acid
Acid, of the lactic variety.

Here’s the deal, I bought a food processor a few months ago and the joys of shredding still seem fresh and new.  This novel invention combined with easy access to the bountiful harvests of my local and beloved CostCo results in some wild and crazy weekend antics.   The only tarnish comes when a giant batch of finely cut vegetables founders in my crisper drawer, leaving an indelicately reduced liquid to sop up rejectedly.  Even if the chopped vittles don’t turn obviously against me, I have suffered at the hands of food-borne illness often enough to throw things away before they become truly dangerous.  It would seem that my only remaining options are to give up my grating addiction or get my act together and attempt some “new” method of food preservation.  I will choose the latter. Continue reading Fermentation… on Acid! →

All Quiet on the Paleocave Front

Ryan's Ramblings

Hey Paleoposse,

You’ve probably noticed things have been a bit quiet over here. You’ve also likely noticed it’s fall. These two things are correlated! And one is likely causal. As the school year ramps up things tend to get a bit busier for us. Things need teaching, meetings need attending, and just real life in general happens all over the place. It makes an awful mess. Unfortunately the victim of messy biological life is this very blog. Are we giving up? NEVER! We like the blog, but we need to make sure we’re doing it in a way that doesn’t destroy us AND provides worthwhile content. To that end we’re gonna restructure things a bit around the Paleocave. You’ll still have the same great content from the same great providers, but perhaps with a new schedule, a new look and other features. So sit tight, give us a minute to regroup and we’ll re-attack your mind-grapes with renewed vigor in half a jiff (I know jiff is an actual measure of time, and yes, it’ll take longer than half of one of them).

xoxo,

Ryan

P.S. Seriously.

Continue reading All Quiet on the Paleocave Front →

BREAKING NEWS: Engineer Finds Love

Ryan's Ramblings

An Engineer has done the seemingly impossible. He’s found a woman who accepts him, engineering and all! Just kidding, folks. It’s Jacob! Resident engineer blogger, awesome helper host and now proud husband. Everyone congratulate Jacob on tying the not to Sarah Simpson. She’s pretty awesome and as much as I roll my eyes whenever anyone else says it at any other wedding, I know these two will be happy. Congrats again, buddy. Now get back to work!

The Great Walrus Haulout of 2010

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Walruses
They usually opt for a habitat “on the rocks”, not on the rocks…

In what can only be described as yet another depressing harbinger of doom, the Pacific walruses in the normally frigid Chukchi Sea have decided, “everybody out.”  The USGS has been monitoring the Arctic walruses’ movements, foraging areas, and sea ice habitats through satellite radio-tags attached to our blubbery buddies since June/July 2010.  This year, the annual sea ice retreat has taken an unusual if not unexpected turn for the dramatic.

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Industrial Evolution

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Babbage’s “Difference Engine #2” first built in 2002

For all of those US based readers and listeners, I salute your labors on this day.  The celebration of Labor Day dates back to 1894, something about Grover Cleveland trying to quell labor riots… we get the day off and towels and mattresses go on sale.

The fruits of my labor are reaped binarily rather than with a thresher, and if you’re exploring this corner of the interwebs I suspect yours may be too.    We should be looking back to the development of computing technologies which we have to thank for smooth girlish hands and carpal tunnel syndrome.

I got to thinking and worked out six degrees of Science Sort of in 30 seconds or less for this post.  Labor day, labor unions, industrial revolution, textile mills, Jacquard weaving looms,  and the eternal frenemies Ada Lovelace the “enchantress of numbers” and Charles Babbage designer of the  “difference engine”. Continue reading Industrial Evolution →

A List of Erroneous Pet Peeves (with Clarification)

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Our show is about promoting a literacy of and excitement about all things SCIENCE! Well sometimes in the interest of not dampening the excitement we let some of the literacy fall by the wayside, but that defeats both purposes so here are a few things you should be aware of to avoid an embarrassing mistake in the future. It’s for your own good.

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5 Movies that REALLY didn’t need transferred to Blu Ray…

Jacob's Knowledge Bombs, ,

Good evening, PaleoPosse.

Today I would like to share with you a bad habit of mine…

On any given trip to Wal Mart and Target, no matter what I happened to be there to buy, I always end up making my way back to the Electronics section… Maybe it’s a ritual from my childhood (I’ll be at the super nintendo Mom!! Come get me when you’re done shopping!), maybe it’s instinctual, or maybe it’s simply the smell of shiny plastic and ozone… Whatever the case, this habit is not healthy.

Ahh the memories…

Now, I consider myself to be a fairly frugal person.  I don’t often make impulse purchases, or buy too many unnecessary things.  I’m the kind of guy that believes, even though I am surrounded by technology every second of every day, I could survive an apocalypse that wipes out all technology.

But now that I have a CAREER, and I make enough money to be able to make a few stupid tiny purchases a month without too much remorse, I have found myself drawn more and more frequently… TO THE BLU RAY AISLE. Dun dun duuuuuhh.

Lucky for me however, it seems like the Blu Ray shelves are being filled with old-ass, CRAP movies that make me nautious enough to stay my thirst for the blood of new 1080p content…at least for a little while.

So in order to keep my hunger at bay for a little while longer (at least until my wedding is over!), I have prepared an utterly disgusting list of movies that REALLY didn’t need to be transferred to Blu Ray.

Continue reading 5 Movies that REALLY didn’t need transferred to Blu Ray… →