Archive for the ‘General’ Category

ABBA The Museum opens in Stockholm

Tuesday, May 7, 2013 by:angelico@sfgate.com (AdminSF)
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They’ve sold over 379 million records, inspired a hit musical and earned a spot in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. And now, some three decades after their split, the sweethearts of Swedish pop have added another triumph to their list of achievements — ABBA The Museum.

The museum, which opened today in Stockholm, traces Björn, Agnetha, Frida and Benny’s glittery trajectory, from their start in 1970 to the final bow in 1983. Its goal: make visitors feel as if they’re the fifth member of ABBA.

Memorabilia lovers certainly won’t be disappointed. As expected, goodies such as the band’s instruments, gold records and over-the-top costumes are on display. But it is the museum’s interactive exhibits that steal the spotlight.

Walk in. Dance out.

Visitors can belt out ABBA tunes onstage with a hologram version of the group, mix a song in the Polar Studio and strut their stuff on a flashing disco dance floor. Another unique attraction is a self-playing piano that is linked to founding member Benny Andersson’s studio. When Andersson plays the piano in his studio, the museum’s counterpart plays as well.

“The new museum will give a complete picture of the band, the music and the incredible success we experienced in the ‘70s and ‘80s, something that we haven’t been able to present until now. It will be like an experience-based music documentary that invites the visitor backstage as well as on and in front of the stage,” said ABBA’s Björn Ulvaeus.

And the Scandinavian musical experience doesn’t stop with ABBA. The museum shares space with the Swedish Music Hall of Fame, which chronicles the evolution of music in Sweden from the 1920s to the present.

More information about ABBA The Museum is available at www.abbathemuseum.com.

— Laurie Isola

Printed gun fires shot as 3D technology moves forward

Monday, May 6, 2013 by:jennlouisew@gmail.com (Jennifer Wadsworth)
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It’s weird, wonderful and a little scary to realize how quickly we’re advancing in the world of 3D printing, also called additive manufacturing for the way printers add layer upon layer of material until a final form takes shape. Now we can even print handguns.

Since a new printed marvel hits headlines pretty much by the minute, let’s take a look at some recent creations worth note, from the unsettling to the innocuous to the medically miraculous.

1. Guns

Except for a thin metal firing pin, literally just a hardware store nail, Cody Wilson’s gun is completely 3D-printed plastic. Days ago, the handheld “Liberator,” as the 25-year-old anarcho-libertarian calls it, became the first known additive-manufactured gun to fire a shot, a .38 caliber round launched into the central Texas landscape, Forbes informs us. Yup, someone made a gun on a Star Trek Enterprise “Replicator”-type computer and it worked. No melted plastic or anything.

Wilson’s a University of Texas law student whom Wired magazine named the 14th most dangerous person in the world back in December for his then-unrealized plans to develop what he dubbed a Wiki Weapon, one with blueprints printable right off the Internet. As of today, those CAD files are ready to download, thanks to Wilson’s group of amateur gunmakers called Defense Distributed.

While cobbling together a shootable gun with all printed parts is undoubtedly impressive, it’s also a little alarming. Given the increasing availability of 3D printers (you can now buy them at Staples), some lawmakers like Sen. Charles Schumer think it’s time to let regulation catch up to the technology, lest home-printed firearms or gun parts become another scourge to worry about.

In the meantime, it’s technically legal to manufacture a firearm for personal use, according to the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. Given the political climate after 2012, what the Daily Caller named the “Year of the Gun,” that’s prone to change.

After all, as Wilson tells Vice in a documentary about his weapons-making endeavors: “Look, gun control doesn’t mean what it meant in 1944.”

2. ‘Mini me’ figurines

Unlike the above-mentioned, there’s no ethical quandary here. Think of this as a photo booth for the modern age. Japanese company Omote 3D peddles a printed “mini me” replica service that could take a turn for the trendy if anyone decides to market these as wedding cake toppers. Just show up to a pop-up studio, stand dead-still for 15 minutes so they can scan you, then let the 3D printing magic fashion a tiny multi-dimensional statuette of yourself, your friends, family or whoever you could get to sit still for a quarter hour session. It’s a little costly considering the size: Up to $528 for a 20-centimeter-short figurine. But the cute and cool factor: Priceless.

3. Living cells, organs and cake

Instead of printing out layers of artificial material, scientists are now using live cells to manufacture parts the body can easily integrate in surgeries. They call it bioprinting. Doctors have used the technique to print skin grafts from stem cells, replacement bladders, new intestines, ears and other lifelike prosthetics, according to the International Business Times. Researchers have used it to print cell-based materials like leather and beef. And a lab announced it printed edible cake.

Correction: An earlier version of this blog post incorrectly stated that the 3D printed gun fires a .308 caliber round. It actually only fires a .38 caliber bullet. We regret the error.

Inspiration for Marge Simpson dies at 94

Monday, May 6, 2013 by:Aubrey Cohen
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Oh Homie.

Marge Simpson (AP Photo/Fox)

Marge Simpson (AP Photo/Fox)

Margaret Groening, wife of Homer, and mother of Patty, Matt, Mark, Lisa and Maggie, died on March 23 in her Portland, Ore., home, according to an obituary in The Oregonian.

Do some of those names sound familiar? They should. Matt Groening created “The Simpsons,” which featured parents Homer and Marge (short for Margaret, yes?), and children Lisa, Maggie and, well, Bart (don’t know where that came from).

Another Simpsons connection: Margaret Groening’s maiden name was Wiggum, as in Chief Wiggum and son Ralph.

Margaret’s parents, Matt and Ingeborg Wiggum, met on the boat coming to America from Norway and settled in Everett, Wash., according to the obituary.

Margaret was high school valedictorian, Miss Everett and May Queen of Linfield College. She married Homer “because he made her laugh the most,” according to the obituary.

Homer certainly has made us laugh, as well. Bon voyage, Marge.

China tries, fails, to censor jokes about penis-shaped skyscraper

Friday, May 3, 2013 by:jennlouisew@gmail.com (Jennifer Wadsworth)
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chinapenis

If your mind’s in the gutter, you’ll see what everyone’s laughing about. (Photo via Getty Images)

Oh, China, way to put your censorship powers to the test.

The People’s Republic needed a new home for the state-run propaganda rag People’s Daily (a paper by the people, for the people … just kidding), so it decided to go all out and build a towering skyscraper in Beijing. Unfortunately for humorless Chinese censors, the new digs, still under construction, took the shape of a certain part of the male anatomy.

Now, the whole world’s snickering.

Weibo, China’s bowdlerized answer to Twitter, lit up with jokes about the undeniably phallic landmark, according to the International Business Times. Censors tried to crack down, but failed since so many people resorted to double entendres.

“Of course, some clever Weibo users have snuck around the censors by way of the double entendre,” The Atlantic reports. “‘It seems the People’s Daily is going to rise up, there’s hope for the Chinese dream,’ reads one message that got through filters, according to the AFP. Another: ‘Of course the national mouthpiece should be imposing.’”

A search using direct keywords on the topic brought up the following message, indicating censored results: “According to relevant laws, regulations and policies, search results cannot be displayed.” Blocked.

Some Weibo users snubbed state thought police by using Photoshop to to poke fun at China’s penchant for, um, erecting suggestive architecture. China Central Television – the TV counterpart to the government newspaper – is housed in an equally ridiculed headquarters, a towering arch the public laughingly calls the “Big Underpants” because it looks like a person’s bottom half. Here’s the resulting mash-up:

peoples-daily-photoshopped

China’s naughty architecture, remixed. (Photo via Weibo and Reuters)

In a video newscast, Reuters reporter Anita Yi could barely contain her smirk.

“Instead of debating the architectural merit, many people saw it as a chance to make fun of the state media for its tight control and censorship,” she remarks, trying to fight back a chuckle. “So they pointed to the building’s suggestive shape. If you have got a dirty mind, you know what I’m talking about.”

Oh we know, Anita. We’re just curious what the tower’s architect, Zhou Qi, was thinking.

h/t The Atlantic

Find Jennifer Wadsworth on Twitter at @jennwadsworth.

Mitt Romney to college grads: Quick, get married, make a bunch of babies

Thursday, May 2, 2013 by:jennlouisew@gmail.com (Jennifer Wadsworth)
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Romney suggests you have a “quiverfull of children if you can.” (Photo via Associated Press)

Mitt Romney shared some questionable (though, if you’re into that biblical stuff, pretty righteous) advice with a gathering of college grads about how to live a full life.

Quoting scripture, Romney, a former Mormon lay bishop, told an audience of Mormon college graduates to “launch out into the deep” instead of  ”living in the shallows.” In other words, go from zero to fruitful ASAP, he says. Find “the one,” join in holy matrimony and start pumping out progeny.

“If you meet someone you love, get married. Have a quiver-full of kids if you can,” the failed 2013 presidential candidate told 100-plus graduates of Southern Virginia University at their commencement last weekend.

Forget about waiting until you’re in your 30′s or 40′s, he continues. What, you want to start your life as an independent adult? Live a little? Travel? Maybe pursue one dream or another until you stumble into your own coming-of-age without a spouse by your side?

Those types, Romney dramatically remarks, “they’re going to miss so much of living, I’m afraid.”

Right. Those poor unattached 20-somethings, wallowing in loneliness while they wait for a partner to help them discover a purpose and unburden themselves from the trials and tribulations of single adulthood. That’s what they get for their self-centered pursuit of happiness. They’ll probably end up at 43 years old in a one-room apartment, eating fistfuls of melting Dibs, perusing profiles on ChristianMingle.com, long past their baby-makin’ prime. Smite!

“Launch out into the deep and your nets will be filled,” Romney preaches. “Getting married is one way of launching out in the deep.”

The audience chuckles.

“Now bringing children into the world is also launching into the deep,” he continues.

Silence. This just got serious.

“Children are a heritage of the Lord, offspring a reward from him … blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them,” says Romney, quoting Psalm 127. That’s a Bible passage that, as Mother Jones notes, is more commonly associated with the Christian Quivefull movement, which rejects contraception and feminism in lieu of having as many kids as you can to propagate the earth with an army of “God’s warriors.”

“Quiverfull adherents have as many children as God will allow, describe their offspring as ‘arrows’ in a divine army, and follow rigid gender roles in the home, where men are the spiritual leaders and women the submissive helpmeets,” MoJo explains.

It’s more than a little unsettling to hear a mainstream political figure referencing what’s widely considered a radical anti-feminist anti-family planning world view. It’s sweet that he commends his wife, Ann, for committing to being a full-time mom and housewife, but his culty language makes it all a little creepy.

So yeah, procreate like crazy, but don’t worry about prosperity, adds the mega-rich father of five.

“I don’t think God cares whether you get rich,” he cautions. “I don’t think he hopes that your business will make a huge profit. I know a lot of religious people who think God will intervene to make their investments grow. Or he’ll get them a promotion. To make their business a success. But life on this earth is about learning to live in a place where God does not make everything work out for good people.”

Well, that sucks. Good luck affording those children.

h/t Mother Jones

Find Jennifer Wadsworth on Twitter at @jennwadsworth.

Plastic surgery for arms up 4,000 percent

Thursday, May 2, 2013 by:michael.damante@chron.com (Mike Damante)
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A report by the American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS) shows that the plastic surgery procedure of arm lifts are up 4,000 percent in women the past 10 years according to this news release.

Upper arm lifts can include liposuction or brachioplasty, in which loose skin is removed from the back of the arms. There is no exact reason why for the increase, but the study attributes a poll that says more women are paying attention to the arms of female celebrities.

The study also revealed these statistics:
-98 percent of arm lift patients are women.
- The procedure is most popular with patients over 40. The majority of patients were ages 40 and 54.
-Average surgeon fee is $3,939 . Total spent on arm lifts: $61 million.

Would your kids go vegetarian for school?

Thursday, May 2, 2013 by:dana.guthrie@chron.com (Dana Guthrie)
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A public elementary school in Queens, New York, is one of the first in the nation to adopt an all-vegetarian menu, the Associated Press reports. Menu items include things like black bean and cheddar quesadillas with salsa and roasted potatoes, tofu wraps and vegetarian chili. Cheese pizza is also served.

The school started out serving vegetarian lunch three times per week and has now completely eliminated meat from its menus. “We discovered early on that our kids were gravitating toward our vegetarian offerings, and we kept expanding the program to meet the demand,” principal Robert Groff told the AP.

Parents, do you think your kids would go for a vegetarian menu? What is your child’s favorite thing to eat at school?

Science fact: How to keep a bottle of beer cold? Keep it dry

Wednesday, May 1, 2013 by:jakeellison@seattlepi.com (Jake Ellison)
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The dew on that glass is doing more harm than good.

The dew on that glass – as romantic-looking as it is – is doing more harm than good.

Okay, there’s global warming and nuclear North Korea and some other big topics out there, but one thing this spring weather has us worried about is the age-old problem of keeping your beer cold.

A test subject being weighed to measure the amount of condensation. The cap prevents air from moving through the opening on top. Photo: UW

A test subject being weighed to measure the amount of condensation. The cap prevents air from moving through the opening on top. Photo: UW

Thankfully, a University of Washington climate scientist decided to tackle the problem and found out that a romantically dew covered bottle or glass of beer/wine cooler/chilled white wine (etc.) will warm up faster because of the condensation on the bottle.

So, want to keep that bottle cold longer – keep it dry.

“Probably the most important thing a beer koozie does is not simply insulate the can, but keep condensation from forming on the outside of it,” said Dale Durran, a UW professor of atmospheric sciences.

The investigation began a couple of years ago when Durran was teaching UW Atmospheric Sciences 101 and trying to come up with a good example for the heat generated by condensation, according to a UW press release on the revelation.

Plenty of examples exist for evaporative cooling, but few for the reverse phenomenon, and Durran thought droplets that form on a cold canned beverage might be just the example he was looking for. A quick back-of-the-napkin calculation showed the heat released by water just four thousandths of an inch thick covering the can would heat its contents by 9 degrees Fahrenheit.

“I was surprised to think that such a tiny film of water could cause that much warming,” Durran said in the press release.

Here’s the rest of that press release:

Though he’s normally more of a theoretician, Durran decided this result required experimental validation. He recruited co-author Dargan Frierson, a UW associate professor of atmospheric sciences, and they ran an initial test in Frierson’s little-used basement bathroom, using a space heater and hot shower to vary the temperature and humidity.

The findings corroborated the initial result, and they embarked on a larger-scale test.

“You can’t write an article for Physics Today where the data has come from a setup on the top of the toilet tank in one of the author’s bathrooms,” Durran said.

First they recruited colleagues in Frierson’s beachside hometown of Wilmington, North Carolina, to duplicate the experiment and compare results with those taken on a hot, dry Seattle day. But they decided they needed to test a wider range of conditions.

Finally, last summer undergraduates Stella Choi and Steven Brey joined the project to run a proper experiment in the UW Atmospheric Sciences building. They unearthed an experimental machine with styling that looks to be from the 1950s, last used decades ago to simulate cloud formation.

With funding for educational outreach from the National Science Foundation, the students first cooled a can in a bucket of ice water then dried it and placed it in the experimental chamber dialed up to the appropriate conditions. After five minutes they removed the can, weighed it to measure the amount of condensation, and recorded the final temperature of the water inside.

The phenomenon at work – latent heat of condensation – is central to Frierson’s research on water vapor, heat transfer and global climate change.

“We expect a much moister atmosphere with global warming because warmer air can hold a lot more water vapor,” Frierson said. Because heat is transferred when water evaporates or condenses, this change affects wind circulation, weather patterns and storm formation.

Durran’s research includes studies of thunderstorms, which are powered by heat released from condensation in rising moist air.

As for his demonstration of the heat released during this process, he and Frierson are now working with the National Center for Atmospheric Research to develop an educational tool that will let students around the world try the experiment and post their results online for comparison.

The example promises to become as classic as a cold drink on a hot summer day.

Jake Ellison can be reached at 206-448-8334 or jakeellison@seattlepi.com. Follow Jake on Twitter at twitter.com/Jake_News. Also, swing by and *LIKE* us on Facebook.

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