Daily News Columnist Sides With Colin Kaepernick

In this day and social-media age when many people form an opinion based strictly on a tweeted news article’s headline, today’s second dispatch by New York Daily News social justice columnist Shaun King is trouble. The headline for the Aug. 29 op-ed reads: “Why I’ll Never Stand Again for ‘The Star-Spangled Banner’.”

King begins with a rather strained culinary analogy. But once you get past that, his argument is straightforward, picking up on a July 4 article published by The Root. The 1814 poem by Francis Scott Key upon which the anthem is based (“Defence of Fort M’Henry”) was written during the days of American slavery and contained a subsequently omitted third stanza that celebrates the death of slaves engaged as troops. Writes King:

While San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick has refused to stand for the national anthem because of the overflowing abundance of modern day injustice in America, he has helped bring to light the fact that this song and its author are deeply rooted in violent white supremacy.

I will never stand for “The Star-Spangled Banner” another day in my damn life. I don’t care where I am or who’s watching… Like Kaepernick, I’ve had enough of injustice in America and I’ve had enough of anthems written by bigots. Colin Kaepernick has provided a spark.

King provides other historical background about Key’s bigotry. He suggests that like the Confederate flag in the U.S. South and a statue of Cecil Rhodes removed last year in South Africa, the anthem needs to be replaced. King also published a piece on Saturday in which he stated his initial agreement with Kaepernick’s protest stance.

Image by: Carl Lindberg

NY1, NY Daily News Drop Anthony Weiner

Anthony Weiner won’t stop asking women if they want to see his wiener, so NY1 and The New York Daily News have decided to cut him off.

CNNMoney reports that NY1 put Weiner “on indefinite leave from the station” and the Daily News told The Daily Beast the paper “won’t be running his [Weiner’s] columns in the future.” Weiner had appeared regularly on NY1 and penned an opinion column for the Daily News.

Weiner was left limp by NY1 and the Daily News after the New York Post reported that Weiner had (once again) been tempting women with Weiner Jr. via sexts. One of the images Weiner sent was of him laying shirtless on his bed with a focus on his crotch… And his son was sitting next to him. That’s next level weirdness right there.

Once the latest sexting news broke, Weiner’s wife—top Hillary Clinton aide Huma Abedin—announced she was separating from him. Good for her.

As for Weiner, well, someone needs to take his phone away from him. Start there.

Because they’re chargers, not bungees

intimate_iphone_1

Chargers, and charging cables for phones are such an afterthought. To be honest, that’s where companies cut corners the most. Plugs that are a space-management nightmare, cables that end up fraying, and most importantly, cables that are too short to reach from the socket till your table or bed. No more, I say. This little plastic sleeve solves those problems (at lease for iPhone users). It gives the charger a nice insulated casing while also providing a neat chamber for wire management. The upper part even has a lip so you can dock your phone there while it’s charging… and since this little life-saver’s made out of silicone, your iPhone’s safe and secure from sudden and accidental slipping!

One small piece of plastic, one large money-saving exercise for iPhone users!

Designer: Yi-Fan Chang

intimate_iphone_2

intimate_iphone_3

Solar-Powered Pipe Concept Desalinates Saltwater Into Clean Drinking Water

Proposé lors de la compétition de design Land Art Generator Initiative (LAGI) de cette année, The Pipe est une révolution technique et technologique imaginée par Khalili Engineers. Electromagnétique et recouvert de panneaux solaires, ce bateau-plateforme pourra désaliniser l’eau de mer, de manière massive, pour en faire de l’eau potable. Bien sûr, l’esthétisme de cette plateforme a été crucial lors de sa conception ; ce dispositif au look moderne devrait se marier parfaitement à l’horizon de l’océan de Santa Monica.

santamonica5
santamonica4
santamonica3
santamonica2
santamonica1

At the Airport Security Line, Remove Your Buckle, Not the Belt

It’s strange to think terrorism has influenced the design of luggage, yet it undeniably has. Frequent fliers seek out bags with pockets allowing for quick laptop egress and ingress, and external pockets for dumping keys and change into, making the airport security line a bit easier.

At some airports we can skip the metal detectors and step into scanning machines where, in the words of Bill Burr, we’re made to adopt “the Jay Z ‘Hova’ position.”

But metal detectors are still the rule, which means we still have to take our belts off. Now a company called Flybelt is aiming to change that with their removable belt buckles.

<pundefined</pundefined

I’m not at all sure these will take, but it’s easy to see the company’s thinking: They’re hoping that frequent fliers will so like the design that they’ll purchase a drawer full of Flybelt buckles, and a series of belts that they’ve designed a hanger for. They’re selling the system

What they need now is to hire a celebrity endorser to popularize them. We recommend Hova.

This Red Dot Award Winning Cordless Grinder from Metabo is Humongous

Metabo’s WPB 36 LTZ BL 230 Quick will surpass all other cordless grinders when it hits the European market later this month but not for the reasons it won a Red Dot Award.

The jury statement provides a quick take on the judges’ thinking:

A balanced distribution of weight enables excellent control over the angle grinder. The straight lines of the geometric design convey its high efficiency.

I can’t speak to the tool’s balance because I haven’t seen it in person or had the opportunity to handle it. But I do agree that it’s sleek and good looking.

The description on the Red Dot Awards page probably came from the manufacturer and is as follows:

The WPB 36 LTX BL 230 Quick cordless angle grinder with its 230-mm disc is able to provide the same performance as large corded devices. The dynamic shape and the rotatable U-shaped handle with soft-touch components give the grinder a lightweight and ergonomic design. The wide paddle switch provides safety and ease of use in a wide variety of working positions. The adjustment of the guard and the changing of discs can be carried out without additional tools.

So far as I can tell, all of the above is true. Oversize switches and tool free adjustments to the spindle and guard are great, but are nothing you won’t find on other cordless grinders. The rotatable handle is particular to Metabo; it has been on their 18-volt grinder for years and is a handy feature.

The most important piece of information about the tool is in the first sentence of the description—that it takes a 230-mm (9-inch) disk or “wheel.” Currently, most cordless grinders have 4 1/2- or 5-inch wheels; a 9-inch wheel is big for a corded tool and unheard of in a cordless machine.

As can be seen in the video, the tool has the power to drive a big wheel—which it does to great effect in cutting a piece of steel the size of a highway guard rail. 

The shape of the grip is related to the size and power of the motor. The motors in most cordless grinders are just small enough to fit inside the grip. Any larger and the grip would be too fat to easily grasp.

The brushless motor in the WPB 36 LTX BL 230 Quick is too large to fit in the grip so it is set forward of it. With no need to accommodate a motor, the grip could be sized for maximum comfort—and need only be large enough to contain a trigger, switch, and wiring. The piece across from it functions as a “knuckle guard” and serves to strengthen what might otherwise be a tenuous connection between motor and battery.

It’s a small detail, but I like the die-cast metal piece at the battery end of the grip—which I assume is there to prevent the battery case from being abraded by the rough surfaces the tool will be placed on in the field.

There’s nothing unusual about the tool having a 36-volt rather than an 18-volt motor; a number of large cordless tools have the same. What’s different is the battery system used to power it. Following in the footsteps of Makita, Metabo designed this tool to be run from a single 36-volt pack or two 18-volt packs placed in an adapter. Makita pioneered this system a few years back and has since gone on to build native two-battery 36-volt tools that do not require an adapter.

Reader Submitted: A Rotating Desk Lamp that Aims to Mimic Gravity

Magnetosphere Desk Lamp is inspired by Earth and two fundamental forces of the universe—electromagnetism and gravity. This desk lamp embodies the concept that everything is attached and free to move about on the surface of the earth due to gravity.

View the full project here

Link About It: World's Largest Ocean Reserve in Hawaii

World's Largest Ocean Reserve in Hawaii


Established in 2006, a remote Hawaiian ocean reserve called Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument covers 140,000 square miles and was protected in order to preserve wildlife and Hawaiian culture. Now, President Obama has more than quadrupled the……

Continue Reading…

Futuristic Melting House in India

La firme d’architecture indienne Cadence Architects a construit une maison appelée Elastica à Bangalore, en Inde. A la fois futuriste et retro, le concept de la maison repose sur son aspect « fondant » et la volonté d’associer des formes « liquides ». Tout semble fondre, de la façade au design d’intérieur, à travers des courbes et du mobilier arrondi.

cadence-architects-elastica-house-interiors-bangalore-india-012
cadence-architects-elastica-house-interiors-bangalore-india-011
cadence-architects-elastica-house-interiors-bangalore-india-010
cadence-architects-elastica-house-interiors-bangalore-india-09
cadence-architects-elastica-house-interiors-bangalore-india-08
cadence-architects-elastica-house-interiors-bangalore-india-07
cadence-architects-elastica-house-interiors-bangalore-india-06
cadence-architects-elastica-house-interiors-bangalore-india-05
cadence-architects-elastica-house-interiors-bangalore-india-04
cadence-architects-elastica-house-interiors-bangalore-india-03
cadence-architects-elastica-house-interiors-bangalore-india-02
cadence-architects-elastica-house-interiors-bangalore-india-01

From the Windows to the Wall: TANK Fills Floor Cracks with Gold

Kintsugi, or kintsukuroi, is the Japanese art form of repairing broken pottery with a gold lacquer—leaving it inherently more valuable than before. Traditionally confined to ceramics, architectural studio TANK has found a new application for the treasured restoration technique: applying it to the floor of a Kyoto apartment.

The apartment, known as the Xchange Apartment, is part of a larger experiment that offers artists and others a short-term residence under one condition: they give something other than money in return. Owned by Rikki Sato, a Tokyo-based designer, the project is a collaboration with Naritake Fukumoto, principal of TANK, who is known for pushing the boundaries of traditional architecture (think: a house where removable patches of the floor double as flip-flops).

The 47-square meter Xchange Apartment is the world’s first “bartering apartment.” Residents can rent the space for a month but they must offer a product, art, skill or something else entirely in exchange. “Anyone who can readily exchange something is eligible for application,” says Yuki Asai, TANK member.

As part of Fukumoto’s vision for the space, the apartment utilizes many traditional Japanese methods fused with modern techniques and practices. “The partly unfinished look of the room encourages the observer to discover what usually goes unnoticed, unappreciated,” Asai says. “The kintsugi ursuhi-nuri (Japanese for “lacquer coating”) on the other hand, demands attention. We intend this as a way for the observer to see through superficial details. We hope these elements, whether intended or not, will evoke new ideas during their stay.”

The idea of applying kintsugi to the floors of the apartment was one that Fukumoto had been toying with for awhile. During construction, traditional plaster cracks as it dries, leaving large voids that are traditionally filled as the material sets. “As the cracking of mortar cement is inherent to the material, he was looking for a way to present this as a merit rather than a demerit,” Asai says. While floor cracks are usually deemed as inferior workmanship (more modern, improved mortar rarely results in the same imperfections), Fukumoto saw the cracks as an opportunity to apply the familiar mending treatment of kintsugi.

“[Fukumoto] originally thought of filling the cracks with normal epoxy as the cracks propagated, but when he talked of this idea to painter Shuhei Nakamura, he suggested adding pigment,” Asai says. “Any pigment could be used, so adding gold-colored pigment naturally came to as an emulation of kintsugi.”

Just as traditional kintsugi requires mixing powdered gold, silver or platinum with lacquer, TANK mixed gold-colored powdered pigment with a transparent epoxy-resin to create the cohesive mortar that fills the cracks in the plaster floor. “In traditional Japanese lacquerware, urushi-nuri, the technique calls for lacquer resin-impregnated jute fabric reinforcing a wooden base to form a rigid composite structure beneath the polished upper coat,” Asai says of a similar process.

After substantial cracking had occurred, Nakamura then filled the actual cracks, taking the gold-epoxy composite and applying it “bit by bit” with a thin wand, as Asai describes. The result—like kintsugi—transforms something previously thought of as ‘unfortunate’ imperfections into something to celebrate, not hide.

“This composite technique is like FRP (Fiber Reinforced Plastic) layering, so we chose FRP using translucent resin for the washroom floor to mimic this method,” Asai says. “The translucent resin is polished to reveal the underlying glass-fiber layers over the wooden base, resulting in a translucent yet complex visual texture while achieving the material strength and waterproofing needs for the location.”

Asai anticipates that cracks will continue to develop in the floor, so the treatment will be an ongoing process, with the team returning to re-apply the epoxy concoction until the plaster has definitively settled. With the construction of the apartment complete, the next step is lining up the future residents. When we last checked, flights from New York City to Osaka were $700. Any takers?