The Great Geek Manual

The Internet is a big distraction… Yahoo! called me eight weeks ago. They wanted to put a book of mine on Yahoo! You know what I told them? ‘To hell with you. To hell with you and to hell with the Internet.’

- Ray Bradbury at a library benefit, June 20, 2009.
• Read more at the New York Times.
• View Bradbury’s Speech on YouTube.

1837
Professor Charles Wheatstone and William Fothergill Cook successfully transmit a message between two places, almost two kilometers apart, using their needle telegraph.

1847
Richard M. Hoe of New York City is granted a patent for the rotary printing press. The revolutionary device rolls paper on a cylinder over stationary plates of type, rather than maneuvering the heavy type plates themselves.

1911
American Hiram Bingham III re-discovers the Lost City of the Incas, Vilcapampa, which will later be called Machu Picchu, where the last Incan Emperors once found refuge from the conquistadors.

1948
The character Marvin the Martian debuts in the short Looney Tunes cartoon Haredevil Hare.

1950
A rocket is successfully launched from Cape Canaveral for the first time. The rocket, “Bumper” No. 8, is a captured German V-2 rocket topped by a seven hundred pound Army-JPL Wac Corporal rocket. The V-2 climbs for for ten miles before separating from the second-stage Corporal, which then travels another fifteen miles. Canaveral will grow from four launch pads and a hand full of buildings to become the heart of U.S. efforts explore space.
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Now that it seems most of the world has seen Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, it’s no secret that Hogwarts has undergone some rather serious changes. Critics and fans alike are proclaiming this to be not only the darkest Potter film yet, but also the most hormone-ridden. Yes, there’s snogging. Yes, there’s sexual tension. But, those aren’t the only signs the characters of Hogwarts have finally reached puberty!

When you finally get around to seeing the film a second time, keep your eyes pealed for these sure signs that you might have missed the first time out:

8. In a mini-featurette entitled “Professor Harry Potter and the Wand of Fire,” Professor Flitwick takes the sixth years aside to explain about sexually transmitted diseases.

7. The students are nearly as preoccupied with Victoria’s Secrets as they were with the Chamber of Secrets.

6. Finally, Harry’s late night use of his Cloak of Invisibility doesn’t involve skulking after dark wizards. Read the rest of this entry » » »

Source: The National Film Board of Canada

Art

• Invading The Vintage is a gallery of amazing photography that bills itself as the “cute aliens invading grandpa’ postcards.”

Film

• The first viral site promoting Tron 2 has gone live: Flynn Lives.
• Hollywood.com offers A Visual Guide to Hollywood’s Most Eccentric Directors.
• Premiere.com has compiled a list of The 40 Most Beautiful Hollywood Women, but I seriously don’t understand how Jessica Biel keeps getting onto these lists. Am I the only one over her?
• SciFi Wire has posted a five minute clip of the animated scifi movie 9. It look like it’s going to be the best animated movie to come out in years.
• When I look back at the Decade of Disturbing Films for Children that was the eighties, I find it amazing that our generation isn’t even more screwed up than we are.

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Comics

• NetworkWorld has posted a gallery of 20 must-see ComicCon panels.

Film

• Great news! Sam Raimi will be directing the Warcraft movie!
• Movie Buzz offers video clips of the Top 10 Famous Film Guns.
• That Guy with Glasses compares the animated and film versions of the Lord of the Rings side by side.
• Total Film counts down 20 Movie Worlds That Could Make Great Holidays.

Internet

• The Digitalist makes the argument that DRM is Not Evil. As some one who is constantly broke, I tend to disagree, but it’s not an argument without merit.

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My definition of a free society is a society where it is safe to be unpopular.

- Adlai E. Stevenson I

1829
William Austin Burt, a surveyor from Mount Vernon, Michigan, receives a patent for his typographer, the earliest forerunner of the typewriter. (US No. 5581X) Burt’s typographer is a heavy, box-shaped contraption, crafted nearly entirely of wood. The typographer has type mounted on a metal wheel, with a rotating, semicircular frame. By turning a crank, a user is able to move the wheel until it comes to the chosen letter. Then the user pulls a lever, pressing the type against the paper to leave an impression. The device predates the later qwerty keyboard by almost thirty years.

1877
The first telephone and telegraph line in Hawaii is completed.

1886
Gottlieb Daimler invents the car. The four wheel vehicle, fashioned from a four seat, horse-drawn carriage, features a steering column and large engine mounted below the back seat. The one-cylinder, 1.1hp engine has a four speed gearbox that turns the back wheels by means of a belt-driven mechanism capable of a maximum speed of 16 km/h.

1903
Ford Motor Company sells its first car, a Model A, to Dr. Ernst Pfenning of Chicago in Detroit. The Model A features a dual-cylinder internal combustion engine designed and constructed by Henry Ford.
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