Personas is a fascinating art piece that takes a name and ‘scours the web for information and attempts to characterize the person – to fit them to a predetermined set of categories that an algorithmic process created from a massive corpus of data’.
Personas shows you how the Internet sees you. It allows you to see how the machine is working, revealing the computer’s uncanny insights and inadvertent errors such as the mischaracterizations caused by the inability to separate data from multiple owners of the same name. It is meant for the viewer to reflect on our current and future world where digital histories are as important – if not more important – than oral histories, and computational methods of condensing our digital traces are opaque and socially ignorant – for now. Fortunes are sought through data-mining vast information repositories, and this kind of data is indispensable but far from infallible.
So go ahead; give it your name and give it a shot.
[Personas]
Jesse James might be known for his bad bikes and monster machines, but when he set his sights on the world land speed record for hydrogen powered vehicles, he didn’t take no for an answer.
After reworking the body on the Dees Milodon Engineering Davis B Streamliner and packing in a 572-cubic-inch Chevy big block, Jesse took it to the salt flats and set a new record speed of 199.7 mph. (Just shy of his goal of 200 mph.)
When asked about the project and why he didn’t just build a car from scratch, Jesse said (in a very Jesse way) “I think it’s way cooler to take an old hunk of shit that many considered useless and make it haul ass. It has built-in soul and history. Plus, it’s recycling.”
Other details include a Liberty airshifted 5-speed transmission, Winters quick-change differential, and three tanks to hold hydrogen at an impressive 5,000 PSI. In all, it makes more than 780 horsepower and 900 foot-pounds of torque.
“I’m not so blinded by the things I build that I can’t see change is needed,” he said. “I’m in love with anything with wheels and a big engine. I hope my son will be able to love the same things. They’ll just be running on a different kind of gas.”
[Wired - Inside Jesse James' Record-Setting Hydrogen Racer]
When Ken Block’s Gymkhana video debuted, it took the blogging world by storm, and now he’s dedicated an entire site to the Gymkhana Project, which hopefully means there’s more on the way.
For now, the site includes a bit of merchandise, the history behind the project, a gallery, downloads, and a bonus cut of the video, though hopefully more is on the way, so keep an eye out for future updates.
[Gymkhana]
CelebriDucks are rubber ducks that have been modeled after the duck-ized icons of film, music, athletics and history. From celebrities and famous figures to mascots, athletes, heros and more, over 200 different CelebriDucks have been created, and no one is immune to duck-itization.
Each limited edition duck comes in its own container, and can be kept as a collector’s item or floated in the bath for a little extra fun.
[CelebriDucks]
