The Friday Links – Four links. Every Friday!

January 22nd, 2021

Happy Friday everybody!

This week feels different somehow. I wonder why? We’ll probably never know.

And now! Your Friday Links!

Find Satoshi

“A Six Degrees of Separation puzzle. Is it possible to locate a man given only his photograph and first name?”

The independent sleuthing in this story is really something else.

h/t kottke (again)

Olafur Eliasson: Atmospheric Wave Wall

This work “creates a dynamic experience activated by the motion of passersby; by the motion of the earth in ration to the sun as light moves across it; and by changes in the season and weather”.

It’s installed in Chicago’s Willis Tower (formerly the Sears Tower.)

Put Bernie Anywhere!

Enter a street address, and this web app will put the Bernie Sanders sitting meme in that location.

Actually kind of amazing.

Powerline.io

A multiplayer Tron-like racing game. Don’t cross the streams!!

Feels easy for a while, then suddenly incredibly challenging.

And there we go!! Links! On a Friday!

Friday Links!

I hope you are all well, and safe, and healthy, and calm.

Happy Friday!

January 15th, 2021

Happy Friday!

Looks like we made it!

And it’s now mid-January. That feels fast to me.

I hope you are all doing as well as possible. This is already quite a year. Yikes.

Let’s begin!

Quant Fund Or Metal Band

Suuuper challenging. I averaged about 50/50.

Checkboxes

Simple: check the box.

Oh look: more checkboxes!

Repeat. Forever.

Paul Cocksedge Studio: Please Be Seated

“Please Be Seated was a landmark commission for London Design Festival and British Land, located in the busy thoroughfare of Finsbury Avenue Square. It was designed as a rippling wave of wood that rises up to form arches for people to walk through, and curves under to create spaces for people to sit, lie, and relax.”

Looks fantastic. Remember sitting in groups?

Just Pong

Well: yes, but you can earn upgrades.

Starts off slow. Gets interesting after that.

And that’s that! Friday Links! On a Friday! In January! In 2021!

Stay safe everybody. Happy Friday!

January 8th, 2021

Well hello there, Friday!

I mean: what a week! Yikes!

I hope you’re all as safe as you can possibly be. It’s the thirteenth month of 2020. We’re going to get through this.

Links time!!

Microsimulation of Traffic Flow: Onramp

Kind of interesting. You can control numerous paramters of the simulation: how many lanes, max. speed, what kind of road, etc.

It is kind of weird what causes backups. Several factors can cause them.

User Design

A gorgeous website discussing Soviet industrial design. Great user interface, great writing, really well done.

A See-Through Steel Church By Gijs Van Vaerenbergh

The architect’s website doesn’t provide any further info. What a great looking structure!

2020 Game

Avoid wildfires, the coronavirus, collect toilet paper at the grocery store, etc.

This! Game! Has! Everything!

And there we go! Friday! 2021! We did it you guyyyyys!

See you in seven days. Definitely stay safe. What a week.

January 1st, 2021

If you’re reading this, two things have happened.

1: It’s Friday!

2: It’s 2021!!!!!

We did it!! We made it out the other side of a terrible, terrible goddamn year!

Welcome to the First Friday of 2021! Happy New Year!

As there are every year there are big lists of lists of lists of the best “something something” of the year. Here are a few of my favorites that will keep you occupied and probably shopping for many hours.

Barack Obama!

Miss Cellania.

A really diverse and comprehensive list of lists from Larry Ferlazzo.

And of course: Year End Lists.

Happy New Year!

And Happy Friday!

Let’s get going…

Flight Patterns

“The hub of logistics creates a dance of take-offs and landings as the aviation industry delivers people and goods around the world.”

Even though right now there aren’t that many flights going on, this is a beautifully realized site.

Bongo.cat

Play bongos! As a cat! Or cowbell! Or bad piano!

What a goofy little site!

Gravity Points

Created by Akimitsu Hamamuro. Kind of mesmerizing.

Color Tiles

“Click on a blank space.

“If the color matches the nearest neighboring tiles,vertically or horizontally,

“from the clicked space, you get the matching tiles.”

Note that you can only make four mistakes and the game ends.

Challenging!

Well there we go! 2021 already off to an okay, fun little start.

I hope you are all well, and warm, and safe, and dry, and not stressing out too much.

We got through 2020! That is definitely a huge accomplishment!

Let’s struggle through.

I’ll hopefully see you next Friday.

Thanks for following along from home.

December 25th, 2020

Happy Friday!

And Merry Christmas!!

I can’t believe it’s already Christmas. What a crazy year. But also: we made it! We can do this!

It’s links time!

Reuters: Pictures of the year 2020

h/t: kottke.

Best Year In Music

An interesting little web… thing that sequentially plays top 5 singles from any year you select and shifts the artists / songs around to reflect their chart position through time.

Kind of complicated but it’s pretty well done.

The best science images of 2020

Which includes, naturally, images of the coronavirus. (Artist’s impression.)

A lot of important science work got done in 2020. This is a great recap.

3D Tilting Maze Game

Kind of challenging

Note: there is a hard mode (H) and an easy mode (E)

There we go! Links. On a Friday! Friday Links! On Christmas Day!

Have a great Christmas Friday! And see you next week.

December 18th, 2020

Happy Friday!

And we have only one more Friday in 2020. We’re nearly out, people!! And! Next Friday is Christmas Day! Whuhoo!

I hope you’re all safe and sound and healthy and doing as well as you can be. Which is hoping for a lot.

It’s links time! Let’s go.

Blob Opera

A Google Arts and Culture… thingy.

Drag each voice to make musical sounds. Once all four are there, they harmonize.

There’s also a switch on the bottom-right to toggle “Holidays” mode.

It’s kind of cool!

Making the rounds.

The Magic iPod

Drag one song on top of another one, and a custom mashup will play.

Note that only some songs can be placed on top of some other songs.

This is kind of astonishing.

Polygon: The 50 best games of 2020

“With the outside world lost, we collectively looked for a world inside. And there, as if purposefully constructed as an answer to this question we found ourselves asking, sat Animal Crossing.”

You might be surprised at where some of the more obvious “best” games ended up on this list.

Christmas Cannon

A pointless little virtual Christmas “decorating” cannon.

But kind of fun, especially if you shoot a bunch of times in a row.

And there we go!! Friday Links!

Thanks for following along at home. Hang in there. We’re almost done with 2020. I can’t friggin’ wait.

See you next Friday.

December 11th, 2020

Happy Friday!

Happy Hanukkah!!

Merry Christmas!!!

And welcome to your Friday Links.

Let’s begin…

Old NYC

A Google-Maps-like interface to choose a specific location and see historic photographs of buildings at that location throughout the years.

The mid-to-late 20s feature strongly for most of midtown.

3d Interactive Earth

[self explanatory]

Beautifully realized. Numerous versions.

64 Reasons To Celebrate Paul McCartney

A segmented long-read full of lots of deep insights I was unaware of.

He’s 79 this year. So crazy.

Slices

Separate the glowing “orbs” in the least amount of slices.

It is very challenging. But also very satisfying.

And there we go!

Alllll linked up!

Have a great Friday, and a fantastic weekend.

Stay safe!

December 4th, 2020 – Christmas Edition!

Happy Friday everybody!

There are twenty one shopping days until xmas. (I know: what is “shopping”?)

I hope you are all hanging in there.

This is the 2020 Christmas List Thingy version of the Friday links.

Obviously this year is quite different from those that came before.

One of my go-tos, kottke.org, has simply not put out a list this year. To me, that’s significant.

I decided to start by highlighting the need for donations at an unprecedented scale for food banks.

Find a food bank in Canada.

Canada, East to West, and North:

Major food bank systems in the US:

Overseas:

And then, sure, gift guides. My Xmas group is passing on gifts altogether. We might (might!) still do a dinner, but it’ll be much more frugal than usual.

Side note: I miss ThinkGeek.

It is definitely recommended that you support your local retailers as much as possible. Yes, you can get virtually anything from Amazon but we really don’t want that to be the only remaining option.

It’s links time!

Looking Glass Portrait

“Your first personal holographic display. For people, real and imagined.”

Holy cow. This is actually pretty phenomenal tech.

It over-over-reached it’s goal. The device will sell next year for $349.

52 things I learned in 2020

Written by Tom Whitewall.

“#31: When bar codes were patented in 1952, they were round”

h/t: Kottke.

Castles In The Sky

“While renovating a house in San Francisco, a couple discovered a diary, hidden away for more than a century. It held a love story—and a mystery.”

Written by Christina Lalanne for the Atavist Magazine.

Includes a narrated version of the story.

Worth it!

Intercity Scooter Racing

Not particularly challenging. You have to reach a certain (unmarked) position within the available time, so you can earn more time.

The dynamic scenery is nice. 🙂

And there we are! Your pre-Christmas Friday Links!

I hope you’re all staying safe and well, and I hope your Friday is most excellent.

Hang in there. We’re getting through this.

See you next week.

November 27th, 2020

Welcome back Friday people!

It’s the holidays! And it’s Friday. And by golly we’re going to get through this!

Are you with me?

Let’s go!

Just Give Me Positive Good News

(Specifically about Covid-19)

e.g.: “Major milestone as zero active coronavirus cases achieved in Victoria (Australia)”

“Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine to be sold to developing countries at cost price”

A good idea!

Old Time Radio

Choose a format and listen to an already-in-progress show from the 1930s and 40s.

Especially if you’ve run out of Netflix during this pandemic, this is stuff you can put on in the background.

Cleanly designed. I like it.

Atlas Obscura: My Hunt for the Original McDonald’s French-Fry Recipe

An actually fascinating little read, plus a bit of corporate and culinary history.

Plus, you know: French Fries!

Road Fury

Controls are a little iffy. You have to keep your mouse within the tiny gameplay area. Shoot at cars to blow them up, then collect the cash that flies up.

Challenging!

And there we go. There it is. Awayyyy we go. Yup yup yup…

Have an excellent Friday, I hope your Thanksgiving (such as it was) was lovely. And have an amazing weekend!

The holidays (such as THEY are) are here!

Happy Friday!

November 20th, 2020

Ok so happy Friday everybody.

Where I live, things are about to lock down even further, so we could all use some Friday distraction I think.

Here we go!

Forensic Architecture: The Beirut Port Explosion

A really detailed, exhaustive investigative report and video about the massive port explosion that happened this past August in Beirut, Lebanon.

Fantastic work! Really engrossing and well done.

24h Sunrise/Sunset

“24h Sunrise/Sunset” is an installation that displays a realtime sunset and sunrise somewhere happening in the world with the use of CCTV.

Created by Dries Depoorter whose manifesto states that he “creates artworks about surveillance, privacy, social media and machine learning. Dries is based in Ghent, Belgium.”

A beautifully executed project.

Cruise Mapper