David Lidsky's Blog, page 4577

How a Small Studio Pulled Off a Major 3-D Film Using Energy-Saving Technology

3-D animation has traditionally been dominated by mammoth Hollywood studios, and for good reason--the amount of processing power that goes into 3-D animation usually requires dedicated server farms that are air-conditioned 24 hours a day.  Illumination Entertainment, the production company behind the just-released feature Despicable Me,  decided to try something new--instead of using air-conditioned server farms to render images, the company asked IBM to built a customized server farm...

Eye Candy: The History of the Universe Writ Small

Almost 14 billion years ago came the Big Bang and then life on earth -- prokaryotes and the like -- and somehow, we managed to climb out of the primordial soup and evolve to such a degree that a human could summarize billions of years of history in a series of paintings captured on in a 10-minute stop-motion video.

[image error]

Big Bang Big Boom is a short animation that the artist Blu -- a sort of Italian Banksy -- bills as an "unscientific story" about the rise and fall of life on earth. He made it...

Racist Design: An Afro-headed Toilet Brush

This is so egregious that it's hard to believe its real: Recently, in L.A., a Thai design firm--appropriately enough called Gumption--exhibited a set of toilet brushes shaped like black people, with the bristles standing in for an Afro. Let me say that again: Toilet brushes shaped like black people.



As Design Boom chirps, "Brings some humor to cleaning the bathroom!" It also brings racism!

Gumption Design is, apparently, a Thai company, and was featured in Design Boom's Asia Now...

Infographic of the Day: The Bumpy Rise of a Start-Up

I think it's safe to say that no one has managed to summarize the dramas, frustrations, and triumphs of running a start-up quite as effectively as this flowchart, by HackFwd, a European VC firm:



Obviously, the overall message of the flowchart isn't terribly complex--have a good idea, work hard, be passionate--but as with any start-up, the fun is in all the unforeseen bumps along the way.

[Via Flowing Data]

A Soccer Field Produces Clean Drinking Water, Shelter and Gathering Place

With the world riveted on South Africa and soccer for a few more days, there's no better time to reveal a new concept that uses a stadium to bring safe water to the region's residents. South Africa will be home to the first PITCH:AFRICA, a structure that serves as a soccer field and community center, as well as a giant water catchment system that filters and stores potable water. The prototype structure was unveiled yesterday at the Port of Los Angeles.

[twistage ccca8c1a96175:]

The...

Adobe vs. Apple: 3-D Powers for Flash, Rich Web Apps in HTML5

The battle between Adobe's Flash tech and Apple's push for clever HTML5 code continues: Adobe's touting next-gen 3-D capabilities, and Apple's heading toward sophisticated multitouch Web apps through SproutCore coding. Who'll win?

Sure, Adobe is angry at Apple for excluding its tech from the iPad, and European regulators (with a firm grip on the wrong end of the stick) are getting antsy about the matter... but the fact is that Web tech is rapidly evolving beyond the limited--and very...

How to Make a Great Web-Curated Summer Meal

[image error]

Photograph by Dan Saelinger

Seasonal pleasure in every Web-ordered bite.

You know what they say about tough jobs. We set out to create a simple but special summer meal without leaving our Wi-Fi-enabled kitchen. You'll pay for the convenience -- alas, this food does not come cheap -- but you'll get spectacular quality.

1. Steak

Allen Brothers, the venerable Chicago butcher, offers dry-aged, prime New York strips that cook up to a velvety, melt-in-your-mouth consistency. Seasoned with just...

Corporate Social Media Policies: The Good, the Mediocre, and the Ugly

CNN's senior editor of Middle Eastern affairs, Octavia Nasr, was shown the door Wednesday after sending a tweet that expressed respect for the Shiite cleric Grand Ayatollah Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah. Despite a lengthy explanation of her 140 character foot-in-mouth, CNN brass stood by their decision. The news organization has pretty clear guidelines about how its employees (and freelancers and interns) should represent themselves on Twitter, Facebook, and other social media destinations.

That...

Best Buy Wants to Collect 1 Billion Pounds of E-Waste Over the Next 5 Years

Walmart isn't the only big box retailer making inroads in the sustainability arena. Best Buy, which released its 2010 Sustainability Report this week, has an ambitious plan to collect one billion pounds of e-waste over the next five years. It's a goal that requires a doozy of a recycling program--and Best Buy thinks it can deliver.

According to Best Buy's People + Power
Corporate Social Responsibility Report (PDF), the chain has collected over 140 million pounds of appliances and...

Google's Schmidt Sees Good Future in China, But Is This Just 'Spin'?

Google's CEO Eric Schmidt thinks that soon his company will resolve its differences with the Chinese government over their ongoing operations in the censor-happy nation. Is he right? Or merely hopelessly optimistic? 

Schmidt was questioned during an informal briefing at a conference yesterday, joined during the interview by Google founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page. Because the spat with China has been long-running and vicious in some cases, and recently came to a head when the Chinese...