Friday, April 22, 2011

Friday Links!

Here's an epic way to start off this week: The Dan Plan. The short version: a guy who's never played golf decides to spend six years building up 10,000 hours of experiece to see if he can play on the professional golf tour. Yes, add overrated Malcolm Gladwell bullshit [here].

That might sound simple, but the conceptual approach he's taking is fascinating (and brilliant, I think), and for a high-level introduction, read the magazine profile here.

From Dirk Knemeyer, and this is both interesting and beautiful, it's planetary orbits, with both Copernican and Tychonian models.

From George Paci, and these are beautiful as well, a collection of graphs of sparse matrices.

From M.J. Reese (whose links are always fascinating), it's The World Of Holy Warcraft: How al Qaeda is using online game theory to recruit the masses. Of particular and sublime note from the article: "After all, the life of an online administrator for a hard-line Islamist forum is not as exciting as one might expect.

From Sebmojo, and this is fascinating, an article about an organism with "social intelligence" devouring the Titanic.

From Jonathan Arnold, a doubleheader. First, it's Geek Zodiac. Also, and this is tremendously clever, it's Google Exodus.

I'm linking to the Japan Quake Map again because there have been over 1,000 earthquakes in the last five weeks. Incredible.

Forget dogs living with cats. Thanks to DQ Fitness Advisor Doug Walsh, we have Monkeys Riding Dogs.

Two links from Dave Schroeder. First, the Oregon State House gets Rickrolled. Next, and this is just as funny as the best of Candid Camera, it's Funniest Japanese Girls Prank.

From Derek Krause, and this drummer is just amazing, it's Vadrum.

From Kevin W, and you're going to want to do this: Coffee Table Train Set.

Here's a tremendously interesting GQ profile of Stephon Marbury, now playing basketball in China: Welcome to the Far Eastern Conference.

Okay, there's a cutness overdose warning here, but man, it's both funny and adorable:
Little Penguin Tickled
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