Tomorrow is election day. To celebrate, I want to highlight the University of Richmond (“Go Spiders!”:http://richmondspiders.cstv.com/) and their “Digital Scholarship Lab”:http://digitalscholarship.richmond.edu/ who have a very cool online exhibition of electoral statistical maps on “their website”:http://americanpast.richmond.edu/voting/index.html. (warning: auto-playing video)
Personally, I love seeing data presented in new ways. As a history major and a bit of a cartographic nerd, these time-lapse maps represent the ultimate in teaching tools. Things I’ve learned by putzing around this site:
* “The populist party had a surprisingly heterogeneous geographic appeal.”:http://americanpast.richmond.edu/voting/thirdparty.html
* “African-American populations haven’t really left the south — and there’s still a lot of empty space out there.”:http://americanpast.richmond.edu/voting/aawpopulation.html
* “Looking at the 2000 election results by county makes me wonder how it could’ve been so close.”:http://americanpast.richmond.edu/voting/aawpopulation.html
Psyched to make your voice heard? Find out where you need to go to “cast your vote”:http://maps.google.com/maps/mpl?moduleurl=http://maps.google.com/mapfiles/mapplets/elections/2008/us-voter-info/us-voter-info.xml tomorrow using Google Maps.
Category Archives: Original Duenos
Fwd: Piglet Squid is Cute
Posted by Xeni “Hussein” Jardin at the famed “BoingBoing blog”:http://www.boingboing.net/2008/10/24/piglet-squid-is-cute.html. This Piglet squid is cute.
(Thanks Melissa)
Previously featured on Duenos:
* “The Unappreciated Glass Squid”:http://duenos.net/article/387/Theunappreciatedglasssquid – Another very pretty squid
* “Life From the Deep”:http://duenos.net/article/235/Lifefromthedeep – A stunningly beautiful documentary on deep sea life
Map Monday: Hook-Up Maps
Interested in finding someone in your neighborhood looking hook up? Maybe you’re the more romantic type and want someone to share a crisp autumn evening with. Maybe you just can’t stand seeing movies alone. Hey, I’m not judging.
“Hookupmaps”:http://hookupmaps.com/ is a new Google Maps mashup that combines a familiar and easy to use mapping interface with the Craigslist personals section. Unlike most mashups which just add mapping to an existing feature set, hookupmaps actually makes it easier to respond to ads with a built-in response form that kicks the hell out of the arcane Craigslist UI.
Not sold on trolling the ‘net for a date? Read this “environmental plea”:http://www.slate.com/id/2202431/ from Slate.com on the latest green trend, locasexuality.
Previously featured on Duenos:
* “Man Test, Inc”:http://duenos.net/article/388/ManTestInc – An introduction to the business of “honey trapping,” in which wives and girlfriends hire someone to test their partner’s fidelity.
* “m4intern”:http://duenos.net/article/445/m4intern – An amazing blog put together by a DC resident to showcase the best Craigslist personal ads specifically targeting the intern population. These can be very scummy.
* “Map Monday Tracking Troublemakers”:http://duenos.net/article/459/MapMondayTrackingTroublemakers – Another novel use of maps, although the motivations are perhaps more pure here, the giggles are sadly absent.
Another interesting computer game….
UNHCR (the UN Refugee Agency) is just full of surprises. One of my fellow VISTAs was complaining about dying in a game yesterday, and when I asked what she had been playing, she showed me a the UNHCR computer gamed called “Against All Odds”:http://www.playagainstallodds.com/game_us.html in which you can choose to play a refugee “running from persecution” after a military coup, “living in a border country,” or trying to find “a new life” (resettling in a new country). Especially fun are the parts where you get interrogated by the government and just see blood dripping onto the screen if you give the wrong answer; trying to click your possessions into a backpack to flee before the soldiers get to your home; and being murdered by the people you ask for help.
Elephant self-portrait
A couple of friends told me about this last night and while I might be the last person to find out about it, I also may not be. So, for those who haven’t seen this video already, I bring you an elephant painting a self-portrait.
Previous elephant posts on Duenos:
* Elephant Stories and Psychology Part 1: a look Topsy, the world-famous elephant from turn of the century Coney Island.
* Elephant Stories and Psychology Part 2: Batyr, an elephant in Kazakhstan that was known to mimic human speech.
* Elephants Stories and Psychology Part 3: Ruby, another famous painting elephant.
Wii Beer Pong
That’s right, there’s a video game for beer pong enthusiasts, complete with 6 unique table graphics and characters that occasionally say such brilliant things as “I’ve got the munchies.” My sister found “this article”:http://wiinintendo.net/2007/08/30/wii-beer-pong/ about how disappointed the Association of Fraternity Advisors was with Wii Beer Pong, which came out in August.
When asked about why she-my sister-thought there was a market for this unbelievably stupid game, she had this to say:
??”Perhaps it eliminates space issues for renting spaces large enough for a pingpong table? You know as prices rise, people are looking for ways to conserve space… oh wait, housing market crash. hmmm… perhaps it is a way to avoid injuries due to drunkenly stumbling into the table… oh wait, game devices have cords that could strangle a stupid drunk person.”??
Hmmmm… Can’t think of a good reason but if you’re interested in learning more, check out this “video and review”:http://wiinintendo.net/2008/08/05/first-15-min-w-pong-toss-beer-pong-wii/ of some guy’s first 15 minutes with the game.
A new kind of cheerleader mom
Until recently, Wanda Holloway was the most famous cheerleader mother. In 1991 Holloway tried to hire a hitman to kill her thirteen-year old daughter’s cheerleading rival. Holly Hunter even played Holloway in a mother based on the plotted murder.
But now Holloway has a rival herself for most messed-up mother obsessed with cheerleading: Wendy Brown. Wendy Brown is a thirty-three year old woman who recently pretended to be her fifteen-year old daughter to enroll in Ashwaubenon High School (Green Bay, WI). Said daughter was actually staying with her grandmother in Nevada. Brown joined the cheerleading squad–in fact, she soon stopped going to class but still showed up for cheerleading practice. Her attendance record led to an investigation, which led to the discovery of her true identity. Brown is now being held on three criminal complaints. You can read the Green Bay PressGazette.com article here.
Refugee Facts from Fiscal Year 2008
Recently, the Proposed Refugee Admissions for Fiscal Year 2009 was presented to Congress. This report contained about seventy pages of really interesting statistics and proposals for the coming year’s refugee limits. A few of the numbers for the 2008 refugee population in the US:
Individuals from Burma made up 28.8% of arrivals (13,986 refugees with Burma listed as their country of origin were resettled in the US). Next came Somalia and then Iran for top countries of origin.
In the fiscal year 2007, the median age of refugees coming to the US was 25.
States least impacted by refugee resettlement:
Last year, Mississippi resettled 1 refugee.
Montana resettled 3;
Arkansas resettled 6;
Hawaii resettled 11.
Of the refugees resettled in 2007, the US accounted for 59.88%. Next came Australia with 12.14%, Canada with 12.03%, and Sweden with 3.55%.
Welcoming the RNC….
While I think I’d prefer not to write political posts on the blog for a variety of reasons, this year the Republican National Convention has come to my home, the Twin Cities…and I can’t resist posting my favorite of the billboards that has been put up in honor of the event:
Bugs are scary
These days digital cameras can take pictures with downright breathtaking quality of color and detail. A sweet deal… but then someone had to go and take pictures of bugs close up and holy crap these guys are freaky looking! It’s actually pretty remarkable how intricate the features of a tiny little insect are, when you get right down to it. Anyway if you have a moment or two, find your nearest enemy and put one of these up as their desktop background:
More from Dalantech.
If you also happen to own a 5000$ camera you might try taking some pictures of bugs yourself, this guy gives some tutorials. He managed to get some of his pictures into National Geographic!