Calling all curious minds—scientists, anthropologists, relentless tourists: Saturday, April 9th, is International Obscura Day, the day to "explore hidden treasures in your hometown," or so says Atlas Obscura, a website dedicated to public curiosities and esoterica. If you're the kind of person who appreciates public oddities every day of the year, tomorrow is icing on the cake. Celebrate Obscura Day in one of hundreds of locales—from Los Angeles to Sydney, from Berlin to Manila.
The Android Megaminxer is mind-bogglingly elaborate, impressively combining multiple geeky mediums to solve an incredibly complex puzzle. ARM, the genius behind the stunt, uses LEGOs (a Mindstorms NXT kit to be exact) to build a robot responsible for the mechanics; they then employ an Android app as the brain, which solves a Rubik's Cube—oh wait, not a simple Rubik's (that would be too easy), but a Megaminx, which is a dodecahedron with 12 faces, each face containing 5 edges. Like the classic...
Can't remember when to water the plants? Wish they could just tell you when they need watering—just call you on the phone or something? Or maybe text you, "Help I'm desiccating!" Telecommunications researcher Kate Harman has come up with the device of an absent-minded plant owner's dreams—Botanicalls. It hooks up to your plant and sends you a short text message when the plant is too dry. Each kit costs $99 and includes metal sensors connected to a microcontroller. Insert the sensors into the ...
Outstanding advancements in medicine and super creepy Androids aren't the only jaw-dropping inventions out there. Every once in a while, an incredibly random—and at first glance, seemingly useless—device comes along and strikes a chord of strangely deep satisfaction. Behold, the SWITL, a mysterious goo-scraper robot hand created by factory equipment manufacturer Furukawa Kikou: From what I can glean from a very rough Google translation, it sounds like the SWITL was developed for food producti...
Tired of getting calluses from incessantly strumming along to 'No Woman No Cry'? Just hook up to the brain-music system and use your brain power to play a tune instead. I'm not talking—humming along in your head. The machine, created by composer and computer-music specialist Eduardo Miranda of the University of Plymouth, UK, is composed of electrodes taped directly onto your skull that pick up tiny electrical impulses from neurons in your brain and translates them into musical rhythms on a co...
Find a PDF You need a PDF file on your computer to convert, so keep the file path in mind.
If you're willing to shell out for a mind-blowing party trick, here's another great one to add to your repertoire. Unfortunately this isn't a dirt cheap junk drawer DIY—you'll need a $40-$60 gallium kit (which doesn't include the spoon mold). What is gallium, you may ask? An amazing, man-made metal which melts at the low temperature of 86 degrees Fahrenheit. Plunk your trick spoon into a cup of hot water, and amaze. According to the Department of Energy, it's safe to handle as long as you don...
We love all things Jackass at WonderHowTo, but before Johnny Knoxville and his pals were sticking fireworks up their butts, snorting wasabi, and taking a shock to the gonads (à la the childhood game, Operation), in the far off land of Ontario, Canada reigned another daredevil—a man named Ralph Zavadil, a.k.a. Cap’n Video. Just as we all winced when Knoxville tore his uretha, community access viewers of the '90s cringed as Cap'n Video bounced off concrete and broke his neck... until Zavadil wa...
Well, this is my first article on WonderHowTo, and is only going to be short because it's an extremely easy and effective method for removing a painful sunburn. This method was recommended to me by my friend's mother, who is a nurse and therefore MUST know what she's talking about. Turns out she did. I hope this helps many painful sunburns to recede or disappear.
Meet Newstweek, a hidden device engineered to hack news items being read at public WiFi hotspots (cafes, libraries, airports, etc.). Both nefarious and tech-saavy, the ingenious mechanism wasn't fathered by a group of web hackers, but rather a pair of Berlin artists, Julian Oliver and Danja Vasiliev. The duo are interested in exploiting the "trustworthiness" of big media outlets in order to demonstrate the vulnerability of relying on just a few dominant networks.
For some of you out there, today may be a looooong Friday. But have no fear, if you've yet to furtively accomplish shaving off a few extra minutes from the office clock, there is an alternative for getting through the day: computer pharmaceuticals. Relax, moms, we're not talking illicit drugs. Computer pharmaceuticals (AKA: optical and audio illusions) are completely natural, harmless highs that promise to alter your perception and consciousness- without the risk of drugs or alcohol.
CentsToShare, we salute you. The frugal living blog is seriously dedicated to living on the cheap. Below, their equation (boiled down to the last red cent) for making simple personal pizzas for a mere 38¢ a serving (4 slices).
Yup, that's right! There is a new larp starting up near me, called Cobalt Nightmares, where the theme is Post Apocalyptic Fantasy. I have to admit, I absolutely adore the Post Apocalyptic genre (especially that awesome Fallout LARP in Poland), and I'm interested to see what happens when it becomes a fantasy game instead of a science fiction game.
Where were you in 1993? Thinking about starting a tech company? Starting elementary school? Awaiting a 1996 Daft Punk party after which you would be conceived? It's been eighteen years, but the game that solidified my dorkdom for good is still coming out with new sets, still fun as hell to play, and deserves some love dammit. To that end, I have started this World: A Magic: The Gathering Spot.
Eric Abrahamson, a professor at Columbia University, writes in to Forbes on how to be the Michelangelo of work shirking. The article is intended to help managers better understand their team's lack of productivity, but it also provides 10 simple tactics for all the lazy asses out there. Introducing exhibit A, June, a total lazy ass who lasted almost a decade in her job before being laid off:
Here at WonderHowTo, we are often presented with morally questionable HowTo's. When it comes to stocking our library, we have to weigh in the community value of indexing tutorials with potentially negative repercussions. Where is the line when it comes to areas like weapons, sex, and drugs?
Here's something that I use to boost the stove top type stuffing mix. With Thanksgiving approaching, I thought I'd share it. The mix is often as cheap as the croutons for stuffing and it already has pretty good seasoning so I don't mind using it. However, what it lacks is the vegetable content that good stuffing should have. What I do is add the classic veggies to hop up the mix. Ingredients1 box of stuffing mix1 tbl Butter2 rib Celery finely chopped1/3 Medium Yellow Onion finely chopped1 tsp...
Hello world! I thought it was about time that wonderhowto had its own World of Warcraft community. A place where gamers from all over the real world can come together to discuss the in and outs of the biggest and best MMORPG.
Check out the full length Debate on Proposition 23, on October 21st at the UCLA campus. We have Dorothy Rothrock in favor for Proposition 23 and Terry Tamminen who stands against it. Both argue with great view points but the questions to keep in mind are as following:
Cows are great to have around! Some cows are better than others. Check out the chart (click to enlarge) to help you decide which cows you'd like to keep more of on your farm.
Spending five days with the game is enough to know it's not to my liking. Is it a horrible MMO? Yes, yes it is. There are better Free to Play MMOs launched years ago that are better than this. As a fan of the Final Fantasy series (I am currently playing and liking Final Fantasy 13), this MMO is so bad that at some point I couldn't justify the awful environment, game play, and interface.
Ever been Privacy Zuckered? Roach Moteled? Friend Spammed? If you've been on the net long, odds are you have — and worse! Fortunately, there's a new resource for keeping track of the web's worst design practices; it's called "Dark Patterns" and it aims to "name and shame" sites that employ "user interfaces that have been designed to trick users into doing things they wouldn't otherwise have done."
Inspired by Jules Verne sea demons, Bea Szenfeld's “Sur la Plage” collection includes 12 pieces handcrafted with cardboard. The idea of unconventional material constraints is a classic art school "test", as well as a typical (and somewhat tired) formula for competitive design reality shows. However, Szenfeld's garments do transcend the material and would surely win any Project Runway challenge.
Have someone pretend to be a house salesman who's showing some people around a house. On the outside everything will seem normal but as they walk into the house everything goes mad.
When viewing Toronto based artist Evan Penny's work, Ron Mueck immediately comes to mind. The clear similarities include a representation which is completely photo-realistic, a playfulness with scale, and the mutually shared background in Hollywood SFX.
If you were wondering which Co-Op would be most worth your time, I've spent a couple hours compiling information and crunching numbers to create this chart.
My friend from Brooklyn and I went to this free show on Monday. The vocals were crisp and less distorted than on the album. Overall great energy and the crowd was totally feeling it. The crowd was made of the typical mix of big messy hair, plaid, and skinny jean wearing indie kids, along with a few random old guys. My friend said NYC shows are a lot more homogenous and was surprised by how diverse shows in LA are. I was surprised by how many tall guys (lots of guys well over 6'2) were in the ...
The idea that you could buy a cellphone sized video camera that shoots 720p for a hundred bucks would literally seem like nonsense to me five or six years ago, as I sat trying to get a shot worth looking at out of my old Sony pd150. They're here, though, the Flips and iPhones and Kodaks and whatever else and while most of their impact can be measured in the increased frequency of Bieber-tribute videos hitting youtube, having a $100 hd camera also puts me in a mind to go - me a regular old idi...
Even if you don’t have time for yoga classes, this simple breath awareness exercise can fit easily into the most stressful day. It only takes a few minutes, and will have stress melting away in no time.
This is the first of two Video's introducing you to your fingers from a Hand Analysis perspective. The Fingers mainly govern the mind and thinking. Somewhere in the vast fabric of time somebody discovered that the length and inclination of each particular finger can bring out certain personality traits. I still find it amazing and satisfying to see somebody with a longer than average 'little finger'(Mercury-communication), that sticks out that can't stop talking and buzzing around all excited...
Apparently the Canon 7D can (with a little help from GigaPan, of course). Via WonderHowTo World, Canon EOS 7D:
Review: Marmaduke I liked the part where the fake dogs danced.
The Illusion Contest of the Year recently announced their top ten finalists, and the overwhelming crowd and jury favorite is Impossible Motion: Magnet-like Slopes by Koukichi Sugihara of the Meiji Institute for Advanced Study of Mathematical Sciences in Japan.
Sometimes ghetto is the way to go. Yankee ingenuity is always the way to go (at least on WonderHowTo, that is).
Los Angeles is filled with a myriad of options restaurant wise for all of your foodie needs. I am indeed a foodie, but there is nothing better to me then simple produce inspired plates. Here are three of my favorite spots in Los Angeles to find great organic treats all around the city. Happy Eating!
via Wired World's Largest Panoramic Photo is Bigger than 1200 Billboards
Apple makes Ellen Apologize Publicly No. Not about her dancing.
Get a little perspective on FarmVille hysteria, via FarmVille World, written by tenebrism: Did you know it only took five weeks to make FarmVille? That it currently has over 80,000,000 users? That FarmVille farmers outnumber real farmers in the United States by a ration of 80 to 1?
Did you know it only took five weeks to make FarmVille? That it currently has over 80,000,000 users? That FarmVille farmers outnumber real farmers in the United States by a ration of 80 to 1?
