Photographer Tadao Cern blasted people’s faces with air and photographed the results. They are so awesome.

Brand Spirit is a tumblr that reduces mass marketed items to their purest form by painting them white, removing all visual branding.

Almost all are easily recognized.

A disaster analysis firm has put the damage caused in “The Avengers” at $160 billion.

Watson said he was surprised by a lower-than-expected total. “Compared to the aliens in Independence Day, for example, these guys were amateurs,” he told THR. “Of course, the Chitauri/Loki alliance were more interested in conquest and ruling, whereas the ID aliens were just looking for lunch or something.”

While that’s what it would cost in normal universe money, they failed to take into account that in the Marvel Universe (in which “The Avengers” takes place), there are many extremely wealthy philanthropists, amazing technology, and a construction company dedicated to cleaning up the messes caused by super villains and superheroes, so I doubt the costs would actually be that high. You know, a movie about Damage Control has some potential.

Artist Benjamin Andrew Moore created an infographic containing every significant bat-suit variation, including all TV series and movies.

I’ve already been asked by quite a few bat-nerds (and I use that term endearingly, as I, too, am a bat-nerd) why I didn’t include the [insert Elseworlds/alternate universe/Green Lantern/Sinestro Corps] bat-suit in the infographic. The fact of the matter is, fellow bat-nerds, if you were to ask anyone not completely frothing over with bat-lore what the fuck a Sinestro Corp Batman was, they would just stare you in the face like the crazy person you are. And they’d be right to!

Personally, I think “The Animated Series” is how I picture Batman…grey and black suit with the oval logo. On that note, “The Animated Series” is fantastic, and if you’ve never seen it you’re missing one of the best incarnations of the caped crusader (even though Robin is in a few episodes here and there).

Clive Palmer, an Australian billionaire, is planning to build a modern replica of the Titanic.

Asked today if the Titanic II could sink, Mr Palmer told reporters: “Of course it will sink if you put a hole in it.

He added: “It is going to be designed so it won’t sink.

“It will be designed as a modern ship with all the technology to ensure that doesn’t happen.

“But, of course, if you are superstitious like you are, you never know what could happen.”

Let’s hope it fares better than the last Titanic II.
Hopefully, it fares better than the last Titanic II.

The AP has updated its Stylebook and now allows “hopefully” to be used as an adverb.

Many (or maybe most) of you were probably letting “hopefully” slip in your conversation and maybe even your prose. For instance: “Hopefully, I will remember to tell the editors in my life about this change from the AP.” Technically, that’s incorrect.

In response to the AP’s announcement, one commmenter wrote:

“When enough people fail to learn the rule, the mistake becomes the rule. This is change but not progress.”

Well, that’s what the English language is. It’s an amalgam of other languages, and therefore can never be static or adhere strictly to its rules. Its usage defines its rules. How many people use the word “peruse” in the wrong way? In my experience, most. And one day, far in the future, you may see “peruse” soften it’s definition, and maybe even be reversed.

On a side note, I’ve used “hopefully” as an adverb four times on joshmadison.com. Hopefully, I’ll be more mindful of its use in the future.

The NYC Department of Records has recently introduced the municipal archive gallery online, with access to over 800,000 photos, maps, audio recordings, and more. It’s so popular that the site is offline as they work on it.

Both The Daily Mail and The Atlantic’s ‘In Focus’ have republished highlights from the archive. It’s amazing to see how much has changed and how some things don’t. The Daily took three photos and posted then-and-now versions.

Note, there are some photos of dead or dying people in the group above. They’re not very graphic, but if you’re very squeamish, you might want to avoid.

The Times profiles Hyman Strachman, a WWII veteran who, at 92, copies bootlegged movies and sends them to troops overseas:

Originally, Mr. Strachman would use his desktop computer to copy the movies one tedious disc at a time. (“It was moyda,” he groaned.) So he got his hands on a $400 professional duplicator that made seven copies at once, grew his fingernails long to better separate the blank discs, and began copying hundreds a day.

[...]

In February, Mr. Strachman duplicated and shipped 1,100 movies. (“A slow month,” he said.) He has not kept an official count but estimates that he topped 80,000 discs a year during his heyday in 2007 and 2008, making his total more than 300,000 since he began in 2004. Postage of about $11 a box, and the blank discs themselves, would suggest a personal outlay of over $30,000.

Let’s hope that the MPAA and studios leave this guy alone.

An extremely rare adult white killer whale has been spotted in the wild.

White whales of various species are occasionally seen; but the only known white orcas have been young, including one with a rare genetic condition that died in a Canadian aquarium in 1972.

I particularly like how the article mentions other white whales while orcas are part of the dolphin family…it’s almost like the author doesn’t know that (should I have chuckled when I noticed the author’s name is Black?).

The London 2012 Olympic organizers contacted The Who’s manager to see if drummer Keith Moon was available to play.

‘I emailed back saying Keith now resides in Golders Green crematorium, having lived up to the Who’s anthemic line ‘I hope I die before I get old’,’ said Curbishley.

I’m hoping that one of these people, who thought Titanic was just a movie, was responsible.

In an interview with Smithsonian Magazine, Matt Groening reveals the true location of Springfield:

Springfield was named after Springfield, Oregon. The only reason is that when I was a kid, the TV show “Father Knows Best” took place in the town of Springfield, and I was thrilled because I imagined that it was the town next to Portland, my hometown. When I grew up, I realized it was just a fictitious name. I also figured out that Springfield was one of the most common names for a city in the U.S. In anticipation of the success of the show, I thought, “This will be cool; everyone will think it’s their Springfield.” And they do.

I want the real Springfield to erect a Homer statue in the middle of town, just like the Jebediah Springfield statue in “The Simpsons”.

Artists Lucie & Simon bring us Silent World which shows what landmarks would look like without people.

Absolutely amazing.

In a study, scientists found that wearing clothes you think have meaning will affect the way you think while wearing them.

If you wear a white coat that you believe belongs to a doctor, your ability to pay attention increases sharply. But if you wear the same white coat believing it belongs to a painter, you will show no such improvement.

This is precisely why I wear an apron when I cook. Makes me feel like I can use the power of the force to make things actually come out well. Sadly, it’s not available anymore.

Up for auction is a photograph of the iceberg that sank the Titanic.

Racing to the rescue as England’s pride and joy went down on her maiden voyage was the RMS Carpathia, which plucked 705 survivors from lifeboats and ferried them to the Titanic’s destination, the West Side of Manhattan.

It was on board the Carpathia that passenger Mabel Fenwick captured the floating ice mass that took down the great ship. The hull of one of the Titanic’s lifeboats can be seen in the top right corner of the historic image.

The auction is mostly postcards and newspapers related to Titanic, but this deck chair is pretty cool.

After taking some ribbing from astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson about an error in the starry sky in ‘Titanic’, director James Cameron updated it for the rerelease.

Cameron described Tyson’s original message “quite snarky,” but conceded that the scientist had a point. “With my reputation as a perfectionist, I should have known that and I should have put the right star field in,” Cameron acknowledged. “So I said, ‘All right, send me the right stars for that exact time and I’ll put it in the movie.’”

I wonder if Mr. Tyson has seen the ceiling in Grand Central Terminal?