Interesting Videos on Mechanisms

I'm not super interested in mechanical solutions to problems, but I found these two videos fascinating.

Differential Gears


Continuously Variable Transmission


It's available for bicycles. Read this entertaining Review:
http://bikehugger.com/post/view/mondo-nuvinci-review

Thanks to my man Daniel Thompson for pointing me to the transmission links.

How walkable is your city?

An interesting web site that calculates a 'walk score' for any address or neighborhood:

http://www.walkscore.com/

Here are the possible scores:

Walk Score	Description
90–100	Walker's Paradise — Daily errands do not require a car.
70–89	Very Walkable — Most errands can be accomplished on foot.
50–69	Somewhat Walkable — Some amenities within walking distance
25–49	Car-Dependent — A few amenities within walking distance.
0–24	Car-Dependent — Almost all errands require a car.

Creative OK Go rube-goldberg video

very inspiring
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qybUFnY7Y8w

OK Go video

Neat video. Good use of graphics. Also, by my count the track has 5 or 10 beats per measure. Very rare.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9H5bUxe3v9g

My Name in Barcode

My name in barcode

Pinker (2007) on the decline of violence

Fights the common misconception that the world is getting more violent.

Election Maps

http://www-personal.umich.edu/~mejn/election/2008/

Science Education Cruise

In the back of a Scientific American Mind issue I saw an ad for a cruise.  At first I thought it  was just another cruise, but then I saw that it had all these science lectures!

http://www.insightcruises.com/top_d/sa02_top.html

The psychology ones are by Lera Boroditsky, whose work I love.   

I still don't think a cruise is worth the money, but this one seems a step up from the others. 

Percussion Busking

These awesome kids were busking at West Fest during the summer of 2008. I enjoyed them very much, and took this short video on my phone (Palm Treo 650).

Science Tattoos

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/loom/science-tattoo-emporium/

Google is so NICE!

Rivals Yahoo! and Google might be forming a partnership.

http://www.variety.com/article/VR1117992428.html?categoryid=18&cs=1&nid=2562

one of the reasons is so cute...

"Brin also said Google felt obligated to help Yahoo because its co-founders, Jerry Yang and David Filo, played an instrumental role in persuading Brin and his partner, Larry Page, to turn Google into a company 10 years ago."

Awwww!

Scott McCloud's Comic Description of Google Chrome

http://www.google.com/googlebooks/chrome/small_00.html

The Crackpot Index

How to tell how much of a crackpot you are! It's made for physics. I should make one for cognitive science.

I would have reposted it here, but it's copyrighted, so you'll have to follow the link:

http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/crackpot.html

Seeing Geography in Flight

http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/magazine/16-07/pb_airfares

Map showing social networking website dominance