As chosen by founding Wired guy Kevin Kelly, so worth a peek. I can highly recommend the Neal Stephenson article, Mother Earth, Mother Board: Wiring the Planet

The Paris Review on the creation of the laugh track:

Today’s sitcoms are based mostly on witty repartee and no longer rely on outlandish situations or sight gags, such as you would see in an episode of Mister Ed or The Munsters or Bewitched-and today’s muted laughs reflect that. Generally, laughs are now much less aggressive and more subdued; you no longer hear unbridled belly laughs or guffaws. It’s “intelligent” laughter-more genteel, more sophisticated. But definitely not as much fun. There was an optimism and carefree quality in those old laugh tracks. Today, the reactions are largely “droll”.

GQ on Bill Murray:

It’s like the first day you check into a hotel in L.A. there’s a message under your door. The second day, there’s eleven messages under your door. The third day, there’s thirty, forty, fifty, sixty, seventy messages. And I realized that they just want fresh blood. They. Just. Want. Fresh. Blood. You gotta get the hell out of there.

Total exoneration of the scientists at the centre of the “Climategate” email brouhaha by three separate independent inquiries. Not that you’d read about it in the very media that created the firestorm. Appalling.

You might imagine the media would be keen to report on authoritative conclusions about allegations they had found so newsworthy in December. But coverage of each of the reports has been non-existent in many news organisations and in others brief or without prominence. At best, the coverage of the inquiries' conclusions added up to a 20th of the coverage the original allegations received, which leaves us to ponder the curiosities of a news media that gets so over-excited by dramatic allegations and then remains so incurably uninterested in their resolution. The newspapers that gave greatest play to the allegations tended to give less attention to the findings. The columnists who gave greatest vent to their indignation have not made any revisions or corrections, let alone apologised to the scientists whose integrity they so sweepingly impugned.

Robert Downey Jr. on The Avengers at Comic Con:

“Anybody see Inception?” Downey asked. “I think that was probably just about the most ambitious movie I’ve ever seen. And then I thought, Wait a goddamn second. Marvel Studios is going to take all of their top superheroes and they’re gonna put them all together in The Avengers? That’s the most ambitious movie I’ve ever seen.”

The big reveal was Mark Ruffalo inheriting Hulk - 3rd time lucky, after Bana & Norton? Also, Thor is sounding promising.

After the penultimate stage last night, Contador is 39 seconds ahead of Schleck. Which is exactly how many seconds Contador gained on Schleck after the infamous chain-drop of Stage 15. Which means, according to my very poor maths, that if it weren’t for the chain they would be on exactly the same time. Now that would have been something - a race for the maillot jaune on the final stage into Paris. Damn.

Le Mans Classic 2010 - Laurent Nivalle.

Beautiful evocative photography, somehow straight out of the 60’s despite being shot in 2010.

*The Awl* on Copy Editing:

Plus, I’d always had an eye for error: When one of my best friends in elementary school asked her mom what “f-u-k” meant because she’d seen it on the door to the bathroom stall, I helpfully jumped in: “I think you mean f-u-C-k.” You’re welcome, Friend’s Mom.

Storms

One of the most amazing sporting sequences I’ve ever seen. Schleck & Contador perfectly matched, climbing a mountain through cloud, shoulder to shoulder, neither able to snap the cord that held them together, like Lyra and her dæmon. Staggering, the bond between them after that experience is hard to fathom. Hats off.

(photos from The Guardian)