The cardboard bicycle - just the right amount of crazy

Israeli designer Giora Kariv had his mind pretty much blown when he heard about someone who created a cardboard canoe - and then he decided that he was going to make a cardboard bicycle...


The project might well have been scuppered if he'd listened to the engineers he consulted: they told him that it was impossible. But he couldn't let the concept just die in his mind - and his wife said that if he didn't at least try, he'd drive himself mad, then her, then his kids.


Good thing he listened:

"Impossible", huh?

The resulting bike is strong (the video below illustrates how strong), water-resistant, looks like it's made of plastic, and can carry riders up to 220kg (that's 485lbs!). And the production cost is just $9 - the cost to the consumer is estimated at $60-$90 depending on what parts are added on.


Take a look at this awesome bicycle in action:






Thank goodness there are people like this in the world, who are unwilling to give up in the face of being told their plans won't work!

Danceth thou ye Hokey-Pokey?

If thou art feeling jaded in thine efforts at merriment and carousing, mayhap thou couldst try capering hither and yon in ye new dance sensation, Ye Hokey-Pokey.


Knowest thou not ye means by which thou shouldst moveth thine body? Then, cast thine eyes upon ye parchment below, and verily, thou shalt be educated henceforth:

Now, Mark maketh no claim to be an all-encompassing expert on ye rituals and customs of ye British populace. That particular fact notwithstanding, Mark possesseth a suffiency of pedantry enabling him to point out that, in ye land of Ye Bard, ye dance is named Ye Hokey-Cokey.


With that said, ye sonnet above pleaseth both he and his good lady in equal measure!




Thy humble scribes at Sense Deprivation giveth thanks to BoingBoing, who in turn sourced this from Neatorama, who located it at Geeks Are Sexy, who saw it on Shakespeare Tonight's Facebook page.

Bend your brain with Perspective

The students of the DigiPen Institute of Technology have a knack for turning out amazing, challenging games. Valve Software's a fan - they hired the creators of Narbacular Drop to turn their game into Portal, and pulled in the makers of Tag to join the dev team for Portal 2... What's more, when students release their projects, DigiPen makes them available as full, free and legal downloads.


Well, browsing through TheCHIVE resulted in coming across Perspective, a mind-blowing puzzler which combines 2D and 3D action. Like The Fourth Wall, another project by DigiPen students*, a click of a button changes the game mechanics. In The Fourth Wall, the screen is frozen to stop the level from scrolling and change it to a wrap-around system... if you don't get my drift, download the game for free and see for yourself. Anyway, in Perspective, a click changes the world from 3D to 2D, and back again...


Can't make a jump across a long pit of lava? Move in 3D until the pit looks small, change to 2D, and just jump across... Here, look, just watch this video and see what I'm blathering about:





As yet, the game isn't available for download, but for goodness' sake, bookmark the game page for when it is! The site presently says Fall 2012, so keep an eye out.


(Thanks to TheCHIVE for highlighting this one!)


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* Both projects, incidentally, have a common link: Logan Fieth.

Teachers Dancing Behind Students

We were linked to this video by our awesome friend jessartisan - the teaching faculty of Abby Kelley Foster Charter Public School in Worcester, MA getting down and funky, during what appears to be the filming of a student documentary...

Our favorite is the bald-headed guy with the goatee - he really gets into it! Wish we had teachers like this at our schools when we were the kids' age...

Most awesome marriage proposal EVAR?

The love-struck guy in this video wanted to propose to his girlfriend - which is fair enough. But how to propose in a way she'll remember? How about getting more than SIXTY friends and family members to lip-sync to Bruno Mars' I Think I Wanna Marry You?





Oh, and there's a nice little play on words: Mars' lyrics include "Or is it this dancing juice?" - watch out for what shows up at those moments in the song...


I know one thing: If you're going to put on a production this big, you'd better be damn sure she's gonna say "yes"...


Originally posted at The CHIVE.

3D printed chocolate brain... yummy!

Inition, a 3D-printing company based in the Shoreditch district of London, England, recently decided to have a little play with the MRI scan of a colleague's brain: They used the resulting data to create a chocolate replica!

Mmmmm.... brains.

What's more, they even went to the trouble of providing a how-to on the process, over at Instructables, together with a Creative Commons-released copy of the MRI scan in question, which is rather nice of them.

The Zombie Apocalypse probably just became more delicious.

(Side note: I was going to use "Brains are quite rich in cholesterol" as a headline, quoting Laura Shigihara's lyrics from the game Plants vs. Zombies, but it turns out that even milk chocolate doesn't actually have that much "bad" cholesterol, so that made a mess out of that idea.)

Thanks to Boing Boing for pointing out this awesomeness!

A functioning Portal turret gun!

A student at Penn State University decided, for the finals of his Advanced Mechatronics class, to build a fully-functioning turret gun from Portal - though this one only fires NERF bullets (not sure whether to be unhappy or relieved about that). He does say, in the video below, that he's still to create the proper shell for it, which is why it looks a little odd.

There's only one logical step up from this: GLaDOS. Just make sure to use NERF Neurotoxin, okay?

Thanks to Geeks Are Sexy for bringing this one to our attention!

Glass gem corn - too beautiful to eat?

Today I learned that there was such a thing as glass gem corn:

When I first saw the article on the subject, over at Boing Boing, I first thought that it was actual glass... I wouldn't want to eat the thing, it looks so damn beautiful!

A small amount of the seeds became available for sale, via the Seeds Trust, last August.

Doctor Who on floppy drives

Delia Derbyshire, the woman who made the iconic arrangement of Ron Grainger's theme tune to Doctor Who, would have been 75 this week. Her arrangement was the first work to be made with entirely electronic means, so it's perhaps appropriate that this tribute is also entirely electronic... albeit on floppy drives...

The Flavorwire article about Delia - one of many online articles which featured the above video - also linked to a short video showing Delia's creative process. Watch that clip, embedded below, and tell me she wasn't a badass at what she did:

Delia Derbyshire, we salute you!

TARDIS for sale or rent...

It's inevitable, when you have a talent contest, especially something like Britain's Got Talent, that there are going to be... unusual acts. For example, why haven't they buzzed off that snarky so-and-so who sits at the end of the panel each week?


Well, this is definitely unusual: Martyn Crofts appeared on BGT with a saucepan on his head, and - without any electronic wizardry - proceeded to parody "King of the Road" as a Dalek.

And, sure enough, that nasty man on the right-hand end of the desk still needs buzzing off...


Thanks to BoingBoing for sourcing that little nugget!

One simply must catch them all, what?

Our lovely friend Siobhan has quite the talent for drawing, and she's done an impressively dapper Pikachu:

That said, one is inclined to wonder just what happens to Pikachu when he's had too many glasses of bubbly, what?

Cutest Queen Cover EVAR

The CHIVE calls this a "parenting win". I'm inclined to agree... a dad and his three kids singing Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody in their car. Awesome.

Boinghenge!

Artist Jeremy Deller has created a full-scale inflatable version of Stonehenge, which is presently on display at the Glasgow International Festival of Visual Art. Named Sacrilege, the inflatable installation is free for young and old alike to bounce around upon to their heart's content.

The piece is on display until May 7, after which it will go on tour through Britain, arriving in London in time for the Olympics. Just keep the javelins away from the thing, please!

Source: io9 - Thanks to @Red_Headed_Nerd for tweeting about this!

One heck of an imagination!

This picture, found at The CHIVE, illustrates just how... imaginative some kids can be. For the love of all that is awesome, do not stifle this kind of imagination!

Source: The CHIVE

The book mules of Venezuela

Being able to read is a wonderful thing, but it's also something that many people take for granted, particularly when access to reading materials is so easy. Sure, there are mobile libraries for more rural areas, but what if you live somewhere that vehicles can't reach - like the foothills of the Andes in Venezuela?


Well, The University of Momboy is helping people in such remote communities with PROYECTO BIBLIOMULAS: using mules as bookmobiles. The hardy, stoic animals are able to navigate the treacherous terrain, and bring books to those people who had to do without. The project is proving to be a huge success, and both children and adults are feeling the benefit. In fact, Proyecto Bibliomulas is expanding, not only in terms of reach, but also in the types of services provided. The mules are being equipped with laptops and projectors, and there are plans to install wireless modems nearby, so the villagers will have Internet access.

One of the bibliomulas of the Andes, Venezuela.

It's reassuring to know that there are people who go the extra mile - and several hundred feet up - to reach out to those in need.


Sources: Boing Boing, BBC