Will Speaker Milton Dick really control MPs’ conduct?
Ministers will set the tone and it is unlikely that the new Speaker, Labor’s Milton Dick, will do much to impose himself…
Chinese Communist Party ‘bullying’ on global stage: Douglas Murray
Opinion | Making sense of the controversy at The New Yorker
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Searchable database of feathers
Provided in multiple languages, Featherbasehas a search engine and two topical lists to browse data – an alphabetical collection and a systemic order collection. Full color photos, Latin, German and English names are included as well as multiple photos of each bird, respective feathers, a description of each bird, distribution of location/cities where the bird may be found, and conservation status if available. There are currently 1717 species, 5821 exhibits, 14,779 photos, and 75746 measurements in this database.
“Since the 20th century, scientific ornithology has been closely linked to the conservation of birds. The study of feathers is a factor that is often overlooked. In museums, the majority of their bird skin collections are archived, stored away in drawers under lock and key and only ever seen by a very selective audience and not the general public….Featherbase is a working group of German feather scientists and other collectors worldwide who came together with their personal collections and created the biggest and most comprehensive online feather library in the world.
Using our website, it is possible to identify feathers from hundreds of different species, compare similarities between them, work out gender or age-specific characteristics and look at the statistics of countless feather measurements. In contrast to the conventional work of museums, Featherbase is much more oriented towards the general public, allowing not just enrolled scientists the opportunity to gain access to the collection, but anyone with an interest in studying birds and their feathers.
Featherbase also frequently collaborates with scientific or educational organizations by offering images, data or teamwork in general. Featherbase works completely independently, without administrative affiliation, and first and foremost without commercial interests…”
CRS Report – Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs), July 20, 2022 [24 pages]: “Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) have become popular as unique and non-interchangeable units of data that signify ownership of associated digital items, such as images, music, or videos. Token “ownership” is recorded and tracked on a blockchain (a digital database that records data on a decentralized network of computers without the use of a central authority).
In the future, supporters believe NFTs will be used as digital representations of physical items, such as a deed to a house or title to a car. NFTs are commonly used to record and represent ownership of an item, verify authenticity, and enable exchange. However, they do not necessarily reflect the legal ownership of an asset or grant copyright to a digital or physical item. NFT owners purchase only the right to the NFT’s blockchain metadata or “token,” not the underlying asset, unless otherwise specified in external contracts or terms and conditions. NFTs share many similarities with cryptocurrencies, and they are commonly bought and traded using cryptocurrency. Both NFTs and cryptocurrencies are built and tracked on blockchains, and they share much of the same customer and community base. However, cryptocurrencies are fungible, meaning interchangeable, whereas NFTs are unique and therefore non-fungible. Most users create and buy NFTs on dedicated NFT marketplaces. For a typical NFT, it is created or “minted” on a blockchain, auctioned off or sold at a fixed price on an NFT marketplace, and “stored”in the buyer’s digital wallet. Smart contracts (self-executing contracts or lines of computer code on a blockchain) can mint NFTs or transfer them from one owner to another. In combination, blockchains and smart contracts are the backbone of the NFT ecosystem…”
Tick tock
Watches that don’t tell time / a very, very thin watch / epic post on the audio and visual legacy of Atari, on the occasion of the company’s 50th Anniversary / a camper conversion of a Swiss Fire Engine / RV print by Darrel Austin / paintings by Tom Walton / art by Julie Avisar / Watch the Skies! The latest piece of esoteric cartography from Herb Lester is a map of UK UFO sightings / The JANET Edition, On secrecy, commutes, and Vegas. An introduction to America’s off the radar Janet Airlines / the British Sea Swim Map / repost? Probably: video game map size comparison / After the Rapture Pet Care. From the FAQ: ‘If there is going to be a time of great tribulation, suffering, judgment, and confusion after the rapture, won’t these Pet Caretakers be much more concerned about that stuff?’ / motion design by Ardhira Putra / a collection of Krautrock recommendations / the architecture of Connell, Ward & Lucas / a very sad farewell to Marcus Fairs, founder of the design website Dezeen, oft linked around these parts.
