Bjoern sez, "'Amazing but True Cat Stories' is a collection of stories about feline antics, illustrated in vivid 8-bit color by true mspaint artists. Stolen pants, pooped-on veterinarians, fur on fire, foretold seizures, and much more! This book was entirely written by the anonymous crowd. All stories and illustrations were submitted by workers on Amazon's Mechanical Turk. I selected, edited and laid out the stories in a short but sweet coffee table book. The idea for this book was born in Terminal A at Washington Dulles, where I was stranded for some hours in late July. To spend my time, I posted the following two tasks on MTurk: 1) Write at least one paragraph about a funny, unbelievable or otherwise memorable incident involving your cat. 2) Sketch a cat. With or without an environment and toys. Before I got out of that terminal, it was already clear that the submissions were too good to keep to myself." When we first received our cat, my father brought her home in his car. She was only a kitten and was running around his car like crazy. To keep her from getting lost he put her into the glove compartment. After about fifteen minutes he began to hear meowing from behind the dashboard. He reopened the glove compartment to find the cat had chewed through the plastic. He later had to remove the radio in order to get her out. The look on his face was priceless after the event. This was an omen of times to come with our new kitten. Amazing but True Cat Stories (Thanks, Bjoern!)...

Todd sez, "A new group of activists in Toronto, the Public Squares, coordinated the temporary conversion of the intersection of Bloor and Spadina into a piazza with trees, fountain and dozens of revellers. From the group:" Blackout Anniversary Five years ago the lights went out on some 100 million people. We spilled out of our home-box, work-box, shopping and car boxes. We stepped away from computers, microwaves and TV's. The streets became our living rooms as we shared the good company of friends and strangers alike. We rediscovered the power and vitality of the commons. Last night's temporary reclamation of Bloor & Spadina is a festive demonstration of how our city could evolve. The streets and avenues are the veins and arteries of the city. Great intersections like this one are vital organs where people are drawn to work, eat, play and commune. This connection of citizens creates a livable city in a way that an easy left turn never will. See for yourself how this thousand square feet of pavement can better serve us all. "Get out of your box and into the square." - the Public Squares Blackout Anniversary Parade (Thanks, Todd!)...

Every idea implies its opposite, and there's no clearer proof of this than the amazing Internet practice of "scambaiting," well-documented in Eve Edelson's Scamorama: Turning the Tables on Email Scammers. You know those ridiculous fraud emails you get from deposed princes, corrupt bankers, desperate widows (and so on), with weird capitalization and punctuation, asking you to advance them some money so that they can liberate a giant, multibillion-dollar sum and give you ten percent for your trouble? These "419" letters originate from all over the world, but Nigeria's perfect storm of connectivity, corruption, lawlessness and poverty meant that the "Lads" of Lagos have elevated ripoff letters to a high art. And for every Lad, there's a scambaiter. Scambaiting is a vibrant internet sport that involves turning the tables on 419 scammers, getting them to undertake ridiculous rituals, expend money and energy, humiliate and debase themselves as they seek to ruin their "victims'" lives through fraud. Scamorama is a popular website for scambaiting, and its creator, Eve Edelson, has put a lot of thought into the nature of the 419 con and those who seek to disrupt it. In Scamorama (the book), Edelson traces the history of scamming back to the middle ages and forward to the present day, giving practical advice on not getting taken in and scam-proofing your friends and family. But where Scamorama really gets going in as a HOWTO manual for scambaiting, with long, hilarious email exchanges between baiters and scammers, and good tips for running your own reverse con. As hobbies go, scambaiting sounds like a pretty fun one -- and it has redeeming social characteristics, since the 419 con artist who is busily whittling you a Commodore 64, sojourning to Amsterdam to meet an "eccentric clergyman" who will front him $20,000, or re-enacting the Monty Python Dead Parrot Sketch is a con artist who is not ruining the life of some more trusting soul. Scamorama on Amazon, Scamorama.com See also: * 419 scammers tricked into re-creating Dead Parrot Sketch * 419 victim shoots Nigerian diplomat * NPR "Xeni Tech": Scambaiters and Monty Python, 419-style * Laura Bush's 419 letter * Dick Cheney's 419 letter * Dutch court locks up 419 scammers * Busting a 419 scammer spammer * Nigerian Letter scammer convinced to carve replica Commodore 64 * Man loses money trying to double it by marinating * Nigerian letters fuel Lagos's Internet Cafe boom * Nigerian legit email hard to distinguish from 419s...

Ah, just look at this fantastic artifact from the innocent era before the War on Fun kicked off -- a beautiful big bangy chemistry set, advertised in the September, 1955 Popular Mechanics. Are you looking for a WONDERFUL FUTURE that can start at home right now? The NATIONAL SCHOOL OF CHEMISTRY offers a fascinating: correspondence course in PRACTICAL CHEMISTRY which will give you a wonderful education that can be used almost immediately to increase your income and your position in life, with prospects of a GLORIOUS FUTURE! The course is very THOROUGH, yet specially prepared to be easy to all regardless of lack of previous training. Very little theory . . . this is a PRACTICAL course with HUNDREDS of fascinating EXPERIMENTS and valuable FORMULAS! Students learn, almost from the start, how to make chemicals and chemical products of commercial value, how to convert wastes into money, etc. THERE IS A GOLD MINE IN CHEMISTRY! Why not share in it? We will open your eyes to GOLDEN OPPORTUNITIES you’ve never dreamt of; for this is a GOLDEN AGE for those who possess special KNOWLEDGE! CHEMISTRY - BIG LABORATORY GIVEN FREE! (Sep, 1955)...

Today on the Worth1000 photoshopping contest: mutated animals. I love the adorable cryptozoological critters! Link...

Today on Boing Boing tv, we are proud to share the sneak-preview of a television pilot, the AQUABATS! SUPERSHOW!, a live-action and animation program featuring the popular superhero ska band, The Aquabats (MySpace). Jon Berrett of Yo Gabba Gabba explains: This spring the Aquabats completed a pilot for a new television show based on the misadventures of rock and roll's greatest super dude men. The Aquabats have been a band for over a decade, have toured the world, and put out 5 full length studio albums. The AQUABATS! SUPERSHOW! TELEVISION PILOT will have a special screening at the San Diego House of Blues show on July 25th, 2008 [during Comic-Con]. If you already have tickets, you are STOKED! The excerpt we are world-premiering on BBtv today is an animated portion of the show's first episode, and includes angry mushrooms, vengeful unicorn princesses, and a subterranean paradise with lakes of hot pink lava. The AQUABATS! SUPERSHOW! also includes live performance and real-world hijinks. We think it's pretty awesome. Link to Boing Boing tv post with discussion, downloadable video, and how to subscribe to the BBtv video podcast. (Huge thanks from all of us at Boing Boing to Jon Berrett and the crew at Yo Gabba Gabba, and to The Aquabats for allowing Boing Boing to share this first with the non-subterranean world!)...

Happy Sysadmin Day! Today is the ninth annual sysadmin appreciation day and I'd like to extend my heartfelt thanks to the systems administrators who keep my life running, especially Ken Snider, who is the technical bedrock upon which Boing Boing is built, and Mark Perkel, who hosts my mailing lists, and Chris Smith, who makes our submission queue spam-resistant, and all the other tireless toilers in the bowels of the Internet. You truly rule the Earth, thou latter-day morlocks. Link (Thanks, Jono!)...

Here's some (way shakycam) video of Danny O'Brien's OpenTech presentation, "Living on the Edge," an extremely provocative and interesting talk about how we might restructure the Internet so that our personal and important moments aren't hosted by YouTube, Flickr, and Blogger, but rather on our own machines. Link, Link to slides...

Modofly -- who laser-etch designs into moleskine covers -- are hosting a contest for new designs for the next batch -- one of the themes is steampunk: Get your steampens and steambrushes (maybe steampunked computer?) ready artists! We are looking for steampunk art in a BAD way. We are really excited about this. We already have some of the hottest steampunk artists working with us, but maybe we don’t know about you, we have been trying to get you, or maybe this will be your first steampunk attempt. We are looking for artwork with airships, gears, steam engines, steampunk fashion, anything fun and retro-futuristic (we aren’t going to get too picky as long as its super cool). We can’t wait to unveil these books and showcase the artists, so make sure you have a shot at the action and send your stuff in today! Link See also: Dan Hillier's tentacle horrors -- now on moleskine notebooks!...

From 2005-2006, illustrator Rafa Toro created and blogged a set of 80 notional monster trading cards. These are terrific -- I want them blown up to back-patch sized and safety-pinned to my jean-jacket! Link (via IZ Reloaded)...