Link roundup

1. The makers of Deus Ex: Human Revolution get it. The easy difficulty mode is officially described as:

Tell Me A Story
You play games for their story and experience, not for their challenge or competitiveness. Enjoy the Deus Ex experience!

2. Great photo essay on Hell Week for Navy Seal hopefuls:

One particularly difficult stretch involves a length of time staying afloat in San Diego bay at night, and then laying down, shirtless on a steel pier. From what I was led to believe, while embracing the pier, certain classes have chanted, “The cold steel is sucking the life from my body. The cold steel is sucking the life from my body.”

3. I fear we're not even close to the end of the financial crisis. Unemployment in Spain is apparently over 20%.

Link roundup

1. From an overview of Tyler Cowen's life:

In 2002 he published "Creative Destruction," which argues that globalization created much of the art and music we might consider "native." Reggae in Jamaica, for example, borrowed from commercial rhythm and blues broadcasts that drifted over the water from New Orleans and Miami. The fur trade and the metal knife helped create the totem poles of the Northwestern American Indians.

2. You've seen the flying military drones, now check out the ocean-going versions.

3. Charles Barkley says Nike asked him to stop being critical of LeBron James. Via.

Link roundup

1. The US Army design guide is available for download (top, right). Via.

2. "On Feb. 5, 1958, a B-47 bomber dropped a 7,000-pound nuclear bomb into the waters off Tybee Island, [Georgia], after it collided with another Air Force jet. Fifty years later, the bomb — which has unknown quantities of radioactive material — has never been found." Via these sites.

3. Custom Portal gun.

Illustration roundup

Lots of great (and silly) Thor by Kirby pages in this gallery. You can buy Kirby's Thor collection at Amazon.




This is a dating don't.




Editorial illustration by Tomer Hanuka for the NY Times.





Spider-Man and Daredevil by Moebius (from a gallery of Moebius art). (It's interesting that Moebius is so famous, yet doesn't have a single comic in print at Amazon.) Via.




Pen Ward looking for a drinking buddy the other night.

Link roundup

1. Cory Doctorow has a great short story here about the challenges of building an internet connection between the mundane world and the world of fairy. (Just skip over the technical details if they're as foreign to you as they are to me.)

2. io9 is giving away a tauntaun sleeping bag.

3. No, special forces dogs don't get their teeth replaced with titanium fangs.