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Andrew Dougherty and Princess Fortier star in this music video parody of "Empire State of Mind." Mark Griffith, who produced it, tells how it was made.  

While living in Beijing, we met Andrew and Nicola Doughtery at our local church. Andrew was an economic analyst who also enjoyed rapping. He had lived in Beijjng off and on for about 5 years. He had noticed my photography and videos and he asked me if I'd be interested in collaborating with him on a rap video. I said yes because I am always open to working on fun projects and learning new things.  We started in April 2012 and the journey took me until July of 2013 to complete. When I said yes, I had no idea what I was getting into and how long the process would take.

The rest of the story is at Mark's blog, where you'll also find the lyrics. Link  -via Viral Viral Videos

Tekhnika Molodezhi was a Soviet magazine that translates to Technology for the Youth. During the Cold War, and especially the US-USSR space race, its futuristic art melded science fiction and technological progress in the same way Popular Mechanics did in the US. Tested has a gallery of 30 illustrations from Tekhnika Molodezhi from the 1930s through the 1970s. Link  -via Boing Boing

Nikola Tesla was born on July 10, 1856. To mark that anniversary, you are invited to find out more about the man and his work. Here are some good places to start:

Tesla: Master of Lightning.

Nikola Tesla's Life in Under 3 Minutes.

7 Geniuses Who Were Completely Insane.

Tesla vs. Edison on the Big Screen.

Epic Rap Battle: Nikola Tesla vs. Thomas Edison.

Tesla's Tower of Power.

Happy Birthday, Nikola Tesla!

And from the NeatoShop, we have the Tesla Finger Puppet and Magnet!

Filmmaker Robert Philipson studied the Harlem Renaissance of the early 20th century as part of his research for a course, and became intrigued with the hints of gay culture in the music of the era. That led him to produce two documentaries, first Take the Gay Train in 2008 and then a followup on lesbian performers, T’Ain’t Nobody’s Bizness: Queer Blues Divas of the 1920s. He tells us how those of the New York City blues scene differed from black Americans on the outside, who were striving to become "respectable" citizens.

The blues community, however, had no such concerns about respectability, and that’s where Philipson found the most references homosexuality. Which is why, three years after “Gay Train,” he followed up with another documentary, this time focusing exclusively on female blues singers with lesbian proclivities.

As it turns out, the blues world was the perfect realm for people who were thought of as “sexual deviants” to inhabit, as it thrived far outside the scope of the dominant white American culture in the early 20th century. In Jazz Age speakeasies, dive bars, and private parties, blue singers had the freedom to explore alternative sexuality, and on a rare occasion, they even expressed it in song.

Those songs are still available to us, in lyrics if not in recordings. And the lyrics were risky, because same-sex relations could get you jailed. Read about Gladys Bentley, Ma Rainey, Bessie Smith, and others whose racy lyrics made them stars, at Collector's Weekly. Link

Hey look! It's time for our collaboration with the ever-entertaining What Is It? Blog! Do you know what the object in this picture is? Guess and win a t-shirt from the NeatoShop! But first, read the rules:

Place your guess in the comment section below. One guess per comment, please, though you can enter as many as you'd like. Post no URLs or weblinks, as doing so will forfeit your entry. Two winners: the first correct guess and the funniest (albeit ultimately wrong) guess will each win a T-shirt from the NeatoShop.

Please write your T-shirt selection alongside your guess. If you don't include a selection, you forfeit the prize, okay? May we suggest the Science T-Shirt, Funny T-Shirt and Artist-Designed T-Shirts?

See more pictures of this ...thing at the What Is It? Blog. Good luck!

Update: this thing is an old-fashioned crimper for can lids. After many serious and no-so-serious guesses, ladybugs finally had the correct answer. The funniest answer was from Randall, who said,

This is a clock unwinder. In Victorian time it was feared that a clock left wound over the new year eve would cause infertility. The first thing that Victorian men would do on the New Years day was get out of bed to wind and set the clock. THe would then go back to bed and test for infertility. As a result of this pratice the clock unwinder was considered a very risque' item great care was taken to keep it stored descreetly. You can still find them in secret cubbyholes under staircases in older homes, covered with dust, biding their time.

That's good for a t-shirt, too! See the answers to all the mystery items of the week at the What Is It? blog.

There's a Shakespeare quote for any situation! This collection is from Grant Snider at Incidental Comics. Link

Artist PJ McQuade knows who would make the Star Wars universe much more interesting: Michonne from TV's The Walking Dead! And why not? She's a fierce warrior with sword fighting skills that would make her a master of the light saber.

Tatooine has been infected with zombie stormtroopers. Who you gonna call? Michonne from The Walking Dead of course! Pay attention JJ Abrams. Given her prowess with a samurai blade, I always picture her with a lightsaber. We all know she’s a total badass, but now she has interstellar credentials. She even has a pelt of decapitated bounty hunter heads - Bossk, Dengar and she’s about to collect IG-88’s tin noggin. Michonne has this cloak of mystery around her so I imagined her as a bounty hunter to muddy the Jedi waters. I see her as a mercenary of sorts, not always towing the Jedi line note for note (perhaps there was a falling out) but she’s on the side of good when the sugar honey ice tea hits the fan, I think…  Designed as the debut issue of her comic, here’s to wishing.

The print is available at Etsy in two sizes. Link -Thanks, PJ!

We've covered deep-fried fair food every year, always uncovering the latest abomination as vendors experiment with just what can be deep-fried and sold on a stick. Food on a stick makes perfect sense for fairgoers, as it makes eating without a table or utensils easier. But there are many things that should never be deep-fried. Rusty Blazenhoff brings us a report of 2013 treats as seen at the Alameda County Fair. Deep-fried Pop Tarts on a stick just seems like a waste of batter. The chicken-fried steak on a stick sounds good, but traditionally includes gravy, which wouldn't work at a fair. And a deep-fried cheeseburger? Since we put burgers on a bun to eat them with one hand in the first place, that just seems silly. Link

(Image credit: Flickr user Rusty Blazenhoff)

Modern digital artists have millions of colors available, and modern painters have almost as many synthetic paints at their fingertips. But in the past, painters used pigments made from chemicals the natural world offered -and many of those are no longer used because they were dangerous, expensive, or made from sources no longer available -like endangered species. For example, the bygone pigment called Mummy Brown:

The pigment, a favored shade of the Pre-Raphaelites, was first made with Egyptian mummies, both cat and human, that were ground up and mixed with white pitch and myrrh. It had a great fleshy color, but due to the actual fleshy components it would crack over time. Martin Drölling, who painted the work shown above, reportedly used the mummies of French kings dug up from Saint-Denis in Paris. According to a 1964 Time story, the Mummy Brown pigment didn’t last due to a shortage of its name defining ingredient.

You might be surprised at what's on those masterpieces in museums! Allison Meier at Hyperallergic tells the stories of some of those pigments of yore, in two posts because the first was so popular.

Link to part one.

Link to part two.  -via Metafilter

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This guy pranked his sleeping girlfriend with a mockup of the wraith that comes out of the TV in the movie The Ring. He caught all the action on three cameras! If they haven't broken up over it, he should be expecting payback in the future. (via Uproxx)

A couple of years ago, the Department of Homeland Security notified NOAA (the weather agency) and the Economic Development Administration (EDA) that they had a potential malware problem in their computer systems. The two agencies reacted in very different ways.

The NOAA isolated and cleaned up the problem within a few weeks.

The EDA, however, responded by cutting its systems off from the rest of the world—disabling its enterprise e-mail system and leaving its regional offices no way of accessing centrally-held databases.

It then recruited in an outside security contractor to look for malware and provide assurances that not only were EDA's systems clean, but also that they were impregnable against malware. The contractor, after some initial false positives, declared the systems largely clean but was unable to provide this guarantee. Malware was found on six systems, but it was easily repaired by reimaging the affected machines.

EDA's CIO, fearing that the agency was under attack from a nation-state, insisted instead on a policy of physical destruction. The EDA destroyed not only (uninfected) desktop computers but also printers, cameras, keyboards, and even mice. The destruction only stopped—sparing $3 million of equipment—because the agency had run out of money to pay for destroying the hardware.

Read more at Ars Technica. Link  -Thanks, Ray Perkins!

(Image credit: Flickr user youngthousands)

It's hard to keep the players straight without a program. Now that the birth of Prince William's first child is imminent, Buzzfeed constructed a handy chart to explain the new line of succession to the British throne. One thing you might notice is that even though the world does not know if the royal baby is a boy or girl, his/her place in the line is set. A change in the rules of succession was made in 2011 which made male and female heirs equally eligible for the monarchy. However, the ruling is not retroactive and only applies to heirs born after 2011. That's why Princess Anne is so far down the line, even though she is Queen Elizabeth's second child. It was announced just yesterday that Zara Phillips Tindall, Princess Anne's daughter and Prince William's first cousin, is expecting a baby next year. That baby will be 16th in line to the throne, displacing all of Princess Margaret's descendants in the line of succession. Link

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This incredibly cute duckling loves his man. He also loves to swim, get his feathers blow-dried, and cuddle. Be warned you might melt from the cuteness. Also, in this video, we learn what webbed feet sound like on a wood floor: wappity-wappity-whap! -via Daily of the Day

The Dixie Hotel in New York City's Times Square opened in 1930 and had a bus terminal in its basement. A rather unique bus terminal, because it had a turntable that rotated buses around! Ten buses at a time could unload and load passengers, while they entered and left one at a time. Scouting New York went to look for it. The hotel is now the Carter Hotel (previously on Neatorama), and the bus terminal is now a parking garage. It's been changed quite a bit, but the turntable is still there, and the original floor from the riders' waiting room. See pictures of the bus station then and now, at Scouting New York. Link

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Doug brings home the bacon, so to speak, in his own manly way. Notable YouTube comment: "TIL I should leave Santa trout and not cookies." -via Tastefully Offensive