use control

Posy gives a short history of the computer mouse cursor, from early straight pointers to the tilted arrow, comparing Apple and Windows designs. He then explains why he designed his own cursor set and offers it as a free download.

The opening lecture of Steve Brunton's Control Bootcamp, covering the kinds of control and why closed-loop feedback matters. It starts a series that follows the control chapter of the Brunton and Kutz data-driven science book.

Kirsten Dirksen visits retired mailman Russ Finch in Alliance, Nebraska, who grows oranges, figs and pomegranates in a backyard greenhouse without paying for heat. The greenhouse uses the stable temperature of the earth, with underground earth tubes, to heat and cool itself.

A clip from Jim Jefferies' Netflix special BARE in which he comedically dissects American gun culture and gun control arguments.

A short talk by Will Dayble of Squareweave arguing that you should design software as if the user were drunk: distracted, impaired in attention and vision, and prone to misreading. It is a user experience talk built around that framing.

Tom Scott visits a rotating house near San Diego and explains how electricity, gas and water keep working on the rotating part. It includes a 3D render of the utility connection system.

A Daily Show segment in which John Oliver examines the argument that gun control does not work, using Australia's experience after the Senate rejected the Manchin-Toomey amendment. It is a comedic, man-on-the-street style piece.

Linus Tech Tips looks at whether buying a used GPU that was previously used for crypto mining is a good idea, as miners prepare to sell off cards. The video discusses how mining affects wear on cards and what to watch for.

A four-minute demo of the greenhouse effect showing how increased carbon dioxide raises temperature. It uses a simple setup that is dramatic and easy to understand.

Sabine Hossenfelder explains how the greenhouse effect actually works, given that infrared is mostly absorbed low in the atmosphere already. She walks through why more CO2 still warms the surface.

Richard Stallman's TEDxGeneva 2014 talk describing how nonfree programs give companies control over users and what users can do to regain control. It introduces the free software movement and the four freedoms.

Kevin Spacey, giving the MacTaggart Lecture at the Edinburgh Television Festival, urges TV channels to give viewers control. He points to Netflix's House of Cards release as evidence that audiences want to watch on their own terms.

Lin-Manuel Miranda performs an early version of the Hamilton idea, then called "The Hamilton Mixtape", at the White House poetry and spoken word evening in May 2009. He is accompanied by Alex Lacamoire and the audience laughs along at the premise of a hip-hop song about Alexander Hamilton.

A short demo of Code Bubbles, an IDE interface built around editable code fragments in bubbles instead of files. It was a research prototype for Java development.

Andreas Antonopoulos argues that money has a fourth function beyond store of value, medium of exchange and unit of account, which is as a system of control. He covers the history of money and why it does not flow freely.

2kliksphilip examines UserBenchmark, a hardware comparison site known for strongly biased, pro-Intel writing. The video explains the site's credibility problems and points viewers to better sources for CPU and GPU information.

A Vox explainer on how many of the British Museum's treasures were taken during British imperial rule, focusing on the Benin Bronzes and requests for their return.

Louis Rossmann reacts to lobbyist ads in the Massachusetts right-to-repair ballot fight that suggest repair access would enable domestic abuse and discrimination, and urges support for the campaign.

Fully Charged gets an exclusive first drive of the Porsche Taycan, running 0-200 km/h launch control repeatedly. It covers the car's twin-motor 800-volt specs, claimed range and fast charging.

Real air traffic control audio of the Air Astana flight whose flight controls had been wired in reverse by a maintenance error. The pilots struggle to keep control while ATC tries to help.

A 1982 Xerox PARC film, presented at CHI '90, in which Star designers David Canfield Smith and Charles Irby give an overview of the Xerox Star interface. It shows the document-centric, icon-and-window office system.

A 1953 US Navy training film on the basic mechanisms in fire control computers: shafts, gears, cams and differentials. It shows how these mechanical parts compute ship and target firing solutions.

Numberphile visits Cliff Stoll, the man behind ACME Klein Bottles, and sees how he stores a thousand glass Klein bottles in a crawlspace under his house. A remote-controlled forklift fetches them.

Tantacrul explains how he and engraver Simon Smith designed the free music notation font for MuseScore 3.6. It draws on the history of the SCORE notation application by Leland Smith.

The final chapter of Rich Rebuilds' saga about buying a used Tesla Model X that went missing, with cameo appearances and the end of the dispute. It is part of a longer series on the problems he had with Tesla.

Tom Scott tours Ocado's automated grocery warehouse, where thousands of robots move boxes on a grid called the Hive, and asks whether they are individual robots or a hive mind.

A demonstration of the 1982 Xerox Star user interface, including its desktop, icons, documents, networking and printing. The uploader argues that Apple's later Lisa and Mac interfaces evolved from these ideas rather than copying them.

CNN's clip of Stephen Colbert's 2006 White House Correspondents' Dinner routine, in which he mocks President Bush and the press in character. It was republished on the tenth anniversary.

A short 2009 WIRED clip showing Kiva Systems robots moving inventory shelves in a warehouse serving online retailer Zappos. It shows how mobile robots bring goods to pickers instead of people walking the aisles.

Second half of a demonstration of the 1982 Xerox Star user interface. It shows how the Star differed from the later Lisa and Mac interfaces, with strengths in networking and printing and little direct manipulation.

Air traffic audio of a pilot slurring and incoherent while declaring an emergency due to extreme hypoxia, with controllers at Cleveland Center struggling to understand him.

Ben Heck modifies a keyboard with magnets, Hall effect sensors and an Xbox controller so the WASD keys give analog control. He walks through the hardware build.

This Old House's Ross Trethewey explains MERV filter ratings and how air filtration works, then shows how to build a localized DIY air filter, including a box fan with multiple filters.

A This Old House segment where Richard Trethewey installs a heat exchanger that uses waste heat from a central air conditioner to heat a swimming pool.

A short !!Con 2016 talk by blind developer Sina Bahram on how he uses a computer and writes code with a screen reader at about 1,000 words per minute. He plays how common interfaces sound and challenges the audience to go a day using only the keyboard.

A DIY demonstration of a fan-and-screen mosquito trap that uses carbonated water as a CO2 attractant. The creator reports catching about 8,000 mosquitoes in two nights.

Not Just Bikes takes on the common excuse that a country is simply too big or spread out for good transit and walkable cities. The video argues that city density and short everyday trips matter, not national size or overall population density.

In a TED talk, behavioral economist Dan Ariely uses visual illusions and his research to show that people are less rational in their decisions than they think. He covers defaults, such as organ donation rates, and how choice framing steers decisions.

An MTA video on communications-based train control, the system meant to replace the New York City subway's century-old signaling. It also shows the mechanical interlocks and signals in use today.

Not Just Bikes argues that North American transit struggles to attract riders because of the land use around it, not the transit itself. It uses examples such as a London, Ontario line with unreachable stations.