Interesting Links for 23-05-2013

• We're getting closer to understanding how salamanders regenerate limbs
  (tags: regeneration biology )
• Average Home Sizes Around the World
  (tags: housing homes )
• The seven craziest findings in the US investigation of Apple’s tax avoidance practices
  (tags: tax apple )
• Amazon gets into the fanfic business
  (tags: fanfic amazon )
• How to post-master an album
  (tags: music )
• Why Facebook Is Doomed And Google Isn't
  (tags: google facebook advertising )
• Some thoughts on the contract for Amazon's fanfic publishing
  (tags: fanfic amazon )
• What depression feels like
  (tags: comic funny depression )
• Authors: Making money by lying to you.
  (tags: comic funny fiction )
• The world that only formerly-blind people can see
  (tags: blindness )
• Could the Royal Navy really operate a US Aircraft carrier?
  (tags: navy )
• You can cross a Corgi with just about anything to get cuteness (and I don't even like Corgis!)
  (tags: dogs cute )
• How Racism Turned an Interracial Family's Trip to Walmart into a Kidnapping Investigation
  (tags: racism usa )
• How My Mom Thinks Search Engines Work
  (tags: google search )
• UKIP MEPs vote against tackling tax evasion
  (tags: europe tax ukip )
• Google gets into the airborne wind turbines business
  (tags: google windpower )
• Baby's life saved with groundbreaking 3-D printed device that restored his breathing
  (tags: 3dprinting medicine healthcare )
• Your Body Does Not Want to Be an Interface
  (tags: ui technology ux interface )
• 'Boys will be boys' in US, but not in Asia
  (tags: behaviour gender children )
• Iain Banks' mainstream novels subsidised his SciFi
  (tags: scifi writing IainBanks )

I just got rid of a load of books

I never actually wanted to own anything. I don't desire to actually have anything that _belongs_ to me. What I want is access to things. So once movies are available on demand, music is streamable, and books are electronic, I can get rid of all of the actual physical objects and reclaim a bunch of wall/shelf space for decorative purposes.

And so this lot were picked up today and taken to Shelter:


Leaving my shelves looking like this:


Still remaining: Graphic novels, reference books, and some things I couldn't quite bear to get rid of (like the Narnia books).

The next step on from ebook readers

I said a while ago that I really wanted a tablet for reading comics on. And one finally came out that fulfilled my specifications: 13" diagonally, widescreen, and reasonably priced. The Archos FamilyPad 2 cost me £250 and runs ComicRack very happily. As well as Angry Birds and World Of Goo, of course.

The screen is not amazing - the viewing angle is less than I'd like, and the resolution is only 1280x800. But that's high enough that I can't see pixels when it's sitting in my lap, and will happily do for the moment - when retina-quality displays are uniquitous in a few years I'll upgrade.

The important thing is that it allowed me to go to Cerebus Downloads, pay $25, and legally obtain the first 25 issues in electronic format, nicely scanned and cleaned up:

You'll note that the image on the tablet is pretty-much identical in size to the actual TPB. _That_ is why I wanted a 13" tablet.

And also to be able to read something that's not quite so legally available:

(Yes, I'll be paying for the oversized hardbacks of that as soon as they sort out the sodding legal rights. And yes, both of those look a lot better in real life than they do from a camera.)