HERE LIES THE QUEEN OF PIN-UPS

Old news, sure, but I've only just seen this:

Bettie Page’s headstone [via Find A Grave].



What a great epitaph to have on yr grave.

Personally I want mine to read:

“He meant no harm”.

Good intentions,

This is dF

THANK YOU FOR EATING BIG MACS™

ITEM: A new paper  published earlier this year in the health policy journal, the Milbank Quarterly, details how major fast food companies are employing PR tactics to fend off criticisms that their food is unhealthy and contributes to obesity.

Tactics include:

1. Dismissing peer-reviewed studies showing a link between their products and disease as “junk science”
2. Paying scientists to produce pro-industry studies
3. Sowing doubt in the public’s mind about the harm caused by their products
4. Intensive marketing to children and adolescents
5. Frequently rolling out supposedly “safer” products and vowing to regulate their own industries
6. Denying the addictive nature of their products
7. Lobbying with massive resources to thwart regulatory action.

Any of this sound familiar? Tobacco companies used to do the same thing.

One of the authors, psychologist Kelly D. Brownell, director of the Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity at Yale University, gives details.

DISCLAIMER: Presented for informational purposes only. I’m hardly a poster child for the “Eat Healthy Organic Foods” movement. I just washed down a three-pack of Oreos with a Coke Zero while I was typing this.

But I do find the propaganda parallels interesting – especially when we know how it all worked out for the tobacco industry in the end.

Still, I don’t know if I favor warning labels on Quarter Pounders or anything.

Hazardous to yr health,

This is dF

NEW YORK CITY BOTS

ITEM: Kacie Kinzer, a student at NYU's ITP has been conducting an interesting social experiment involving cute simple robots navigating their way through New York City.

Rolling at a constant speed, in a straight line, Tweenbots have a destination displayed on a flag, and rely on people they meet to read this flag and to aim them in the right direction to reach their goal.

The object was to see how much help the bots received from passers-by. Kinzer intentionally made the robots lo-tech, fully expecting them to be run over in traffic, or kicked, or stolen, or whatever.

Result: every bot made it to their destination.

Which either means that humans are nicer than we sometimes give ourselves credit for ... or we’re nicer to cute li'l machines than we are to each other.

Either way, I like Schneier’s observation that it indicates a victory in favor of common sense over fear. If someone had tried this four years ago (or in Boston), the police would have declared it a possible IED, put the city on high alert and shipped Kinzer to Gitmo for further “questioning”.

Welcome to the jungle,

This is dF

THE GREEN DOOR IS CLOSED

ITEM: Marilyn Chambers has died, I see.

SFW details here. NQSFW details (with a great Ron Jeremy anecdote) here.

Believe it or not, I never actually saw Behind The Green Door, or in fact any of her porn work. Granted, I was only seven when BTGD came out. Still, I’ve never really had a chance to see it. I knew her more by reputation, which was legendary. And why not? She helped define modern porn as much as anyone, even if movies like Deep Throat were more notorious.

Respect.

Anyway, I’m sure much will be written about her adult film career and the Cronenberg movie and the Ivory Snow thing, but there’s two other things I’d like for Marilyn to be remembered for.

1. Marilyn Chambers was Charles Jay’s vice presidential candidate for the Personal Choice Party (PCP) in the 2004 Presidential race. They only got on the ballot in Utah, and they pulled something like 900 votes. But hey, how many people can say that?

2. Marilyn Chambers was a kung fu master.

Evidence: the one film of hers I actually have seen: Angel Of H.E.A.T.

[Mostly SFW except for that bit you see there, but it's all psychedelic, so you should be fine.]

Plot: A mad scientist uses an army of androids and a device that can disintegrate metal to try to steal microchips containing top secret information. The government dispatches a beautiful female agent to stop him.

With added Mary Woronov!

Touched by an angel,

This is dF