CameraMachines

[lumberjackloverboy-moved]

for my fellow psychotics who struggle with thinking someone is in their house, a method I’ve found that really works are these guys:

i put them on my front door and anytime it opens they ring. that way if i think someone has broken in or i see someone who isn’t there i can think back to if the bells have rung, and if they haven’t i can assure myself it’s not real. obviously it’s not fool proof, like if you are prone to auditory hallucinations, but it has really helped me calm down in time to avoid major psychotic breaks. it’s a real lifesaver

nonpsychotics encouraged to rb

[camerasandmachines]

My grandmother had a "door harp" which i always loved. Could help if you don't like the sound of bells.

[britttaperryhasmoved-deactivate]

[aurevoir-mes-amis-deactivated20]

YOU GUYS IT’S DECEMBER 10TH YOU DON’T UNDERSTAND THIS HAS BEEN IN MY QUEUE SINCE FEBRUARY

[donttwalkaway-deactivated201302]

you have the rest of the day to reblog this

[tilthat]

TIL that the reason lead levels in children’s blood have dropped 85% in the past thirty years is because of an unknown scientist who fought car companies to end leaded gasoline. He also removed it from paint, suggested its removal from pipes, and campaigned for the removal of lead solder from cans.

via ift.tt

[squeeful]

Yep.  It also correlates extremely strongly with an increasing decrease of violent crime.  One of the symptoms of low level constant lead exposure is increased aggression and volatility. 

[kurowrites]

“Unknown scientist”? That was Clair Cameron Patterson.

[solarpunkcast]

Gas companies are still so mad at him he’s “unknown scientist”, know his name

[bogleech]

Daily reminder that health and safety standards like these are what politicians mean when they talk about “deregulation.”

[prismatic-bell]

Patterson died 5 December 1995.

Petition to make his date of death a Tumblr holiday celebrated by talking about cool shit the gas and petroleum industries don’t want us to know about, and fighting to continue his work.

[kittydesade]

Happy Clair Cameron Patterson day!

[ailelie]

Oh, hey, it’s almost Clair Cameron Patterson day!

[femalegothic]

[maryfitzroy]

This anecdote reminded me of how he was too sexy for The Graduate:

[conifersncoasts]

My favorite part of yesterday was virtually everyone saying how good looking he was.

[mias-back-from-the-dead]

tbh i think the funniest phenomena that's been happening in the last couple years is "youtuber, having gone too deep into the research hole, has been made an investigative journalist against their will"

[aces-and-anime]

Shout out to the guy who wanted to do some fun & silly little reviews but uncovered an illegal gambling operation

(Review 2)

[json-derulo]

this guy started out poking fun at australian politicians and ended up investigating the firebombing of his own home, during which he uncovered connections between the same politician he was making fun of + major organized crime

[wedding-funeral-waitress]

JasperDasper started out just curious why everything had suddenly become about trans people and questioning some of the sources used in a book. He came out of it, 4 years later, with a 5 hour long video that connects all transphobia to less than 60 people. (I'm not joking. literally every single transphobic rhetoric and bill passed is because of these 50 or so people.)

If you wanna watch it I cannot recommend it enough; I just warn that it covers a LOT.

[oldguardians]

once again thinking about "the lottery" by shirley jackson.

imagine there was a man in the story who went around giving speeches about the importance of the lottery as a tradition. He said the casualties were unfortunate, but also an inevitable price of freedom. Imagine he treated those who sought to end the senseless cycle of violence with condescension and derision, calling them idiotic, naïve, and diseased.

yet when that man was selected for the lottery and stoned to death, everyone mourned him and said how unfair it was that a bright young family man should die so soon. And when people pointed out that this man was killed by a system he adamantly defended and worked to perpetuate, they lost their jobs and were shunned from the community as insensitive and monstrous.

Imagine. Hypothetically. For no particular reason.

[campyvillain]

soooo today i learned that back in the early 90s, coca cola tried making this thing called “ok soda” as a marketing stunt to beat out pepsi since they had way more of a hold on the “younger/rebellious” generation at the time, and their way of doing that was naming it “ok soda” so that they could copyright the word “ok”, the most popular word in the world, and at the same time brand it as an…ironic soda??? like the whole thing with it was that they tried to brand ok soda as a counterculture soda but instead of making it about typical 90s RADICAL EXTREME!!! fodder the theme of it was uh. unsettling capitalist brutalist dystopia. instead of being bright and colorful the color scheme was only stark whites, grays and reds and the cans looked like this. bold shapes and labels stating ominous, robotic things with a figure always staring dead into you on the front, no coca cola branding on it at all.

sometimes there would be “prize cans” of this stuff where instead of having soda inside it there would be hats. and they didn’t sell this option in boxes by the way they just put prize cans in random vending machines. and put like 25 cents in it so hey. you could get an actual soda that isn’t just hats. maybe.

did i mention that this soda also had a fucking MANIFESTO??? because yeah it sure had that printed on some cans and it goes as follows

and there’s these things called “coincidences”, which… yeah it doesn’t make it sound any less ominous

and you might be wondering how the soda itself tastes like does it taste good? ok? well apparently it was just a regular “citric” tasting soda but somehow they fucked it up so bad that it was compared to “carbonated tree sap”, and instead of trying to make the drink taste better they included that it tasted like shit, INTO THE ADVERTISING SCHEME ITSELF. they would literally advertise that it tasted like ass as a part of the ironic marketing, no i am not kidding.

but if you thought that’s where it ended there’s one more curveball and without any exaggeration, you will not expect what i am about to tell you.

take a look at this guy.

this guy is the “face” of ok soda, as in he was printed on the most cans and technically served as a mascot of sorts for the entire thing. his face was a major part of the branding, and this design for the cans was one of if not the most common.

okay. cool. no issue there right?

take a guess on who this guy is based off of.

the artist’s coworker? a generic guy? the artist himself? a relative? some random reference model they hired?

CHARLES MANSON. YES, THIS IS REAL. MEANING FOR A BRIEF MOMENT IN TIME, CHARLES MANSON’S FACE WAS USED AS A MEANS TO SELL COCA COLA.

the lead artist himself has even come forward to say this is the case. and now you may be asking wait. how’d he do this? how’d he possibly get away with this, years after the crimes had been committed?

well according to him, it was simple. apparently none of the contracts he signed said anything against putting a mass murderer on the can. so. there’s THAT.

unfortunately or fortunately depending on how you look at it, ok soda never really caught on since *surprise surprise!* teens really don’t want to buy soda that looks like a brutalist art museum, and it never had a wide release so it was only a thing for like two years between 1993 and 1995. but from what i’ve heard there’s still people who are giving this soda a small modern following, collecting all the cans and merchandise and even coming up with stand in recipes for the soda formula itself.

so yeah! that was ok soda.

what the fuck

[mevima]

NY county clerk refuses to file Texas' fine for doctor accused of prescribing abortion pills

A county clerk in New York has refused to file a more than $100,000 judgment from Texas against a New York doctor accused of prescribing abo

A Texas judge last month ordered Dr. Margaret Carpenter, who practices north of New York City, to pay the penalty for allegedly breaking that state’s law by prescribing abortion medication via telemedicine. The Texas attorney general’s office followed up last week by asking a New York court to enforce the default civil judgment, which is $113,000 with attorney and filing fees. The acting Ulster County clerk refused. “In accordance with the New York State Shield Law, I have refused this filing and will refuse any similar filings that may come to our office. Since this decision is likely to result in further litigation, I must refrain from discussing specific details about the situation,” Acting Clerk Taylor Bruck said in a prepared statement.

This is what we're talking about. This is the resistance someone can do in their everyday job. Judgement gets passed down and you're just supposed to dot the i's and cross the t's? Don't. Just refuse.

Now, I know an acting county clerk isn't just anyone - this man had a very unique opportunity to do some very serious blockading in his everyday job - but that's kind of the point! Nobody's just anyone. You never know when you'll have an opportunity.

[sayaratyriea]

This is also a great example of why preemptive compliance is a terrible idea, and how local legislation in blue states can work to help everyone. If this clerk just went along with the filing because “well, my job is just to check the formatting and rubber stamp and there’s nothing else I can do, actually enforcing it is on someone else who can make the right choice,” we wouldn’t be here. Instead, he knew the law.

The clerk mentioned the New York State Shield Law. New York has laws in place that actually prohibit various government and law enforcement officers from collaborating with out-of-state investigations into reproductive and gender-affirming healthcare, and those laws explicitly apply to telehealth abortion care. Those laws can likely be used to protect this clerk, enabling him to potentially protect more doctors and patients. And that’s all thanks to the state legislature creating state laws to protect people! This is why state and county level elections matter - they create extra protection, so that more people can safely engage in these acts of resistance that in turn protect others. Any state could pass laws like this if its residents managed to get enough reasonable-minded people into state and local office.

Don’t preemptively comply. Look up the rules and laws that can apply to your job, and find out which ones you can use to your advantage to help others, justify small acts of good, or hinder incoming harmful bullshit. And support whoever is working at the state or county level to make good laws in your area - they make a difference.

[mevima]

An update:

New York clerk again refuses to enforce Texas judgment against doctor who provided abortion pills

A New York county clerk has again refused to file a more than $100,000 civil judgment from Texas against a doctor accused of prescribing abo

Texas asked demanded again, and he refused again.

[stephaniematurin]

STATES' RIGHTS, MOTHERFUCKERS

[camerasandmachines]

And you don't have to make a stand or risk your job. Sometimes just throwing salt in the gears. Delay every request you reasonably can. Give them forms to fill out. Make them verify information. It's not nothing. It makes it harder and more frustrating and less profitable.

[shutyourmoustache]

Someone on Amtrak’s social media team deserves a raise like N O W. 😂

[camerasandmachines]

I took the train this weekend. I went 90 miles, it cost $21, took about 90 minutes (not including the drive to and from the station.) My mom picked me up on the other end.

[ashenmind]

good lord this thing is useless

[fishmech]

idk what yall are mad about the new Lies Your Older Cousin Tells You machine is working great

[dragongirltongue]

Happy horse on mars day

[alanaisalive]

The other night husband and I were watching a documentary about the yeti where they were doing DNA analysis of samples of supposed yeti fur, and every one of them came back as bears.

Anyway, the next night we watched a thing about some pig man who is supposed to live in Vermont. People said it had claws and a pig nose but walked upright like a man. Now, I happen to know that sideshows used to shave bears and present them as pig men. So every piece of evidence they gave of this monster sounds to me like a bear with mange.

So now the running joke in our house is that everything is bears. Aliens? Bears. Loch Ness monster? Bear. Every cryptozoological mystery is just a very crafty bear.

Bears. They’re everywhere. Be wary. Anyone or anything could be a bear.

[iguanamouth]

oh shit

[throughshadow-to-the-edgeofnight]

[alanaisalive]

As the OP of this post, I’m going to threaten that if this gets to one million notes by the 10 year anniversary on 1 June 2026, one year from today, I will get a lower back tattoo of the loch ness bear monster.

[docd666]

Y'all know what to do Tumblr.

[neenarchive]

no i don't want you to redirect me to your app i want to look at recipe

[neenarchive]

i am not going to a secondary location with you one of us dies here

[evilvarric666-archive]

Ok am I, stupid or do a fair portion of the lyrics to Kiss From A Rose just not make any sense at all

[evilvarric666-archive]

Why do your eyes get "larger" when it snows. What the fuck is a gray. Seal. Seal I am talking to you. Seal.

[evilvarric666-archive]

this is hilarious actually.

[saywhat-politics]

[camerasandmachines]

That is my question as well. Where do I sign up to get paid for this?

[taigacryptid]

decentralize and clean up your life!!!

use overdrive, libby, hoopla, cloudlibrary, and kanopy instead of amazon and audible.

use firefox instead of chrome or opera (both are made with chromium, which blocks functionality for ad-blockers. firefox isn't based on chromium).

use mega or proton drive instead of google drive.

get rid of bloatware

use libreoffice instead of microsoft office suite

use vetted sites on r/FREEMEDIAHECKYEAH for free movies, books, games, etc.

use trakt or letterboxd instead of imdb.

use storygraph instead of goodreads.

use darkpatterns to find mobile game with no ads or microtransactions

use ground news to read unbiased news and find blind spots in news stories.

use mediahuman or cobalt to download music, or support your favorite artists directly through bandcamp

make youtube bearable by using mtube, newpipe, or the unhook extension on chrome, firefox, or microsoft edge

use search for a cause or ecosia to support the environment instead of google

use thriftbooks to buy new or used books (they also have manga, textbooks, home goods, CDs, DVDs, and blurays)

use flashpoint to play archived online flash games

find books, movies, games, etc. on the internet archive! for starters, here's a bunch of David Attenborough documentaries and all of the Animorphs books

burn your music onto cds

use pdf24 (available online or as a desktop app) instead of adobe

use unroll.me to clean your email inboxes

use thunderbird, mailfence, countermail, edison mail, tuta, or proton mail instead of gmail

remove bloatware on windows PC, macOS, and iOS X

remove bloatware on samsung X

use pixelfed instead of instagram or meta

use NCH suite for free software like a file converter, image editor, video editors, pdf editor, etc.

feel free to add more alternatives, resources or advice in the reblogs or replies, and i'll add them to the main post <3

last updated: march 18th 2025

[30-minute-memes]

I see his robot as an absolute win

[katsdom]

OK - a very tangential takeoff: Engineering prof assigns students this question: Explain how to determine the height of a very tall building using a barometer.

Obviously meant to use change in barometric pressure with altitude. But one student submitted the following:

There are several ways of doing this

1. On a sunny day, stand the barometer up in the sun, measure the length of its shadow relative to its height, then measure the length of the building’s shadow and calculate its height from that.

2. Go into the stairwell and climb the stairs to the top, marking off the length of the barometer on the wall, giving you the height of the building in “barometer units”.

3. Go onto the roof of the building and drop the barometer off the top and time how long it takes to hit the ground, then calculate the height using the well known formula of 32 ft./sec./sec.

4. Go into the office of the building superintendent and say “If you tell me how tall this building is, I will give you this nice barometer”.

[thesundaytea]

Newton….

[shambling-under-moonlight]

This is basically any DnD party solving puzzles but with more success.

[jabberwockypie]

Per @arinrowan's recommendation, I'm watching Implosion: The Titanic Sub Disaster.

And let me just say these Coast Guard guys at this hearing appear to be REALLY feeling this image:

[jabberwockypie]

#i listened to a ninety minutes podcast about the oceangate implosion and watched this ninety minute documentary #and there were SO MANY red flags and safety violations and mechanical failures the two had almost no overlap (tags via @arinrowan)

[ralfmaximus]

My chief takeaway after watching the Discovery channel thing: Stockton Rush was such an asshole.

It's not a matter of "we didn't know" or "exploration is risky". It's more like EVERYONE told you it was a bad idea but you did it anyway. Some of the interviews with ex-Oceangate employees were heartbreaking because they knew their boss was a jackass but were pressured into following the cult.

They stored their billion dollar submersible in a parking lot during the off season, exposed to the elements. For months at a time! Then they'd just hose the crud off, plunk it into the ocean with minimal testing, and descend 2.3 miles to the bottom of the ocean like it's a trip to the store. With paying passengers!

And then there's the whole "let's treat the Titanic mass gravesite as a tourist destination" angle that's disgusting. Rich assholes excited to go there like it's Disneyland. Video of Stockton Rush foaming at the mouth with excitement to see Titanic yet again for the 88th time.

Watching that show was like getting punched in the face every 30 seconds or so.

[arinrowan]

The parking lot scene was insane. Not even a tarp! They were storing that thing outside during a polar vortex and they couldn't even spring for a tarp!

I think what was most bewildering was how... sloppy, Oceangate was? Being convinced the submarine had to be made out of an unsafe and untested material that kept showing signs of weathering, fine. Not doing doing proper upkeep or testing, following minimal safety checks or maintenance, pre-launch doing such a poor job checking on the vehicle that they didn't check THE BOLTS WERE EVEN DRILLED IN?

It's clear to me that even if they had been working with a sub made from approved materials, an accident was inevitable.

[jabberwockypie]

#like it was always going to end like this! #they were cutting corners and acting like they were taking people on an airport shuttle to a hotel rather than down to#one of the most dangerous places on earth #you can't fuck around with the ocean without finding out

(tags via @arinrowan )