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 webslinky: insects
This week, invasion of the arthropods. In the age of plastic and metal it's a shock if anything from the natural world encroaches on the tightly controlled artificial environments we like to call Homestead Unit 500. Whether it’s the discovery of mushrooms growing in a surprising crevice or rodent droppings making an uncomplementary addition to your cereal, we rarely welcome a reminder of our place in the ecosystem.Insects are probably the most persistent of intruders, so you’d better read up on them. What's That Bug is a friendly old-fashioned site that's made with love and genuinely fun to browse. Just look at all these harmless “pseudoscorpions” and international varieties of Daddy Long-Legs (the most ludicrous insect with arguably the best name). If you’ve developed an aversion to nature and perhaps think you could do better, why not make your own artificial insects? Then you can play god without leaving the house. You could get started straight away – first by learning a programming language, then by writing your own life-simulation software, possibly whilst cackling. Or you could just download Framsticks while you wait for Will Wright to release his Spore. You could also go one step further, if you like your megalomania a bit more hands-on, and attempt to improve on nature by creating a mechanical super-race of roboinsects: build an InsBot using these handy schematics to subvert cockroaches for your cause. Finally, why not relive the short-lived craze for Rods? Blink and you – quite literally – may have missed it, but the rod “phenomenon” was all the rage for a couple of weeks. You remember – rods! The mysterious flying creatures that moved so fast they could only be seen on video. “Rods gain their name from their rodlike shape,” states the authoritative voice of WikiPedia. Flying Rods is an amusing place to relive some of the utterly ridiculous theories that were bandied around. A vote on the front page offers visitors a choice of explanations that include “tiny alien ships”, “military experiment that escaped“, “flying scrolls like in the Bible”, and “creatures that can pass between dimensions“. Pity they turned out to be blurry insects.
David Thair
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 webslinky #105video rip'n'share  webslinky #104avatars  webslinky #103a decade of flash  webslinky #102widgets  webslinky #101web 2.0  webslinkyarchive
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