Highlights, and one solemn obituary, from this past week:

To complement GOOD 010: The China Issue, Jaime Wolf has been posting on some of the quirks of Chinese culture. This week he covered the lesser known, but intolerably cute, red panda, and the best sources for real news from China.

The fate of Nabokov's unpublished last work was decided.

Scott Ballum is connecting with the people behind the things he buys with the year-long Consume®econnection Project.

Prospect and Foreign Policy collaborated on a list of the world's "top" public intellectuals.

The Tuymans Experiment explored how fine art fares when it's taken out of the museum and has to busk on the street.

And last but not least, the Rebel Alliance loses a cadet to the Galactic Empire: Nau closes its doors.

We heard news today that our friends at the clothing company Nau are closing shop. We're not happy about it. From the super-efficient "Webfront" stores to the 5% donation on every purchase, Nau took its responsibility to our collective wellbeing seriously. This oldish profile from Fast Company explains Nau's effort to build sustainability into every aspect of its business.

A letter on their blog explains the circumstances.

Car makers have, apparently, imagined building an injury-proof car—one that would keep passengers unharmed in any crash—for a while now. We didn't even know that was considered a possibility, but Volvo recently went so far as to set a date for the completion of the ultimate safe car: 2020.

The automaker already offers ignitions that won't operate if a driver is intoxicated, sensors that assess alertness and sound an alarm if the driver is dozy or drifting, and Global Positioning Systems to help prevent drivers from rushing to their destinations...

In a crash situation, where many drivers freeze, the car will be able to take over and steer or brake on its own.

We hope it actually comes with the Cross Colors paint job.

Via PSFK.

Kottke linked to the breathtaking time-lapse photography of Alexy Titarenko this morning. The images have this haunting quality to them that somehow doesn't seem possible stateside.

The world's first billion-dollar home, commissioned for a petrochemical tycoon (surprise!) from India, will be a 27-story skyscraper in downtown Mumbai. Forbes mentions that hanging hydroponic gardens that "lower the energy footprint" of the house by absorbing heat and sunlight will dot the exterior of the first six floors. All of which, incidentally, are devoted to parking.

There's a slideshow here and an article here.

Via Archinect.

It's May Day, aka "International Workers' Day." We'd like to take a moment to celebrate the establishment of the eight-hour work day and advances in workers' rights more generally. In L.A., the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce is joining with protesters calling for immigration reform.

Foreign Policy and Prospect have released a list of the "Top 100 Public Intellectuals." The list is dominated by political scientists, economists, and journalists, but also includes many working in the natural sciences and a few of the world's "most introspective philosophers" (the most impressive kind).

The whole process of picking a "top" public intellectual is a little ridiculous but it's fun to browse their bios. Anyone you think really should have made the cut (other than Bill O'Reilly, obviously)?

We bet no one at Hill & Knowlton is smart enough to suggest this, but if the Chinese government really wants to endear itself to the rest of the world, it should kick the dopey Panda to the curb and adopt the Red Panda as the country's new national animal. Native to Southern China (and also—hello!—to Tibet), the Red Panda looks less like a bear and more like a raccoon or a cat; despite its name, its actual relationship to the familiar Giant Panda seems quite distant. An engangered species, the Red Panda simply happens to be the world's cutest animal, and we all know how powerful cuteness can be as an inducement to forgive or overlook various transgressions. Naturally, the Japanese, with their unsurpassed connoisseurship of cuteness, understand the Red Panda's appeal—an episode of "Genius! Shimura Zoo", in which the supercute Japanese hostess Becky is forced to share her apartment with a pair of mischievous Red Pandas stands as one of the signal achievements in the culture of kawaii. The Red Panda is also commonly referred to as the Lesser Panda—to which all we can say is: Please.

Tomorrow, the 27th day of Nisan in the Hebrew calendar, is Holocaust Remembrance Day. It's a sombre day, to say the least; but this year, it's also a day of giving.

The Hollywood director Zane Buzby (Golden Girls, Newhart, Married...with Children) has established The Survivor Mitzvah, which aims to raise $6 million (in honor of the six million Jews killed in the Holocaust) and distribute all of it to elderly survivors. The project's mission statement reminds us that "for many of these elderly and forgotten people, the war never really ended," but with our help, "they may live out their last years with some measure of comfort, support, and dignity."

As you may have heard, McCain and Clinton have both suggested we all stop paying the 18.4 cent-per-gallon excise tax on gas over the summer. They think this is a good idea (or, more likely, hoped the public would think so) because at first glance a gas tax holiday sounds like a sale on gas. Who wouldn't want a sale on gas?

People who study how money works, that's who. Economists across the political spectrum agree this is a bad idea.

Putting this in terms we can understand—frozen desserts—the Christian Science Monitor points out that "If a driver uses 10 gallons a week, he or she would save about $26 during the three months – enough to buy seven or eight milkshakes." So for only a handful of milkshakes per person, we'd suffer a huge administrative hassle, add to the deficit, and take a big step back in weaning ourselves off oil.

Pandering isn't new. The fact that the media and the pundits aren't biting is what surprises us. News shows can't find economists to support the plan on air, and Matt Yglesias even found a case of reporting on television (below). Is the media going to start dabbling in objectivity and insight again or is this a special case?

A while back we posted about the Texas-sized "island" of trash floating in the Pacific Ocean, and marveled that there weren't pictures of the monstrosity. Now we have them, thanks to the folks at Vice. They hired a boat and struck out for the North Pacific Gyre, the vortex of currents where the trash apparently accumulates. Check out the 12-part "Garbage Island" video series.

In episode nine they enter the gyre. What they encounter is an "unfathomable bummer." The trash hasn't gathered in a huge, amalgamated mass (this rumor was always a little suspect). That would have been a big problem, but one with clear boundaries. Instead, limitless volumes of plastic scraps are dispersed throughout the ocean, hopelessly entangled with the natural environment. It's bad news, we know, but worth confronting.

Via PSFK.

Barack Obama plays three-on-three.

Via Matthew Yglesias.

Kelly Cox is an integrated marketing specialist for the Natural Resources Defense Council. Here, she offers her thoughts on the NRDC, the necessity of sound policy, and what inspires her to go to work each day.

What does a $20 donation do for the NRDC?
With a $20 GOOD subscription, you’re adding your voice, in a sense, to our 1.2 million members and online activists. When we go to court, we go to court for you. It only increases our power. By joining the NRDC circle, you are helping to increase our strength in Congress to get better laws and policies made for our country.

How did you get involved?
Personally, I’ve always been an activist. My whole mantra is about just being responsible. So I don’t look at the environmental movement as “you’re either green or you’re out.” It’s more about self-awareness, being responsible, and picking up after yourself.

What is the hardest part of your job?
Right now it’s difficult from a communications perspective to cut through the green clutter. I always came from the perspective that if we’re not engaging a mass culture, we’ll fail.

Read the complete interview here.

Too frequently the slick, overly produced style of network television news shows ends up obscuring the actual subjects they're purportedly covering—most programs, despite the opportunities presented by the medium, are sadly more "tell" than "show." As a result, some of the more interesting glimpses of life in China can be seen via various scrappier and less polished outlets. Over the past couple of years, Current TV has presented a handful of China pieces, including stories on the influx of Western entrepreneurs trying to establish businesses in China, migrant labor, and the Chinese sex industry. The expat-run web-video concern Sexy Beijing TV produces quirky documentary snapshots on urban development and local culture, and Al Jazeera often runs China stories, including reports on the growing Chinese auto industry, and about Chinese workers brought to Italy to work in sweatshops operated by the country's textile industry.

A letter by the famously reclusive J.D. Salinger to his paramour Janet Eagleson (who he calls "Janet, old Son of Eagle") is on the block at eBay. In this private correspondence, Salinger uses fun new words like "scroll-y" and "socko-ness" and, on the subject of the cinema, says:

…Have seen no good movies, except The Last Metro…I got hooked into seeing Raiders of the Lost Ark, which might be excused for its unwitty, unfunny awful socko-ness if it had been put together by Harvard Lampoon seniors…

The thought of the almost-mythical Salinger sitting through an '80s action-adventure movie reminds us of Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure, when Ghengis Kahn, Socrates, and Beethoven all get lost in the San Dimas mall. Given Holden Caulfield's attitudes about Hollywood, however, we're not entirely surprised by the unfavorable review of Raiders.

Our friends at TakePart remind us that today is Free Cone Day at Ben & Jerry's stores. Is this a public relations stunt? Yes. Will it net you some delicious ice cream? Also yes. Find the Ben & Jerry's in your neighborhood here.

John Cleese visits a "laughing club" in India. Enjoy! It's impossible not to.

Via Boing Boing.

From New Scientist, a modular robot that can reassemble itself when broken apart.

As one commenter at YouTube points out, "this is the first step towards building a fully functional T-1000."

Thanks, Craig.

In "The Tuymans Experiment," the acclaimed Belgian painter Luc Tuymans and some art-world collaborators punk the plebes. The painter—whose work sells for millions at auction and whose importance is, we're assured, beyond dispute—paints a mural on a busy Antwerp street. A hidden camera records whether passersby stop to appreciate the work of a master. It's a thought-provoking video.


We're all for public art, and the modest Tuymans is a good sport. But, when only 4% of passersby stop, the narrator hopes that "these numbers will wake people up...[to] take more interest in art." We're a little uncomfortable with the suggestion that a busy student, or surgeon, or postal worker, is obligated to stop just because a Tuymans painting is there. After all, people routinely walk past entire museums full of art for perfectly good reasons.

Just for fun, we'd be curious to try the opposite experiment: take a painter without critical credentials, put them in a respected gallery, and secretly tape the praise of the aesthetes.

Thanks, Noella.

For his 30th birthday last month, New Yorker Scott Ballum embarked on the Consume®econnection Project, a year-long effort to meet the people who make the stuff he buys. For everything he consumes, Scott wants to establish a personal connection with someone along the production chain, be it a designer, a factory worker, or even a trucker.

He's chronicling the experience online. Barely two months in, Scott has already encountered some obstacles, but a recent trip to the Maker's Mark distillery in Loretto, Kentucky was rewarding. We'll be following the project with interest.

The Maker's Mark distillery in Loretto, Kentucky

When we finally snuck away from the pimento cheese finger sandwiches and headed towards some buildings not on the tour, we found ourselves approaching a tall, burly fellow in a brown MM sweatshirt, work boots, and well-worn cowboy hat. A Godsend.

Jude is a barrel-roller. He is one of about 18 guys who rolls empty barrels off trucks from the warehouse into the cistern, where they are filled with whiskey ready to become bourbon, and then rolls the full barrels back onto another truck to go back to the warehouse. 360 barrels a day, each one 150 pounds empty, 500+ pounds full. But as Jude put it, "It's not so bad, you let the whiskey do the work."

Given that all of the Maker's Mark Bourbon in the world is distilled in Loretto, and that Jude is one of only eighteen people who move these barrels, there's a high likelihood that much of the Maker's I've consumed in bars or at home, and will continue to consume, was aged in barrels he's rolled.

Vats of bourbon