A little Star Wars oragami to start your Friday off right.

Interesting article in the New York Times about a robot talent show in Brooklyn where artists and engineers highlighted the creative potential of machines. Most impressive was the autonomous Roving Walter Walter built by two Belgian artists from MXHz.org:

It darted around the floor as if it were R2-D2, sampling sounds from the room that were meant to inspire its own audio stream. On Saturday it would emit only a low repetitive growl. But Guy van Belle, one of its creators, refused to tinker with its algorithms, saying the robot knew best.

"We have to allow our autonomous robots to make their own decisions, whether the humans like it or not," he said.

The Parisian Asphalt Initiative is a non-profit organization dedicated to raising the money to completely pave the nation of France with blacktop, increasing Europe's parking a thousandfold. Interested? Learn more, here.

A bad week for security devices. Seems that black felt-tip markers and Jell-o can be a hacker's best friend.

Two words: Ha, ha.

Technology buffs have cracked music publishing giant Sony Music's elaborate disc copy-protection technology with a decidedly low-tech method: scribbling around the rim of a disk with a felt-tip marker.

Full story here.

Fun pictures of Miss Kittin, Golden Boy and other assorted characters from Electropop at Tonimolkerei, Zürich, March '02 here.

Tonight.

Ishkur has attempted what mere mortals such as myself have only contemplated in dreams – to create a complete categorization and what looks to be the beginnings of an etymology for all the various genres and sub-genres of electronic music. Although by no means is it perfect or complete, it’s quite a good start for an overwhelmingly ambitious project. Check out his well done Guide to Electronic Music (requires Flash 5).

So yesterday, I finally went to go see Spider-Man. I didn't have very high expectations, which I suppose was good, because I ended up being pleasantly surprised and really enjoying it. I mean, it certainly wasn't a life changing event, but it was fun, and Tobey Maguire did a great job as Peter Parker. All in all, it was $9 well spent.

January 2001 interview with Caroline Herve, a.k.a. Miss Kittin here.