Nikhil Dandekar › Comments

"The feather is an extraordinary biological invention and the key to the success of modern birds. It has to be light and flexible to give birds fine control over their airborne movements, but tough and strong enough to withstand the massive forces generated by high-speed flight. It achieves this through a complicated internal structure that we are only just beginning to fully understand, with the aid of unlikely research assistants - fungi." - Nikhil Dandekar from Bookmarklet

"San Francisco is my first in a series of themes on place. I didn’t choose this city because I live here and love it. Not entirely. I picked it because I know it. I will need help when I feature Cuba. I will need a larger, more distributed community when I tackle beyond-the-stereotypes Detroit. Even for New York or Paris, I will need help from someone who understands the backstreets and can read between the lines. But San Francisco I can feature now, and with any luck, I can show how a place can be relevant even if you don’t live there, haven’t been, or don’t like it. Cities have durable personalities that radiate through the veils of different light and different eyes. I’ve scattered in quotes about San Francisco’s character from Pictory members and famous figures, and at the end of this showcase you’ll find another kind of portrait of the city by the bay. Here’s to the first of many features on place. I hope it makes you think again — or take a new photograph, or tell a new story — about where you live." - Nikhil Dandekar from Bookmarklet

"At first glance, the Copenhagen climate summit seems like a Salvador Dali dreamscape. I just saw Archbishop Desmond Tutu being followed by a swarm of Japanese students who were dressed as aliens and carrying signs saying "Take Me To Your Leader" and "Is Your Species Crazy?". Before that, a group of angry black-clad teenage protesters who were carrying spray cans started quoting statistics to me about how much carbon dioxide the atmosphere can safely absorb. (It's 350 parts per million they pointed out, before sucking their teeth.) Before that, I saw a couple in a pantomime cow costume being attacked by the police, who accused them of throwing stones with their hooves. But the surrealism runs deeper and darker than this. Inside the Bella Centre, the rich world's leaders are defiantly ignoring their scientists and refusing to sign a deal that will prevent our climate from being dramatically destabilised. The scientific consensus shows the rich world needs to cut 40 per cent of our... more... - Nikhil Dandekar from Bookmarklet

"And so it is fitting that the biggest progress on building an external brain also comes from chaos.  Search engines pick out the gems in a democratic sea of competing signals, helping us find the brilliance that we seek.  Occasionally, our external brain leads us astray, as does our internal brain, but therein lies both the risk and beauty of building a brain on disorder." - Nikhil Dandekar from Bookmarklet

"london’s underground became the first subway system in the world when it began operation in 1863. since then, underground subways have been built in almost every major city of the world. from new york and paris to hong kong and dubai, subways are an essential part of public transportation in cities. within these systems, architecture plays a big role in defining the environment of the subway. here is a collection of some of the most architecturally interesting subway stations." - Nikhil Dandekar from Bookmarklet

"Lord Nicholas Stern, the British economist who produced an influential report on the potential costs of global warming, is strongly urging the British public to go vegetarian in order to slow the accumulation of heat-trapping gases in our atmosphere. Said Stern: “Meat is a wasteful use of water and creates a lot of greenhouse gases. It puts enormous pressure on the world’s resources. A vegetarian diet is better” [The Times]. Stern also suggested that climate change legislation that makes it more expensive to generate greenhouse gases could soon force meat producers to raise prices, which might lower consumption." - Alexander Kruel from Bookmarklet

Always ask questions, I agree, silly or not. But there's no need to sit in the dark eating cabbages - but why not think of impact and sustainability when making decisions, and when the compromise is tolerable choose sustainable? That won't give a crazy advantage to china, because if you choose local properly made high quality goods over cheap disposable goods, for example, you're feeding your local economy - Joelle Nebbe (iphigenie)

"India's Supreme Court has asked the government to consider whether it might legalise prostitution if it is unable to curb it effectively. The court said legalising prostitution would help in the monitoring of the trade and rehabilitating sex workers. " - Nikhil Dandekar from Bookmarklet

"When you say it is the world's oldest profession and you are not able to curb it by laws, why don't you legalise it?" Judges Dalveer Bhandari and AK Patnaik asked a government solicitor. "You can then monitor the trade, rehabilitate and provide medical aid to those involved." The solicitor said that he would look into the court's suggestions. "The [sex workers] have been operating in... more... - Nikhil Dandekar

Fifth Element. Wait, I haven't seen Wayne's World. But does it have Milla Jovovich? No. So there you go. - Jandy, ConcertMaven of FF

H...hated fifth element?! Another strike Anika, first it was pancakes...now FE! *disdain* - Mo Kargas

"1000 years in the future, the legacy of John, Paul, Greg, and Scottie remains." - Nikhil Dandekar from Bookmarklet

"Lakes have been the source of fascination for geologists, historians and general mankind for thousands of years. Coming in every shape, size, age, colour and depth you can imagine, they are natural wonders to behold and often the source of fear at what lurks beneath. With that in mind, we have scaled the globe and selected some of the most dramatic, breathtaking and potentially dangerous lakes you're ever likely to discover…" - Nikhil Dandekar from Bookmarklet

"Nomura’s jellyfish is a very large Japanese jellyfish. It is in the same size class as the lion’s mane jellyfish, the largest cnidarian in the world. The diameter of these jellyfish is slightly greater than the height of an average fully grown man. It grows 2 meters (6 feet 7 inches) in diameter and weighing up to 220 kg (about 450 pounds), Nomura’s jellyfish live principally in the waters between China and Japan, mainly in the central Yellow Sea and East China Sea. Nomura’s jellyfish has plagued the seas of Japan from 2005 up to the present. The unintentional attacks brought by this kind of creatures have severed the fishing industries of the affected regions in Japan as well as the balanced food chains in the seas." - Nikhil Dandekar from Bookmarklet

"I decided that because this woman thought it was okay to make me feel uncomfortable in my home, I would retaliate and make her feel just as uncomfortable, if not more. This woman was wearing a ankle-length corduroy skirt, which, as we all know, is a fashion nono. So, in order to make her feel uncomfortable, I stood next to her and held a sign that said Corduroy skirts are a sin! I don't think I have ever drawn so much attention in my life. SO many people asked to take a picture with me, I got laughs, high fives and there were the few that even cursed off the woman standing behind me. As I drew interest to what was going on with myself and the woman with the hateful sign, I started to draw a crowd that stood with me in support. Before I knew it I had 100+ people holding signs for gay rights asking people to honk their horns to support. I was interviewed by a news station, and more than 5 student organization papers, and the post standard of syracuse. I never expected anybody to come... more... - Nikhil Dandekar from Bookmarklet

yay to Chris Pesto for not putting up with that crap! and ya to the people in Syracuse who supported him! :) This totally made me smile :) - Anna Lynn M.

I love how humor drew more support than a more serious approach would have (most likely). - Laura Norvig

"A picture is worth a thousand words that is the motto of photojournalist, a photojournalist attempts to produce straight, truthful and realistic photography of a particular subject, most frequently pictures of people. According to Mark M. Hancock, a professional photojournalist, “is a visual reporter of facts. The public places trust in its reporters to tell the truth. The same trust is extended to photojournalists as visual reporters.This responsibility is paramount to a photojournalist. At all times, we have many thousands of people seeing through our eyes and expecting to see the truth. Most people immediately understand an image.” Photojournalists are doing really a great job over the world for humanity, they are working for peace, for human rights, for raising humanity problems and issues, for pointing out the people living below the bottom line of poverty, for raising awareness about educational and child labor issues and much more… Our today’s post is about Inspirational... more... - Nikhil Dandekar from Bookmarklet

"Some frequent questions about the H1N1 Swine Flu vaccine answered as clearly and as visually as I could manage. A few people asked for this so I thought I would oblige. It was hell on earth to research. There’s a jungle of science around H1N1. Very hard to hack through. You can check all my sources here." - Nikhil Dandekar from Bookmarklet

"This summer, Glacier Park Magazine editor Chris Peterson undertook a photographic project to take photos of Montana's Glacier National Park over 100 consecutive days, starting on May 1, 2009, for a traveling photo show in 2010 to commemorate Glacier's Centennial. He used a mix of film and digital cameras, including an 8 by 10 field camera, a Kodak Pocket Vest camera, circa 1909, and a Speed Graphic, among others. His idea was to use the cameras that would have been used over the course of the Park's 100 years. While Chris was kind enough to share some of his photos below, you really should check out his whole set of 100. All photos and captions are from Chris Peterson." - Nikhil Dandekar from Bookmarklet

"“I HAVE heard rumors of visitors who were disappointed,” J. B. Priestley once said of the Grand Canyon. “The same people will be disappointed at the Day of Judgment.”" - Nikhil Dandekar from Bookmarklet

"National Geographic's International Photography Contest attracts thousands of entries from photographers of all skill levels around the world every year. While this year's entry deadline has passed, there is still time to view and vote for your favorites in the Viewer's Choice competition. National Geographic was kind enough to let me choose a few of their entries from 2009 for display here on The Big Picture. Collected below are 25 images from the three categories of People, Places and Nature. Captions were written by the individual photographers." - Nikhil Dandekar from Bookmarklet

Natural vs Artificial - Nikhil Dandekar from Bookmarklet

"THE YEAR WAS 2081, and everybody was finally equal. They weren't only equal before God and the law. They were equal every which way. Nobody was smarter than anybody else. Nobody was better looking than anybody else. Nobody was stronger or quicker than anybody else. All this equality was due to the 211th, 212th, and 213th Amendments to the Constitution, and to the unceasing vigilance of agents of the United States Handicapper General. Some things about living still weren't quite right, though. April for instance, still drove people crazy by not being springtime. And it was in that clammy month that the H-G men took George and Hazel Bergeron's fourteen-year-old son, Harrison, away. - Nikhil Dandekar from Bookmarklet

"The Dalai Lama is a wonderful chap. He is wise and full of good humour and has led a peaceful resistance movement for half a century. His antagonist, the Chinese government, is hard to sympathise with. It is a regime that has committed gross crimes in the past and continues to deny its citizens certain basic human rights. It is not surprising, then, that the Dalai Lama's cause finds favour across the globe. The demand for Tibetan independence, unfortunately, is backed by arguments that twist history, misinform the public and are on occasion willfully deceptive." - Nikhil Dandekar from Bookmarklet

"Almost a year after Barack Obama ascended to the White House, many of his supporters are bemused. His healthcare bill is a hefty improvement but it still won't provide coverage for all Americans, and may not provide a public alternative to the over-charging insurance companies - if it passes at all. His environmental team is vandalising the vital Copenhagen conference by saying the US – the single biggest emitter of warming gases – will not sign up to any legally binding restrictions there. He has placed the deregulation-fanatics who caused the New Depression, like Lawrence Summers, in charge of the recovery. Despite the real improvements on Bush – such as the end of torture, the resumption of stem-cell research, and opposition to the coup in Honduras – many people are asking: why he is delivering so little, so slowly?" - Nikhil Dandekar from Bookmarklet

"On this day, ninety-one years ago, the guns that raged over the battlefields of Europe for more than four years fell silent. Never before had slaughter on such an industrial scale been conceived of, and never again would the lives of those who survived, or the collective consciousness of the nations who suffered, be the same again. Environmental Graffiti has compiled a collection of rare colour photographs, illuminating in grim detail the horrors of a war that set a precedent for bloody conflict in the twentieth century." - Nikhil Dandekar from Bookmarklet

"Notice that after the birth of rock & roll in the 1950’s, the production of “great songs” peaked in the 60’s, remained strong in the 70’s, but drastically fell in the subsequent decades. It would seem that, like oil, the supply of great musical ideas is finite. By the end of the 70’s, The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, the Motown greats, and other genre innovators quickly extracted the best their respective genres** had to offer, leaving little supply for future musicians." - Nikhil Dandekar from Bookmarklet

"Havana, the capital city of the island nation of Cuba is home to nearly 4 million people - 20% of the entire population of Cuba. On November 16th the city will celebrate its 490th anniversary, being founded by the Spanish in 1519. Havana is also the seat of the state-run economy, one that has been faltering more and more in recent years. President Raul Castro has even gone so far as to warn Cubans that their socialist system must change - and to invite (limited) criticism of the state. Cuba's economic woes are compounded by the 50-year-old trade embargo imposed by the United States, a practice recently condemned (again) by the United Nations with a vote of 187-3. Collected here are recent photos from in and around Havana, Cuba." - Nikhil Dandekar from Bookmarklet

Pretty neat... - Nikhil Dandekar from Bookmarklet

"Twenty years ago, on the night of November 9, 1989, following weeks of pro-democracy protests, East German authorities suddenly opened their border to West Germany. After 28 years as prisoners of their own country, euphoric East Germans streamed to checkpoints and rushed past bewildered guards, many falling tearfully into the arms of West Germans welcoming them on the other side. Thousands of Germans and world leaders gathered in Berlin yesterday to celebrate the "Mauerfall" - the dismantling of the Berlin Wall and German reunification - and to remember the approximately 100-200 who died attempting to cross the border over the years. Collected here are photographs both historic and recent, from the fall of the Berlin Wall. Be sure to pause on photos 12 - 15, and click them to see a fade effect from before to after." - Nikhil Dandekar from Bookmarklet

"Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg won re-election Tuesday, but voters were less enthusiastic about him than the last time he ran in 2005. The mayor did well in high-income white areas of Manhattan and Queens, and also in election districts dominated by immigrants, like Flushing and Brighton Beach. But his vote fell sharply in black neighborhoods, especially southeast Queens, where the black middle class has been hard-hit by foreclosure." - Nikhil Dandekar from Bookmarklet

"Sixty years ago, the Soviet Union detonated its first nuclear weapon, nicknamed "First Lightning", at a test facility on the steppe of northeast Kazakhstan (formerly the Kazakh SSR). The test site, named the Semipalatinsk Polygon, would go on to host 456 atomic explosions over its 40-year existence. Residents in the surrounding area became unwitting guinea pigs, exposed to the aftereffects of the bombs both intentionally and unintentionally. The radiation has silently devastated three generations of people in Kazakhstan - the total number affected is thought to be more than one million - creating health problems ranging from thyroid diseases, cancer, birth defects, deformities, premature aging, and cardiovascular diseases. Life expectancy in the area is seven years less than the national average of Kazakhstan. Photographer Ed Ou has graciously shared with us these photos from the area, with thanks to the excellent" - Nikhil Dandekar from Bookmarklet

Sure Demetrios... - Nikhil Dandekar

"Among the many questions raised by photographs of child beauty pageant contestants, there is the question of how we are to view them. Are these images art or exploitation? Creep show or camp? The little faces spackled with makeup, the hair poufed and shellacked, the fake tans, fake teeth (called "flippers," they mask baby teeth), fake nails and, often, fake smiles -- all of it seems so jarring on toddlers and tweens. Looking at these pictures, shot by Los Angeles-based fashion photographer Susan Anderson and recently published in a book called "High Glitz: The Extravagant World of Child Beauty Pageants," you can’t help feeling unsettled. The mind knows these are very young girls, and yet the eerie effect of all the cosmetics and correctives is to create the illusion of child-women far older than their actual years. Several seem to be on the cusp of middle age, as though they should be shaking a martini rather than twirling a baton. The mind keeps mentally adjusting, attempting to... more... - Nikhil Dandekar from Bookmarklet

Hahaha... this sounds familiar. - Nikhil Dandekar from Bookmarklet