It’s the end of an era as the the Space Shuttle Atlantis lifted off for its last flight this morning. Watching Atlantis lift off gave me a great shot of nostalgia from the early days of the shuttle program when I was a kid. Here are some screen shots I took from NASA’s broadcast this morning.

I’ve been a reader of Roger Ebert’s blog since he started writing it. Most of his posts are about as profound as it gets. Reading his stories ranging in diversity from his own history and childhood to the loneliness of isolation he feels from those that leave comments on his blog, one is left with little doubt why the famous critic was drawn to journalism — he’s an amazing writer.

When he lost his lower jaw to cancer in 2006, he lost the ability to eat and speak. However, he certainly didn’t lose his voice. In this moving talk from TED2011, Ebert and his wife, Chaz, with friends Dean Ornish and John Hunter, come together to tell his remarkable story.

Hit play or watch Roger Ebert’s talk on TED.com.

Somewhat (but not really) related: Roger Ebert has been entering the New Yorker’s cartoon caption contest almost weekly since it began and this week, he is a finalist for the first time. (New Yorker link).

Do something nice for someone you don’t know very well. If you’re not sure what that is, try introducing them to someone else. I’m amazed at the unseen rewards that happen when you introduce someone. You get (at least some) credit for all the good that comes of that new relationship.

I love this:

Tom Brokaw Explains Canada to Americans – YouTube

P.S. Parliament has been prorogued during the Olympics so Harper’s little flag waving speech was actually given at the British Columbia legislature.

As a private with the 106th Infantry Division, Kurt Vonnegut, along with five other battalion scouts, wandered behind enemy lines for several days during the Rhineland Campaign and became cut off from their battalion. They were captured by Wehrmacht troops on December 14, 1944 and imprisoned in Dresden, Germany.

While a prisoner, he witnessed the controversial fire bombing of Dresden in February 1945 which destroyed most of the city. The Germans held Vonnegut in an an ad hoc detention facility that had originally been an underground slaughterhouse meat locker. This experience was the inspiration for his famous novel, Slaughterhouse-Five.

A month later he wrote his family from a repatriation camp informing them of his capture and survival:

See the rest of the letter at Letters of Note – Slaughterhouse Five.

Chris Martin and Mick Dawson set off in a 23ft long and 6ft wide boat from Choshi, Japan on Friday 8th May 2009 and arrived in the San Francisco Bay under the Golden Gate Bridge last Friday 13th November 2009 becoming the first crew to row unsupported across the North Pacific Ocean.

Chris and Mick photograph their historic entrance into the San Francisco Bay.

Within seconds I looked up and saw the underside of the bridge. A shotgun sounded off to our left indicating that we had made it. We had rowed across the North Pacific Ocean. After over half a year of giving everything we had to the ocean and this breathtaking, life changing an historic moment was our most welcome reward. I looked round at Mick who held out his hand which I gladly shook. The rest of the trip into land was a bit surreal.

Check out the video that Mick produced in preparation for his attempt:

[Golden Gate Endeavour | YouTube]

They kept a blog of their daily progress at http://www.goldengateendeavour.com/.

Not exactly “backmasking” or even reverse speech, but I loved the feeling this creative prose evoked when it started to go backwards.

[Lost Generation - YouTube]

From http://www.googlelunarxprize.org/:

“The Google Lunar X PRIZE is a $30 million competition for the first privately funded team to send a robot to the moon, travel 500 meters and transmit video, images and data back to the Earth.”

[Moon 2.0 - YouTube]

Cheesy video? Yes. Feeling inspired anyway? How could you not?

Randy Pausch, gives a wonderful and exuberant “last lecture”. He’s currently struggling with pancreatic cancer but hasn’t let it get him down at all.

Almost all of us have childhood dreams: for example, being an astronaut, or making movies or video games for a living. Sadly, most people don’t achieve theirs, and I think that’s a shame. I had several specific childhood dreams, and I’ve actually achieved most of them. More importantly, I have found ways, in particular the creation (with Don Marinelli), of CMU’s Entertainment Technology Center (etc.cmu.edu), of helping many young people actually *achieve* their childhood dreams. This talk will discuss how I achieved my childhood dreams (being in zero gravity, designing theme park rides for Disney, and a few others), and will contain realistic advice on how *you* can live your life so that you can make your childhood dreams come true, too.

By the way, producer/director J.J. Abrams of “Lost,” and “Mission Impossible III” fame (among others) asked Randy if he’d like to be in the new Star Trek movie that he’s directing, sort of fulfilling another of Randy’s dreams to be Captain Kirk (he’s not going to be captain, but it’s still pretty cool).

My very good friend, Louise, wrote Derek Powazek (founder of JPG Mag, husband to Heather Champ of Flickr fame and Leta’s Internet Godfather) to ask him if he’s ever regretted his transparency on the web.

Derek’s response: Never tell a story like it’s not about you. In answering her question, he reminds us why it is we keep sites like this. It gives me encouragement to write more about myself, rather than just link-posting which is what I’ve found myself doing a lot lately.

Last January Mike Wesch, an assistant professor of cultural anthropology at Kansas State University, brought us Web 2.0 … The Machine is Us/ing Us.

Last month he released this follow-up video focusing on the information, technology, taxonomy theme. It’s called Information R/evolution (runtime 5:28).

[Information R/evolution - YouTube]

Ze Frank’s extremely popular show, “The Show” is over, but Ze’s still blogging and creating music. Check out A Social Network for Two, a classy love song for our time.

Yoko Ono is about to unveil the Imagine Peace Tower in Videy Island, Reykjavik, Iceland on October 9th 2007, John Lennon’s birthday. The tower will exist in the form of light shooting into the sky and symbolizes love, peace, and harmony.

Despite what some may criticize as a new age, hippie, pipe dream—I think it’s pretty nice.

The IMAGINE PEACE TOWER is an artwork conceived by Yoko Ono in memory of John Lennon.

It is dedicated to peace and bears the inscription IMAGINE PEACE in 24 languages.

Its construction and installation is a collaboration between Yoko Ono, the City of Reykjavik, Reykjavik Art Museum and Reykjavik Energy.

The work is in the form of a wishing well from which a very strong and tall tower of light emerges. The strength, intensity and brilliance of the light tower continually changes as the particles in the air fluctuate with the prevailing weather and atmospheric conditions unique to Iceland.

Every year it will light up between October 9th (Lennon’s birthday) and December 8th (the day of his death).

In addition the IMAGINE PEACE TOWER will be lit on New Year’s Eve, during the first week of spring and on some rare special occasions agreed between the City and Yoko Ono.

Accordion Guy, Joey deVilla, shares a story about a recent Craiglist wedding. His wedding music choice put a smile on my face.

I wonder how many opportunities like this we pass up everyday?

(via)

Previously: Blogging Saves Lives and Accordian Guy’s Blog Lands Him in Trouble with Moving Bullies.

Paul Dunay, of Buzz Marketing for Technology has a recap of Malcolm Gladwell’s recent speech at the World Innovation Forum about, what else, innovation.

Paul found an opportunity to speak with Gladwell during the conference and recorded his interview.

Gladwell illustrates some of his points from his book, The Tipping Point, and what I found to be quite interesting, how the “last mile problem of marketing” is still trouble for marketers.

“The last mile in word of mouth marketing is personal relationships. At the end of the day I’m most powerfully influenced by those I know, respect and love,” explains Gladwell. The most complicated marketing scheme in the world won’t have a very strong affect on any given individual if the people that that individual trusts aren’t moved by the product.

Gladwell also talks a little bit about his new book. He says it’s about exceptional performers and high achievers, how they got there, and what we can learn from them.

Listen to the “Buzz Marketing for Technology’s” interview with Malcolm Gladwell.