Vodaphone and Nokia building 4G network for the moon

Vodaphone Germany and Nokia are designing a 4G network for the moon. The network is meant to support PTScientists's "Mission to the Moon" that involves the Berlin-based company launching a lunar lander and two moon rovers aboard a SpaceX rocket in 2019, the 50th anniversary of the first moon landing. (PTSScientists was one of the teams competing in the Google Lunar XPRIZE that's ending this month without a winner.) From Space.com:

Vodafone picked Nokia to build a space-worthy version of its Ultra Compact Network, one that will be the lightest ever made, at just 2.2 lbs. (1 kilogram) — no heavier than a bag of sugar, Vodafone representatives said in a statement.

"This project involves a radically innovative approach to the development of mobile network infrastructure," Vodafone Germany CEO Hannes Ametsreiter said in the same statement. "It is also a great example of an independent, multi-skilled team achieving an objective of immense significance through their courage, pioneering spirit and inventiveness."

Under the plan, PTScientists' ALINA lander will use the 4G network to beam the first live HD video feed from the surface of the moon. The signal, which will operate in the 1,800-MHz frequency band, "will be broadcast to a global audience via a deep space link that interconnects with the PTScientists server in the Mission Control Centre in Berlin," according to the statement.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sj0fiA5J0Gk

The Light Phone 2 is designed to be used as little as possible

The makers of the Light Phone 2 want you to leave your smartphone at home, and use this simple phone with calling, messaging, and an e-ink display instead. You can pre-order one on Indiegogo for $199. If it also had a Kindle app, I might buy one, but I guess that goes against the whole point.

The Light Phone 2 is a 4G phone with a beautiful black & white matte display. It's a more reliable, durable, and practical phone than its predecessor. It brings a few essential tools to the Light Phone, like messaging, an alarm clock, or a ride home, so you can 'go light' more often... or for good!

Premiere of “Heathers” TV series will be delayed out of respect for those affect by Florida school murders

Viacom issued a statement this afternoon that the “Heathers” TV series, which was scheduled to premiere on March 7, will be delayed "out of respect for the [Florida shooting] victims, their families and loved ones." They should also probably stop saying the series is "based on the killer cult classic."

Paramount Network’s original series "Heathers" is a satirical comedy that takes creative risks in dealing with many of society’s most challenging subjects ranging from personal identity to race and socio-economic status to gun violence. While we stand firmly behind the show, in light of the recent tragic events in Florida and out of respect for the victims, their families and loved ones, we feel the right thing to do is delay the premiere until later this year.

Image: Paramount Network/Youtube

Here's an expandable vault to protect students during routine school shootings

https://youtu.be/D9nQmKNtOY4

If the GOP and NRA have their way, frequent mass murders of students in classrooms will continue to be the new normal. A South Carolina company called Big 6 has developed an expandable vault that can be installed in classrooms as a place for children (or, as some conservatives call them, "crisis actors") to hide when an active shooter tries to kill them.

The VAST6 is an innovative collapsible active shooter protection, available for entry in less than 20 seconds and meets FEMA 453 active shooter ballistic requirements and certified F-5 Tornado protection from FEMA P-361 specifications.

When the VAST6 is folded way, it is only 28" thick and takes up limited floor space. The VAST6 unit itself can be scaled to fit just about any class size to make sure there is room for everyone to feel safe and secure.

The ballistic panels meet FEMA Manual 453, National Institute of Justice Level III, and UL 752, Level 8 requirements.

What does that mean? The VAST6 stops .308 ball/7.62 mm rifle lead core full metal copper jacket, military ball, 150 grain at 2,750 feet per second. To put in simply, the VAST6 will stop bullets from pistols, shotguns and semi-automatic rifles such as the AK-47, AR-15 and AR-10. The ballistic material exceeds the protection elements comparable steel. The ballistic panels of the VAST6 will absorb the bullet which will prevent ricochets while at the same time will not spall (flakes of a material that are broken off of the wall when a bullet hits that wall from the other side. This causes that material to become projectiles themselves) on the inside walls.

Hey, Sydney! I'm coming to see you tonight (then Adelaide and Wellington!)

I'm just about to go to the airport to fly to Sydney for tonight's event, What should we do about Democracy? (more…)

Video: How old folks talked in 1929

Dinotopia artist James Gurney writes: Old people were lively and well spoken a century ago. Some of the people in these video clips were born earlier than 1840, with one man vividly recalling an event he witnessed in the Civil War."

My short story about better cities, where networks give us the freedom to schedule our lives to avoid heat-waves and traffic jams

I was lucky enough to be invited to submit a piece to Ian Bogost's Atlantic series on the future of cities (previously: James Bridle, Bruce Sterling, Molly Sauter, Adam Greenfield); I told Ian I wanted to build on my 2017 Locus column about using networks to allow us to coordinate our work and play in a way that maximized our freedom, so that we could work outdoors on nice days, or commute when the traffic was light, or just throw an impromptu block party when the neighborhood needed a break. (more…)

The latest "reflection attack" gooses Denial of Service attacks by a factor of 51,000

To launch an effective Denial of Service attack, your bots need to overwhelm your target with a flood of requests; the more bandwidth and computing-power your target has, the more you need to knock them off the internet. (more…)

Simone "Shitty Robots" Giertz hunts a robot and eats its tofu

https://youtu.be/c3PLJnKPn6g

Simone Giertz is the beloved creator of a series of Shitty Robots, and now she's working at longer lengths, having created hilariously profane, shitty-robot-themed show about vegetarianism and robots, which culminates in the construction, stalking, killing and eating of a tofu-impregnated robot that she and Adam Savage built. It's pretty much perfect. (via Beyond the Beyond)

How citizenship-for-sale and statelessness change cities

James Bridle (previously) is the latest contributor to The Atlantic's excellent series on the future of cities (Bruce Sterling, Molly Sauter, Adam Greenfield); in a new piece, Greenfield discusses the phenomenon of "virtual citizenship," and how it affects cities that are either turned into dumping-grounds for inconvenient poor people, or rootless, tax-dodging one-percenters. (more…)

Watch this 3D-printed Killmonger spear get made

Darrell aka The Broken Nerd created this cool Killmonger spear from glimpses he caught in Black Panther. It turned out really great. (more…)

Watch: The Yes Men's short documentary on the NRA's murder-happy nature

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GvnyFPKX8-A

In 2016, the Yes Men (previously), everyone's favorite political pranksters, hoaxed the NRA: today, they've released their short documentary, which lays bare the NRA's internal culture of racist-driven fear and gun-humping murderous fantasies. (more…)

Cotton balls turned into a colorful garden tool handle

Peter Brown decided to dye some cotton balls, soak them in resin, then turn the resulting form on a lathe to make a delightful colored handle for a refurbished garden tool. (more…)

As a boy, Ronald Clark literally lived in a New York Public Library

In the 1940s, Ronald Clark's father was a custodian at the New York Public Library's Washington Heights Branch. That meant he and his family lived in an apartment in the library. Here's an animated StoryCorps video about Clark's childhood in "The Temple of Knowledge" and "creeping down to the stacks in the middle of the night when curiosity gripped him."

Drugs in the bible

Over at pop archaeology site Ancient Origins, Danny Nemu considers the psychoactive plants referenced in the Bible:

The Odyssey and the Vedas include verses still recited today that describe psychoactive plants and their effects, but the most impressive stash is in the Bible:

Thy plants are an orchard of Pomegranates, with fresh and pleasant things; Henna, with Spikenard. Spikenard and Saffron; Kaneh-bosem and Cinnamon, all trees of Frankincense; Myrrh and Agarwood, with all the chief spices.

Of the ‘chief spices' (literally ‘head spices’) listed in this paradisiacal garden from the Songs of Solomon, eight are identified and seven of them are known to tweak the brain. Both of the resinous gifts of the Magi, for example, are classed as tranquillizers today, though the label doesn’t do them justice. Myrrh targets mu- and delta-opioid receptors (like opium), and frankincense contains dehydroabietic acid which works on GABA receptors (like Valium)...

In Islamic jurisprudence, saffron is classed as one of the permissible “drugs that cause joy”. It contains the GABA agonist safranal, as well as safrole which is used in the manufacture of MDMA

"Getting High with the Most High: Drugs in the Bible" (Ancient Origins)

Image: "Delicate saffron threads, plucked from crocus flowers and dried" by Huberti

Watch how to make transparent potato chips

Barry Lewis from My Virgin Kitchen decided to make clear potato crisps, and they look amazing, like little starchy dried jellyfish. (more…)

A list of all 8 fonts used on the Srirachi bottle label

Fonts in Use took a stab at identifying all of the fonts used in the Srirachi bottle label, which breaks all design rules but still looks awesome.

Both the packaging and contents of tương ớt sriracha hot chili sauce bottles from Huy Fong Foods, Inc. have become condiment icons in recent decades. Sometimes referred to as “rooster sauce” because of the rooster on its label (the illustrator of which is unknown), the chili sauce features a chaotic jumble of elements on its packaging in multiple writing systems.

The most prominent Latin text elements are rendered in a variety of informal script typefaces released by American Type Founders in the 20th century, namely Balloon and its shaded counterpart, Balloon Drop Shadow, as well as Brody. Smaller text on the back of the bottle is set in Impress and Tekton.

Unfortunately my skills with recognizing fonts for Chinese text aren’t good enough to identify those used on the label. Any insight is welcome.

[via Kottke]

Image by Guilhem Vellut from Paris, France - Song Huong @ Paris, CC BY 2.0, Link

Toner 2-pack for Brother laser printers: $8

Life has become immeasurably better ever since I swore off inkjet printers and started using a laser printer exclusively. Unless you must have color print outs, laser printers are faster and less likely to have problems. I have an older model similar to this one. Brother sells toner cartridges for $54, but you can buy a 2-pack of toner cartridges for $8 when you apply coupon code AZ18LV2P at final checkout on Amazon.

Watch how to make hard candy that has a sunflower inside

Greg at Public Displays of Confection created this delightful honey-flavored crystal candy with a sunflower pattern inside. It's really cool to see how they did it. (more…)

Elfquest concludes 40-year run

Elfquest, one of the first breakout indie comics of the 1970s, is ending its 40-year-run with today's issue. There's a farewell signing with creators Wendy and Richard Pini tonight at Things From Another World in Portland -- if you can make it, tell them hi from me!

There'll be more Elfquest in future, the Pinis say, but this wraps up the tale for their towheaded Wolfrider chief Cutter and his family.

MILWAUKIE, Ore., (February 14, 2018) — All good things must come to an end. Today, Dark Horse Comics is both proud and sad to announce the end of “ElfQuest: The Final Quest.” After 40 years of genre bending and award-winning content, Wendy and Richard Pini are stepping away from their beloved series to take a well-deserved break and to focus on other projects and ventures.

“How simple, like the closing of a door, a 40-year labor of love comes to the conclusion we ordained so long ago,” explained artist Wendy Pini. “Richard and I can barely express our joy at the love we’re receiving from fans around the world. We return that love and look forward to our continued association with Dark Horse. Nothing’s more fun for us than being the guiding hands behind other creators’ interpretations of the elves.”

“I’ve followed ElfQuest since it’s very first publication. It took me several decades to finally bring Richard and Wendy’s wonderful creation to Dark Horse, and we’re proud they’ve chosen us to present the final chapters of their epic story,” said Mike Richardson, Dark Horse president and founder. “As a publisher, I couldn’t find better people to work with. As a fan, I couldn’t be more honored.”

A number of interviews sprang up this week but those with The Hollywood Reporter and SyFy are best. Both contain spoilers!

Previously at Boing Boing:
• The Secret History
• The Original Legacy of Elfquest
• All 6500 pages of Elfquest online
• Friendly darkness in the palace of utopian fantasy

#ENOUGH: Striking instant camera photos memorialize victims of Chicago gun violence

Last year, photographer Jim Young visited murder scenes and memorials in Chicago and documented what he saw with an instant camera. Last year, there were 650 murders in the area with 90 percent of them involving guns. Enough. “Though most of the [memorials] are gone,” Young says, “their photographs will be forever, and I hope memories [of the victims] will be, too.” See the series at FOTO: "Behind the Bullets"

Image above:

On Sept. 21, Manuel Hernandez was in a car when a minivan pulled up beside him. Someone in that van opened fire, killing the 30-year-old father of two girls. Pictured: the shattered glass of a nearby restaurant, hit by a stray bullet.

Twin sisters Addison and Makayla Henning loved riding their bikes. They were just shy of 6 years old when their mother, Celisa Henning, shot them in a murder-suicide on Aug. 31, 2017. The twins’ grandmother said Celisa Henning had suffered health issues resulting from a car crash in 2015.

Damien Santoyo, 14, was killed by shots fired from a car while he stood on the steps of an apartment with two other boys on Aug. 6. His killers had reportedly yelled gang slogans as they drove by, but relatives said Santoyo was not involved in any gang activity. A football player in junior high school, he was weeks from beginning high school.

Marvel at this master of coin stacking

TANU is a master at the magical art of coin stacking. Don't sneeze... More on Twitter: @thumb_tani

(via Laughing Squid)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oWU-N6HyhX0

The 'mystery' of who built the earthen mounds in the Midwest was nothing but white dude propaganda

I've lived my whole life as a pale, red headed fella. So, I say this, with authority: white people are dicks.

According to Smithsonian.com, white pioneers and archeologists in the 18th and 19th centuries pumped out a bullshit story about Cahokia, once the largest Native American city north of Mexico, as having been built by the Welsh, Vikings, Hindus – anyone but the indigenous population:

The city of Cahokia is one of many large earthen mound complexes that dot the landscapes of the Ohio and Mississippi River Valleys and across the Southeast. Despite the preponderance of archaeological evidence that these mound complexes were the work of sophisticated Native American civilizations, this rich history was obscured by the Myth of the Mound Builders, a narrative that arose ostensibly to explain the existence of the mounds. Examining both the history of Cahokia and the historic myths that were created to explain it reveals the troubling role that early archaeologists played in diminishing, or even eradicating, the achievements of pre-Columbian civilizations on the North American continent, just as the U.S. government was expanding westward by taking control of Native American lands.

So yeah: it's hard to claim that you're displacing or irradiating a gaggle of savages when they prove themselves to be part of a society with a culture and history that's just as complex as your own.

Cahokia's collection of earthen mound structures aren't the only ones said to have been created by a mysterious group of builders. Similar sites can be found all over Ohio, the Mississippi Valley and well into the Southeast.

Image: Skubasteve834 - EN.Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0, Link

Video tour of VR World NYC

This video report looks at the current state of consumer arcade VR with VR World’s Head of Content Tommy Goodkin. (more…)

Criminals are laundering money by selling books of computer-generated gibberish on Amazon

Lower Days Ahead is an Amazon print on demand paperback book filled with nonsense sentences, the kind found in spam email to make its way past Bayesian filters. The author is "Patrick Reames" but when Reames received a 1099 form from Amazon he made $24,000 selling the book he was surprised, because he didn't write it or get any money from the sale of the book. It's likely that criminals are using Amazon's print on demand program to launder money.

From Krebs on Security:

Reames said he suspects someone has been buying the book using stolen credit and/or debit cards, and pocketing the 60 percent that Amazon gives to authors. At $555 a pop, it would only take approximately 70 sales over three months to rack up the earnings that Amazon said he made.

“This book is very unlikely to ever sell on its own, much less sell enough copies in 12 weeks to generate that level of revenue,” Reames said. “As such, I assume it was used for money laundering, in addition to tax fraud/evasion by using my Social Security number. Amazon refuses to issue a corrected 1099 or provide me with any information I can use to determine where or how they were remitting the royalties.”

Scientists in Antarctica watch the movie that inspired The Thing, every year.

Chock up another one for the women and men who work in Antarctica. Not only do they spent months on end slugging away for the betterment of humankind, they also mark the turning of the seasons by watching a film about a crew in their shoes being hunted by an alien threat.

iO9 reports that every year after scientists and logistical staff leave Antarctica for the winter, the skeleton crew that maintains one of the research stations over the winter months gathers to watch the 1951 sci-fi classic The Thing From Another World. The movie, which is as corny as you might imagine, still managed to be menacing enough to inspire John Carpenter to create The Thing, back in 1982. The best bit: The Antarctic winter crew watch the movie after the last flight leaves the island, knowing that they'll be isolated for months from the rest of the world as the howling winter storms envelope the continent.

I can't imagine that the isolation that the winter crew faces while they're in Antarctica does anything good for their skulls. That they make light of things going terribly wrong for folks in a similar situation to the one that they face? That's bad ass.

Image via pxhere

Trailer for a game in which you have one hour to rebuild civilization

One Hour One Life is a "multiplayer survival game of parenting and civilization building" by Jason Rohrer. Your character ages one year every minute. I'm not completely clear on how it works but I like the hand-drawn characters and graphics.

Lovely animation of kites for a song of hope

Hannah Jacobs animated this simple and clean kite-themed video for Secret For The Mad by Dodie (previously). (more…)

Experimental animated film records jazz with a Kinect

Marcin Nowrotek filmed a jazz quartet with a Kinect, then ran the recording through volumetric processors to give NEBULA an otherworldly 3D look and feel. (more…)

Artificial intelligence brought the freaky visuals to this music video

A loud experimental band from Monaco named Hardcore Anal Hydrogen enlisted the aid of artificial intelligence to generate the trippy, psychedelic visuals used in their music video for the track, "Jean-Pierre."

On their site, the band details the ins and outs of how they manipulated Google Deep Dream, Neutral Style Transfer, and DeepFlow to get these results:

How the AI...works seems complicated but it's not. There are 2 main steps : training, then exploiting. It's the same thing than learning an object to someone, let's say a chair. You show him many pictures of differents chairs. Then after learning it, when he'll see a chair, he'll be able to answer "it's a chair", even if it's a new one he's never saw.

Turn down the volume and open your eyes and minds.

(The Awesomer)

Artists humorously adds himself beyond the edges of iconic album covers

Russian digital artist Igor Lipchanskiy humorously imagines what's just beyond the edges of iconic album covers. In every case, it's him.

He writes, "I like to listen to music and when I peer into the cover of the album I find a place for myself there."

https://www.instagram.com/p/Bfq-Q-kjcYy/?taken-by=igor.lipchanskiy

https://www.instagram.com/p/Be29Q20jPLi/?taken-by=igor.lipchanskiy

https://www.instagram.com/p/BcrXD1HjWgE/?taken-by=igor.lipchanskiy

https://www.instagram.com/p/BaUnE-Ej6hF/?taken-by=igor.lipchanskiy

https://www.instagram.com/p/BcFOrDzjk7U/?taken-by=igor.lipchanskiy

https://www.instagram.com/p/BV7dZNbj5Zy/?taken-by=igor.lipchanskiy

(Bored Panda)

This “Floral Tea Story” photo series offers a whimsical tea time

As part of her incredibly aesthetically pleasing Instagram account, Russian artist Marina Malinovaya creates these whimsical photographs in which plants and flowers stand in for tea and steam.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BW4axxXFPRF/

https://www.instagram.com/p/7KSHt5ltsV/

https://www.instagram.com/p/BOJqzmoDmex/

https://www.instagram.com/p/BNBkFgTD-si/

https://www.instagram.com/p/6cAnWVFtqF/

https://www.instagram.com/p/yOvSyCFtgP/

https://www.instagram.com/p/BSiThWzDv3d/

You can see more Floral Tea Stories, as well as other gorgeous photography, on Malinovaya’s Instagram.

[via My Modern Met]

Help kids see A Wrinkle In Time for free

The racial justice organization Color of Change has launched the #GiveAChildTheUniverse campaign to make it easier for kids to see Ava DuVernay’s highly anticipated big screen adaptation of A Wrinkle In Time. For every $10 donated, AMC Theatres will provide a ticket to a child or teen who might not otherwise be able to see the film. The premise behind the campaign is that, “Kids of all kinds should see image of themselves throughout the universe.”

Based on Madeleine L’Engle’s beloved 1962 book, A Wrinkle In Time stars Oprah Winfrey, Reese Witherspoon, Mindy Kaling, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Chris Pine, and newcomer Storm Reid as Meg Murry. The movie opens on March 9th. You can make a donation to the #GiveAChildTheUniverse campaign right here or learn more about the campaign on this FAQ.

Wildly-popular UK dance party pays homage to Sir David Attenborough

Legendary naturalist and longtime BBC personality Sir David Attenborough is the inspiration for "Jungle Boogie," an ongoing series of all-night raves planned by two students of the UK's Leeds University.

Producers Louis Jadwat and Will Burbage give each venue a rainforest vibe, hand out cardboard cutouts of the 91-year-old biologist, and hire local DJs to blend Attenborough's distinctive "grandfatherly" voice with vintage house, disco, funk, and soul. Their dance party also features projections of Blue Planet and Planet Earth on the walls.

Jadwat told The Independent:

"We saw the immense popularity of him amongst students in that every Sunday people would love watching Blue Planet and Planet Earth so thought it would be great to pay homage to him."

According to Mixmag, "Jungle Boogie" has already sold out two 600-800 capacity shows. Future dates can be found here. A portion of the proceeds benefit World Land Trust.

photo via DAJBoogie

Does Marilyn Monroe’s stuffing recipe still hold up?

Tasty’s Devon and Jared test out Marilyn Monroe’s prized stuffing recipe and try to figure out what secrets it holds about her love life.

Clerk jailed for refusing same-sex marriage licenses writes of "furious, fist-pounding homosexual men"

Rowan County county clerk Kim Davis famously refused to issue licenses to gay couples after same-sex marriage was legalized in Kentucky. She was briefly jailed for contempt of court after refusing a judge's order to do her job or quit it, making her a hero to conservatives. Now she is writing a book.

“Under God’s Authority: The Kim Davis Story” is being promoted and sold by the Orlando-based Liberty Counsel, which defended Davis in her legal battles and describes itself as “a nationwide public interest religious civil liberties law firm.”

A description of the book says “Kim chronicles her dramatic encounters with furious, fist-pounding, homosexual men and the hate mail that flooded her office.”

Nate McDermott: https://twitter.com/natemcdermott/status/968646339289649152

Otherwise professional ad with native English voiceover uses machine-translated script

The ROICHEN EASY TRAY "helps you to stock and pull out your clothes without making a mess" and is an instant classic in the annals of weird advertising.

The NRA actually used to support gun control

In this video, AJ+’s Sana Saeed breaks down the long history of the NRA, from its beginnings as a post-Civil War sports club to its present day pro-gun activism. It turns out the group wasn’t always the aggressive Second Amendment defender it is today; the NRA actually used to support gun control. NPR has a similar video featuring senior political editor and correspondent Ron Elving discussing the history of the NRA too:

https://youtu.be/7460CZcGJRY

As NPR’s accompanying article explains:

The power of the organization is legendary, especially the widely published report cards it issues giving A to F grades to lawmakers. The cards have been credited with the election (or blamed for the defeat) of many a candidate, including incumbents.

Even the nuances of the group’s affection, an A+ over an A grade, for example, can make the difference for candidates, especially in Republican primaries.

That is why the NRA has anchored the opposition in every major gun-related debate since it altered its main aim from marksmanship to hard-edged political activism. That change came 40 years ago and was related to other shifts in political sentiment, including the departure of Southern rural conservatives from the Democratic Party. All these helped elect the first presidential candidate to ever be endorsed by the NRA, Ronald Reagan, in 1980.

Read the full article on NPR’s website.

Burglar doesn't realize he's being filmed

This burglar doesn't realize he's got about a minute to get his work done before the Scottish police turn up. It's interesting seeing British commenters complain that he was treated too roughly by them, while the American ones marvel that he wasn't executed on the spot.

My guess is the copper didn't see the crowbar until right on top of him in the cramped backyard, creating an opportunity for the burglar to strike and thereby necessitating a pre-emptive beating that sadly lacks the usual jaunty interaction between British police and suspect, the extended ironic ruminations on the nature of crime and the inevitability of justice, the perverse yet socially reinforcing affectations of honor and fair play, the tea and biscuits down the station, etc., that are the usual hallmarks of modern British policing and its interactions with the criminal element.

Whirlwind video tour of five fabulous tiny houses

From treehouses to homes on wheels to tiny off-grid cottages, the folks at Living Big In A Tiny House count down their five favorite tiny home tours from last year. (more…)

Watch a bullet get shot at an axe blade

In this fascinating video, the energy of a bullet is on full display as it's shot directly at the sharp edge of an axe. The first shot from seven yards misses, but the second one sends a visible shock wave through the axe head. (more…)

Learn how to break a glass with your voice

Mike Boyd of Learn Quick shows how to tune your voice to the resonant frequency of a glass and break said glass using only the unamplified human voice. (more…)

An oral history of that insane Oscars fuck-up from last year

It’s been a year since the infamous Oscars broadcast in which La La Land was briefly crowned Best Picture before it was revealed that Moonlight was actually the real winner. The Hollywood Reporter has put together a really fascinating oral history of the entire night, which includes some great details, like how Warren Beatty literally held the envelopes hostage to ensure he wasn’t incorrectly blamed for the snafu. Here’s an excerpt:

LISA TABACK, Awards consultant, worked on both La La Land and Moonlight campaigns I went backstage, and I see a security guard with Warren Beatty. Warren is really tall, and he was holding his arm up as high as he could—which must be about seven and a half feet off the ground—because in his hand was the envelopes. He was saying into the phone, I believe to his wife, “I’m not giving it up to anybody!” It was dead quiet.

ANNETTE BENING, Actress, wife of Warren Beatty My impulse was to call him right away. And I did. And he picked up the phone. And I said, “Oh my God. You did a great job, but what happened?!” And he said, “I have the envelopes, and I’m not giving them to anyone!”

MARA BUXBAUM, Publicist, guest of Casey Affleck I was backstage with Casey and there was a logjam by the elevator. I don’t know if it was the [PricewaterhouseCoopers the accounting firm] people, but they were trying to get the envelopes from Warren, and he was like, “No, I need to make sure that everybody knows what this envelope says.” Warren is really smart, and he’s the first to be careful for new narratives to take over, so he would not let go of the envelopes.

Plus there’s also this great anecdote from actress Busy Philipps, who was seated in the front row:

PHILIPPS Then I’m like, “I’m sitting next to Ben Affleck—he can stop the show because he’s fucking Batman!” I kind of grabbed his arm—we’re not friends, but I was like, “You have to do something! Do something!”

You can read the full oral history over on The Hollywood Reporter. Or learn more about the terrible typography that probably caused the mishap in the first place.

[Photo: ABC/Image Group LA]