31/10/05
Dave:
The Simpsons body count, a list of people who have mysteriously died after appearing on world famous television show... The Simpsons.
Dave:
BBC bollocks 6 watchdog staff for emailing each other which work experience girls they'd bonk.
Justin:
Welcome to Justin's book corner. This week I'm recommending Cloud Atlas by young British author David Mitchell.
Dave: Read it, it's pretty good. I can recommend Oryx and Crake, it's superb.
gareth: That was the first book she's done from a male's point of view, wasn't it? Or perhaps that's another I'm thinking of.
Dave: I have no idea, my girlfriend lent it to me and I loved it.
justin: Atwood - we studied The Handmaids Tale in A Level English. I suppose if you've read 1984, Brave New World et al you may as well read this.
Justin:
No way George Takei, or Sulu from Star Trek, boldly takes it where no man has gone before!
tim: and he's in a stage version of equus!
tim: find me, bum me, find me, bum me...... captain
sulu: Oh my... captain, a giant surgeons knife slashing in the dark.
kirk: Dammit Sulu - I'm trying to f*ck this green horse!
sulu: captain, giant horses eye three points to starboard
kirk: knife set to stab!
Dave: ?
McCoy: Dammit Jim, passion, you see, can be destroyed by a doctor. It cannot be created.
Dave:
Kissthisguy (Kissthesky?) dot com, an archive of misheard lyrics.
Dave: A nice little article about the name of the site.
Gareth:
Book crossing: the practice of leaving a book in a public place to be picked up and read by others, who then do likewise.
Dave: I picked up a copy of Stephen King's The Running Man this way... It was sh*t.
gareth: Yep, it is. The Schwarzenegger movie is even worse.
28/10/05
Dave:
The Sex is for Fags! Abstinence-Only Education Program, for boys... and the Iron Hymen for Girls
gareth: That reminds me of Technical Virgin, which I'm still not sure whether it is a joke or not.
justin: Well.... "When I started dating, boys always expected me to have intercourse with them. I knew I couldn't resist the peer pressure alone, so now I double-date with my pal Shelly. Now when boys pressure us for sex, we say "no" together – then satisfy them by putting on a hot girl-girl show in the back seat."
Justin:
Microsoft Zombie computer horror
justin: I'm posting this article more out of curiosity than anything - does anyone notice any correlation between the first paragraph and the rest of the story?
justin: Well?
gareth: No, not really. The only link I can think of is a "You've been bad, we're going to take away this and this" sort of thing.
justin: Nevermind, they've edited the article, which started talking about something else Microsoft had done.
Justin:
How low can Bush go?
justin: Why are some people only now realising what a shambolic embarassment Bush is?
gareth: I'm sure it has something to do with blind patriotism.
Dave: Bush is in deep sh*t at the moment apparently his approval ratings are down in the 30's, Nixon resigned when his rating reached an all time low of 24. Come on America... feel the hate.
dave: See, deep sh*t.
Justin:
Article on sarcasm.
Dave: Oh Good work, I was gonna post that, well done.
gareth: I was trying to think of a similar thing Dave, but couldn't. You're just a genius, aren't you?
Dave:
George Lucas has opened a new digital studio whose first projects will be the Star Wars spin off shows.
gareth: That's the ugliest Yoda ever.
27/10/05
Gareth:
Aryan Wear. With modelling done by Prussian Blue. It's amazing how nonchalant and comfortable people are with being complete racists.
justin: I think Something Awful said it best when they said "I bought the tape in the hope there'd be a picture on the inside sleeve of the girls making out, like Tatu"
tim: 'try zyklon b- its a gas!' heheh thats not a bad gag actually. maybe they aren't REALLY evil hellbound mass murders after all....
justin: Prussian Blue - in reality.
Gareth:
Beavers back in England. Insert lesbian jokes here.
justin: "the beavers could also help keep waterways clear of debris." - what's the one thing that we know beavers do to waterways?
Gareth:
Some bunch of very odd people tried to copyright the smell of strawberries (and failed, luckily)
Gareth:
Chimps do not help eachother, even when it proves to be of no inconvenience for them. Hm, I guess they are more similar to humans than I thought.
Marcus: More similar to contributors on linkbunnies.org anyway.
Marcus: Like, there's a missing space in that link, but do I go in and edit the post to correct it? Nope.
Marcus: I bet those bloody zoo chimps wouldn't either. Selfish selfish selfish. Me me me. Ook ook ook.
Marcus: In fact, the only time they ever want to collaborate is when there's an infinite number of them and a typewriter happens to be lying around.
gareth: Well, if you paid us better...!
Justin:
Gamers and their avatars - or "interesting people who play online games instead of the fat losers who probably make up the bulk of players"
Dave:
Where the hell is Marcus? It's been 6 days!? Has he got a new toy?
justin: Yeah Marcus, stop being a one track minded loser and get some more links up here.
Dave: Goddamn it Marcus, if I find out you have a life now, so help me I'll...
gareth: I'll bet he's busy off conquering the world with his newly trained army of students.
Marcus: I'm on holiday this week on a super-secret personal mission. Normal posting will resume as soon as we're sure what normal is anyway.
Justin:
The first satellite built entirely by European students has launched from Plesetsk in northern Russia.
justin: Presumably made from a stolen shopping trolley and some traffic cones.
gareth: The second image they have of it makes it look like a bunch of toasters stuck together.
Gareth:
An awesome timeline clock
Dave: I like that.
justin: Does anyone do that active desktop thing where you can have web pages or flash movies as elements on your desktop? Maybe this would be cool there?
gareth: I believe you can have html as a wallpaper in WinXP.
Justin:
I'm sure Dave will love, review and comments of Banksy's latest art installation thing - with live rats running around the gallery.
Dave: What a sellout.
26/10/05
Dave:
Remember when you were a kid and you used to make prank calls? Did you ever get one as funny as this?
gareth: What's fun is calling someone and then pretending to be a Pizza Delivery Place, and that they called you.
gareth: I mean... erm, I'm very grown up now! Definitely.
Dave:
For the love of God, give me strength. As a race we are doomed. Kill yourself now and beat the rush.
gareth: I'm beginning to think that a meteorite crashing into the earth might be a positive thing.
25/10/05
Dave:
The Nazi answer to the Olsen twins.
gareth: Wow, now that is shocking.
Dave: If you think that's bad go to the website for the resistance record label mentioned in the article and have a look around the forums.
Dave:
Got a motor bike? Get a motor bike air bag.
chris: Mad. Here's a mad motorcycle to go with it.
24/10/05
Justin:
King Kong net, King Kong resource. The best thing is the King Kong post production diary. Lots of QT footage of animators and special effects crews at work.
Chris:
Creative powerhouses The Darkness have recorded a six-minute track about going bald. It's not worth taking the mick out of this, they've already done it for us.
gareth: I'm pretty sure this is a sign that our society has basically stopped on the road of accomplishment, and is merely spinning it's wheels in the mud.
Dave: Surely a one-way ticket to Hell and back, is a return ticket?
justin: Unless you consider that a journey to hell and back is is fundamentaly a journey in itself - and that raises the question of whether you can "return" from that emotional and spiritual journey of discovery.
gareth: That was deep.
Dave: No no no no, you don't return from your return journey that would be preposterous.
Dave:
Check out the video blog of uber-chav Devvo. Start at the bottom of the page and work up. The first one is so scary it's unreal.
Dave: Have any off you watched this? It's pretty f*cked up.
Justin:
Artist resource for learning about the appearance of explosions - interesting to all I'd say. Check out the fuel air bomb at the top of page 4.
gareth: Explosions and fire are ridiculously difficult to model. Well, for an amateur like myself anyways.
justin: Aww, you want to be like uncle Justin. What package are you using?
gareth: I'm using 3dsmax 7, an educational liscense.
gareth: In the past, I've just used Max's built-in particle system for explosions and fire - it definitely wasn't amazing, but it did a decent job. Although I had to have ridiculous amounts of gizmos to get it to look right, perhaps I wasn't using them effectively.
Justin:
The Doom movie tops the US chart, yet Hollywood continues to slump.
justin: I'm thinking that if movies like Doom are the best Hollywood has to offer, then maybe that's why it's in a slump.
gareth: This comic from Ctrl alt del just about sums it up.
23/10/05
Justin:
5 reasosn why Jack Thomspon is right, and 5 reasons why he is wrong.
justin: Jack Thompson is that shrill US lawyer bent on blaming computer games for everything bad. Though check out the graph that plots violent crime in America versus the release of Doom.
Justin:
Elephant Dream trailer - plus CGTalk discussion - the thing with this is that it is made with open source software.
gareth: Funny you post this right after a post about Autodesk.
Justin:
Dan Drake and friends took $59,030 and started Autodesk with a bunch of bad ideas and one that panned-out -- AutoCAD. Sometimes one is enough.
Gareth: Considering stand-alone versions of AutoCAD 2006 are going for five thousand dollars canadian a pop, that is not a bad idea.
21/10/05
Gareth:
Coworkers judged by iTunes shared playlists. Interesting article. Judging by the stuff shared on my network, there are a lot of very depressing emo people around here.
Gareth:
Dad's home. Not sure what it is, but it's great.
Dave: I'm afraid it's a double post that's what it is. From about a year ago. What's the statute of limitations on these things?
Gareth:
Stubbs the Zombie (a game made by some former Bungie employees, on the original Halo engine) looks absolutely hilarious. The only thing wrong with it, according to it's Gamespot review is that it is far too short.
Marcus:
BBC News: "Teachers in England are to be given stronger legal rights to restrain pupils and to punish badly behaved children."
Marcus: Woohoo! Still nothing in there about getting cattle prods, but hopefully it's only a matter of time.
Dave:
Anyone else think this is a little bit weird.
justin: Huh - yeah, it is a bit. Getting the kids used to obeying big brother.
Dave: All the little men are smiling. I wonder if they sell an angry looking suicide bomber?
Justin:
Jack thompson - putz lawyer and anti-video game crusader is slapped down by gaming geeks and is under investigation by the American Bar Association.
Justin: Bonus! Best. Avatar. Ever.
gareth: Hehehe, that is a good avatar.
Gareth:
SphereXP: a very entrancing 3D desktop replacement for Windows XP. This reminds me of the crazy OS seen briefly in Swordfish.
gareth: Note: after DLing, I am not nearly as impressed.
gareth: Don't judge a book by it's cover, etc.
20/10/05
Justin:
Documenting the existance of the Flat Earth society - people who still believe the Earth is flat.
justin: Cheers Alex.
19/10/05
Chris:
Another wacky aircraft design that reinvents something from, oh, absolutely ages ago. It does look rather amazing, though, in a "oh my God they're all going to die" kind of way.
Tim:
Mass murder saddam hussein on trial? put him in a playpen!
gareth: That will work great, until he learns how to walk and climb. Man, I'm glad the sucker is done teething!
justin: He does seem to have been reduced to petulantly arguing the toss with a judge he doesn't recognise.
justin: Oh, and scuffled with the guards - any money he starts flicking bits of paper at his defence lawyer with a rubber-band.
Dave:
Getting broadband via an a hot air balloon becomes a reality.
Marcus: An a interesting article.
Marcus:
Presidents of the USA's Some Postman music video: first video shot entirely on mobile phones (Sony Ericssons apparently, although it doesn't say what model). (via)
18/10/05
Gareth:
How to de-flea your cat. One of the strangest things ever - do you really have to vacuum your cat?
Aimie: Difficult with my parent's cat. She sh*ts herself at the mere mention of the vacuum.
chris: It's actually cheaper and more efficient to wrap cats in toilet paper than cardboard rolls...
chris: ...but it's my experience that cats *love* being vacuumed. Providing it's with a hose attachment, naturally. Not with one of those big whirry upright things. That would be - bad.
Aimie: Hmmmmm.....I've yet to meet a cat that actually likes hoovers. All the ones I know are terrified of the sound of them.
Dave:
Looking for a new job? Try this.
justin: Looking for the original post? Try this.
Dave: Want to feel stupid? Try doing this.
Justin:
Europeans about to invade Venus. - man, we [mankind] are launching probes all over the place. This rocks!
17/10/05
Tim:
more madness from that cheeky scamp mugabe. watch the video by the way, its a classic
Dave: YEah, it's wrong but he's right, to a point. Good God politics is one big grey area.
Marcus: That's our Mugabe!
Gareth:
This goes under the "What the hell are they thinking" column: Sylvester Stallone doing Rocky 6. I guess this will be the one where he dies of a heart attack, and doesn't come fighting back.
justin: Fix it.
gareth: Done and done!
Justin:
"My daughter is simple, down to earth honest, loving, adjustable, a good home maker as well as have keen interest for service and higher studies. Willing to go abroad. god fearing at the same time believes in hard work Looking for: Hindu Marathi brahmin, lovable, god fearing, hard worker, honest." - It's Indian online personals!
gareth: Beat me to it.
Justin:
Swing your Justin.
Dave: Is this irony or double post? I can't tell.
Dave: I just worked out what this is. Very clever Justin. Very Clever.
Gareth: He's a witty one, that Justin!
Marcus: "Don't play with fire, play with Marcus."
Gareth:
Sloganizer: randomly generated (and pretty funny) slogans.
Aimie: Especially if you put in a rude word or five....."Simply c*nt" anyone???
Justin:
Origami Yoda - (PDF, takes a while to load)
gareth: Wow, that is complicated. And in spanish, that probably doesn't help either.
Justin:
Apparently US scientists can now harvest stem cells without destroying the embryo.
gareth: Well, that should definitely change things on the moral front.
Dave:
Buy this for your wife / Girlfriend and receive a slap in return.
Laura: The frightening thing is that my Dad wanted my Mum to buy it for him. He was too much of a wuss to buy it himself.
Aimie: I got an ex to buy both Spice Girls CDs once (for my younger sister I hasten to add). He did it too.
Justin:
Scottish parliament wins Stirling [architecture] prize - in pictures
justin: I liked the BMW factory and the nursery... but they ALL deserve first place. They're very brave.
Dave: It's just like the special olympics. They are all winners.
Marcus: The residents of Edinburgh I met when I visited the city a couple of years ago uniformly hated the new building, primarily because it cost a ridiculous amount of taxpayers' money, took far too long to be built and was subject to all kinds of farcical delays (the current one when I was there was something along the lines that they'd had to have extremely expensive bombproof windows put in which had some kind of fault and had to be replaced). I'd call it a local joke except it was more of a "local thing to be angry about".
justin: Yeah, cuz the Scottish are known for being happy to hand over money.
16/10/05
Gareth:
Did the Jedi have it coming? I think so. After all, Anakin was meant to simply balance the Force.
Marcus: I bet a Sith wrote that.
Marcus: The article that follows it, which tries to make a case for The Phantom Menace actually being really cool and in no way appalling, is rather less convincing.
Marcus: "If Lucas had put Jar Jar in sunglasses and a leather trench coat, handed him an Uzi and filmed a scene of him machine gunning down Neimoidians aboard their flagship - preferably doing a few slo-mo flips along the way - everyone would be talking about how cool he is and lobbying for him to star in Episode II."
Gareth: Erm, no we wouldn't.
15/10/05
Gareth:
Apprantly today is supposed to be the Second Advent. Keep your eyes peeled for that Jesus guy.
Gareth:
Slashpower: charge your cellphone (or various other devices, I imagine) without plugging it in.
Marcus:
Clothes rigged with all kinds of coloured lights and available to buy.
Marcus: I haven't decided yet if the light-up nerve suit is cool or just creepy.
Marcus:
"A study shows the average pillow is home to a host of potentially-harmful fungi." I'm never going to bed again.
Aimie: Yeah, but these bad boys also live in your pillows too along with a host of other stuff.
Marcus:
The MPAA finally does something useful: it's legally pursuing six websites which pass themselves off as legit music/movie download sites - then just charge a fee to redirect to BitTorrent.com et al.
Gareth:
DancingPaul: Paul dances, as well as greatly annoys.
Marcus: His Buy-Me-A-Beer.com is entertaining too. Wish I'd thought of that.
Aimie: Blimey, I haven't seen the DancingPaul site in years.....pretty much still the same though.
Gareth:
Firesomething: an extension which allows you to change the Firefox browser name. For example, rather than Mozilla Firefox my browser currently says Turbocharged Firewombat.
Gareth:
The Thinking Machine: this killer will destroy you at chess even moreso than your Dad ever has.
Dave: That is wicked cool.
14/10/05
Dave:
This is one mad bastard.
gareth: It's Patrick Swayze!
justin: Greg thinks it's a fake, especially as the camera pans evenly, allowign the chap to be centre frame even after he is lost.
Dave:
Steven Speilberg is going to team up with EA to make 3 games with them. In a pretty hardcore way too, sounds like he'll be quite hands on.
Justin:
The art of Menstruation.
Marcus: Bonkers.
Dave: Goddamn it man. What the f*ck is wrong with you?
Marcus: Well, it's not his site - it's the site of people who want to make art out of menses because, it's, er, feminist or something. Whither the semen art sites?
Aimie: It's f*cked up, that's what it is. Drinking her own menstrual blood????? That woman needs help, and fast!!!! And what's with the vulval prints using her own menstrual blood???? I don't think she meant to make a pun when she said "I have been making these prints periodically since 1981" though. I feel sick.
Justin:
Looks like the next Bond will be Daniel Craig - whom you may have seen in Layer Cake
gareth: I thought the arrival by boat seemed a bit more like a Richard Branson move, rather than James Bond. I mean, he didn't actually drive the boat or anything Bondish like that.
Aimie: I like the fact that him mum accidentally broke the news before the press conference when they were to announce it.
Marcus:
Listen to Radio 1's 6-hour John Peel Day show featuring all kinds of awesome music: 7-9pm, 9-11pm and 11pm-1am.
13/10/05
Justin:
Leaked screenshots of the Beta version of Windows Vista - note Internet Explorer 7 with tabs.
gareth: Wow, that is one ugly browser.
Marcus: I think the default Vista theme is way too dark grey and boring - like it's there as a kind of visual placeholder ready for the mega awesome theme that will (probably not) come with the finished product. And what's with those new window buttons, they look like some kind of third rate amateur skinning effort?!
Marcus: The Energy Blue theme released for Media Centre at the beginning of the year (and subsequently ripped for normal flavours of XP) is pretty much the only decent Windows theme I've seen to date.
Justin:
This is funny - make me a website since we are friends... it will look good in your portfolio...
Dave:
Who will be the next James Bond? Place your bets... NOW!
Dave: That article is written by Elliot Carver. A prize for the first person to say why that is special.
justin: He is a bond villain! - tee hee hee!
Dave: Correct. You win a prize.
gareth: And a news-obsessed villain at that.
Dave:
The Rolf Harris website has everything you've every wanted to know about Rolf, except, how he used to do the clap at the end of Rolf's Cartoon Club (next week).
Aimie: The sad thing is that I think I know how to do that hand clap. Oh, and I met Rolf a couple of years ago. Nice chap.
Aimie: And I have a photo to prove it.
12/10/05
Justin:
No, Bob Hope is funny.
bob hope: "I guess I have my critics everywhere." –In Saigon where a bomb went off at his hotel just before he checked in
Dave:
Apparently Apple have announced the video iPod. Is this it?
Dave: I saw that Marcus you did a dual post and deleted it I SAW IT!
Marcus: We're both about an hour late, but most weblogs don't even seem to have caught on to it yet. Which seems a bit slow.
Marcus: I like the idea of an iTunes Store for TV programme episodes.
gareth: I saw it too Dave. I guess Marcus is just smart in deleting his double posts.
Marcus: It was 10 seconds after Dave's and it was only because my bloody Firefox crashed as I was about to send it! Anyway, it seemed a bit dumb to have the same two pieces of news directly adjacent.
Marcus:
Wikibooks: Wikipedia for academic textbooks. This is pretty old news, but I was reminded of it earlier and this recent CNet News article does a good job of delving into it all.
Marcus: Wikijunior, reference books for children, is a cool idea too.
Justin:
What does 'woot' mean and why do tw*ts keep saying it?
Dave: w00t!!111!!one
Marcus: People who regularly type "w00t" and "lol" will be the first up against the wall when the write in proper bloody English and stop using illiterate hackneyed Retard-O-Speak revolution comes.
Laura: Just shoot me now, then you won't have to wait for the revolution.
Justin:
"The Shocking Story of How The U.S. Military, The Feds, and Every Martial Art School On The Planet Is Trying To Prevent You From Getting This Elite Combat Training."
Dave: "Colonel K"? Isn't he from Dangermouse?
Marcus: Good grief DM!
justin: "I don't need to beg for people to learn what really works in a combat situation. In fact, although this may sound like bragging and I probably shouldn't say it - the fact is that I don't even need to coax the uncertain buyer with the gimmickry of money back guarantees, no risk money back guarantees and so on."
Marcus:
Bridge: amusing series of animations detailing "the ongoing story of the persistent attempts to get to the other side."
Marcus: Warning: these animated GIFs contain scenes of stick figure peril.
Marcus:
UFO Pool Party. Shockwave 3D game. Fly a UFO around a town and use your tractor beam to abduct unwitting humans and drop them into the mothership. Whereupon they will probably be subjected to all sorts of unpleasant probes. Mwahahaha.
Marcus:
Quick copyright-busting video guide to Firefly so that people who don't know about it can watch the Serenity movie and be clued in. (via)
Marcus: I haven't seen either the TV show or the movie but will probably get round to it at some point. If it turns out to be Buffy the Camp Vampire Slayer In Space then heads will roll. Heads.
Dave: I watched 3 episodes last night and have to be honest I quite liked it. It's kind of like a good Farscape crossed with the magnificent 7.
Laura: Even a Buffyphile like me reckons that Buffy looks like Crossroads in comparison to Firefly. Oh, and if you're interested, Firefly also has it's own Wiki, cos you know, Whedon fans are obessive like that.
justin: Here's the torrent for that.
Dave: Liar! That's not Crossroads!
Marcus:
Counter Strike Lite doesn't have much to do with the actual Counter Strike game, but it's still a fun shooting gallery effort.
Gareth:
A very nice open letter to Jack Thompson from Tim Buckley, of Ctrl Alt Del.
justin: He attacked The Sims! - you can't do that. Although it's interesting reading actually.
Marcus:
Boulangerie: Flash game. Try and catch croissants on a baguette. Try and do it. Go on. Try and get just one. You're more likely to eat the monitor out of frustration. (Via)
Marcus:
Download Charade, a Cary Grant/Audrey Hepburn movie placed into the public domain by mistake. (Via)
11/10/05
Dave:
South Park Cripple Fight game!!!
gareth: Hehehe, awesome find. That was a good episode of southpark.
Justin:
Star Wreck - I know a full-length fan fiction comedy version of Star Trek sounds gay, but this is supposed to be top class. So do take a look.
Justin:
What causes a Wiccan?
Laura: Ah heck it's that time of year again isn't it? Ha ha ha, can't stop laughing at the photo of a typical Wiccan male. Oh am so gonna share this on Pagan Network. And the flo chart! Better tell the other half to stop skateboarding then, seeing as it's satanic and all...
Justin:
Since the archive was lost, I thought it might be worth posting Pathetic Geek Stories again - a warm hearted look at the miserable failings of geeks.
Justin:
Remember those Falun Gong chaps the Chinese government is trying to repress? it's not some political organisation... it's just a bunch of new agers meditating and doing exercises.
10/10/05
Justin:
A fire has destroyed the Aardman archive in Bristol, UK.
justin: Cars even 3 miles away had ash on them, and I can smell smoke even now, like 8 hours later.
Marcus:
Weird and unsettling 3D-altered QuickTime movie in which plants have grafted-on blinking eyes, tentacles etc. (Via)
Marcus: I wish this fad for ultra-shakey camera movement in an attempt to invoke "realism" would stop though.
justin: I did work though - and I like it. Plus when you composite something, any occasion where you can make the backgroudn and foreground subject to the same influences, you make the comp look better. I'm goign to allow this.
tim: and it worked in battlestar galactica, the first mini series that is....
justin: Also, remember that the shakey camera is not just an "effect" it's use comes from the idea that a cameraman can follow the action in a more natural or "honest" way when they are freed from complex rigs.
Marcus: I contend that over use of camera shake is the next lens flare, morphing, etc.
Marcus:
"The people of Belgium have been left reeling by the first adult-only episode of the Smurfs, in which the blue-skinned cartoon characters' village is annihilated by warplanes."
Marcus: All in the name of public education.
Marcus: Quicktime streaming movie slideshow of the video (stills rather than the actual video) here. (Via)
Marcus:
Guardian: "Critics panned Guy Ritchie's new gangster flick, so how did the PRs for Revolver find a Sun quote saying the director was 'back to his best'?" (Via)
Marcus: "Basically, the Revolver-related content on the Sun's website is a piece of PR puff paid for by the film's distributors."
Marcus: There's lies, damned lies, and movie poster review quotes.