February 17, 2007
AutismTown
AutismTown? Autism is a puzzling and disastrous disorder which has recently spread to affect 1 in 150, according to new government data; now there is a new non-profit "pixel-based" site to organize the community and fund research and services. A bit of a "who's who" in the field...
This Is An Ex-Parrot!!! (And Maybe, Just Maybe, An Ex-Scammer)
Monty Python's Dead Parrot Sketch, Scammer-Style. (YouTube, approx. 7 mins.) The video was created by a Nigerian email scammer who thought he was producing a video for a victim he tried to scam. The victim fought back. Read the whole story (it's a long story, with many tangents, but fascinating) in two parts from 419 Eater: Part 1, Part 2. For reference, here's the original Monty Python Dead Parrot Sketch.
Surrealish sites
If you enjoy strange art, you may like these artists' sites:
Courtesy Max Szoc.
Follow the links!
Re-release the Beast
Sampled by Daft Punk. They've been mentioned here before, sometimes disparagingly. Here, gathered and laid bare for all to see, are a collection of samples (primarily from their album Discovery) the House music duo have used. Depending on your view of them, this may shock or delight you.
Open Source Dramatics!
In the Air Tonight
In The Air Tonight. Acapella R&B group Naturally 7 perform their version of the Phil Collins classic on a Paris Metro.
Kids, the Internet, and the End of Privacy: The Greatest Generation Gap Since Rock and Roll
Kids today. They have no sense of shame. They have no sense of privacy. They are show-offs, fame whores, pornographic little loons who post their diaries, their phone numbers, their stupid poetry—for God’s sake, their dirty photos!—online. They have virtual friends instead of real ones. They talk in illiterate instant messages. They are interested only in attention—and yet they have zero attention span, flitting like hummingbirds from one virtual stage to another.So goes the common wisdom but things in fact are more complex.
Say Everything
Online Piracy: Both sides of the coin
One creative cartoonist claims that micropayments would virtually eliminate the problem of piracy.
On the other hand, programmer Sean Barrett disagrees.
...at the end of the day, we're specimens to be dissected, examined and studied so that you may teach a "lesson" that you view as important. ...
We Are Not Freaks --from Silber's Power of Narrative--and applicable to all who fall outside the norms.
RIP Larkin.
Is this why Britney shaved her head?
Edward 40hands. No, not Edward Scissorhands, Edward 40hands. That's right, I said Edward 40hands. An interview with Edward 40hands. (you tube, NSFW, swearing) One difficulty in becoming Edward 40hands. (you tube, NSFW, bathroom humor) The Edwina 40hands Beauty Contest.(you tube) A Modest Proposal. Certainly, the future of our civilization is in sure and (sort of) steady hands.
I have to pee.(google video)(pee humor)
working together
How can you have a normal life when you have to share your body with a conjoined twin? Some do remarkably well
Talkin' dictionaries at Google.
I know you people like words and language, and I know you like Google, so when I found a clip of Erin McKean giving a talk about dictionaries at Google, I thought "Normally, I wouldn't watch a 54-minute video of someone giving a talk, but this one was really interesting, and maybe my fellow MeFites will think the same thing." (Be sure and stick around for the Q&A session at the end; Google people, as you might expect, ask really interesting questions.) Erin McKean is not only the editor of The New Oxford American Dictionary, she's got a dressmaking blog. And if you don't feel like watching a video right now, here's a transcript of an hour-long online chat at Wordsmith.Org from a couple years ago. (Video link via Taccuino di traduzione.)
Converting Garbage into Energy
Mr Fusion - coming soon. Startech Environmental Corporation's "Plasma Converter" works like "the big bang in reverse," creating nothing out of something. With the ability to break down any type of material (other than nuclear waste) into component molecules and and actually generate energy in the process, we may be at the twilight of the landfill industry. Via.
Peeking opera
With apologies to the European masters [ARTY NUDITY] Beijing photographer 潘鉞 (Pan Yue) recreates some famous European paintings in a Beijing Opera style. Other series by yer man: Farmers in Opera costume, Secret Opera Main link via.
The dolphin with the artificial fin
An artificial fin has given a bottlenose dolphin a new lease on life. Fuji, a dolphin at Okinawa's Churaumi Aquarium, lost 75 percent of her flukes to an unknown disease. But a prosthetic fin developed by Bridgestone Corporation engineers has enabled Fuji to swim again in the aquarium's dolphin lagoon.
Watch the BBC video report here. Read the aquarium's notes on the project and see photos of Fuji both during and after the disease's onset here.
Does that make him the murderer, or do the homemade curtains reduce him to the level of the child molester?
The Way We Are: David Sedaris makes coffee with tea while ruminating on identity
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