583 MetaFilter comments by jjg (displaying 1 through 50)

"'Repent, Harlequin,' Said the Ticktockman." An illustrated version of Harlan Ellison's short story of the same name.
comment posted at 3:24 PM on Feb-4-10

The death of SciAm. It's no secret that print media is getting hit pretty hard, but the butchering of Scientific American seems particularly brutal.
comment posted at 5:48 PM on Apr-23-09


If you use Flickr, your home page is about to change. It looks more like a social networking site than ever.
comment posted at 10:44 PM on Sep-10-08


The WGA strike has entered its third month. Since New Year's, Worldwide Pants, the Weinstein Co., and United Artists have reached interim deals with the WGA, with rumors of more to come. Microsoft announced new deals with Hollywood companies. And on Friday, ABC Studios terminated deals with more than a dozen writers. Tonight, CBS, NBC, and 20th Century Fox have followed suit. Names of producers, writers, and shows affected are still being revealed as letters are received. Force majeure.
comment posted at 7:28 AM on Jan-15-08


Dr. Seuss 2.0 NYT's blogger, David Pogue, expounds on the un-creative Seussification of 2.0 website names. Entertaining and right-on... except that the Washington Post featured the very same article a week earlier! Ouch.
comment posted at 3:10 PM on Dec-6-07

Evel is gone from the world Robert Craig "Evel" Knievel, Jr. (October 17, 1938 - November 30, 2007) was a motorcycle daredevil who has been a household name since the late 1960s, and arguably the most iconic motorbike stuntman of all time. Evel Knievel's highly publicized motorcycle jumps, including his attempt to jump over the Snake River Canyon, claim four of the top 20 most-watched Wide World of Sports events of all time. He enjoyed a lengthy career in this extreme sport despite suffering a series of major injuries during stunts.
comment posted at 2:40 PM on Nov-30-07

This is why we can't have nice things/people. Jade Raymond is a producer for Ubisoft's new video game Assassin's Creed. Being an attractive woman, Ubisoft decided to capitalize on this fact, leading to sad and pathetic video game coverage of said woman. Then the comic hit.
comment posted at 10:02 PM on Nov-19-07


As usual, Rupert Murdoch gets what he wants. Despite the concerns many in the US have expressed about Murdoch's tendency to leverage his media assets in pursuit of his personal business interests with ruthless disregard for the public interest (all within the bounds of current law, of course), Murdoch now appears to have succeeded in his controversial bid to take over Dow Jones. (Newsfilter)
comment posted at 11:25 AM on Jul-31-07

So now we can all stop, right? A brief catalog of Bloglish clichés from Gawker.
comment posted at 9:46 PM on Jul-18-07

Better Off Dead Camaro. Finding and fixing the 1967 Camaro SS-350 from Better Off Dead.
comment posted at 2:32 PM on Jun-26-07

Interview with Ze Frank on creativity Ze Frank discusses some techniques he learned himself to harness his creativity. Apart from his quite creative daily online video, which is now defunct, he's apparently also an adjunct professor at NYU's Tisch School of the Arts, Parsons School of Design, and SUNY Purchase.
comment posted at 9:48 PM on May-22-07

Chicago based designer & music fan J Tyler took it upon himself to craft a music video for The Arcade Fire song "My Body Is A Cage" using clips from the classic Sergio Leone film Once Upon A Time in the West. The clips evoke the elegaic, reflectively somber beauty in the song remarkably well - so well that the video reached the attention of someone in the Arcade Fire's camp, who emailed Tyler and requested his permission to post his work on their official site. If you have the bandwidth, I highly recommend this direct download link to a high-res quicktime version, it's much, much better than streaming flash.
comment posted at 12:39 AM on May-20-07


Amongst the many companies with offices in Manhattan is a multibillion-dollar French conglomerate that handles "diversified commodities, energy, shipping, real estate, manufacturing, and communications." The owner, Gerard, is one of the richest men in the world, and, at 75, his children and grandchildren stand to inheirit a tidy sum of perhaps half a billion each upon his passing. Unless you've been in a cave for a few decades, one of them has — given syndication, perhaps even daily — been making you laugh for a long, long time. A heiress and princess who you first met live from New York (where she met her husband), then a yuppie in a movie of Christmas indignities, and finally in a small, barely aired show about, er, nothing ... meet Elaine Julia, the multibillion-dollar heiress, Northwestern dropout, Emmy-winning actress, and even a distant relative of Richard Dreyfuss. And then compare her to a certain other celebrity heiress.
comment posted at 11:28 AM on May-2-07

Please God, make everyone die. Amen. Todd Goliath, the creator of the infamous "Boys Are Stupid, Throw Rocks At Them" t-shirts/paintings/flash games/etc. (previously x2) has been discovered to have a piece in a gallery show which is remarkably similar to this Purple Pussy cartoon by Dave Kelly (a/k/a Schmorky) of Keenspot and SA. Not only that, but he's got another character, Eve L. who bears more than a passing resemblance to Lenore, The Cute Little Dead Girl by Roman Dirge. (other examples in the main link -- a surprisingly on-topic thread for SA)
comment posted at 12:35 AM on Apr-8-07

"What are they talking about?" Was it just an April Fools' joke? Are they really gonna end Red Vs. Blue: arguably the most successful machinima series ever? Will Blood Gulch be silent of one-liners and snide comments once more, or is this a blatant attempt by Rooster Teeth to drum up interest in their 100th episode? Considering the fact they started it four years ago on April Fools Day, it's really hard to tell. (surprise! no youtube links!)
comment posted at 11:28 PM on Apr-3-07

Facing Life With a Lethal Gene. Say you're in your early twenties. For years you've seen members of your family twist and turn invouluntarily and developing dementia due to your family history of Huntington's Disease. Even if you have the gene for the disease, the symptoms are unlikely to hit until you're 50. Would you want to find out if you're going to share the same fate as your relatives, or live life out as much as you can unaware if you're going to suffer from it too? Another touching human interest story from the NY Times which has had a bunch of these recently.
comment posted at 1:30 AM on Mar-18-07


Breaking News: Apple Announces Touchscreen iPhone. In this morning's MacWorld keynote, Steve Jobs announced the iPhone, a touchscreen smartphone with only one button. Two years in the making, it runs OS X, works as an iPod, displays video on a 3.5" screen, and has the usual bells and whistles (Bluetooth, e-mail, Google Maps, WiFi, etc.), plus some other slick features like: a proximity sensor that turns the screen off when it's near your ear, an accelerometer that detects whether it's in portrait or landscape, and an ambient light sensor to dim the screen accordingly. I'm not usually a gadget person, but this thing seems pretty damn cool. Now let's just see how much it costs...
More live MacWorld coverage available at: Engadget , MacRumors.
comment posted at 7:24 PM on Jan-9-07

Laughter seems to be just as contagious as yawning.

(Popcorn Post, Youtube, Old People, Babies, Southerners, A kitten, and the word "Cuteums")
comment posted at 7:16 AM on Jan-4-07

La Jetée. Following the postapocalyptic bleakness of the Threads posting, you may wish to watch La Jetée,, a 28-minute film told nearly entirely in stark black-and-white photos (and, in this version, with an English narration). This has quite a following, especially since Terry Gilliam's eerily similar 12 Monkeys.
comment posted at 12:33 PM on Dec-24-06

Goreans are inspired by the sci-fi works of Gor, by John Norman, whose turgid prose lays out a way of life for male masters and female slaves...but also Free Women. So why not meet one? Or at least say hello. And don't forget their humor! It sure is something. It just isn't BDSM.
comment posted at 8:48 PM on Dec-20-06

Raging Rudolph, a Martin Scorsese, Bankin/Rass Production.
Does my nose amuse you, is it funny like a clown, does it make you laugh?
No, no, no, great nose.
OK, I'm the Capo now.

comment posted at 12:25 AM on Dec-11-06

This is the largest gallery of works by the amazingly intricate designer/cartoonist/artist Chris Ware (author of Jimmy Corrigan) that I've ever seen online. However despite its breadth, it does not include his four covers for last month's New Yorker. Ware completists, also enjoy this (previously posted) gallery of Chris Ware papercraft toys.
comment posted at 12:07 AM on Dec-3-06


Bob Harris blogs the pudu. Thank you that is all.
comment posted at 11:06 AM on Nov-29-06

A blog dedicated to American sports uniforms may not sound that enthralling but when you discover it was conceived and written by Paul Lukas of Inconspicious Consumption fame it suddenly becomes a hell of a lot more attractive. For easy access into this world of minutiae try starting here.
comment posted at 5:56 PM on Nov-22-06

Odeo. Listen to lots and lots of podcasts. Like Alan Richman's culinary assualt on New Orleans.
comment posted at 12:49 AM on Nov-4-06

Finding The Third Dimension. A research project at Carnegie Mellon University that attempts to extract the third dimension from one single photograph. (YouTube video, via)
comment posted at 9:17 PM on Oct-24-06

Ima Gangsta -- the motivation and the regret. "San Francisco has an out of control gang violence problem, but what motivates young people to join gangs? Ruben City Palomares -- in his first film -- explores the reasons young homies choose to get jumped into a gang and reveals the lifetime of regret older gang members carry as a result of their fateful decision to be a gangsta. Palomares, 16, is a filmmaker with Conscious Youth Media Crew."
comment posted at 10:48 PM on Oct-4-06

Tuesday was all about R.E.M. at the Fabulous 40 Watt in Athens, GA. Local musicians came together to celebrate a benefit CD release, a new CD/2CD/DVD release of R.E.M.'s early years, and R.E.M.'s induction into the Georgia Music Hall of Fame. The Elephant Six Collective were there (darned near all of them) performing as The Observatory. Patterson Hood played, as did Five-Eight. And to start the show out right, R.E.M. themselves (even my fellow farmer Bill Berry) took to the stage. People in the audience (myself included) were feeling fine.
comment posted at 2:28 PM on Sep-15-06

Some people love the Dog Whisperer. Some people think he's a crock (link goes to a discussion of an August 31, 2006 editorial in the New York Times which is archived and can't be read without paying). There has been a fair amount of controversy about his methods. His former publicist is suing him for copyright infringement, among other things. Emily Yoffe rehabilitated her difficult beagle (discussed in her book) using techniques learned by watching his show and reading his book. I myself have used some of the techniques with our recently-acquired pound puppy. What about you? Do you think Cesar's got it, or full of it? Have you ever tried any of his methods on your dogs? What worked, what didn't?
comment posted at 12:43 PM on Sep-12-06



Star Trek XI: First there was the producer, J.J. Abrams from Lost and Alias. Then there was the poster, unveiled at this year's Comic Con. Throw in a little bit of controversy for good measure. Now comes word that Matt Damon has been cast to play a young Captain Kirk.What does Star Trek XI mean for the future of Trek?
comment posted at 1:35 PM on Aug-3-06

MTV turns 25 today. Music Television, otherwise known as MTV, was launched with its first broadcast on 1 August 1981, 25 years ago today. Famously, the first video broadcast was the Buggles' "Video Killed the Radio Star." Ironically, MTV evidently isn't going to acknowledge its anniversary on-air in any way, with a spokeswoman saying that "We made the decision when MTV was founded to always stay young and evolve with our audience. To do that, it has been important to serve our audience at that moment, not our audience of yesterday." This is about par for the course, though, since when was the last time that MTV actually broadcast music videos? A broader question: does anybody who wasn't weaned on MTV (or anybody who was, for that matter) care anymore?
comment posted at 11:47 AM on Aug-1-06

Welcome to the Aperture Science Enrichment Center. Remember our motto: "There's a hole in the sky, through which things can fly." (Coming soon.)
comment posted at 7:38 AM on Jul-20-06
comment posted at 7:53 AM on Jul-20-06
comment posted at 11:46 AM on Jul-20-06
comment posted at 11:23 AM on Jul-21-06

How valuable is your favorite sports star to his or her team? Sports economics take center stage as the NBA finals are underway in the United States and World Cup fever has gripped the rest of the world. Malcolm Gladwell reviews the Wages of Wins, where “Freakonomics meets ESPN”
comment posted at 9:01 PM on Jun-13-06

We have been called to inspire absolutely nothing in you , and we’re answering that call here tonight.
comment posted at 10:12 PM on May-10-06


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