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Will Smith, Gary Barlow (Take That), and the audience of The Graham Norton Show perform the theme song from The Fresh Prince Of Bel-Air". [performance begins about 1m8s into the clip]
comment posted at 10:42 PM on Jul-24-12

Cat-Scan.com is one of the strangest sites I've seen in some time. I have no idea how these people got their cats wedged into their scanners, or why.
comment posted at 9:43 PM on Jul-14-12

22 Reasons Why Design Was More Awesome In The '80s (SLBF)
comment posted at 9:19 PM on Jul-10-12

Scientists at CERN, using the Large Hadron Collider, may have discovered the Higgs Boson. (previously) and (previously)
comment posted at 11:56 PM on Jul-2-12

The Royal Society of Chemistry is offering £1000 to the person or team producing the best and most creative explanation of the phenomenon, known today as The Mpemba Effect
comment posted at 11:00 PM on Jun-27-12

The Internet is going crazy for 19 (or 16? or 17? Definitely not really 13) year old Florida rapper Kitty Pryde’s track “Ok Cupid.”
comment posted at 4:32 AM on May-21-12

Before hip-hop beefs, there were response records, also known as answer songs, usually replies to well-known songs. There are a few key eras: blues and R&B recorded music in the 1930s through 1950s, including a number of responses to "Work With Me, Annie" (1954), recorded by Hank Ballard & the Midnighters, with answers including "Annie had a Baby," and "The Wallflower" by Etta James; and Big Mama Thornton's "Hound Dog" (1953), with a quick response by Louis Innis and Charlie Gore, made a mere week after the original was released, and Rufus Thomas' "Bear Cat" (1953), Sun Records' first hit. Country, rock & roll, doo-wop and pop music picked up where the blues left off, with most activity in the 1950s to 60s. Two examples from this era are "Are You Lonesome To-night" and "Who Put The Bomp," and responses to both. The most well known from the next decade was Lynyrd Skynyrd's "Sweet Home Alabama" (1974), a response to Neil Young's "Southern Man" (1970) and "Alabama" (1972). Until the 2000s, no answer songs had charted as high as the original hits. That changed with Frankee's "F.U.R.B. (Fuck You Right Back)" (2004), a response to Eamon's "Fuck It (I Don't Want You Back)" (2003), which was the first answer song to reach number 1 in the UK. Six years later and across the pond, Katy Perry's "California Gurls" was a response to "Empire State of Mind" by Jay-Z. It was the first answer song to reach No. 1 in the Billboard Hot 100. More Responses inside.
comment posted at 3:31 AM on Apr-2-12

Drunk Ron Swanson That is all.
comment posted at 2:02 AM on Jan-20-12

We were kids...and songs would come on...and I would sing really loud...always the wrong lyrics. My little sister grew up thinking MY lyrics were the right ones. via
comment posted at 2:00 AM on Dec-22-11

In Memoriam: Christopher Hitchens, 1949–2011
comment posted at 9:15 PM on Dec-15-11

You are not special. You are not a beautiful and unique snowflake. You are the same decaying organic matter as everything esle. You use FIGHT CLUB brand soap.
From the real-life Omni Consumer Products Corporation, a product development company focusing on "licensing, defictionalization, and reverse-branding". Previous products include Brawndo, Tru Blood and Stay Puft Marshmallows (giant monster mascot not included).
Disclaimer: This post is NOT intended to help sell the product, just to inform you that it exists in this atrophying universe. Previously.
comment posted at 6:32 PM on Dec-14-11

Daniel Manitou is ActualPerson084 on Twitter. He writes slices of life about marketing and unspeakable horror. He is a real person and not a metal ghost in a rainbow box.
comment posted at 5:57 PM on Dec-12-11

Texas Governor and GOP presidential candidate Rick Perry is booked on all the major morning shows tomorrow, and with good reason. After two months of gaffes, impolitic stands, and bizarre speeches that quickly waned his once-strong odds of winning the Republican nomination, Perry went into Wednesday's CNBC debate sorely needing a win... only to deliver a tortuous, cringingly forgetful attempt [video] to recall just which three cabinet departments he'd vowed to abolish, a stunning failure political scientist Larry Sabato deemed "the most devastating moment of any modern primary debate" in his memory. While Perry's slow-motion flameout has boosted the fortunes of dark horse candidate Herman Cain, the unlikely challenger is facing troubles of his own in a volley of sexual harassment claims -- an oddly ineffective scandal Cain is doing his best to (somewhat dubiously) disavow. If Cain collapses, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich may reap the benefits, but his moribund campaign has issues of its own. Pawlenty, Bachmann, Perry, Christie, Cain, Gingrich... the base is loathe to rally round him, but after so many failed, flawed, or forfeited challenges, can anyone topple Mitt Romney?
comment posted at 1:05 AM on Nov-10-11

In the nine years since its last appearance in the blue*, Taquitos.net has grown to more than 5,000 snack reviews.
comment posted at 10:22 PM on Jul-31-11

The "Google Effect" affects how you remember information. The effect of search engines on the brain may make us more likely to forget data we find online - instead we are more likely to remember where to find the data. Check out the Columbia University Article for a more detailed analysis.
comment posted at 1:47 AM on Jul-19-11

Weekend At Kermie's: The Muppets' Strange Life After Death. Elizabeth Stevens asks:

What if, in 1990, instead of recasting Kermit—something that had been done to Mickey and Bugs Bunny before him—the Muppets had continued on Kermit-less, as "The Simpsons" did after Phil Hartman died. Recall Susan’s words on "Seasame Street" about Mr. Hooper in 1982: “Big Bird, when people die, they don’t come back.” Let’s say Robin showed up saying his uncle Kermit had passed away? Or, if that was too dark for Disney, what if Kermit had left show business to go off to start a family with Piggy? Someone else could lead the gang of weirdoes.

It would’ve made more artistic sense than what happened.

comment posted at 5:30 PM on Jul-14-11

Wood Tape. As told by Scott Nesin, of GamesByEmail. Drawings by Guy Nesin.
comment posted at 1:43 AM on Jul-13-11

"Hey guys, drinks are on me! I finally scored that interview with the Dali Llama. My journalism career is finally about to take off." 30 minutes and 3 rounds later..."Phil, you know what you should do? Tell him the Pizza joke. I'm sure he'll get a kick out of it." "Haha! You're right. That's an awesome idea. What could possibly go wrong?"
comment posted at 10:57 PM on Jun-16-11

Shea Hembrey created an "inaugural biennial" showing the works of 100 artists - all fictitious. (SLTED) Over a two-year period, he created over 100 pieces in a wide variety of forms, media and styles as well as profiles and bios for the 100 artists (plus two fictional curators). Is this Meta-Art, Art Deconstruction, open fraud, parody, large-scale pranking, the worst case of Dissociative Identity Disorder ever or All Of The Above? (exhibition website and catalogue)
comment posted at 11:19 PM on Jun-14-11

Lunchbox Doodles: "At the beginning of his first school year – on his first day of kindergarten in fact – my wife was preparing my son Andrew's lunchbox. As I sat sipping my coffee, she handed me a 3 x 5 blank index card and asked me to draw something for his lunchbox."
comment posted at 11:35 PM on Jun-4-11

Armageddon, final Orbit
comment posted at 3:39 AM on May-21-11

After being involved with the N.B.A for 40 years, Phoenix Suns President and CEO reveals that he is gay.
comment posted at 1:16 AM on May-16-11

Tim Heidecker endorses Donald Trumps for president
comment posted at 1:57 AM on Apr-27-11

Illustrator Nate Simpson was a longtime veteran of the video game and concept art industries. Back in 2009, he opted to take a year off from work to work on Gordon and the Stareater, his first attempt at sequential art.This week, Simpson's first major-publisher creator-owned comics project, Nonplayer, hit the stands courtesy of the folks at Image. How'd the experiment work out?
comment posted at 8:05 AM on Apr-7-11

Love at First Sight, Quite possibly the worst case of drunk dialing ever to reach the internet. Ryan Responds spoof.
comment posted at 12:26 AM on Apr-1-11

Beloved anime classic Akira (previously) is in the process of getting a live-action adaption courtesy of Warner Bros. and Legendary Pictures. In fact, they're currently trying to assemble a cast. Oddly enough, despite keeping the leading characters' names Kaneda and Tetsuo, all the actors approached are white. This hasn't gone unnoticed, and Racebending.com is preparing a campaign to protest. Just last year M. Night Shyamalan's adaption of The Last Airbender (previously) drew massive criticism for having an all-white cast in an Asian setting.
comment posted at 11:00 PM on Mar-24-11

Long-time bullying victim finally snaps: a video of an incident at a Sydney High School has gone viral over the internet three days prior to Australia's National Day of Action Against Bullying and Violence. Police and bullying experts are concerned about the level of online support that the fed-up victim's actions have received after the video, filmed by his miscalculating tormentors, was posted to Youtube (since removed and reposted multiple times). The 16 year-old has been suspended from school, but already has an online tribute to his actions and thousands of Facebook supporters.
comment posted at 7:13 PM on Mar-15-11

Star Wars: Episode I The Phantom Menace to be released in 3D. The movie will hit theaters on February 10, 2012.
comment posted at 6:31 PM on Mar-3-11

A massive quake ripped through the Canterbury area of the south island of New Zealand this morning.
comment posted at 7:36 PM on Feb-21-11
comment posted at 7:40 PM on Feb-21-11

Through my eye, not Hipstamatic's. (SLNYT)
comment posted at 6:14 PM on Feb-15-11

I notice a pair of faux-leather lace-up ankle boots that look a lot like the Jeffrey Campbell ones I'm wearing: The style is the same, so are the combination of hooks and holes for the laces and the distinctively shaped heel. Forever 21 sells the boots for $35.80, less than one-quarter the price I paid. I mention them, and Linda says brightly: "You should buy another pair here." An in-depth look at Forever 21 and the family that built the fast-fashion empire.
comment posted at 10:24 PM on Jan-24-11

Twenty-five years after hitting the airwaves, the Dire Straits hit "Money For Nothing" has been banned from Canadian radio. The Canadian Broadcast Standards Council decision is here.
comment posted at 9:32 PM on Jan-12-11

Muppets With People Eyes. [SLTumblr]
comment posted at 8:36 PM on Dec-29-10

Halfway through the third book of the Hitchhiker's Guide series, there is a throwaway reference to a doomed starship, one whose incredible splendor was matched only by the cosmic absurdity of its maiden-day annihilation. But the story didn't end there. Unbeknownst to many fans, this small piece of Adamsian lore was the inspiration for an ambitious and richly-detailed side-story: a 1998 computer adventure game called Starship Titanic. Designed by Douglas Adams himself, the game set players loose in the infamous vessel, challenging them with a maddening mystery laced with the devilish wit of the novels. The game was laden with extra content, including an in-depth strategy guide, a (mediocre) tie-in novel by Terry Jones, a whimsical First Class In-Flight Magazine, and even a pair of 3D glasses for one of the more inventive puzzles. Key to solving these puzzles was the game's groundbreaking communications system -- players interacted with the ship's robotic crew through a natural language parsing engine called SpookiTalk, whose 10,000+ lines of conversational dialogue spawned 16 hours of audio recorded by professional voice actors, including John Cleese, Terry Jones, and even Douglas Adams himself in several cameos (spoiler cameo). Want to experience the voyage for yourself? Then watch this narrated video playthrough (intro (ads) - 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9? 10 11 12 13) ...or click inside for a information on how to run the game for free on Windows, Mac, and Linux (along with a bunch of other goodies!).
comment posted at 7:37 PM on Dec-22-10

"Normal" human pregnancies last 40 weeks, right? Well, no; they can vary quite a bit by the mother's race, age, number of previous children, family history of delivering early or late, home state, work habits, and even the fetus' HLA type. So where does that "40 week" thing come from? Oh, dear. So check out this super-nerdy pregnancy statistics website, from an engineer mom who is collecting data from the public (see the raw data and auto-generated graphs, and read the FAQ about the survey, with more cool graphs). Looking for day-by-day probabilities on when that baby's due? This would be your stats table with daily prediction (adjust dates at top of page as needed). Of course, you could always shut up your constantly inquiring relatives and friends another way.
comment posted at 12:38 AM on Dec-17-10

Every DNS dot net, a free DNS provider, deactivated Wikileaks’s DNS entry (news article) after the latter allegedly breached the former’s terms of use. EveryDNS.net is not Easy DNS dot com, an unrelated Toronto domain registrar. But, as EasyDNS founder Mark Jeftovic relates, try telling the Internet that.
comment posted at 9:37 PM on Dec-8-10

Amazing movie quote search engine subzin is pretty simple, but pretty amazing. Put in your favorite quote from a movie, and it'll find the movie and the exact time it appears in the movie and links to Neflix if available (via df).
comment posted at 1:03 AM on Nov-30-10

Staggering Cache Of Picassos Turns Up In France. A retired French electrician and his wife say they stashed hundreds of never-before-seen works [in French at Libération, who broke the story] estimated to be worth at least $80 million in their garage. The works are believed to be authentic, but it's not quite clear how they came to be in the couple's possession.
comment posted at 1:01 AM on Nov-30-10

The flat earth and geocentric world are examples of wrong scientific beliefs that were held for long periods. Can you name your favorite example and for extra credit why it was believed to be true?
comment posted at 10:15 PM on Nov-24-10

University of Central Florida professor Richard Quinn uses highly-detailed analysis to accuse many of the students in his Strategic Management course of cheating on their midterm exam. Since posting his online lecture, 200 of the 600 students in his class have come forward to admit they cheated using testbank exam answers. While some are calling Professor Quinn a "folk hero", many students in the class are now complaining because they feel their professor has been dishonest about where he obtained the information for his exams. But Professor Quinn isn't exactly responding in student news sources to these complaints.
comment posted at 10:23 PM on Nov-18-10

Scientists have discovered a female boa constrictor reproducing asexually.
comment posted at 4:25 PM on Nov-5-10

Once Upon a Title - "pervy little stories made entirely from children's book titles"
comment posted at 6:55 PM on Nov-1-10

Somebody fed the hydra a hand grenade. The “robo-signer” scandal began September 20th when news broke that GMAC/Ally was suspending foreclosures in 23 states due to flawed affidavits submitted in foreclosure proceedings there. Since then, JP Morgan Chase, and Bank of America, and now possibly Littleton Loan Servicing (a subsidiary of Goldman Sachs) have admitted similar problems. With yesterday’s announcement by Bank of America that it will be suspending foreclosures in all 50 states (not just the ones where foreclosures go before a judge) all signs point to the fact that mere false affidavits are no longer the issue; other, more serious problems are now being uncovered, e.g. forged assignments and failure to serve papers. Up to 40 state’s attorney’s general are poised to announce a joint investigation. What does all this mean? Well…uh…can you actually prove you own your house? And can your bank? And can the investment bank who’s been collecting the payments from the bond they made out of your mortgage? If you can’t, you’re going to have a hell of a time selling it.* And so will all the banks.* Did I mention that bank-owned (REO/forclosures) sales are 25 percent of the housing market?
comment posted at 11:01 AM on Oct-9-10

The Minister for Science is launching a book against evolution--whaaaat?!! No comment seems necessary. I should add that because of the outcry the Minister has since withdrawn from the launch.
comment posted at 2:21 AM on Sep-14-10

Space Loteria. The Mexican memory game Loteria illustrated using characters from the Star Wars universe. Click on a card to see it larger, along with its traditional counterpart.
comment posted at 7:46 AM on Sep-6-10

Those old Disney cartoons too slow-paced for you? BLAM! (Original.) Are you confounded by physical humor? BLAM! (Original.) BLAM! (Original.) Does a cartoon without wisecracks leave you unsatisfied? BLAM! (Original.) BLAM! (Original.) BLAM! (Original.)
comment posted at 6:57 AM on Aug-29-10

Today is the anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.'s famous, "I have a dream speech". The Rev. Al Sharpton, NAACP, National Action Network and others will hold a rally starting a Dunbar High School. Glenn Beck and conservative leaders will hold a rally of their own on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. Graduate students studying journalism and the media at American University are covering the events with a team of embedded bloggers.
comment posted at 10:22 AM on Aug-28-10

The people have spoken mumbled a bit. The Australian Federal election held last Saturday has produced an extraordinary result. A minority government with the support of 1 Green and (maybe) 4 very independent independents will should result, but which way will it fall, left or right? Every Westminster-style government, claimed to produce strong stable majorities, now has a hung parliament. Even though results may not be known for several days yet, we can acknowledge the outstanding work of the Australian Electoral Commission. (Previously).
comment posted at 9:57 PM on Aug-24-10

25 Hong Kong tourists were held hostage in Manila in a 12-hour bus siege that ended with ten dead and six injured.
comment posted at 4:07 AM on Aug-24-10