Tool-assisted speedruns seek to create a perfect run by using tools such as slow motion, scripts and manipulation of random numbers. A few TASs have appeared on the blue before, but it's easy to get lost in the archives of
TASvideos. The pages of
popular videos and
notable videos are useful here. You could browse by
platform or use the tabs to sort the videos by various statistics. A good starting point might be
Actraiser (
yt), a hybrid of sidescroller and city simulation, which has been subtitled so that you can understand the choices made by the author
(click on the 'closed captions' button). Some of the most impressive TASs take advantage of glitches: watch Link complete
Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask (
yt - no cutscenes) by supersliding, bomb jumping, and eschewing boss keys or a long game like
Super Mario 64 (
yt) completed in 5 minutes in a no-stars run. However, sometimes watching a longer, competent run like
Donkey Kong Country 2 (
yt) 102% is just as fun. Here are some recommendations.
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posted by ersatz
on Sep 21, 2012 -
37 comments
Robert MacPherson interviewed as part of the Simons Foundation's
Science Lives series. MacPherson is among the founders of the modern theory of
singularities, points like a kink in a curve where the geometry of a space stops being smooth and starts behaving badly. In the interview, MacPherson talks about cultural differences between math and music, his frustration with high school math, growing up gay in the South and life as a gay man in the scientific community, smuggling $23,000 in cash into post-Soviet Russia to help mathematicians there keep the lights on, catastrophe theory, perverse sheaves, how to be a successful graduate student, stuttering, and of course the development of the intersection homology theory for which he is most well-known.
posted by escabeche
on Sep 12, 2012 -
5 comments
He was doubled-over, crying. He looked up at my mom and simply said, "Play this at my funeral."
Which we did, on Memorial Day, in our backyard beside his trout pond. ..
"I made this video with and for my father, Larry Zander, who died a few weeks ago, on May 27, 2011. He was 78. For those of you who knew my Dad, you will instantly recognize him in his natural habitat."
posted by thisisdrew
on Sep 5, 2012 -
20 comments
Diamanda Hagan is an obsessive Dr. Who fan in scary makeup. She posts extensive, entertaining, and exhaustively nerdy rants on some of the worst episodes of Nu Who. Behold!
The Beast Below,
Voyage Of The Damned,
Victory Of The Daleks,
Fear Her,
The Next Doctor,
Planet Of The Dead,
The Doctor's Daughter, and
The End Of Time (The Whole Damn Thing) (NSFW language)
posted by The Whelk
on Aug 31, 2012 -
299 comments
Suppose I could offer you a choice of two technologies for watching TV online. Behind Door Number One sits a free-to-watch service that uses off-the-shelf technology and that buffers just enough of each show to put the live stream on the Internet. Behind Door Number Two lies a subscription service that requires custom-designed hardware and makes dozens of copies of each show. Which sounds easier to build—and to use? More importantly, which is more likely to be legal?
If you went with Door Number One, then you are a sane person, untainted by the depravity of modern copyright law. But you are also wrong. The company behind Door Number One, iCraveTV, was enjoined out of existence a decade ago. The company behind Door Number Two, Aereo, just survived its first round in court and is still going strong.
Why Johnny can't stream: How video copyright went insane by MeFi's own
James Grimmelmann.
posted by Horace Rumpole
on Aug 30, 2012 -
18 comments
In 2011, in front of a sell-out theatre at the BFI in London, Charlie Kaufman delivered the final lecture in BAFTA's Screenwriters' Lecture Series. Eliot Rausch took snippets of the lecture and set them to apposite visual clips and produced this video:
What I Have to Offer (single link vimeo). [via]
posted by AceRock
on Aug 26, 2012 -
10 comments
How to Eat a Watermelon Tutorial (SLYT) was made by
Tom Willett, a 74 year old semi-retired comedian, musician, and actor. Willett's personal website,
Comedy Parade, includes style and character-building tips for budding comedians, interspersed with tributes to comedians he admires.
This recent interview with Willett comes off the heels of the watermelon eating tutorial video's viral success.
When asked why he continues to film videos of his skits, comedic news broadcasts and songs instead of “retiring,” he said it‘s because he hasn’t changed from the 14 year old who decided to throw all of his ambition into being an entertainer.
“I’m basically the same person I was when I was 14 — inside. I haven‘t changed what I like and I never do what you’re supposed to do. I do what feels right.”
posted by catch as catch can
on Aug 20, 2012 -
18 comments
"
The Most Important Gay Porn Film Ever Made?" [NSFW Warning: Pictures of a naked guy, no sex or penis shown.]
"
Dawson's 20 Load Weekend redefined bareback porn and the men who appear in such porn. It influenced subsequent videos and expanded the availability of bareback films. It depicted a prevailing truth about gay sexual behavior "post-AIDS" and arguably encouraged risky sexual adventure-seeking. It led to the saturation of bareback porn online, making unprotected sex normative to whomever might be watching. To dismiss this film, to minimize its social and cultural impact, would be to demonstrate a profound misunderstanding of gay sexuality today."
posted by andoatnp
on Aug 16, 2012 -
54 comments
'textbook definition of surrealism' In his epic new bio of James Brown, "
The One"--an account of not just the man's life and music, but a panoramic view of African-American, southern and American political and cultural history of the 20th Century--author R.J. Smith briefly discusses "Future Shock," a dance show that Brown hosted in the mid-1970s. It aired on a pioneering Atlanta station, WTCG, a Ted Turner-owned UHF station that would become a satellite channel by the end of 1976. Along with the pay-only HBO (started in '75 in select markets), WTCG paved the way for a cable TV revolution. Its name would be changed to
WTBS (otherwise known as Superstation WTBS) in 1979.
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posted by raysmj
on Aug 14, 2012 -
13 comments
[NSFW, TW]
Sex House is an Onion webseries about six sexy Americans locked in a house for a reality show about getting nasty, but by the end of the first night things start to get terrible. Think
No Exit meets
Black Mirror (
previously), it's a scathing satire of American sexual attitudes that's also amazingly suspenseful.
posted by The Devil Tesla
on Aug 9, 2012 -
97 comments
