What Do You Do When Your Only Online Identity is a Pseudonym? In a move reminiscent of recent Facebook purges, a well-known Second Life user (whose only online presence is pseudonymous) finds his
new Google+ account deleted, allegedly for not being a real person. Whether this move is directly related to the limited-beta status of Google+ or not, questions remain for those who have been 'unpersoned' by Facebook and hopeful that Google's laissez-faire attitude toward personal identification would make G+ a friendlier environment - particularly given Google's encouragement -
as recently as February of this year - to "be who you want to be" when using Google services.
posted by tpoh.org
on Jul 8, 2011 -
189 comments
The official Google Earth plugin is one free download that makes all sorts of cool stuff possible in your browser. There's
a full screen version of the program (complete with underwater views and 3D buildings) which can be searched by entering queries at the end of the URL. There's
a framed version with support for layers, historical imagery, day/night cycles, and the Google Sky starmap.
Less useful but more fun are Google's collection of "experiments" demonstrating the possibilities of the Earth API, including
a "Geo Whiz" geography quiz,
an antipode locater,
a 3D first-person view of San Francisco,
a virtual route-follower, and
MONSTER MILKTRUCK!, a crazy fun driving simulator that lets you careen a virtual milk truck through the Googleplex campus, ricochet off the Himalayas, or explore any other place you care to name.
Lots more can be found in the
Google Earth Gallery -- highlights include
a look at mountaintop removal mining,
a real-time flight tracker,
a guide to trails and outdoor recreation,
a 360 panorama catalog,
geotagged Panoramio photos,
and the comprehensive crowdsourced
Google Earth Community Layer.
And while it's too large to view online, don't miss loading
the Metafilter user location map into a desktop version of Google Earth!
[more inside]
posted by Rhaomi
on Jun 9, 2011 -
15 comments
I'm on a mission - not to praise Jesus or ensure that every child in Namibia has a netbook, but to kill every single living vaguely human-like character in Fallout 3. ... everyone ... no matter how friendly, helpful, or beneficial to my completion of the game, must be put into the ground. "Natural Born Killer", an experiment in virtual genocide, parts
One,
Two and
Three.
posted by slimepuppy
on Mar 26, 2010 -
45 comments
Jaron Lanier's new book,
You Are Not a Gadget -- a
cri de coeur on the commercialized, despoiled, fallen Eden of the modern Web-- is reviewed
here . MetaFilter name-checked by reviewer, though with the aid of a shoehorn. The
Mondo 2000-era dreadster explains himself
here. Lanier,
previously discussed on MeFi.
posted by darth_tedious
on Jan 3, 2010 -
43 comments
Savita Bhabhi is India's First Virtual Pornstar (NSFW). A sexy,
buxom, and lusty almond-eyed femme fatale, Savita, bearing the title 'bhabhi' which means 'sister-in-law' indicating that she's married, is the quintessential Indian male porn fantasy 'toon.
Launched in March this year, the web site has proven to be a hit, incorporating South Asian themes such as sleeping with the
servant boy; with a
cousin; and, of course, the boys playing
cricket next door.
posted by Azaadistani
on Oct 6, 2008 -
33 comments
Rowan Oak: In 1930, William Faulkner purchased what was then known as "The Bailey Place," a large primitive Greek Revival house that pre-dated the Civil War standing on four acres of cedars and hardwoods. Take a virtual tour of the home that housed this great American writer.
posted by Fizz
on Aug 11, 2008 -
11 comments
MUVA El PAIS has been conceived as a dynamic, interactive museum bringing together the most renowned works of contemporary Uruguayan art, an important contributor to Latin American art. MUVA is devoted to quality, content, education, information and recreation through the knowledge of visual arts. In Spanish and English, Flash and/or HTML.
posted by netbros
on Aug 25, 2007 -
2 comments
The Hamster Ball for Gamers The
VirtuSphere is a fully immersive virtual reality sphere that enables free movement in any direction for military and first-responder training (gaming), tourism (gaming), education (gaming), real estate walk-throughs (gaming), the possibilities are only limited by your imagination (gaming). You can run, jump, walk or otherwise locomote (i.e. roll a wheelchair) through an endless virtual world. And look like a
total dork doing it but who cares? The
videos make it look totally badass and fun and great exercise too! Though I do wonder what happens if/when you trip and biff.
posted by fenriq
on Feb 19, 2007 -
15 comments
Alexadex is a place to buy virtual shares in websites, with the share prices set according to Alexa.com's site traffic ranking. Metafilter.com currently stands at $535 per share.
posted by slater
on Feb 14, 2006 -
18 comments
NSFW MMOrgy: No more logging on and feeling sheepish 'cause you wanna know where the bordello is first. No more endless search through horrible shops finding implements for you and your fiancee who's 3000 miles away to have fun with.
NSFW
posted by signal
on Dec 22, 2005 -
25 comments
On July 13, 1865, one of the most celebrated institutions in the United States, the American Museum, burned to the ground. But thanks to the wonders of technology, it has been rebuilt—sort of—on a Website called The Lost Museum...
As it was managed by Phineas T. Barnum, the original American Museum was located in lower Manhattan and presented an ever-growing collection of wonders across five floors, ranging from "cosmoramas" and wax figures, to aquariums and live-animal specimens, to "moral representations" in the Lecture Room.
Via the incomparable
Common-place's
Finding Barnum on the Internet.
posted by y2karl
on Oct 6, 2005 -
8 comments
Purdue University has begun providing podcasts of lectures of some courses, intended for students who miss a class or who want to review specific lectures. Users of the service
can download a specific lecture or all of the lectures from an entire course. Apparently also open to the public it is called
Boilercast, about 50 classes are starting now for Fall 2005.
posted by stbalbach
on Aug 31, 2005 -
15 comments
The G.W. Talking Sockpuppet The Idiot's Guide to Presidentiable Speechwriting For Dummy
::blink :: ::blink :: ::blink :: ::blink :: ::blink :: ::blink :: ::blink :: ::blink :: ::blink :: ::blink ::
posted by y2karl
on Jul 11, 2004 -
9 comments
Half-Life meets Matisse in a virtual reconstruction of the apartment of
Etta and Claribel Cone. During the first three decades of the twentieth century, the sisters amassed one of America's foremost collections of modern art. Today, many of the pieces can be viewed in the
Cone Collection at the Baltimore Museum of Art. As part of the 50
th anniversary celebration of the museum's acquisition of the collection, the
Imaging Research Center at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County designed a
digital walkthrough of their apartment so that visitors could see the art in its original context.
posted by Aaaugh!
on May 4, 2003 -
5 comments
I'd invite you round my house but it's so tiny we have to throw the cat out to open the oven door. So lets go round
MrWong's house instead. A nice little (!) collaborative project to build a towerblock. I can't help feeling we need some MeFi floors...
posted by twine42
on Apr 1, 2003 -
8 comments
The Virtual MetaBanquet: Eat, Drink And Be Merry! Any class which includes A.M.Bowie's stimulating "Thinking With Drinking" paper in the bibliography, has to be worth taking but John Porter's
The Ancient Symposium/Convivium course description is full of wonderful links to all that is classical wining, dining, conviviality, friendship and other forms of philosophical and physical cheer. Brush up on your Plato and Xenophon!
...Which, together with the
Cooks' Thesaurus linked yesterday by
plep led me to imagine a glorious
Sunday MetaFilter Banquet...[
More inside.]
posted by MiguelCardoso
on Mar 29, 2003 -
11 comments
Virtual Journalist, experience the challenges of working in the liberal media. Fun but the politics are a bit heavy handed.
[flash required]
posted by bobo123
on Jan 22, 2003 -
5 comments
View the Wall. Recently a group of photographers took photos of every name on the Vietnam Memorial, did some magic in Quicktime VR, and now you can search the entire wall virtually. Nothing is as good as actually being there, but this is a close second.
posted by jragon
on Jun 28, 2002 -
13 comments
