March 2007 Archives

Kurt Vonnegut - 8 Rules For Writing Fiction

The 10 Worst Rap Album Covers Ever Made

.... The Devil in Miss Jones? The 50 Greatest Film Soundtracks

If ancient Rome had the Internet...

Student punished for spaghetti beliefs

Afro-Netizen: MC Rove: The Last Sign of the Apocalypse.

And other media types: Rejected Letters to the Editor. Via 3QD.

Which PKD Story Are We In Today?. PKD, ripped from the headlines. Via Boing Boing

A couple of addictive web games:

• Kdice is a multi-player version of the Risk-like Dicewars. Unlike Risk, however, the games are about 15 minutes long, not 3 hours. And, as there's a maximum number of 8 "armies" (dice) on each territory, you can't turtle and build up some huge army. A good mix of chance, strategy, and psychology.
• Desktop Tower Defense is a "live action puzzle game." You spend money building various kinds of towers, which automatically fire on the "creeps" trying to cross your territory. Killing creeps gets you gold, which you can spend on tower upgrades and more towers. The design of the game is cute -- it's pictured as an imagined game on your desk. I haven't made it past level 34.

Enjoy!

Anyone who remembers the MySpace + Hotlinking + Goatse post from January will understand the basic mechanism here: McCain campaign sets up MySpace page. McCain's staffer uses someone else's template, and hotlinks the images from the designer's template. Designer changes the image. Hilarity ensues.

Via Mark.

Six Freakiest Children's TV Rock Bands. Via Waxy.

B000LC55F2Certainly better than the dreadful Illusionist, but not great. Still, half a star just for having the screen credit "David Bowie as Nikola Tesla." 3 stars.

B00005YU1OAt first I put this into the "amazing looking but not engaging" category, but toward the end (when he stops merely "swept along") I was hooked. 3.5 stars.

Alex's investigative work last year into the connection between Aquasana and the "review" site WaterFilterComparisons.com takes a new turn: their president wrote back. I ask some further questions about this questionable marketing tactic.

I guess we'll have to wait until 2008 to find out.

B000021Y772nd viewing was better than I expected, but still not as good as the first. Did you know that the average shot length is 2.7 seconds? Still 3.5 stars.

Who knew that Ahmadinejad read Andy Borowitz?

Borowitz on March 20

President of Iran Declares War on Sparta Vows to Nuke 300 Warriors

In what foreign policy experts believe to be a direct response to the hit movie “300,” Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad today declared war on Sparta.

Even for the mercurial Mr. Ahmadinejad, the move struck many diplomatic insiders as extraordinary, since the consensus in the international community is that the city-state of Sparta no longer exists.

But according to a close associate of Mr. Ahmadinejad, the Iranian president’s thoughts turned to war after seeing a matinee showing of “300” this past Saturday at the Tehran Cineplex 12....

The NY Times today:

'300' Irks Iranian President

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran, obliquely attacked the hit Warner Brothers film “300” in a televised speech to mark the Iranian New Year on Wednesday, Variety.com reported. While not mentioning the film, about the Battle of Thermopylae in 480 B.C., by name, he accused Western powers of “trying to tamper with history by making a film and by making Iran’s image look savage.” Last week, his cultural adviser, Javad Shangari, declared the film “part of a comprehensive U.S. psychological warfare aimed against Iranian culture.” Warner Brothers said, “The studio developed this film purely as a fictional work with the sole purpose of entertaining audiences; it is not meant to disparage an ethnicity or culture or make any sort of political statement.”

Tasty, tasty McNuggets!

0441008615Picked this up at the airport bookstore. I'm sure 10,000 people have said "If Douglas Adams had written about Armageddon it might be this book," so I'll just be 10,001. A book to borrow.

Remember Gopher? TidBITS: Down the Gopher Hole. (Via Kerim.) Man, I remember reading about this new "Mosaic" thing...

Urban Legends Reference Pages: Letter from God about Abbey. Go on, I dare you not to cry.

0312422156This was so good, I would give it a Pulitzer if it didn't already have one. And if I had them to give. A Book to Buy

All Culture Will Be Remix Culture

On returning to the 34th Street station this morning, after a week-long vacation (hey guys, I'm back!) I saw this poster for some horror flick called Disturbia. The tag line? "Every killer lives next door to someone."

Um.... what about Ted Kaczynski?

Of course, this is preferable to the poster it replaced, a PSA to remind us, hey, um, genocide is going on. For some reason, the existence of advertising campaigns to remind us of genocide really bothers me. I understand why such campaigns exist, but bother me they do. The problem with this particular poster was its tagline... "What Happens in Darfur Happens To Us." Unfortunately, every time I saw it my brain substituted the more-ingrained Las Vegas tagline, so it read "What Happens In Darfur Stays In Darfur." Which, unfortunately, is probably closer to the truth.

This was usually pre-coffee brain, but still.

Anna Nicole Smith vs. Walter Reed

Both MSNBC and Fox News devoted more coverage to Anna Nicole Smith — three weeks after her death on Feb. 8 — than they did to the multiple developments involving the neglect and deplorable conditions at Walter Reed military hospital.

And no, that's not a comic book. Via Rebecca Blood.

Mr. Coffee-All-Over.

I am totally baffled why you would make a coffee pot that spills coffee every time you pour it.

Granted, I went low-end. I got the $24.99 DR12. (Does that stand for Dribble 12?) I don't expect it to clean itself or adjust the brew strength according to my mood. I don't need it to play MP3 files or keep track of my appointments. I just want it to heat water, drip it through coffee grounds and pour the results into my cup. Am I naive to expect this from your entry-level model?

Area girl calls 911 to report grandpa cheating at cards. Via Obscure Store.

pepakura star wars paper models

I haven't yet clicked through to any content yet, but the interface on Screenvader is wikkid. Via Coudal.

Cartograms...

Ironic Sans: 50 States in 10 Minutes