Cognitive Dissonance: Computers and Internet

What are all those damn clocks for anyway?

Wed, 13 Aug 2008 17:14:25 GMT

Bert is Gangsta

Wed, 13 Aug 2008 17:12:47 GMT

Motivational Daily Scripture

Wed, 16 Jul 2008 18:36:50 GMT

Heh.

Jesus and the Leper, Mark 1:40-47

...40 And there came a leper to him, beseeching him, and kneeling down to him, and saying unto him, if though wilt, thou canst make me clean. 41 And Jesus, moved with compassion, put forth his hand, and saith unto him, I will; dost thou have insurance? 42 And the leper saith unto him, Yes. I have Empire Blue Cross. 43 And Jesus asked of the leper, Dost thou have the PPO or the HMO? 44 And the leper saith unto him, I have the HMO. 45 And Jesus saith unto him, I am sorry, my child, but heal you I cannot, for I only accept Empire Blue Cross' PPO plan. 46 And the leper wept, but Jesus saith unto him, Perhaps another messiah will be along who accepts your plan. 47 And he sent the leper away from him.

CollegeHumor - Funny Pictures, Funny Videos, Funny Links!

Transitional Fossil Records

Sat, 28 Jun 2008 15:28:29 GMT

Daily Kos: State of the Nation

More McCain Store Goodness

Thu, 12 Jun 2008 18:38:30 GMT

John Cole got this one. But really, the humor just writes itself....

From Balloon Juice:

This place is the gift that keeps on giving. Via the comments section at the GOS, we see that you can also purchase the McCain Nautical Lapel Pin for the modest price of $200.00:

Take it away, GOS:
The flippin’ $200 boat lapel pin (what’s this, a yacht tax?), spells his initials with nautical flags. Thing is, nautical flags also refer to conditions. The flags mean:
J – Juliet – On Fire, Keep Clear
S – Sierra – Engines Going Astern
M – Mike – I Am Stopped
Perfect metaphor for the whole dang campaign.

We rate this a “Heh-Indeedy!”

Balloon Juice

Floppy Drive Music

Tue, 10 Jun 2008 20:25:51 GMT

One of a kind...

Tue, 06 May 2008 21:40:03 GMT

Not actually, My mom has a bunch of these old Edison cylinders. but this video rules.

Hunter-Gathers Returns!

Tue, 22 Apr 2008 22:36:45 GMT

Venture Bros. Season 3 Preview! Fuck Yeah!

Isolating the Christian Gene

Wed, 16 Apr 2008 17:23:34 GMT

Ha!

FSM @ Microsoft

Tue, 15 Apr 2008 20:51:34 GMT

So I tend to wander around the buildings at Microsoft just to get some exercise and see what is up, and we have a big collection of art on campus that gets rotated between buildings every year or so. So I generally expect to see some interesting things in the halls. So while I was over in Building 4 the other day (location of the closest espresso stand) and I notice some odd sculpture on the second floor balcony. Going upstairs, what do I find?

A sculpture of the Flying Spaghetti Monster! Now that's some pretty cool art.

Go read Deus Ex Malcontent

Fri, 07 Mar 2008 22:56:45 GMT

If you aren't reading this site every day, Here is some of what you are missing. The guy who writes it is the guy who was a producer on CNN who got fired for blogging. Then the guy who fired him got fired.

Funny shit. Some Samples:

Save the Date
Match.com is now offering six free months of service to any subscriber who hasn't found a compatible partner within an allotted time period. This is worthless; they should pay for someone to come to your house and perform oral sex on you.
Smelling Assaults
"Secret" anti-perspirant/deodorant is advertising a "clinical strength formula" version of its product. If you feel that you require this level of wetness and odor protection, please do the world a favor and don't ever leave your fucking house.

Fortune Favors the Fool
Supposedly, one of the most popular shows on Iraqi TV right now features a fortune teller who claims to be able to predict the future of those who call in. Exactly how hard can this be? "Tomorrow, you're gonna be blown to pieces -- thanks for calling."

Maternity War
Does every woman in America have a long-running dysfunctional relationship with her mother? If not, for Christ's sake, why do all chick-flicks not falling into the "implausibly fairy-taleish romantic comedy" category seem to deal with adult women coming to terms with the latent resentment of their mothers for the lifetime of insecurity the elders instilled in the younger? There are millions of men out there still nursing physical and mental scars inflicted upon them by their fathers -- you don't see them bitching about it and longing to revisit the trauma while curled up on the couch with a box of Kleenex.
Buck up ladies.

Deus Ex Malcontent

New Episode of Yacht Rock!

Tue, 12 Feb 2008 22:21:12 GMT

Now With Jimmy Buffett!

Sadly, He doesn't fare so well compared to the other characters. Pretty much, he and the Parrotheads get pwn3d.

Check it out:

Yacht Rock #11

Birdwalking with The Medium is the Massage

Sat, 29 Dec 2007 06:30:34 GMT

A couple of things got me thinking of Marshal McCluen today.

I tend to go on these mental birdwalks, sometimes over the course of a few nanoseconds, and sometimes for days at a time. I picked up a copy of Elmore Leonard's 10 Rules of Writing, a marvelously small and concise book about what not to do in writing. (go get it) This is only a 30 minute read, if you read it twice, but has some really neat ideas on what makes a writer invisible to the reader, and after completing A Moveable Feast and The Sun Also Rises, I can see that Leonard is a fan of Papa Hemingway.

This got me onto Leonard's website, which then had several broken links, letting my mind drift over to minimoose, a character from Invader Zim. A quick Google search found a few Youtube clips from the show, and a link to some forum where some other guy linked off to another Youtube clip from Woody Allen's Annie Hall.

The clip had woody waiting in line with some loudmouth behind him, bragging about his understanding of McCluen, and then Woody breaks the Fourth Wall and pulls Marshal McCluen from offscreen to tell the guy he is full of shit. It's funny as hell.

If you aren't familiar with McCluen, then go get a copy of the Medium is the Massage, which is a twisted and difficult read on media and ideas and presentation. Then go grab the first two years worth of Wired magazine, and it looks like some student out of a university communications class made Wired by ripping open McCluen and smearing ideas from his brain all over in a random pattern, and selling it. Wired is much calmer and mundane now, it's a real trip to see how it has changed.

I still have those old issues of wired in my garage, I haven't been able to get rid of them, although I lost my copy of The Medium is the Massage. And that brought me back to thinking of my old boss, and friend, Mike Bowler.

Mike and I worked together years ago, and he was a huge child of the Sixties, and a McCluen fan. He kept these journals of clipped out images from magazines, glued together with annotations and thought balloons, like he was stamping raw ideas out of his own brain for later reference. He loved the early Wired magazines, but he also thought that the editors were trying too hard. I haven't seen him since my first year at Microsoft, bummer.

He's a good guy to learn from, but tough to follow at times. But that's the case for most teachers.

I'm pretty sure that he'd laugh his ass off at the Woody Allen clip, then reach out to an alternate dimension to pull McCluen into our frame of reference, and ask him what he thought. Then he'd add it as a page to another of those journals.

Makes my nerd heart glow

Sat, 29 Dec 2007 05:51:43 GMT

Heh.

From some .sig:

‘Preceded by itself in quote marks yields a full sentence’ preceded by itself in quote marks yields a full sentence.

Top ten terrible tech products - Vista

Tue, 27 Nov 2007 18:12:39 GMT

Wow. Someone at Cnet was pissed off. Can't say he's that wrong though. Vista does kinda have a headless twin attached to it's ass.

Windows Vista
Any operating system that provokes a campaign for its predecessor's reintroduction deserves to be classed as terrible technology. Any operating system that quietly has a downgrade-to- previous-edition option introduced for PC makers deserves to be classed as terrible technology. Any operating system that takes six years of development but is instantly hated by hordes of PC professionals and enthusiasts deserves to be classed as terrible technology.
Windows Vista conforms to all of the above. Its incompatibility with hardware, its obsessive requirement of human interaction to clear security dialogue box warnings and its abusive use of hated DRM, not to mention its general pointlessness as an upgrade, are just some examples of why this expensive operating system earns the final place in our terrible tech list.

Top ten terrible tech products - Crave at CNET.co.uk

CLOVERFIELD - not your father's Cthulhu

Tue, 20 Nov 2007 16:51:06 GMT

So Cloverfield is coming in January, and being a lover of monster movies, I am getting excited. It looks silly and cheezy enough to still have fun with, w3ith cool effects and super Blair-Witch-Cam. Neato. Lots of folks are thinking it is a modern Cthulhu retelling. Which would be even better.

From the AICN talkbacks (sing to Safety Dance):

C, c, c, c
T, t, t, t
H, h, h, h
U, u, u, u
L, l, l, l
H, h, h, h
U, u, u, u
CTHULHU!!!
We can dance like Cthulhu
We can answer to his call
Watch him kick Lady Liberty's head
down the road like a soccer ball
Say, we can dance like Cthulhu
Live it up while the livin's good
Cause once he awakens, the world starts shakin'
and there goes the neighborhood
Say, we can dance, we can dance
Great Old Ones are in control
We can dance, we can dance
Hear them callin' the call
We can dance, we can dance
Terror makes you go in a trance
We can dance, we can dance
Everybody's shitting their p-a-a-nts
The Cthulhu Dance
The Cthulhu Dance
The Cthulhu Dance
YEAH!
It's the CTHULHU DANCE!!!

CLOVERFIELD trailer in HD and a glimpse, barely, of the creature! -- Ain't It Cool News: The best in movie, TV, DVD, and comic book news.

QOTD

Thu, 15 Nov 2007 22:09:02 GMT

From WWTDD:

Choosing who to root for between Japanese fisherman and animal rights activists is like choosing what color bat I want to get whacked in the balls with.

Welcome - What Would Tyler Durden Do

who the fuck?

Tue, 06 Nov 2007 16:18:02 GMT

OK. someone keeps searching on Google, and in various languages, for Charles Lasseter. My site comes up as a top hit, I can see the referrer traffic in my logs. Who the fuck are you?

It's really weird to see in the logs.

bloody rain

Sun, 30 Sep 2007 21:57:54 GMT

looks like its going to be a wet week. Though I don't mind the rain itself so much, with as little sleep that I get normally it seems to totally throw my systems for a loop. After running aroung yesterday morning, yulia laid down for a nap, and I took the time to read a bit.

I must have woke up an hour later, as folks were coming over for dinner, and I could hear them pulling ujp. I was completely in a state of confusion for about the next hour and a half. it was insane. I could barely function. I think it's the rain that does it.

Or all that narcotic cough syrup.

Pocket PC blog editor

Wed, 26 Sep 2007 20:31:54 GMT

looks like we have a new editor for blogs that works from windows mobile phones. i'm testing it out now. its called Diarist, and seems to be pretty good.

I shall have to do some more testing to see what else it supports.

Geeky - yet Soviet!

Wed, 19 Sep 2007 23:02:42 GMT

A Soviet Poster A Day is a site that gives you your daily Soviet-era propaganda poster. I have some of these at home. Sweet!

I had this Gagarin poster in High School, I got it in Russian class during some kind of exchange. It was pretty cool.

A Soviet Poster A Day

Nerd Alert: Tron Remake!

Tue, 11 Sep 2007 16:29:53 GMT

I suppose there could be something nerdier than getting excited abouta possible remake/sequel to Tron, but I just don't know what it could be.

From AICN:

Customarily, I wholly disagree with the notion of remaking "classics". In this case, re-approaching TRON makes an enormous amount of sense - especially with Lisberger's involvement. Firstly, it may not be a "remake". And, a film like 300 could clearly be a template for how a movie as (literally and conceptually) "virtual" as TRON might be made. We've all seen the tremendous leaps forward in CGI technology since 1982...and the concept by nature, well, intrinsically supports an upgrade - v 2.0, and all of that.
There is a TRON 2.0 game by the way - no word on if this film will use the game as a template, although I doubt it will.

The Master Control Program Has Chosen You To Serve Your System On The Game Grid!! There's A New TRON Movie In Motion!! -- Ain't It Cool News: The best in movie, TV, DVD, and comic book news.

Windows Live Home - Craptacular Crapapolooza!

Fri, 10 Aug 2007 15:28:56 GMT

So a bunch of my buddies at work updated their blogs with the exciting news that the new http://home.live.com page just launched. and normally, I'm pretty jazzed when we ship new stuff. I like the Windows live products (spaces and search obviously) and since http://www.live.com loads pretty slow, I figured that this should be a pretty decent improvement. And on first glance it looks great.

Then I tried to use it.

Where shall I start? The header is really nice. I get the weather and date. Of course I have moved since setting up my passport long ago, so the wrong city shows. I can change that fine, of course that change doesn't follow me from machine to machine, so I have to figure out how to make that permanent. The rest of the header matches spaces, so that's cool. How about the body of the page?

The first section is Hotmail, with a little Ajax control that never loads, then an ad for messenger. Now I would expect this ad to know if I am running messenger at the time, and change what it shows if I am. It doesn't. Then there is a ad for MSN contacts, which links to an error page.

Below that are two controls that mirror the Spaces Home page, Updated Spaces and My Blog. Those work and are really useful. Right next to it is a blank space that I cannot figure out how to fill.

The third section has more ads. Specifically for Onecare, Skydrive, and then a bunch of smaller crap. None of these seem to detect if I have these services, like the blog controls do.

To top it off, the title bar for each of these sections has little tools on them, and the tools exactly match the modules in each section. That's right, the top section has the email module, IM module, and Contacts module, and just in case you miss those, there is a little Email, IM and Contacts button directly above them. What fresh hell is this?

I know that a lot of people that I like worked very hard on this, but I hope that this is some kind of public beta or something, because it is a fucking embarrassment. This page adds no value to me as a user. It's basically a collection of ads and redundant links. the Spaces home page http://home.services.spaces.live.com is similar, but a million times more useful. it has views, friends, blog entries, messages, and the toolbar links aren't redundant.

Sorry guys. What bends me out of shape is that we all work too hard to be shown up by shoddy work like this. If it isn't good. Don't ship it.

Oh, and I'm still watching that Hotmail ajax control spin, sucking up CPU cycles.

Windows Live Home

Article: 10 Ways Microsoft Can Salvage their iPod Killer

Thu, 07 Jun 2007 17:16:19 GMT

Go read this. Zune Sucks.

Link to 10 Ways Microsoft Can Salvage their iPod Killer

Got an AppleTV

Wed, 06 Jun 2007 19:43:55 GMT

So we got one of those new-fangled AppleTV things at home now. So far it seems pretty cool. It's certainly a version 1.0 device, but I think it has real potential. So far, the photo slideshows are about the coolest thing, I think. I need to create more albums and sync them, but the photo quality is just sweet, and it pairs with music, if that is wanted.

The video features work great, but the quality is really limited by the content, not the device. I need to re-rip some of my DVDs to a better quality. Also the streaming works great, so I don't need to sync everything, which is good because the device has a small drive (40gGB).

Music works perfectly, and I can't wait for YouTube to arrive (in a few weeks supposedly)

Overall I like it, we will see how it ages when the new car smell wears off.

Dear Dr. Laura

Wed, 23 May 2007 04:33:19 GMT

Reposted from gonzo.org:

In the late 1990s, Dr. Laura was a huge lightning rod for a number of things, especially the photos of her that showed up on the Internet and her comments on homosexuals. I listened to her show a couple of times, and I honestly can't imagine why anyone would call and take advice from her. Do you suppose she gets a kick from demeaning people over the air?

Dear Dr. Laura,

Thank you for doing so much to educate people regarding God's Law. I have learned a great deal from your show, and I try to share that knowledge with as many people as I can. When someone tries to defend the homosexual lifestyle, for example, I simply remind him that Leviticus 18:22 clearly states it to be an abomination. End of debate. I do need some advice from you, however, regarding some of the specific laws and how to best follow them.

a) When I burn a bull on the altar as a sacrifice, I know it creates a pleasing odour for the Lord (Lev. 1:9). The problem is my neighbours. They claim the odour is not pleasing to them. Should I smite them?

b) I would like to sell my daughter into slavery, as sanctioned in Exodus 21:7. In this day and age, what do you think would be a fair price for her?

c) I know that I am allowed no contact with a woman while she is in her period of menstrual uncleanliness (Lev. 15:19-24). The problem is, how do I tell? I have tried asking, but most women take offence.

d) Lev. 25:44 states that I may indeed possess slaves, both male and female, provided they are purchased from neighbouring nations. A friend of mine claims that this applies to Mexicans, but not Canadians. Can you clarify? Why can't I own Canadians?

e) I have a neighbour who insists on working on the Sabbath. Exodus 35:2 clearly states he should be put to death. Am I morally obliged to kill him myself?

f) A friend of mine feels that even though eating shellfish is an abomination (Lev. 11:10), it is a lesser abomination than homosexuality? I don't agree. Can you settle this?

g) Lev. 21:20 states that I may not approach the altar of God if I have a defect in my sight. I have to admit that I wear reading glasses. Does my vision have to be 20/20, or is there some wiggle room here?

h) Most of my male friends get their hair trimmed, including the hair around their temples, even though this is expressly forbidden by Lev.19:27. How should they die?

i) I know from Lev. 11:6-8 that touching the skin of a dead pig makes me unclean, but may I still play football if I wear gloves?

j) My uncle has a farm. He violates Lev. 19:19 by planting two different crops in the same field, as does his wife by wearing garments made of two different kinds of thread. (cotton / polyester blend). He also tends to curse and blaspheme a lot. Is it really necessary that we go to all the trouble of getting the whole town together to stone them? (Lev.24:10-16) Couldn't we just burn them to death at a private family affair like we do with people who sleep with their in-laws? (Lev. 20:14)

I know you have studied these things extensively, so I am confident you can help. Thank you again for reminding us that God's word is eternal and unchanging.

Your devoted disciple and adoring fan

New Term of the Day: GILF

Tue, 05 Dec 2006 20:34:15 GMT

Ha! I love the internets. When the pipes aren't clogged.

Link to GILF: Alaska's First Gal Governor Sworn In - Wonkette

LEGO MindStorms NXT - OnBrick

Tue, 05 Dec 2006 17:02:14 GMT

Sweet! Sotware for your WM phone or PDA that lets you control your lego robots via BlueTooth!

Link to LEGO MindStorms NXT

They're made out of meat

Fri, 01 Dec 2006 15:44:52 GMT

A dialogue by Terry Bisson. From a series of stories entitled "Alien/Nation" in the April issue of Omni.

"They're made out of meat."

"Meat?"

"Meat. They're made out of meat."

"Meat?"

"There's no doubt about it. We picked several from different parts of the planet, took them aboard our recon vessels, probed them all the through. They're completely meat."

"That's impossible. What about the radio signals? The messages to the stars."

"They use the radio waves to talk, but the signals don't come from them. The signals come from machines."

"So who made the machines? That's who we want to contact."

"They made the machines. That's what I'm trying to tell you. Meat made the machines."

"That's ridiculous. How can meat make a machine? You're asking me to believe in sentient meat."

"I'm not asking you, I'm telling you. These creatures are the only sentient race in the sector and they're made out of meat."

"Maybe they're like the orfolei. You know, a carbon-based intelligence that goes through a meat stage."

"Nope. They're born meat and they die meat. We studied them for several of their life spams, which didn't take too long. Do you have any idea the life spam of meat?"

"Spare me. Okay, maybe they're only part meat. You know, like the weddilei. A meat head with an electron plamsa brain inside."

"Nope. We thought of that, since they do have meat heads like the weddilei. But I told you, we probed them. They're meat all the way through."

"No brain?"

"Oh, there is a brain all right. It's just that the brain is made out of meat!"

"So... what does the thinking?"

"You're not understanding, are you? The brain does the thinking. The meat."

"Thinking meat! You're asking me to believe in thinking meat!"

"Yes, thinking meat! Conscious meat! Loving meat. Dreaming meat. The meat is the whole deal! Are you getting the picture?"

"Omigod. You're serious then. They're made out of meat."

"Finally. Yes, they are indeed made out meat. And they've been trying to get in touch with us for almost a hundred of their years."

"So what does the meat have in mind."

"First it wants to talk to us. Then I imagine it wants to explore the universe, contact other sentients, swap ideas and information. The usual."

"We're supposed to talk to meat?"

"That's the idea. That's the message they're sending out by radio. 'Hello. Anyone out there? Anyone home?' That sort of thing."

"They actually do talk, then. They use words, ideas, concepts?"

"Oh, yes. Except they do it with meat."

"I thought you just told me they used radio."

"They do, but what do you think is on the radio? Meat sounds. You know how when you slap or flap meat it makes a noise? They talk by flapping their meat at each other. They can even sing by squirting air through their meat."

"Omigod. Singing meat. This is altogether too much. So what do you advise?"

"Officially or unofficially?"

"Both."

"Officially, we are required to contact, welcome, and log in any and all sentient races or multibeings in the quadrant, without prejudice, fear, or favor. Unofficially, I advise that we erase the reconds and forget the whole thing."

"I was hoping you would say that."

"It seems harsh, but there is a limit. Do we really want to make contact with meat?"

"I agree one hundred percent. What's there to say?" `Hello, meat. How's it going?' But will this work? How many planets are we dealing with here?"

"Just one. They can travel to other planets in special meat containers, but they can't live on them. And being meat, they only travel through C-space. which limits them to the speed of light and makes the possibility of their ever making contact pretty slim. Infinitesimal, in fact."

"So we just pretend there's no one home in the universe."

"That's it."

"Cruel. But you said it yourself, who wants to meet meat? And the ones who have been aboard our vessels, the ones you have probed? You're sure they won't remember?"

"They'll be considered crackpots if they do. We went into their heads and smoothed out their meat so that we're just a dream to them."

"A dream to meat! How strangely appropiate, that we should be meat's dream."

"And we can mark this sector unoccupied."

"Good. Agreed, officially and unofficially. Case closed. Any others? Anyone interesting on that side of the galaxy?"

"Yes, a rather shy but sweet hydrogen core cluster intelligence in a class nine star in G445 zone. Was in contact two galactic rotation ago, wants to be friendly again."

"They always come around."

"And why not? Imagine how unbearably, how unutterably cold the universe would be if one were all alone."

don't let me forget.

Thu, 06 Jul 2006 01:43:09 GMT

I need to tell the story of gary hart's fax line.

Mobile Spaces

Mon, 03 Jul 2006 21:27:23 GMT

so this new beta seems pretty cool. lets see how it works