The Word on The Streets!

A vertical mouse? A Fiber optic table cloth (BALLIN' SON!) Indiana Jones 4? I actually thought he would look terrible, turns out Harrison Ford is timeless like the character...

Mad Hot Weather Woman, Of Course She's Spanish...

KAW!

Recently in China a huge fossil was uncovered which is believed to belong to a a huge dino bird that towered over other feathered dinosaurs of the time. I can't imagine the fear that this freakish thing inspired, then again we know that dinosaurs did not exist anyway since there is no mention of them in the Bible...

News for some of those in states where cell phone use while driving is illegal, a new company aims to help The Man crackdown on cell phone using drivers. The device purports to be able to detect a car where the cell phone is in use for a call allowing cops to just use it like a radar gun and give out tickets even if they don't see the person in the car using the phone. This is so wrong its not even funny. Here is a comment that pretty much sums it up, from the web page.

What does it mean to attach a "paint gun mark" to a car? That sounds vaguely like "shooting a car with a paint gun." That's remarkably unsafe for a device that's supposed to save lives. Can it successfully detect if the user has his window rolled down or his convertible top down? Will it miss pedestrians? Damage the car?

And what makes you think that an "EMP gun" can properly localize its effect to disable only the cell phone while leaving the vital elecronic components of the car intact? Not to mention that an EMP pulse doesn't temporarily disable the phone, it destroys its circuitry. No more phone. Have they done any studies to see if a badly timed EMP makes the battery catch fire in the users hand?

And hey, what about the users complying with hands-free laws? They must get their phones fried too, since I'm fairly sure there's no way to distinguish between the two modes of operation aside from, yep, you guessed it, looking at the user.

This is about 17 terrible, halfway thought out ideas. Either April Fools day came late this year or this is a company that really likes the concept of bankruptcy.

Elvira hawking Software?!

The Day Hipsters Stole My Buddy

Oh where, oh where has my friend Pinto gone.?Oh where, oh where could he be? That was some fucked up shit Pinto. Or actually, the situation was handled really badly. Next time you want to change plans on someone, maybe you should just call them and try and explain it to them instead of getting drunk and telling them they are shit out of luck.

Never Trust Robots...

Don't take them along on trips, they might poison your bag of chips. Check out the stories on the Chair Robot and the Bear Robot. Can you imagine seeing this thing coming towards you on the battlefield after you have been shot? I would probably pop my cyanide pill or whatever they are giving the soldiers these days to avoid torture and questioning.

Salty and Doughnuts

Look how fun rookie day CAN be...it's not all hospital beds ands blue faced kids...





Two words that are supposed to be the ultimate defense if any trouble were ever to befall the Rochester Institute of Technology's rugby team.

Officer: ...And who supplied the alcohol?
Rugby Team Member: Two other players, their names were Salty and Doughnuts, I don't know their real names.
Officer: You don't know their real names?
RTM: Yes. Everyone on the rugby team is given a nickname (true) and we call each other by those names. I know these two only as Salty and Doughnuts.

It worked in the past and when this pathetic ban is lifted the ultimate pseudonyms will return. Long Live SALTY & DOUGHNUTS!

More Free Music

Bringing you yet another sweet free album, the people over at Williams Street have teamed up with eSurance for the release of "Warm & Scratchy". The album takes a departure from the usual hip hop/beat driven tracks and delivers some indie bands including Tv On The Radio and Asobi Seksu, two of my favorite bands. Peep it Adultswim.com and thank God that you know me.

What's Hot In The Tech Spot

First on the plate today is news of the Apple's offering of new "+" songs that come free of DRM and at a higher quality than the previous tracks from the itunes music store, but at a $0.30 increase in price. Videos that are DRM free will still be $2.00. The new tracks run at a 26Kbps rate while the old tracks were 128 Kbps. Although I congratulate Apple for trying come up with viable solution to the strong hand of the RIAA attempting to control how we interact with the information we are paying for, I still think that it's not enough. An article here does a double blind study as to whether you can even here the difference between 128 and 256 (and they even test the default Apple earbuds against a higher quality after market set to see if that makes any difference). Personally I think being able to burn a CD of your bought tracks which can then be ripped back onto your comp as a DRM-less copy ruins any hope of this really working. What companies need to do is make it so easy and cheap to get music that you can freely share that it's worth it to pony up the cash instead of jumping through digital hoops to make copies and share with friends. Think eMusic. I think the Microsoft Zune had a great idea with their wi-fi music share capability. But like many things that they do, the implementation was so terrible that it actually became a con of the player itself. In a somewhat related article, The Consumerist points out 50 politicians who took contributions from the RIAA. Shame on you.

Next up, close up your shades peeps because a little privacy issue from none other than Google could have the entire internet seeing what kind of cereal you like to eat. The company that promised to "do no evil" has added a new feature to it's popular maps app called "Street View" that will give you a ground level view of the street. It's currently only for certain locations but it's enough to get people worrying about the privacy of their homes. A woman who claims her cat can be seen in one of the photos has requested that Google remove the picture from the street-level database. I actually can understand peoples concerns here if this was a naked lady or at least some girls sunbathing, but your cat? Really? The first person that is going to make a stink about this is a chick afraid for the privacy of her cat? This is why when you raise privacy concerns about something valid you might get laughed at by not only the people pushing the products but your own peers as well.

Apparently the new thing in questioning social norms and pop culture is breaking them down into equations using a bevy of variables. First the Voice did it with the infamous "This is Why I'm Hot"track. Now I have found a serious piece of reading concerning the game of leaving the toilet seat down or up. This won't apply to most of us since we are swinging bachelors, but for some that have been subjected to the irritation of living with the opposite sex, this might prove useful or funny or neither.

Now for some Sad news. It seems that after a statement then a counter statement then a final statement, the series Battlestar Galactica will be ending after their fourth season. Contrary to the title of the article it seems that the shows creators are the initiators of the curtain call on the immensely popular albeit looked over series. Apparently the show, unlike other sci-fi series, had a beginning, middle and end envisioned although exactly how long each would be was not known. As a fan of the show I can say that it was one of the best sci-fi series I have watched including every incarnation of Star Trek. I feel that if it wasn't linked in people minds to the hoaky show of the 70's and attached to a network that a large segment of viewers do not tune into it did not get the praise it really deserved. I guess there is alway syndication.


You know we bitch so much about privacy in the states that we rarely look at how other westernized civilizations are handling privacy in this new world of technology and terror. Maybe they have some advice to offer? Or maybe they have got it all wrong. One need only to look to the UK of what it means not to bitch everytime the government introduces a new way of "keeping you safe". In response to the obscene gestures taken by the UK government a new film called "Taking Liberties" will be airing in theatres in various cities within the UK this weekend. I can only hope that this makes it to the States so that more people will be wary when new measures are introduced that are supposedly meant to "keep the terrorists from attacking" by somehow tracking all the inquiries you make on these here internets.

The Cansecos? As in Jose?

No Vivek, as in The Cansecos, a band. Here's the song I found, for free on eMusic I might add, that forced me to download the rest of the album.