BLOATED TROUT

The Best Title In The World

2007-07-07T08:32:00.000-04:00

2007-06-25T21:21:00.000-04:00

iPhone News
robotically bringing you the latest in iPhone headlines

What do you get when use the ability of several search engines and several social linking sites to save searches as seperate RSS feeds, then set up Tumblr to read those feeds? Your own custom iPhone News feed comprised of searches from several search engines and social linking sites and a lazy man's blog. I access the RSS from iPhone News to give me a one stop list of the days iPhone Buzz Machine.

2007-04-24T07:52:00.000-04:00

The Prius Versus HUMMER: Exploding the Myth

photo from xtcian
"Over the past year, there has been an explosion of stories raising questions about the real environmental cost of hybrids.

One of the most misleading ones, which has been spread by countless blogs over the past several weeks, and cited without verification by several sources that appear reputable, looks to have originated in a story last November in England's Daily Mail, a right-leaning, British tabloid paper, which bore the gleefully spiteful title 'Toyota factory turns landscape to arid wilderness.' An editorial, published last month in a newspaper for a small state university on the East Coast, helped bring this misleading report a new life."
The click here to read the full article

A.I. (Artificial Inteligence) busted for A.L. (Artificial Lawyering)

2007-03-07T06:42:00.000-05:00

AI Cited for Unlicensed Practice of Law

"A web-based "expert system" that helped users prepare bankruptcy filings for a fee made too many decisions to be considered a clerical tool, an appeals court said last week, ruling that the software was effectively practicing law without a license."

When to buy a mac?

2007-02-22T08:01:00.000-05:00

MacRumors Buyer's Guide page

This page provides a product summary for each Apple model. The intent is to provide our best recommendations regarding current product cycles, and to provide a summary of currently available rumors for each model.

Phillips roll-up Display

2007-02-07T07:29:00.000-05:00

Phillips plans on releasing a portable display unit with a black and white screen that rolls up into the "Smaller than the screen itself" case.

Mairo in Grand Theft Auto

2007-02-07T07:05:00.000-05:00

What would happen if Mario and his brother from another mother went for a joy ride in Vice City? Here's Robot Chicken's take on it.

Play OLD games on your PSP

2007-02-06T22:09:00.000-05:00

So, you want to get in on the PSP homebrew scene? This ought to get you started.

First your going to need a way to get files to your PSP, get a nice size memory stick and a card reader from the electronics store or get some online. Sandisk makes a 5 in 1 reader that reads almost every card out there, well, at least five of them. The price of memory sticks have dropped dramatically and a card reader is real cheap. They run you about $20. You'll need it to copy files over to the PSP and a place to store all of your software.

If you want to know how to start emulating old game systems on your PSP, go here.

If you have a mac, or just don't understand filing systems too well, go here.

My favorite emulator to run is DGen, a Sega Genesis emulator. It's pretty flawless and the speed is spot on. Games like Vectorman and Sonic run without a hitch. Brings back memories of thumb blisters and orange carpet.

Have fun

A sense of scale

2007-01-13T21:16:00.001-05:00

The variety of scale in the known universe is amazing. Think how big we feel when we look at an ant. Next, think of how tiny we are in relation to our planet, how tiny earth is in relation to our sun. Then there is VV Cephei, an eclipsing binary star system that makes our average sun look miniscule in comparison. If it were placed at the center of our Solar System, it would extend to the orbit of Saturn

iPhone

2007-01-09T19:13:00.000-05:00

...and I thought my white chocolate was cool

SWF DECOMPILERS / SWF EXTRACTORS

2006-10-18T11:34:00.000-04:00

have some old swf files you made but lost the source files? check out this list of flash extractors

SWF Decompilers / SWF Extractors

WEB - MySpace Friends Private Status Hacked!

2006-08-27T09:28:00.000-04:00

Simple Hack to view all comments on a private Myspace profile | Help For Beginners

Thought your "private" myspace comments were really private? Well think again! This simple code lets ANYONE view all the comments on your PRIVATE profile. With a simple variation you can also view "private" pictures.

Digg-poster Kevgig nailed it when he wrote: "There is nothing private about the internet, period. Just goes to show that if there are parts of your life that you do not want to share with the world, keep it to yourself."

It appears this hack is restricted to friends seeing others friends private info. Even so, this is a major security flaw and if not fixed immediately, could spell disaster for MySpace AND some friendships. Hahahahahahahahahaha!

technorati tags:MySpace, Security

TECH - Writely, google's web based word processor launched

2006-08-25T00:34:00.000-04:00

Welcome to Writely

Writely, the web word processor from Google says.

Can I ... upload from Word? YES!
Can I ... save to my desktop? YES!
Can I ... publish on the web? YES!
Can I ... post on my blog? YES!

Writely was purchased by Google some time ago and is now poised to do for document creating what Gmail did for email. To take the application off of your desktop and make it web accessible. You can also share a document with a group for collaborative editing. Read up on the terms of service when deciding how personal you want to make your documents.

WEB - Web2.0 Logo Creator

2006-08-17T11:06:00.000-04:00

Web2.0 Logo Creator by Alex P

Create your own WEB 2.0 logo with this automatic WEB 2.0 generator. Even has the obligatory "BETA" burst as an option.

technorati tags:logo, generator, WEB2.0

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TECH - Conceal Your Web Surfing From Prying Eyes?

2006-08-17T09:08:00.000-04:00

workFRIENDLY - BETA

Hahahah. For those of you for whom research on the tubes is shunned upon at the workplace, then I recommend you try "WorkFriendly". It masks the content of your most favorite page as a Word document.

technorati tags:surfing, secure

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Doug Engelbart: The Demo

2006-08-16T22:12:00.000-04:00


"Doug Engelbart giving the "mother of all Demos" Watch as the computer mouse is introduced, back in December of 1968

SPACEPORT - New Mexico spaceport unveils new name

2006-08-16T08:11:00.000-04:00

Goodbye Southwest Regional Spaceport. Hello Spaceport America.

New Mexico officials planned to unveil the new name Monday for a proposed $225 million space hub where British billionaire Sir Richard Branson hopes to send paying tourists on suborbital flights.

The previous name was a mouthful to pronounce and didn't reflect the cutting-edge vision of the project, said New Mexico Economic Development Secretary Rick Homans.

USATODAY.com - New Mexico spaceport unveils new name

technorati tags:spaceport, newmexico

Blogged with Flock

TECH - Program for mac users to remap keys on your keyboard

2006-08-14T21:59:00.000-04:00

DoubleCommand.

DoubleCommand is software for Mac OS X (a kernel extension) that lets you remap keys, in other words change the way your keyboard works. Often used to make a PC keyboard more comfortable with a Mac, swapping the Alt (Option) and Windows (Command or Apple) keys, since they are in swapped positions on Mac and PC keyboards. DoubleCommand is a quick and easy way to fix this if you use a PC keyboard with your Mac.

I bought a spill-proof PC keyboard for my mac recently (since I went through three non-spill-proof keyboards recently) and this software works great. I can see windows switchers using this to make the transition from win-dose to mac more comfortable by remapping the mac keybord keys back to what they are used to on a windose keyboard.

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VIDEO GAMES - Program your own xbox360 games!

2006-08-14T18:58:00.000-04:00

NexTechNews - Microsoft to allow 360 "Homebrew" well ... kinda.

XNA Game Studio Express, a set of (dumbed-down) development tools that will allow hobbyists and their ilk to develop games for both the Xbox 360 and the PC. Initially, these homebrew (is it still considered "homebrew" if you're using official tools?) games will only be playable to other coders part of a so-called "Creator's Club," a nice way to say that Microsoft will charge you $99 for a one-year subscription to play such games.

Still, $99 to play as many games as you like and the chance to develop your own with like minded folks? Don't sound so bad to me. I would even consider getting a PC for that.

technorati tags:xbox, video, games, development, homebrew

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TECH - Easily Create and Share Customized Google Maps

2006-08-13T08:22:00.000-04:00

Show Me Where: Easily Create and Share Google Maps.

Need to make your own custom google map? With "ShowMeWhere", you can

Drop markers or draw lines.
Annotate markers or lines with any HTML you want.
Send your map in an email, or host map on your website.
Open your map directly in Google Earth.

Show Me Where is a point-and-click interface to creating customized Google Maps. Want to place a marker on a map? Just click there. simple stuff.

technorati tags:google, map

Blogged with Flock

TECH - Space Ship Builder Guru Burt Rutan talks about His Plans for Space Tourism

2006-08-11T20:31:00.000-04:00

SPACE.com -- Burt Rutan on Civilian Spaceflight, Breakthroughs, and Inside SpaceShipTwo

At ScaledComposites—home of the privately financed and built SpaceShipOne that made atrio of piloted suborbital flights in 2004 under the rubric of Tier 1—thefabrication of a fleet of passenger-carrying space planes and huge carrierlaunch planes is underway. This activity is labeled Tier 1b.

Burt Rutan,head of the firm, is chief design maestro leading a spaceliner workforce. Whilehe’s not about to roll out blueprints or show you factory floor hardware, hegave this reporter a squat down, legs folded, but relaxing beanbag chairinterview in his office to discuss the business of public space travel.

What does visionary space frontiersman say about his planned fleet of space tourism crafts?

“I’d loveto be working on going to the Moon. I’m doing this really because I don’t thinkI can convince a funder to go out and invest in an orbital system that we’renot sure would work.”...

...Along withlots of windows, a close second on the “must have” checklist is for customersto experience weightlessness. A person in SpaceShipTwo will feel just fourminutes of freefall, so having a great big cabin is extremely important, Rutanpointed out, “to be able to stretch out your arms and legs and float around.”
“Theimpression you get is that it’s important to know why you’re floating, so youneed windows. You want to fly…you don’t want to be strapped in. And toexperience weightlessness in shirtsleeve is important, not being bothered witha pressure suit or tied down to a cable or having a helmet on,” he said.

technorati tags:spaceship, space, tourism, burt, rutan

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Robot - No legs and no wheels, this robot balances on a ball

2006-08-11T20:06:00.000-04:00

New Scientist Tech - Breaking News - Ball-balancing robot refuses to roll over

The tall, thin robot, called Ballbot, sits on top of a ball, which it controls using a pair of rollers. Balance sensors feed information to an onboard computer. This continually moves the ball to make sure it is always under the robot's centre of gravity. Ballbot can also move in any direction, and regain its balance after a push, by making minor adjustments to the ball beneath it.

Click through for cool video clips

technorati tags:Carnegie Mellon, robot, movement

Blogged with Flock

TECH - How to Build a Panoramic Tripod Head for $10

2006-08-11T01:15:00.000-04:00

Worth1000.com tutorial

Panoramic heads can be very expensive – in the $300 to $500 range for “name brand” heads. Several designs for closer to $100 are available on the web, but look a tad on the flimsy side.

Building your own panoramic head for an SLR isn’t too hard or expensive. The parts for the design shown here cost about $10. Every part here is available at a store like Home Depot.

Once you get past some of the misinformation out there, the only really hard part is figuring out the dimensions. The downside is that the mount is only useful for a specific camera/lens combo. On the other hand, you can’t mistakenly mess up one of the critical adjustments once you’ve built it, and the homemade mount is as light as a couple small pieces of wood.

technorati tags:photography, tech, panoramic, tutorial, diy

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FLOCK blog post test

2006-08-11T00:01:00.000-04:00

First Bully game trailer now up - Joystiq

technorati tags:bully, rockstar, video, game

Blogged with Flock

TECH - interview with Chris Anderson, author of The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business Is Selling Less of More

2006-07-27T00:00:00.000-04:00

link to the real audio clip

link to Radio Times home page

WHYY's Marty Moss-Coane from Radio Times recently interviewed Chris Anderson, author of The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business Is Selling Less of More. Chris is the current Editor-in-Chief of the tech-centric Wired magazine. I caught the podcast of her show this afternoon while installing some house stuffs and was immediately distracted by what Chris had to say. He does an excellent job of putting the Long Tail into layman's terms. If your interested in the possible direction of popular consumption, this would be worth a listen for you.

DESCRIPTION: How the internet is shaking up the traditional supply and demand model for business. We'll talk with CHRIS ANDERSON, author of The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business Is Selling Less of More. Anderson says, the internet is allowing less popular products to have longer shelf lives, creating a new class of retail niche markets.

CULTURE - SPACE WALKING FOR EVERYONE! if everyone is filthy rich.

2006-07-23T12:38:00.000-04:00

Space walking for the rich masses.

I'm glad to see that space tourism is finally here. I'm not happy about the price tag. 35 million dollars will buy you a space walk, in space. 20 million for a week on the international space station and an extra 15 million for you to venture out into space in a suit. But take heart simple commoner, Virgin Galactic's $225 million spaceport in southern New Mexico will be taking people into space later this decade for a mere US$200,000.

illustration by roryobrien.org

CULTURE - fun new family friendly blog

2006-07-23T12:03:00.000-04:00

LUKIRA.com

LUKIRA describe themselves as "A home of superawesomeness. A practical pop culture guide for kids with really, really cool parents." and I would have to agree. This site manages to find great snippets of inteweb that's fun for the whole family. From obscure cartoons from the sixties to the modern kitsch of the Fish N' Flush Toilet Tank Aquarium Kit, this site seems to be off to a great start.

TECH - Automatically remove unwanted people from your photos

2006-07-23T11:44:00.000-04:00

Tourist Remover.

Tourist Remover is a web service that will automatically remove people (or any non-stationary object) from your vacation shots. The caveat? You need to plan ahead and take several shots of your landscape so Tourist Remover can ascertain what shouldn't be there. Still, with a little pre-planning, you can get that perfect vacation shot you've always wanted.

BOOK - COSMIC VIEW: The Universe in 40 Jumps

2006-07-21T00:27:00.000-04:00

Cosmic View

"Kees Boeke's Cosmic View is a classic on learning about the scale of things. It is similar to the Morrison's Powers of Ten, but aimed at a younger audience. Its legacy includes Charles Eames's film Powers of Ten, the resulting book by Philip and Phylis Morrison, and several similar books which followed. Unfortunately, the problems Kees hoped to address, including peoples' understanding being fragmented by scale, remain as pressing today as they were in 1957." Some dude scanned in the entire book, it consists of a series of 40 illustrations with text and captions.Here's a link

ANIMATION - 1977's "Powers Of 10" zooming out to the edge of the universe and back

2006-07-21T00:12:00.000-04:00

Power of ten.

Created by Charles and Ray Eames, 1977's "Powers Of 10" zooms from the hand of a picnicker out to the edge of the universe and way back into the hand for a view of a molecular core. This animation follows "Cosmic Zoom" created in 1968 by Eva Szasz which was inspired by Kees Boeke's book, Cosmic View

ANIMATION - "The Power Of 10" updated with today's knowledge and animation capabilities

2006-07-20T23:41:00.000-04:00

New Fangled Power of 10.

Zoom out from a group of kids playing in a square to the edges of the known universe. A modern take on Charles and Ray Eames 1977 "Powers of 10". This clip is half the length of the original version but is updated with today's knowledge and animation capabilities.

ANIMATION - "The Power Of 10" in the Simpson's universe

2006-07-20T23:32:00.000-04:00

The Power Of 10 looped

"The power of 10" remade by the Simpsons. The original Power of 10 was done back in the 70's that used animation to visually show what the power of 10 represented using scale of size. The original went from a picnic goer to the edges or the known universe back to the picnicker and into his hand for peek at his molecules. the Simpson's version adds a little twist to this. Watch the clip to see how.

TECH - Globe4D is a 4 dimensional direct manipulation device for globe viewing.

2006-07-20T23:17:00.000-04:00

visit globe4d.

Globe4D is a 4 dimensional direct manipulation device for globe viewing. The 4 dimensions are height, width, depth and time. Imagine a giant old-school mouse with a mouse ball turned upside down. Then manhandle the ball around. As you do that, a projector projects a globe onto the ball which moves at the same rate you move the ball. So the effect is that you are moving the images around. What sets this apart from any library globe that you can spin, is the fact that you can also rotate the base of the globe -holder like a record and see the image of the globe reflect the change. So for example, you want to see the movement of the tectonic plates move away from each other through time, spin the base clockwise, watch them merge back into Pangea, roll back time by rotating the base counter clockwise. Take a look at the video to see how they pulled this off.

ANIMATION - 50 'National Film Board of Canada' animated shorts... free

2006-07-17T05:33:00.000-04:00

Internet killed the TV star.

Fifty animated shorts from the 'National Film Board of Canada', including several animation classics, can be accessed directly from this section. You can search them by title, director and year of production. Select a film and watch it now!

WWW - Where are you? Add yourself to the BloatedTrout Frappr map

2006-07-14T06:21:00.000-04:00

Add yourself.

I never intended Bloated Trout to be anything more than a hobby. It's a way to explore new web tools, new technology and to keep abreast of what's going on in the internets. But since BloatedTrout has had over 2,000 visitors since I've been keeping track, (mostly from people doing searches for the misspelling of Gnarls Barkley), I've grown curious to see who's been a visiting. So, if you have a moment, add yourself to the Bloatedtrout Frappr map. It's one of those "web 2.0" projects that takes advantage of some GoogleMap code. It's a simple way of seeing where you hail from. You can find the map near the bottom left of this page. So, ah, start frapping.

WWW - Tutorialism, social bookmarking for graphic design and programming tutorials

2006-07-10T22:03:00.000-04:00

visit Tutorialism here.

Following the success of DIGG comes a website that borows DIGGs essence and uses it to provide folks a way of spreading the world on tutorials.

Tutorialism is a social bookmarking website for all kinds of graphic design and programming tutorials, including tutorials for the famous Adobe Photoshop program as well as PHP, HTML or Javacript help. All the tutorials are submitted by the users and the users do decide as well which tutorials are promoted to the frontpage: If enough people like you vote for a tutorial they like (by using the Vote! button) it gets published on the frontpage of Tutorialism!

ANIMATION - Bob Sabiston, animator for 'A Scanner Darkly', spoke at MIT

2006-07-10T06:00:00.000-04:00

Bob Sabiston talks

Bob Sabiston, Creator of the proprietary animation software for such movies such as 'Waking Life', a small bit of 'I Am a Sex Addict' and most recently 'A Scanner Darkly', was at MIT and gave a demonstration of the software behind his rotoscoping animations. The video clip also contains snippets of his other works. An interesting watch.

ROBOT - modular self replicating robot

2006-07-01T08:42:00.000-04:00

Simple but seminal: Cornell researchers build a robot that can reproduce.

Bill Steele writes "Admittedly the machine is just a proof of concept -- it performs no useful function except to self-replicate -- but the basic principle could be extended to create robots that could replicate or at least repair themselves while working in space or in hazardous environments, according to Hod Lipson, Cornell assistant professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering, and computing and information science, in whose lab the robots were built and tested."

Watch Hod Lipson's creation move in the following video...

MUSIC - KRAFTWORK's Musique Non Stop vintage video

2006-07-01T08:07:00.000-04:00

Musique Non Stop on You Tube.

Some say it's Kraftwerk's most innovative promo video of all times featuring CGI. It was released in 1986. C.G.I. used in this context stands for "Computer Generated Image", meaning no hand drawn cartoons here. Although today, this type of imagery could be easily rendered on a cell phone, back then it was bleeding edge tech and only a handful of folks had the capability to create such images. Oh, and the music is cool too.

DESIGN - sweet FULLBLEED shirts for sale

2006-06-30T06:01:00.000-04:00

the FULLBLEED store.

Looking to spruce up your wardrobe? illustrator/artist, rob dobi of FULLBLEED is offering up t-shirts with great designs.

TECH - The Pong Clock is On Sale! Sold Out!

2006-06-27T19:41:00.000-04:00

visit buro vormkrijgers

The Pong clock is the mostest ultimate timepiece in the history of gamegeekery. Designed by award winning Dutch design studio Buro Vormkrijger, Pong Clock went on sale Monday and quickly sold out. Buro offered them for $285.85. The ten left from an original run of 400 are to be offered up on EBAY. 25 % of the sales go to the warchild charity which helps kids who have become a victim of war, back into a normal life. Try your hand at bidding on one of these or wait until someone from Taiwan knocks off the design so you can pick one up for a crackin' discount.

DESIGN - many graphic design tutorials on one page

2006-06-22T23:06:00.000-04:00

oman3d tutorials.

Why read the manual when you can let someone else do it for you. This site boasts many insightful tutorials that will help get you get a leg up on the following: 3D Studio Max, Flash, Photoshop, Illustrator, Fireworks, Cinema4D, Swift3D, Maya, plus several miscellaneous tutorials. Do yourself a favor and give it a quick looksies.

DESIGN - Digg-like for Design Tutorials

2006-06-22T22:47:00.000-04:00

visit pixelgroovy.com.

REBLOGGED FROM DIGG.com - "There are some pretty good tutorials in there, mainly in Photoshop but it touches to many web design facets. Be sure to check the Tools section, as there are some nice links there."

read more | digg story

DESIGN - How to Airbrush your photos in Photoshop!

2006-06-21T19:57:00.000-04:00

wonder how models' skin look so perfect in photos? Here is a tutorial on how to airbrush your photos in adobe photoshop!!

read more | digg story

WWW - Google SketchUp makes 3d making easy

2006-06-19T20:51:00.000-04:00

Learn Google SketchUp

I've been lazy with the posts lately. Google is one of the reasons. Google offers new free and paid software that allows anyone to create satisfying 3d scenes with minimal effort. It ties in directly with Google earth when you want to put your building, park, or whatever you've built on the virtual globe. The tutorials are built directly into the scene and, as a result, are extremely easy to follow. The above image is a simulated version of my backyard I whipped together over several hours while learning the software. You can also upload your 3d creation to what they call the 3d warehouse. A repository of 3d models that you upload to or download from with just two clicks. This is great when you need to quickly put trees or cars into your scene. New content is being uploaded every day so a tree you could not find today might be there tomorrow. SketchUp was amazing software before google bought them and now its even cooler with all of the benefits Google brings to the plate. This software is well worth learning.

ROBOT - Humanoid Robot to Debut on CNN 6/15

2006-06-15T05:09:00.000-04:00

World's most advanced humanoid robot debuts on CNN.

Indo Asian writes, "Hubo, the world's most advanced humanoid robot, and its creator Jun-ho Oh will be introduced to viewers during CNN's roundtable 'Future Summit: Of Man And Machine', starting Thursday evening."

CNN's Michael Bay writes, "Originating from Singapore, the one hour program will focus on the long-term impact of research into the fields of robotics, cybernetics, genetics and stem cells...

...We've asked our panelists to share some of their insights into the impact of research into robotics, cybernetics, genetics and stem cells."

A full show description can be found on CNN

The program is to air tonight and will have repeat telecasts June 17 and 18.

SPACEPORT - Oklahoma, the Final Frontier

2006-06-15T01:00:00.000-04:00

Oklahoma gets a spaceport.

It appears that spaceports might be popping up all over the place sometime soon.

James S. Tyree writes, "The Federal Aviation Administration this week approved an operator’s license for the Oklahoma Spaceport in Burns Flat. The spaceport is a former Navy and Air Force base now called the Clinton-Sherman Industrial Airpark with a runway exceeding 10,000 feet...

...Rocketplane, a company based in Guthrie, is expected to begin test flights into the lower reaches of space early next year, and the company plans to take passengers into space later in 2007."

MUSIC - Gnarles Barkely as Star Wars performs "Crazy"

2006-06-11T18:13:00.000-04:00

Gnarles Barkely performing thier UK hit "Crazy".

Spotted from Digg. DJ dangermouse of "Grey Album" fame along with long time American hip-hop, funk, soul and R&B musician Cee Lo dress up as Star Wars characters in their collaborative effort, Gnarles Barkely, performing their You Kay hit "Crazy" with Chewbacca on drums.

ROBOT - robotic telepresence for schoolchildren

2006-06-11T09:27:00.001-04:00

Robots in the classroom.

Jim Fitzgerald from the The Associated Press writes "Lying in his hospital room, on a mattress designed to protect his fragile skin, 13-year-old Achim Nurse poked his bandaged fingers at an orange button on what looked like a souped-up video game console.

Half a second later, in a social studies class discussing the Erie Canal, a 5-foot-tall steel-blue robot raised its hand.

"You have a question, Achim?" said the teacher."

How long before I can send a mechanical Martoon to my office? Entire article here.

CULTURE - Attention- Juggling in the High-Tech Office

2006-06-09T22:22:00.000-04:00

Attention - Juggling in the High-Tech Office.

New York Times article re-blogged from hatch.org

TECHNOLOGY is having a double-edged impact in the workplace, says Ed Reilly, president and chief executive of the American Management Association. It improves productivity, he says, but it may also be a distraction that prevents high-quality thinking. Here are excerpts from a conversation:

Q. Do all the distractions mean that people don't have time to think deeply about what they're doing?

A.There is no arguing that productivity has been improving at a historically unprecedented rate, particularly in the past five years. Look at the things that are enabled by improved technology. In retailing, look at how Wal-Mart has combined information technology to set their supply chains against other people's supply chains and to allow for outsourcing and offshoring that they've been able to do. The Internet has driven down pricing in lots and lots of industries. From a consumer point of view, eBay is the ultimate in pricing transparency. If you want to sell a watch or an antique piece of jewelry, it used to be very difficult. Now you can put it on eBay and 10 million people look at it.

Read the rest of the article here.

(image borrowed from this modern world)

FLASH - Badgods barely animated shorts

2006-06-09T21:33:00.000-04:00

visit the Badgods website.

Clik on the image above to see what Lore Sjöberg has cooked up for you today. This one explains Darth Vaders cool baritone voice. Visit the Badgods website to see more condensed craziness.

ROBOT - Robot device mimics human touch

2006-06-09T00:02:00.000-04:00

Robot device mimics human touch.

BBC news states "US scientists have created a sensor that can "feel" the texture of objects to the same degree of sensitivity as a human fingertip.

The team says the tactile sensor could, in the future, aid minimally invasive surgical techniques by giving surgeons a "touch-sensation".

I think it It would be interesting to see how this technology scales in the future. Imagine "feeling" the rocky mountains or "feeling" the eyeball of a fly.

PODCAST - Podio book, Free serialized audio books, delivered on your schedule.

2006-06-07T22:57:00.000-04:00

Visit Podio book.com

My 80 mile a day commute is wearing on my car and my attention span. To pass the time, I turn off the radio and turn on the podcasts. Podio Books is the newest addition to my morning syncing ritual. They house about 40 different books that you get served a chapter at a time. The best part, once you register, you get to pick the schedule of when you want to receive the stories. Once a day, once a week, once a month or any combination in-between.

Current Podiobooks I subscribe to:

What if the cataclysmic Tunguska explosion of 1908 was caused, not by a meteor or a comet, but by a microscopic black hole? What if that fantastic object - smaller than an atom, older than the stars, heavier than a mountain - is still down there, orbiting deep inside the earth, slowly consuming the planet? What if only a rookie government agent and an uncannily-insightful consultant stand between a renegade Russian billionaire and his plans to use the black hole to change history - or end it? What if it's all true?

Singularity

Sonic Fiction features an eclectic mix of authors from a range of ages and backgrounds. This collection of short stories is a true potpourri of genres. From fantasy to noir, to modern-day struggles with relationships, this book spans the gamut of human emotions and experiences, from the ancient past to the far-off future. Featuring works of Science fiction, gritty war tales, murder and intrigue, comedy and farce, this is a book for any fan of short fiction.

Sonic Fiction

VIDEO GAMES - Cave Story, Cross Platform Game

2006-06-07T22:11:00.000-04:00

get Studio Pixel's Cave Story.

In a time when gamers have been clamoring for bigger and better and more polygons and denser textures, it's refreshing to see someone pull together a home-brew that is just fun to play. It's been a while since I played an exciting, fun, old-school platformer like cave Story. It's an impressive freeware game you can download to your computer to play, Mac or PC. The learning curve is smooth with new weapons introduced just in time for beating down the next big boss. My lousy screenshots do the game no justice. The motion is smooth, graphic are pixel, the music is midi, and it all comes together to make an awesome experience. Authors description: Cave Story is a jumping-and-shooting action game. Explore the caves until you reach the ending. You can also save your game and continue from where you left off. His description does the game no justice. Play and be amazed.

FLASH GAME - Interactive Buddy v.1.02

2006-05-31T04:32:00.000-04:00

Play Interactive Buddy.

Launch Interactive Buddy in your browser and you'll have at least 30 minutes of guaranteed lost productivity as you spend time unlocking all of it's bonus items. Clicking around causes the Buddy to react to what ever you throw at it, literally, baseballs, bowling balls, grenades, fireballs and more. The catch? Most of the items need to be purchased and you can earn money several ways at first. By tickling the buddy, but that does not earn you as many points as quickly as when you use the grenades. Sound sadistic? Sure. Sound Fun? You bet!

VIDEO GAME - nanaca-crash

2006-05-28T22:39:00.000-04:00

play nanaca-crash.

I first spotted this on a TV show called "cinimatech" on the kiddy video game cable channel, G4. It's an addictive Japanese flash game that has you launching some kid VIA chick-on-mountainbike across the landscape. the further you go, the cooler you are. You will bounce off the ground back up into the sky, and if your lucky, you will land on one of the characters that just stand there waiting for you to land on them, so they can give you a power boost VIA punch in the gut. A better description of the game is here. My best so far? 10,000 meters.

TECH - SNOIL, A display based on Ferrofluid.

2006-05-20T08:14:00.000-04:00

they call it Snoil.

144 electromagnets plus Ferrofluid equals a dimensional display system where the magnetic fluid raises above the surface as tiny mountainous pixels.

TECH - 15 year old documentory about INTERNET

2006-05-19T23:22:00.000-04:00

This jem found on Throw away your tv. With just a computer and a phone, you can connect to INTERNET! Check out this documentory of INTERNET, where there were not found screenfulls of "Go to hell!"

VIDEO GAMES - OG (Original Gamers T-Shirt )

2006-05-19T22:56:00.000-04:00

get one from jinx.

Jinx sells these. As with our other OG shirt (Original Geeks), we were hard-pressed to pick only four people. In the end, we went with Shigeru Miyamoto, Lord British, John Carmack, and Sid Meier.

BIKE - xtracycle SUB (sports utility bike)

2006-05-19T22:46:00.000-04:00

Reblogged from Cool Tools.

What happens when you extend the ass-end of your favorite mountain bike by about two feet? You get an Xtracycle. An awesome idea if you need a handy way to get the groceries home without spending a bundle on gas.

"This kit transforms a regular bike into an SUB (sports utility bike) by extending back the rear wheel and adding a seat and baggage platform. I've had my SUB for two years now. I find it makes owning a car completely unnecessary! I've transported my folding kayak on it. I've taken my girlfriend and her Australian Blue Heeler on it. I've moved furniture. It's crazy how stable it is. In many ways I prefer how it handles to my regular bike! And for giving people tours around NYC people just LOVE it."

ANIMATION - Open Source Animated Short

2006-05-18T22:58:00.000-04:00

Elephants Dream

They made an animated short using open source software and tools. Then they gave it away on the internet. But that's not all, they also released the models and source files used to create the film so you can remake or unmake your own version. It's a bizarre story of an old man walking a younger man through an ever changing environment of machinery, wires and gears. I'm not sure what it all means, but it's certainly an impressive look into the future of open sourcery and the creative frontier.

TECH - 12 tips for better e-mail etiquette

2006-05-18T22:13:00.000-04:00

Reblogged From AskRoland

There are some days I just can't get through the barage of work-related e-mail I receive. Check out this list of 12 tips for better e-mail etiquette from Microsoft Office Online. It's a great reminder of how to use email effectively and get your concise message through.

1 - Be informal, not sloppy.

2 - Keep messages brief and to the point.
3 - Use sentence case.
4 - Don't forget your job numbers in the subject header

VIDEO GAMES - Super Mario Beat Box

2006-05-17T22:21:00.000-04:00

Super Mario Beat Box.

A video whereas young Poizunus replaced the sound effects from a Super Mario game with the beat and the boxing.

MUSIC - edit beatbox

2006-05-17T21:49:00.000-04:00

Edit beatbox.

Animation student Lassegg makes up for his lack of beatboxing skills with manic video editing skills. Lassegg says "Trust me, my grampa is doing better beatboxing I possibly could when he's choking on his painkillers, sounds awesome!"

MUSIC - beatbox

2006-05-17T21:37:00.000-04:00

Rahzel M. Brown

A video with Rahzel talking a little about Beatboxing and his new album.

Rahzel, born Rahzel M. Brown, is an American musician. He is a hip hop MC who specializes in beatboxing (he calls himself a 'vocal percussionist'). He is probably best known as a member of The Roots. He is also called "the Godfather of Noyze".

AUTO - Peugeot concept car contest car built

2006-05-17T21:03:00.000-04:00

Peugeot concept car contest car built.

The Peugeot Design Contest was the first major design contest to be held on the internet and it fuelled the imagination of designers all over the globe when it first hit in 2000. Here was an opportunity for a young designer with vision to bypass everything on the way to global acclaim – the winner received significant prizes and the ultimate reward was to have their concept produced as a working vehicle and featured on the Peugeot stand at the world’s premier motor show, the Frankfurt Show. This year the third Peugeot Design Contest saw André Costa carry off the first prize for his outrageous two-seater electric concept car, the Moovie.

André Costa’s words that described the car went as follows: "What shaped the visual look on the vehicle was the two big electric wheels with a hollow rim, these wheels are hollow in the middle, this is where the doors of the car are located, the vehicle has like this big doors allowing the users to have enough space to enter and exit the vehicle." The link takes you to some impressive photos of the completed car.

VIDEO GAME - Flash Game, Burping Cat.

2006-05-16T22:43:00.000-04:00

Kekker Cat.

Imagine a platformer like Mario but instead of Mario, your a deformed cat. And instead of jumping on top of the enemies to knock them out, you burp and or poop on them. If your burping is good and your pooping is pure, then the enemies will get sick and pass out, clearing your way to victory. Space bar burps. Shift key poops. Arrow keys for left, right, jumping and ducks.

VIDEO GAMES - The antique Vectrex

2006-05-16T22:34:00.000-04:00

A Look Back, The Vectrex.

Techblog found this video of what Brian Jepson from make magazine said about the Vectrex. "This week is E3, so in the spirit of gaming, we’re going to do a bit of gaming coverage, of things not at E3, MAKE style, like this video from our very own Brian Jepson showing off the Vectrex, one of the most stunning systems in the history of gaming" I have one of these antique systems, so I can contest to the fact that it does take several attempts to insert a cartridge just right so it will play.

PHOTO - bad photos make good desktops

2006-05-11T20:10:00.000-04:00

desktop wallpapers.

I like to take random photos. A lot of them. Enough so that the percentage of the pictures that come out somewhat decent are somewhat acceptable. Then I save them for no good reason, but to take up space on my hardrive. Recently I had the realization that these random shots might make for good desktop wallpapers. So if your in need, you might want to consider one of these. I had 385 to upload onto flickr, but it only accepted 36 of them before my bandwidth allowance was used up. I will load up the next batch 30 days from now.

WWW - make your blog a podcast... with robot voice!

2006-05-11T19:30:00.000-04:00

feed2podcast.

Let's say you have a blog, like I do. Let's say you would like to get into podcasting, like I do. But then you realize you hate talking, like I do. Then you find a website that will have a robot read your blog postings and have them served up VIA podcasts for free as long as they get to plug their service at the end of each post because your too cheap to invest any money in your blog, like I am. Sign up, sit back and giggle as everything you type turns into machine accented audio files, like I do.

To see an example of how it works, click on the "<)) Listen Now" link over there on the right. You can also subscribe to bloatedtrout using iTunes by clicking one of the two links below it.

ROBOT - robots VIA Popular Electronics 1958

2006-05-10T21:24:00.000-04:00

there are robots among us.

Modern Mechanix has 5 pages from an article about the furture of robots that ran back in 1958
THE AGE OF SCIENCE has made the word “robot” the focus of popular fears and hopes. The hope is that machines with minds, machines that can talk, think, and work like men, will give everyone a life of leisure. The fear is that robots will replace mankind, that they might run amuck and destroy their masters, that the robots will get us if we don’t watch out. What was conceived as a work-saving machine has become the popular bogeyman of the age of science...

OT - new dog

2006-05-08T19:23:00.000-04:00

a: normal dog.
b: male dog.
c: female dog.
d: my dog.

GAME - mario world gunman series Flash game

2006-05-05T05:32:00.000-04:00

mario world gunman series

Play this game in your browser using the flash plugin. Your object is to defend your castle using an arsenal of weapons against wave after wave of Bowser's evil minions. Collect coins to buy ammunition and weapons upgrades. Attach turrets to the castle walls for assistance.

MUSIC - Kong Country Music Reinterpreted, and Rearranged

2006-05-05T04:55:00.000-04:00

DOWNLOAD - Kong In Concert

Free Music - 22 arrangements - Kong in Concert is a collaborative arrangement project born from the music of Donkey Kong Country and created for the purposes of reviving, reinterpreting, and rearranging its entire soundtrack with our combined talents, honoring those who originally composed it, and reawakening the nostalgia and love for a landmark videogame.

GAMES - Classic Arcade Sound Archives

2006-05-05T04:46:00.000-04:00

Classic Arcade Sounds

We recorded video games from 1982 until 1988. Fortunately I managed to save all fourteen audio tapes of video game sounds and arcade ambience which were recorded from a variety of locations in the U.S. Most of the recordings are from Ithaca, NY, Albany, NY, Lancaster, PA, Ocean City, MD as well as Key West, FL....
Clips are in MP3 format. You need an MP3 player (such as WinAmp or MusicMatch Jukebox) or QuickTime to listen to them. Most files are less than 1mb.

WEB - throwaway your tv @ http://throwawayyourtv.com/

2006-05-03T21:29:00.000-04:00

throw away your tv.com/

Lookit - Save your delicate plazma screen for those pirated DVDs. Unplug your crappy cable connection and tune in nightly to throwawayyourtv.com where every evening is a surprise clip from the outskirts of interest as a concerned Canadian documents the United States as it spins itself out of control. Whoop wooooooop!

GAMES - Bob Ross, Joy Of Painting legend, to make video game

2006-04-29T23:22:00.000-04:00

Bob Ross - Joy of gaming

i know, old news, BUT, smooth talking Bob Ross, pwner of noobs, will be developing a video game, from the grave, based on his hit television show, "The Joy Of Painting". Bobby's news page states "The Bob Ross game will utilize the unique inputs that the Nintendo DS and Nintendo Revolution have that can truly immerse the players while they learn to paint like Bob Ross and can play the addictive and fun games that we have planned for the title. I believe that Bob Ross Inc's and AGFRAG Entertainment Group's similar beliefs in independence, creativity, and teaching others will benefit how the game is developed and how the players of all ages will be able to enjoy this game."
Wikipedia states "AGFRAG has not yet found a publisher for the games, although they are actively seeking one." I state, "ooooooh I hope they find one, that games gonna kick some ass!

TECH - AT&T Labs Text-To-Speech sample site

2006-04-29T07:44:00.000-04:00

AT&T Labs Text-To-Speech (TTS)

Hey, it's the AT&T Labs Text-To-Speech Demo page (good for prankin') You type up a message, choose a talker, hit the "SPEAK" button and out comes cool robot voice.

TECH - Switch from Windows XP to Mac OSX with ease!

2006-04-28T06:32:00.000-04:00

How To Use A Mac

32-year-old big-boobed blonde bimbo, Julie Geng is bent on teaching the ex-windoze user how to experience a mac... The first thing you should notice even before powering on your new Mac is the keyboard and mouse. There isn’t a Windows key anymore, and the Alt button now has the word “Option” on it. The Windows key has been replaced by what is commonly called the Apple or Command key, and for the large majority of hotkeys, will replace the Ctrl commands normally found on Windows.

You should also happily take note of three keys: F9, F10 and F11. These three keys make up Exposé, which is currently a Mac-unique feature that makes working on a computer infinitely easier. F9 miniaturizes all of your open windows and lets you view all of them. F10 miniaturizes your open windows in the program you’re running, and F11 pushes all windows out of the way to expose your desktop. See Expose section later."

TECH - run Macintosh on your Pocket PC

2006-03-10T23:55:00.000-05:00

I remember the old days of wondering why my pictures disappeared from the computer every time I shut down the machine. It took a while for me to realize that I had to save them first. My first real computer experience was with the Mac Plus so I was pretty excited to learn that I could relive those experiences with a mac emulator for the Pocket PC. I couldn't find a complete walkthrough, but after a little while of surfing, this is what I found out...

Getting Mini vMac for Windows Mobile 2003 to run on a pocket PC goes like this:

Go to Mini vMac for Windows Mobile 2003 and download Mac Plus 2.6.1 (F) binary (32 KB)

Go to MacPlus Antique System and download vmac.rom, System 6.0.8 - Finder 6.1.8., MacPaint 1.4 and MacDraw 1.9.5

Uncompress those files and put them all into the same folder and then copy that folder onto the memory card of your PDA

From the PDA, navigate to the file minivmac.exe and launch it

Once it launches, you'll see an icon of a disk with a question mark, at that point, hit the center button of your directional thingie on your PDA and a virtual keyboard will appear

Tap the key called Ctl and then tap the letter O key

A Dialog box will appear which will prompt you to open a disk image, you'll need to open the system disk called Disk608

Once your booted up, use the same method to insert the MacPaint or MacDraw disk you downloaded and start pixelating

Here are the key commands that you can use once in the emulator:

'A' - About - version information
'O' - Open Disk Image
'Q' - Quit
'L' - Limit Speed toggle
'M' - Magnify toggle
'F' - Full Screen toggle
'K' - emulated 'control' Key toggle
'R' - Reset
'I' - Interrupt
'H' - Help - show this message

You should shut down the emulated machine before quitting to prevent corrupting the mounted disk image

Quick Warning, I haven't quite figured out how to close thekeyboard once I'm done typing. If anyone knows, please leave me a comment.

TECH - Retro Thing has their own iBoombox sidestep

2006-03-08T00:18:00.000-05:00

Retro thing

This week Apple made one of their much ballyhooed announcements. I don't mind when they earn their hype stripes by actually doing something cool, but what gets my goat is when they act like they've invented some perfectly ordinary thing. This week they introduced the iPod HiFi, an amplified speaker system avaialble in the usual porcelain toilet finish.

I'm sure that it's a nice sounding three speaker system for the iPod, but it inspired me to look around my house to see if I could reproduce the same thing for a lot less money..

Digisette MP3 Player...

TECH - UPS meaty style stylus

2006-03-04T23:02:00.000-05:00

UPS man was kind enough to let me keep this awesome stylus. The one I lost for my DELL x30 PDA was far inferior to this industrial strength model.

GAMES - SPORE: the evolution in gaming?

2006-03-04T22:33:00.000-05:00

official spore website

VideoBomb found a clip of the mindblowing gameplay of Spore. Will Wright talking at the Game Developer's Conference about 'Spore', which looks like it could possibly be the best video game ever. It's about 30 minutes long and fascinating.

DESIGN - Lady Libery Jedi in Lego

2006-03-04T22:23:00.000-05:00

nathan sawaya brick artist

Why?...to capture the essence of the New York based organization as well as their love for everything Star Wars that led to Lady Liberty weilding a lightsaber.

TECH - create your own iPod Boombox

2006-03-04T13:39:00.000-05:00

create your own iPod Boombox

You like Apple's new boomBox, but it's pricey. How do you make an iPod BoomBox for a fraction of the cost. With powered computer speakers found at a garage sale, duct tape and felt pads. I got tired of tripping on my headphone wire while doing work in the house listening to my iPod. After hearing about the new speaker that apple has, I thought it's be nice to have one for the house. But $349.00 is a little too steep for my pocket. So I decided to make my own. I created this tutorial so that you can be rocking the house in 20 minutes.

TECH - Kinematic Models for Design Digital Library or House Of Gears

2006-03-03T07:06:00.000-05:00

KMODDL

If you ever wanted to know the different kind of gears out there and how they interact, then start here. KMODDL is a collection of mechanical models and related resources for teaching the principles of kinematics--the geometry of pure motion. The core of KMODDL is the Reuleaux Collection of Mechanisms and Machines, an important collection of 19th-century machine elements held by Cornell's Sibley School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering. In other words, it's a museum that collects gears and has a ton of sample clips showing impossibly confusing moving mechanical things. Many of which are shown via sample movie clips

OT - Reanna drew this awesome picture.

2006-02-05T07:57:00.000-05:00

My neice learned how to change brush sizes, use the color picker, and a wacom tablet pen. All in under 15 minutes. I've seen adults take hours to get to this point.

MUSIC - VIDEO GAMES - FLASH - name that tune/video game tune

2006-01-31T07:33:00.000-05:00

NAME THAT GAME

I may have blogged this before? Hmmm... I like this game cause I'm old as the hills, playing games before you were born. If your an old fart like me, this game will bring back memories of joysticks slick with pizza juice and the pie man trying to throw you and your friends out every 15 minutes. "Name that game" is a multiple choice quiz. The twist, the game will play a couple of bars from one of the thousands of classic home and arcade video games from the early days, and you test your decrepit memory and see if you can choose the right title. Brought to you by PBS

TECH - a Web Word Processor that many can use at once

2005-12-29T10:05:00.000-05:00

writely

If you like writing but can't afford a quality word processor because you dropped all your loot on bandwidth, then I would recommend Writely. It's a cross platform app that loads in from the web instead of your hardrive and two of my favorite features is it's free and that you can give access to your document by just adding them to a list. Once they have access, they can also modify the document. Great for group writing for stuff that requires such things.

Official Description:
· Nothing to download -- your browser is all you need.
· Collaborate just by entering people's e-mail addresses.
· Publish on the web or post to your blog with a click.
· Pick exactly who can access your documents.
· Upload from Word/OpenOffice & save to your desktop.
· Edit your documents anytime, from anywhere.

Would this be, how you say, "web 2.0"?

TECH - Dreamstation Video Game Show podcast

2005-12-28T19:54:00.000-05:00

Dreamstation

Todays STANLY is the Dreamstation Video Game Show. I've been meaning to blog this for a while now, but failed my last three attempts because of bad "copy/paste" skills. Since I've spent a lot of time trying to find a good quality video game show, I can honestly say that these guys are by far the best. It might be because they are all older than 13 but more than likely it's because they are well informed, do the show for fun, and have a great time doing it. Some of my favorite segments are the weekly rants on Florida Lawyer, video game opponent and all round nut-case, Jack Thompson, who they refer to as "Bumblefoot" (since they don't want to give him any more attention than he deserves) and another ongoing segment is "Video Game Death" where they report on how somewhere in the world, someone died a video game related death. There are also tons of inside jokes that carry over from week to week that just seem to get funnier each time you hear them. I'd write more but I have to go to Home Despot to pick up some felt padding, some duct tape and a torch wrench (don't ask)

Official Description: The DreamStation.cc Video Game Show is a weekly podcast bringing you the latest PlayStation 2, GameCube, Xbox, PSP, Nintendo DS, Game Boy Advance, PC, PS3, Nintendo Revolution, Xbox 360, and other video game news, reviews, interviews, rumors, rants, and more.

Don't be a fool, subscribe and enjoy!

MUSIC - sweet free album with PSP magazine download

2005-12-28T09:38:00.000-05:00

Kill Your FM

"Kill Your FM" is an electronic 'zine for the PSP that covers new music. The benny is that you don't need a PSP to enjoy the free music that goes along with it. The mag is a series of images (JPEGS) but that can be read on any computer update: the images are formatted for the PSP to be read with the PSP turned on it's side, as a result, the images on your computer look sideways and the music (mp3) is holed up in a seperate folder that you can enjoy in any player. The tunes range from punk, hardcore, hip hop and more. Here's the official description for this issue:

82 packed pages of quality music journalism and awesome aesthetics, including:

-Interview w/ Derek Sivers, creator of CDBaby.com
-The Thieves: Prophets In The Cathedral Of Rock?
-FM Killers: Pandora & 15 Megs Of Fame
-1920’s Jazz vs. Modern Day Hardcore: More similarities than you think!
-Happy Birthday! The MP3 Turns 10
-A Popular Donkey, Episode III (and a whole lot more)

And of course, excellent indie rock, hard rock, and hip hop tracks from the bands we feature! Free, and legal.

I’ll let the issue do the rest of the talking. Major thanks to the entire staff for helping me crank this one out. Please enjoy, and leave feedback!

download and enjoy!

TECH - podcasts - ANCESTOR podio book

2005-12-20T20:29:00.000-05:00

ANCESTOR

After speaking to a bunch of folks about podcasting, I've discovered that the biggest problem people have with this new medium is finding good quality podcasts to listen to. I've decided to start bloggin the podcasts I've found and really like. I'll call this, the Podcasts I Really Like or STANLY for short". Todays STANLY is ANCESTOR! it's a podiobook read by the author, Scott Sigler. A sci-fi thriller about biotech gone terribly wrong. It starts off with a bunch of scientists trying to home grow organs for those in need of a replacement, then it quickly turns into Alien with cows. The science is deep but not baffling and the pace is zippy, even in the slow sections. He releases a chapter once a week, every Sunday or Monday night. and each chapter times out to be about 45 minutes long. Subscribe and enjoy.

ANIMATION - Spidy Battles Doc Oc in legovision (stop animation)

2005-12-19T22:13:00.000-05:00

Spider-Man: The Peril of Doc Ock (2004)

This is possibly the best, if not only, lego stop motion animation I've witnessed to date. The comedy that comes across with these lego blocks is quite amazing and the the shots are simply cinematic. The accompanying music is also excellent. Done by Spite Your Face Productions Ltd, commisioned by Sony Pictures/Marvel Studios/The Lego Group to accompany the release of Sam Raimi's Spider-Man 2. Watch Spidey and doc Oc battle it out in a giant New York City made of legos!

VIDEO GAMES - real life video interpretation of mortal kombat

2005-12-19T22:06:00.000-05:00

Mortal Kombat LA PELICULA

These two knuckle-heads did an excellent job of recreating the classic Mortal Kombat video game in real life video, sans game, complete with floaty power bars and faux fatality!

VIDEO GAMES - Play PSP online with Tunneling Software

2005-12-01T20:04:00.000-05:00

Tunneling Into PSP

IGN explains "Tunneling, for those who have never had to resort to desperate measures in order to play great multiplayer games like the first Halo or Mario Kart: Double Dash online, is a system where a home PC acts as a middleman between your game system and the internet. It intercepts from the game the LAN (or, in this case, wireless LAN) signal on the PC and sends it across the internet to another player using the same tunneling software for his game. With such a system, players would be able to unofficially play any multiplayer PSP title with WiFi LAN multiplayer online against any other player with the same system. Kai (the XLink software) even features a buddy list and other features for finding other tunneled players to game against. It's not quite the same as the online plan that Sony's hoping to use (the official solution would allow players to play anywhere, since their servers would be hosting the game -- with tunnels, players would have to be near or in WiFi range of their LAN-running computer with the tunnel software), but it's worked with other consoles in the past, and as of this writing, there isn't much reason to expect tunneling with PSP not to work."

Ken Edwards says"Not only is there a Windows Kai client, but they have Mac OSX Terminal and GUI versions as well. "

Ken's article has the links necessary to get you started. Mac users be forwarned, unless you have an Airport Extreme to make it all work, your boned.

ANIMATION - insanely twisted superstitials

2005-11-29T22:28:00.000-05:00

insanely twisted

Michel Gagne says "Here is the first series of interstitials featuring "Insanely Twisted Shadow Puppets" that I created for Nickelodeon's 2005 "Halloween Shriekin Weekend". These are the "Director's Cuts" and are not necessarily the ones shown on the network. All the spots were completely animated in Flash. No other software was used for the animation."

I've checked these out and can honestly say that they are sweet, and when I say sweet, I mean awesome.

TECH - RSS feeder for your iPod

2005-11-29T21:59:00.000-05:00

Pod2Go

If you've ever had a palm device and used AvantGo, you'll immediately know what this new software does. If not, then basically, Pod2go allows you to select a bunch of text content from the web and have it dumped onto your iPod for future reading.

Once you open the software for the first time, you can set your own RSS feeds or select a bunch of feeds from a pre-existing list that Pod2go supplies. The list is comprised of RSS feeds broken down into various categories such as news, weather, horoscopes, gas prices, directions... You can also set any text docs from your hard drive to appear in your iPod and Pod2go will create a iPod compatible version of your text doc and automatically stick it onto your iPod during the next sync. It's pretty slick in howit does this. The iPod "notes reader" app has some limited html functionality built into it. Pod2go takes advantage of this and prepares a new directory in your "notes" folder then dumps text files into. If a text file exceeds 4k (the limit a note can be on the iPod) Pod2go will break it up into one or more files and link them together using "Next" and "Previous". Simple but effective.

Besides keeping me company while giving birth to a food baby, another great feature is that you can have your safari bookmarks synced up to the iPod as well. This comes in handy for when I'm at work and can't exactly remember link I found the previous night. I just connect the iPod to my computer and pull the link from there.

TECH - Headphone Ear Protection Hack

2005-11-29T21:49:00.000-05:00

headphone hack

This low-tech hack requires only the smallest bit of knowledge about wiring and absolutely no expertise beyond that whatsoever. The completed product is a combination of earmuff style ear protectors and audio headphones, allowing the user to listen to music or any other audio imput with hearing protection (I hook it up to my iPod or a guitar player's output feed to I can sinc up to the music while drumming). This is useful for mowing the lawn, or working on a project the requires both ear protection and background tunes. (Check the link for instructions)

At first I thought this was a silly thing to do, until I realized that I spend upwards of 6 hours a weekend annoying my neighbors with noisy lawn equipment and making myself deaf in the process. I had a pair of ear protectors lying around and a decent pair of behind-the-ear sony headphones I no longer used. I also had a real old pair of broken hi-fi system headphones from the mid 70's that I could never use because it had a gigantor plug that didn't fit not any of my music players. It had sweet head padding across the top of the set as well as some shiny hole grommets that came in useful for putting together my version of the hacked headphones. I ripped apart the two existing headphones. I used the speakers and the wires from the sony and the padding and grommets from the oldy-timers. I drilled holes into the ear protectors, removed the padding, soldered up some wire and crammed everything together. Because of the padding, I was able to snake the wire from one ear cup across the top, to the other ear cup which allowed me to have only one wire dangling down to the mp3 player which makes the new earmuffs surprisingly tangle-free.

How do they work? Pretty good. The actual speakers sit about an inch and a half from the ear inside the padded cup so they don't really crank, but because of all of the padding inside of the ear-protectors, they don't need to be loud. The ear-protectors do a great job of muffling all of the outside sound and I'm left with pleasant music. But my neighbors, they still hate me.

WEB - word recognition turned on th thwart spam posters

2005-11-03T10:23:00.000-05:00

I've just been machine-spammed. I won't mention the company name since they don't deserve any advertising from me, but as a result of having to remove 15 posts from the same spammer, I've decided to turn on blogspots word recognition for posters. It's cake to deal with if your a human, but it has a tendency to baffle the machines (for now)

OT - Pumpkin

2005-11-02T00:20:00.000-05:00

This is a picture of our pumpkin. I took one with the flash and with the flash off. No-flash wins. It looks much scarier that way for sure.