Tampon Gun

From the I Can't Believe Someone Thought of This department:

Inspired by marshmallow shooters, this air-powered tampon gun turns your feminine hygiene products into high-flying projectiles. Have a shootout between rival tampon brands, or use it as a fun alternative to paintball. The tampon shooter has a range of 10 to 20 feet depending on your ammo and lung capacity. The matching bandolier lets you carry a full “clip” (i.e., box) of 20 tampons, so you’ll never be caught short in the heat of battle.

[Via Boing Boing]

"Greatest Hits" coming to PSP

I had to post a link to this just out of the sheer hilarity of the statement in and of itself. For those of you who don't follow the game industry, let me lay it out for you like this: there is not a single thing great about any of these titles, and, to be sure, none of which are exactly what one would refer to as a "hit."

It's kind of like saying that an oasis in the middle of the Sahara is a "hit" among people who like to drink.

When reading "Greatest Hits" in this capacity, please just understand it to mean "Heavily Discounted."

And by "Heavily Discounted," understand that they are now priced where they should have been priced in the first place.

Just doing my part to save Humanity ...

I had to post this. With spokespersons like these two, one doesn't need enemies. Seriously, Kirk Cameron is a little buck nutty now.

Topher Grace is Venom

Oh. Hell. Yes.

digg story

Topics: Movies, Spiderman, Venom, Topher Grace, Spider-man 3, Spider-man, Comics

TMNT Trailer hits

I love the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

This is why my account name is Fifthturtle. I know. I know. It's like a light bulb just went off in your head.

In recent years, the TMNT have had somewhat of a resurgence -- although not as huge as that of the original tidal wave circa 1987-1994 -- mostly due to the new cartoon show featured prominently on Fox Saturday Morning cartoons. The new cartoon is leaps and bounds better than the original for a ton of reasons, mostly because it actually focuses on larger stories, more distinct personalities, and is actually based on the comic books that the TMNT spawned from. But still, for many, there is only one TMNT, and it is that old one.

At any rate, they are making a new movie to capitalize on the popularity of the new TV show (use the term new loosely, it debuted in 2003). This movie is done completely in CGI (a la Pixar movies), and it just looks brilliant. There are some true TMNT fans (and one half of the creators) working on it, and it shows. The tone looks to have been directly lifted from the comic books. This is how the Turtles should always have been on the big screen.

The teaser trailer was released today. Check it out.

Let's hope this is as awesome as it looks, generates a ton of money, and they make more.

Lack of Posts, and The Washington Post

Dearest Readers,

I apologize for the lack of updates over the last few months. My production, while not completely non-existent, has most certainly dropped off a tad since June. This is because I started grad school and my time has, in fact, been non-existent. My class will be ending next week, so I'm optimistic things will pick up again and time will rejoin my life.

On a totally unrelated note -- besides the word "post," which I found serendipitously agreeable -- the front page of the Business section of The Washington Post had a positively brilliant article the other day on the RIAA and its stranglehold over Congress.

Jake over at IPac did a great commentary on it and highlighted the best parts, so I'm not going to attempt to reinvent the wheel. So pop over there and check it out.

Solve Sudoku (Without even thinking!)

Sudokus are number logic puzzles that are, of late, becoming the latest craze for bored people everywhere. Find a full proof method of solving them at the link.

Solve Sudoku (Without even thinking!)

This instructable provides step by step instructions to complete a Sudoku puzzle by simple process of elimination.

One of the things I that drove me crazy about Sudoku is how difficult it is to return to a puzzle if you get interupted. This system allows you to walk away from a puzzle at any time and return exactly where you left off.

Nielsen to discover that no one watches commercials

I wanted to point this out because it is mind boggling that no one has thought to do this sooner. The real question is how they are actually going to do it.

Why did we have to wait for the DVR phenomenon to come about? It's like Advertisers never had a clue that people don't like being interrupted during television shows to find out about products they don't care about until people started to hit fast forward.

Do these people not use the bathroom during commercials? Or check email? Or do anything else besides watch intently, paper and pencil in hand, eagerly awaiting the next sale at Pottery Barn to be bestowed upon them by their mystical idiot box?

I emplor you, answer me!

At any rate, Nielson Media Research is going to attempt to find out what everyone already knows -- and spend a lot of money doing it. Perhaps the forthcoming empical evidence will cause a paradigm shift in the way we watch TV -- for better or worse.

Nielsen Media Research will start monitoring commercial viewing habits starting in November. The Wall Street Journal reports that this could lead to a decline in advertising rates since Nielsen is expected to learn what we already know: we tune out commercials. This hard evidence could lead to an increase of product placement, or advertising within a program instead of during program breaks. I'm not quite sure how Nielsen will know that viewers have walked away from the television for a snack or a bathroom break during commercials. It looks like they'll actually be tracking the way we use our DVRs and whether we fast-forward through commercials."

[Via TVSquad]

Jon Stewart on Net Neutrality

This man is becoming more and more my hero.

Embarrassing questions for the entertainment industry

EFF has put together a list of "Frequently Awkward Questions" for the entertainment industry, "tough questions for times when you hear entertainment industry representatives speaking and want to challenge their positions."

digg story

Brits set to invade The Office!

Now this is cool. I'm a huge fan of NBC's sitcom The Office, which, as I'm sure many of you are keenly aware but wholy unexperienced with, is based upon a BBC show of the same name. This British version follows the same docu-style format and even drier comedy (to be assumed, they are British afterall) than the Carrell-lead American version. The American version's character are all largely based on British counterparts, but have different names. And now, these British alter-egos are going to be coming stateside next season. It's going to be like Bizarro World, but without the red capes and blue tights. Cor Blimey!

British cast to appear on American version of The Office - TV Squad:

Some of the American characters on NBC's The Office are going to come face-to-face with their British alter-egos! American executive producer Ben Silverman says next season we can expect to see Mackenzie Crook, who played Gareth; Martin Freeman, who played Tim; and Lucy Davis, who played Dawn on the American version of the show. These are essentially the alter egos to Dwight, Jim, and Pam."

As an addendum, you may also notice that Mackenzie Crook (Dwight's alter-ego Gareth) is the pirate with the wooden eye from Pirates of the Caribbean. He is hilarious.

Spider-man Can Count

Enjoy.

Senator Stevens Speaks on Net Neutrality | Public Knowledge

I wanted to bring everyone's attention to this.

Why is this man in charge of anything technological?

Why do Senators and Representatives not have a term limitation similar to that of the Presidential position? There is no reason that this man from the 1950s should be in charge of legislating modern issues.

Senator Ted Stevens (Alaska-R) is behind both the Neutricidal Movement as well as the Broadcast Flag Movement.

Find him here explaining the mysterious thing called Internet. You should listen to the whole thing, but be prepared to be dumber afterwards.

Friendster Wins Patent for Social Networking. What will become of the MySpace cult?

Friendster said Thursday that it has received a patent that covers online social networks, one the company had applied for long before its decline and recent recapitalization.

The U.S. patent, which was awarded June 27, is extremely general, and would seem to cover the activities of many other sites, especially those like LinkedIn that allow people to connect within a certain number of degrees of separation.

So this affects MySpace, Facebook, and LinkedIn - unequivocally. What will they have to do? Pony up some big time dough? Meethinks...

Why the "loudness wars" are killing today's music

collision detection: Why the "loudness wars" are killing today's music

Pull out a vinyl record from the 70s or early 80s, and listen to it. Odds are it'll have a big dynamic range -- it'll be whisper-quiet in some parts and booming loud in others. You'll pick up new nuances every time you listen to it. Now listen to any music track recorded in the last ten years, and it'll be radically different. That dynamic range is gone: The entire track is loud, all the way through. The sound sounds a lot more intense, and it "grabs" you more quickly the first time you hear it. But does it still reward re-listening?

Nope, says a writer at Stylus magazine. In this amazing and lengthy piece, he argues that the "loudness wars" are destroying music. Record labels for decades have tried to make records louder, on the mostly-correct theory that louder music is more likely to pull you in on first listen. But the way you make music louder is via "compression". In a normal recording of music, the loudest parts -- the peaks -- are much higher than the quietest ones, the valleys. Compression shrinks the difference between the peaks and valleys, so there's less dynamic range; this frees up more room up top so you can boost the whole volume of the entire song.

I'd agree that this is a large contributing factor to the way much of current music sounds. Once again, art takes a back seat to money.

The Daily Show gets the Bananas

Classic clip of The Daily Show -- back when Stephen Colbert was a correspondent. Mainly blogged this because I don't want to lose this clip.

Independence Day 2006

Old Glory

I really love this photo I took at my cousin's Independence Day cookout.

Also, in the spirit of freedom and independence, I found a sweet website with a ton of famous Independence Day quotes. Some are very moving. Here is my favorite:

He that would make his own liberty secure, must guard even his enemy from opposition; for if he violates this duty he establishes a precedent that will reach himself."

~Thomas Paine

Topics: Independence Day, 4th of July, Patriotic, Quotations, Thomas Paine, Just for Fun, Politics, Freedom, Liberty