Today's WTF

I don't know what the fuck it means but it's pretty cool. May be NSFW

In other news...

Ray Bradbury is still alive and a total raving crazy old man!

Houston, We Have a Throblem

Just watch the video....NSFW.

Great Joke.

So the RIAA and the National Association of Broadcasters have come together and proposed a fantastic idea. They want to force manufacturers of portable devices such as mp3 players and mobile phones to include a FM radio in every such device manufactured. Seriously? When was the last time you listened to a fucking radio station? Local radio is a vast wasteland of talentless personalities pushing poorly made advertisements interrupted occasionally by the same recycled crap music that they played an hour ago.

Radio Broadcasters have not woken up to the reality that their entire industry is already dying. What sane person would listen to an FM radio station on their mobile phone when they have access to Pandora, Last.FM or one of a dozen other streaming music services. Radio morons always use the same guise, we are providing valuable local information and if there is ever an emergency you'll be glad we're there. If there's an emergency then I'll grab any one of the shitty little emergency radios that I have lying around my house that haven't been used in 15 years.

Oh and associated yourself more closely with the RIAA is a great idea....they're so fucking popular with consumers.

Douchebag

A wise man once said that your driving skill does not correspond to the size of your wallet.

Here's a perfect example of that.

The Secret to being Evil.

Hopeful nerds around the world have always seen Google as some kind of White Knight in the corporate world. Mostly because Google gives a lot of their services away for free but also because the founders have always pushed the philosophy of "Don't Be Evil".

Google has been making back door deals with Verizon to try and ensure they get preferential treatment in the coming bandwidth wars. When you get betrayed by the ones you love it's always the hardest.

This Techcrunch article is the best one I've seen about the whole situation.

Take it to the bank.

This story about secret number Swiss accounts and tax evading bankers is awesome. READ IT!!!

R.I.P.

R.I.P. Former (i.e. disgraced) Senator Ted Stevens.

I've given Stevens shit in the past for his disgraceful exit from the Senate but I'm still sorry for his family.

Still, he was responsible for one of the best Internet Memes ever....the Series of Tubes.

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Today's LOL

First, this is some really funny shit. Second, she is a Hot Piece of Ass!

Update: BOOOOO!!!! Another Hoax Meme! She's still hot.

Time to punt.

Google and Verizon come out in favor of Net Neutrality...

So at first your like, way to go Verizon! Finally you've done something that is not a total dick move. However...they only want this lack of FCC restrictions to apply to wired networks. What's the big deal there you ask? Verizon knows that wireless is the future and that market has WAY BIGGER margins for them. It's far cheaper to build towers and create a decent mesh network than to buy right of ways and dig ditches for fiber. Besides, wireless users are already conditioned to pay exorbitant amounts of money for tiny amounts of data.

WTF?

I want one of these!!!

CRACKERS!!

Seriously, one day the Onion News Network is going to kill me. Make sure you watch to the end the last bit is the best.


Guatemalan Flight's Data-Recording Parrot Holds Clues To Crash

That's Helpful

LOL....Total losers.

Stirring.

The Big Picture never fails to move me. These pictures from Afghanistan are amazing and sad.

What me guilty?

Oh Charlie Rangel....just admit that you're a dirty scoundrel.

The Douchebag Chronicles

Reason #5432 to hate Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Facebook.


He's worth AT LEAST $4 Billion and he drives an Acura TSX.......are you fucking serious?

I think a portion of my brain just shut down because I literally cannot comprehend that fucking statement. With billions at his disposal he could drive something truly magnificent but he chooses to drive the automotive equivalent of a scientific calculator. Talk about the ultimate expression of his personality, or lack there of.

What a douchebag!!!!

O.M.G.

Watch the Pagani Zonda R set a new Nurburgring lap record.



Make sure you watch that in HD. The most amazing thing is that the camera appears to be mounted in some kind of super steady gimbal rig because you can see the movement of the roll cage and dash as the car flexes through turns. Fucking amazing.

Go for the adventure

Here's a video from an Oxford educated guy that decided to quit his job and work as a security contractor in Iraq....crazy.

Today's LOL

Now this is funny shit.

Oil Disaster Boom Town

Holy shit this is a crazy story.

The Alan Parsons Project

Here come the laser turrets for the Navy. Hopefully they will have X-Wings next year to attack these things like in Star Wars.

Think about how much money they could save in ammunition. An aircraft carrier is basically a floating nuclear power station so they've got a massive amount of power in reserve.

The New King

Is Apple the new Sony? I remember when I was a kid Sony made all the coolest stuff; TVs, Stereos, the Walkman, the DiscMan and tiny freaking portable TVs. They were the home entertainment hardware kings and we all flocked to by their products. The Walkman made riding in the car with my parents something that could be enjoyed instead of feared. These days Sony is but a former shadow of itself, sure they still make great products but their market dominance is a distant memory.

At the height of Sony's consumer electronics dominance Apple was the king of the personal computer. If you had told someone in 1986 that Apple would end up ruling the portable audio market they would have locked you up. Get ready for Apple's big push into the living room....

The truth is out there.

The controversial head of WikiLeaks speaks at TED....fascinating stuff.

Miami Nice

So I've been watching back episodes of Miami Vice for the last few weeks on Netflix. I'm about half way through the second season and if you grew up in the 80's you should really think about re-watching it yourself. Here are some of my impressions.

• Don Johnson smokes....a whole lot. It's seems that every scene is an opportunity to smoke up and man does it look bad ass while doing it.
• Johnson's wardrobe is freaking insane....PASTELS!!
• Even a fake Ferrari Daytona is a thing of beauty.
• Then there are the other cars, whoever was responsible for sourcing the cars for the show was a serious motorhead. I mean who the hell owned an original Maserati Quattroporte in the 80's?
  
• Guest stars!! Its a veritable who's who of people that went on to bigger careers.
• The Music. First off there is the iconic Jan Hammer score which is pretty amazing but then there are all the classic 80's songs including some "performances" of music within the show itself.
• Man the dialog, story and editing of TV shows have come a long way in 25 years. Want to really appreciate Lost despite its less than stellar ending just watch a few episodes of Miami Vice.
• Lots of hot babes. It's amazing to see all of these girls in bikinis without obnoxious fake breasts.
• Edward James Olmos is one bad motherfucker. On BSG he could own a scene like no one's business but his presence on Miami Vice is amazing.
  

Close but no cigar

Shut the damn door!

Sigh...

Saw this new Chevy ad for the Corvette on Jalopnik and it just made me kind of sad.



Which reminded me of a pretty awesome commercial that Chrysler is running for the Challenger.



Who cares if the Challenger drives like a truck and anyone that buys one instead of a Mustang has shit for brains...that commercial is awesome. Although my first thought was WTF, why aren't those Challengers Red, White and Blue? Doesn't come in white for 2011....what bullshit. Have they not seen fucking Vanishing Point?

Money well spent

The RIAA is supposed to protect the interests of it's members, the companies and artists of the recoding industry. I'm not sure how blowing $62+ million on fighting piracy is really helping but whatever.

LMAO!

Now this is some seriously funny shit.

FAIL!

If you can afford an Audi R8 and a Samsung HDTV then pay for the fucking delivery charge...or borrow a fucking truck. Oh wait, he can't borrow a truck because people that drive Audis have no friends......ZING!

Props to Jalopnik.

Stay Classy

This is pretty cool.

Friend!

Funny stuff from The Onion as usual.


New Apple Friend Bar Gives Customers Someone To Talk At About Mac Products

Stick to what you know.

LOL.....check out this awesome story about Prince and his belief that "The Internet is Over".

This finally made me realize that while Prince appears to be frozen at age 32 by some kind of wizardry he still thinks like the 52 year old man that he really is.

It's just a phone?

I wish I was Steve Jobs and had enough money to not give a shit about any one else's opinions or problems.

The iPhone 4 has some 3G reception issues that may or may not be serious. My experience so far is that it gets far better service than my iPhone 3g did but a lot of people are complaining that holding your phone in a certain way kills the phone's ability to get reception. All phones are effected by this in one way or another but when it effects the Jesus phone all hell breaks loose. So people are irate and pleading to the Sith Lord himself trying to find some kind of explanation for why he is a cruel god and not a benevolent one.

So how does Jobs respond to one of these irate customers? "Relax....It is just a phone"

Such a far cry from his "what have you done" diatribe from a couple of months ago. Hey Steve; relax, it's just a phone.

UPDATE: The whole relax email may be a hoax....whatever.

Now that is sweet.

Retro styling meets modern Corvette? Man this thing is sweet.

Piss it away.

Here's a subject close to my heart, IT Project Management. It appears that parts of the Government have seriously dysfunctional IT systems that have had some bad fails over the last few years. The VA office alone has wasted $300 Million dollars on two systems that have resulted in no improvement in capability.

I've been involved in large scale IT Project Management for several years and here's my opinion on what goes wrong.

• Hire your own people to manage the contractors. It's not realistic to hire all the developers and programmers you need as full time employees but paying the same company to create the system AND run the project is the second biggest mistake you can make. You'll pay a fortune and it will take twice as long....I promise.
• The biggest mistake you can make is to hire a contract company to tell you what you need. Hire a good team of analysts and project managers as full time employees. Give that team the tools and the power to explore your organization, talk to the stakeholders and come up with a list of requirements that maps out your needs.
  
• Never, ever pick a platform or an underlying system based on a vendor pitch. Stick to your requirements statement like your life (or job) depends on it because it does. Find a system that meets your needs as closely as possible with as little customization as possible.
• Don't fall for a vendor's promise that their software can do anything you want. You want the "off the shelf" software to meet your needs as closely as possible with no customization. Custom programming = $$$$$$, you can never completely avoid this but make every effort to keep it to a bare minimum.
• Picking a platform first is the death knell. Trying to force a specific platform to conform to your existing processes will take forever and cost an absolute fortune. Besides if you really want to take advantage of new software systems then now is a good time to improve your processes.

If this helps you or your business then send me a check.

Light it up.

Whoa....

Lightning strikes three of the tallest buildings in Chicago at the same time! from Craig Shimala on Vimeo.

Frankenrat

Soon we'll all be able to smoke as much as we want!!!

PT Jobs's Phone Circus Spectacular Suckfest.

Today is launch day for the iPhone 4. I sit hear salivating for its sleek glass and stainless steel body, angry that I didn't have the time to get a pre-order. I'm left to root around in the filth with the unwashed masses grasping my shabby iPhone 3g like some kind of poorly evolved primate.

So why is the thing so "magical"? Look where we were twenty years ago....

Stan vs, the Volcano.

A little more inside info on how the Rolling Stone reporter was able to get the big scoop on this whole McChrystal fiasco. Looks like his only real issue was being stupid enough to let his guard down with a reporter within earshot.

Put it on your ho's.

This is pretty epic.

Loose Lips

I can't believe people are shocked that Obama shit canned McChrystal over the snarky Rolling Stone interview? Do you talk bad about your boss in a public setting? I liked McChrystal and I think that his approach to the war could have been successful long term so I hate to see him dismissed in this way.

Wonder if Obama can use this as a way to abandon the longest war in US history....

Who's hand is in your pocket?

Watch this shit.



A Representative from Texas apologizing to the BP CEO for the Government's "shakedown" of his company....at least he has his constituents interests at heart. Those being all of the oil companies interests in Texas.

Nice moves.

I thought that MTV had really gone into the toilet until I saw this.



Is that a Walkman on his belt? WTF.

Desperate Times

BP is employing private security firms to prevent the credentialed media from interviewing clean up workers on a PUBLIC beach. No....you read that right.



More of the same corporate bullshit. Of course the guy that is making the only money he can by cleaning up BP's mess isn't going to talk to the media in front of BP's security goons. It's not like he can go fucking fishing anymore.

Corporate Greed.

BP....Bird Punishers.


What BP...you can't fly so you take it out on the birds. Assholes.

The Art of Motorsport

This video is beautiful. It's amazing that this was filmed on a camera that you could probably pick up in a local camera shop for less that $3000. Of course there's no way to buy yourself talent like this.

24 HOURS IN 19500 FRAMES from tim hahne on Vimeo.

Coolest kid ever.

This is the coolest kid in the world. I f I could have one just like him it might change my mind about not wanting kids.



Everyone is so uptight about this kid smoking, fucking let him be. Don't you see how happy he is? A hundred years ago P.T. Barnum would have had this kid under a tent charging people a nickel to see the amazing smoking kid!

To hell with your moral objections. Why don't you start worrying about something important?

Now that sucks

It must really suck to be rich enough to afford an Aston Martin DBS but not rich enough to afford off street parking in London.

The Angry Dwarf

RIP Gary Coleman.

In latter years he was known as an angry man with a really big chip on his shoulder but I grew up with him as Arnold the precocious kid.

Super Hyperbole

The radical right is up in arms about a proposed mosque that will be built very near to the site of the World Trade Center. The Jesus freaks are claiming that it will insult the memory of those that died in the 9/11 attacks to have a place nearby where Muslims can practice their faith. They didn't seem to think that spending trillions to invade a country(Iraq) that had nothing to do with those attacks to be so egregious.

Of course all Muslims are evil and all Christians are good....right? It's racism and bigotry at its finest. Activate Constitutional Sanity check.....Separation of Church and State stupidity shield activated.

Wait for it....

May be NSFW, you may want to get a bucket.

Memorial Day

Link may be NSFW.

Wow.

The ultimate douche move

Read this fun little article.

Anyone that has ever worked for a large corporation knows what a total bullshit statement this shit is. All that "we empower our employees" corporate PR speak is what ALL companies say but the truth is so much different. What they really mean is go ahead and stop work an cost us a shit load of money but if you're wrong it will be your job and your ass. If you're right about stopping you'll must likely still get fucked because if there was an existing issue that should have been prevented then your boss, who you just went around, is going to bend you over his desk and show you his gratitude. Not to mention the fact that working in offshore drilling is a very macho business so what are the odds that someone is going to risk looking like a pussy because they are scared.

So go ahead BP and Transocean rape the corpses of the employees that died in service of your company. Assholes.

Still sad.

Check out this awesome time lapse of preparing a Space Shuttle for flight.



Now that you've watched remember this: In less than six months all of this infrastructure, experience, equipment and technology will be decommissioned. How many of the dozens of people in this video will still have jobs once the Shuttle is grounded for good?

The more I think about it the more upset that I get, if there was a viable alternative in place maybe I wouldn't be so pissed but this could very well be the end of NASA's manned flight program. Nearly fifty years of exploration, science and pushing the limits of technology comes to an abrupt end.

To me the Space Shuttle IS space exploration, the only manned flight system that I have known in my life. I remember the horror of watching the Challenger disaster from my grade school class room and the triumph of repairing the Hubble Space Telescope. There was a time in my college years that I had horrible insomnia and I would spent an entire night, sometimes nights on end, watching the live NASA broadcasts of missions in progress. I'll never forget the early morning hours of February 1, 2003. I was playing Mech Assault on XBOX Live when someone in game gasped that the Shuttle had burned up on re-entry. Everyone in game stopped what they were doing and turned on their TVs to watch the news but we all kept the chat going and talked about how sad it was.

While there have been two spectacular failures resulting in the loss of 14 crew members in its service life there have been 132 successful manned flights that have put hundreds of people into space. To put that into perspective there were only eleven manned Apollo missions and of those two were failures with one resulting in the loss of three astronauts. That's a less than 2% failure rate for the Shuttle versus 22% for the Apollo.

The Space Shuttle deserves to have a legacy, it has been a stunning success for nearly thirty years and if it turns out to be the end of manned flight for NASA it will be a sad statement of our Government and it's lack of commitment to science.

Creepy

Skynet is coming.

Game Changer.

Apple made a half-hearted stab at cracking into the living room with the AppleTV. It was great in theory but in practice Apple couldn't (or didn't want to) make a usable interface for their iTunes store that worked on a large format TV. You can still buy an AppleTV today, connect it to your TV and watch your content purchased via iTunes. It doesn't really innovate the TV experience, it just changes where the content comes from. You buy the shows from Apple via iTunes instead of buying them from your cable/satellite provider whether it be by monthly subscription or on demand. It seemed that when the iPhone came out Apple made a very conscious decision to let AppleTV twist in the wind and focus on the mobile platform. That choice certainly hasn't hurt Apple financially.

Now along comes Google which announced today their Google TV platform. The only similarity between AppleTV and Google TV is that you will buy a box that connects to your television. The Google box will connect IN BETWEEN your cable/satellite box and your television. The box will then be connected to your internet connection and allow you to overlay the Internet on top of your TV signal or vice versa. Think of it has having picture in picture with the TV and the Internet. You can pull content from online providers like Hulu and watch shows streamed from the Internet or services like Netflix.

For me this is just awesome. I usually browse the Internet on a laptop while watching TV so this just combines that into one simple interface. The implications could be huge.

Star Trek nerds only.

This video with Jonathan Frakes and Marina Sirtis is awesome.

Dance Monkey!

Rand Paul is infuriating. Watch this:

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All he really cares about is the theory of the Constitution and ideal that the Government should be completely true to EVERY ideal set forth by the Constitution simultaneously. No exceptions, no interpretations, just the clear rule of the law. I think he may want to become a Marxist because his pipe dream of Democracy could only exist in the fallacy of a Socialist Utopia. Sorry Dr. Paul but laws exists because people lack morality either through their own ignorance or poor upbringing. The Constitution is a living document and our Government was designed to allow that document to be changed as society demanded. To embrace the Constitution is to embrace and champion change, not to fight for it's fundamental literal meaning.

In a perfect world there would be no need to "force" private citizens to not be racist but we do not live in a perfect world.

Seriously funny.

ONN does it again.


New Google Phone Service Whispers Targeted Ads Directly Into Users' Ears

Totally chill

Sloths are the most laid back animal in the world, check these guys out.

Liar!

This is kind of fucked up but awesome.

Turn that frown upside down

Kevin's wife of 12 years left him and she took everything except her wedding dress. Help Kevin as he struggles to honor his ex-wife's wishes of doing "whatever the fuck he wants" with her unwanted wedding dress. Talk about funny.

Fix It Already

Interesting article about how the Saudis fixed a HUGE oil spill that they kept very quiet. Fascinating article.

Sad

I hit this picture on Stumble and it just made me sad.

Tomorrow is the final officially scheduled flight of the Space Shuttle Atlantis. It will be her 32nd trip into space and puts us one step closer to having no manned space program in this country for the first time since 1961.

Update: The Boston Globe's awesome blog called "The Big Picture" has some fantastic high resolution pictures of what it takes to prep a Shuttle mission. The end of an era is nigh....

Why is that a surprise?

It amazes me that people are surprised to see Sarah Palin "writing" another book this year. If I could slap my name on a stack of my own bullshit and make $5-10 million then I would write a book every week. She'll probably have a cookbook out eventually....

As long as there are uninformed, uptight and ignorant people out there she'll keep selling her ghost written trash. I really hope she runs in 2012 if for only one reason. She was completely eviscerated in her one debate with Biden so can you imagine what it would be like to see her on stage with Obama? Talk about out of your depth.

Credit where credit is due, Sarah Palin has found her true calling as a media whore.

Running Amok?

How is it possible that the four biggest banks in America all made money for 61 days straight in the worst economy in decades? The sad fact is that these institutions are still solvent in large part by the enormous amounts of tax payer dollars that was shoveled into their coffers by the US Government. Still think that reforms in financial regulation and corporate governance are a bad idea?

Of course since we now longer have a manufacturing industry in this country we better cling to the few successful business sectors we have left. Now if they could just learn to fuck other countries out of their money while NOT destroying our own economy in the process. If that happens then we could be an economic powerhouse again. Of course without decent paying, low skilled jobs we are going to have huge amounts of unemployed for years to come...what are the social implications of that?

Roundabound

TomTom has made a brilliant commercial for new custom voices for their GPS devices. I give you Darth Vader....

The real thing

I had to watch this twice because I could not believe just how fluidly this guy moves. Check out what a REAL Kung Fu master looks like in action.

German?

No-talent, teen heart throb/douchebag Justin Bieber really needs to be in school.



Seriously? Doesn't know what Germany means? Give this kid a map of Europe and a DVD copy of fucking Schindler's List.

Fucking Pixie Dust

NSFW (language)

Adam Carolla can be a blow hard sometimes but I usually like what he has to say. This video diatribe is absolutely priceless and 100% right.

All those granola eating hippie posers that protested nuclear power plants in the 70's and 80's should be publicly ridiculed. Better yet they should be forced to pay for the CO2 offset of all the coal and gas that was burned to generate power instead of using nuclear.

Once bitten....

Watch this video of a girl getting bitten by a Rattlesnake in her garden. Make sure you watch the last 30 seconds when the girl's British friends talk about how much it cost for her to be treated in an American hospital.

Fantastic

Check out Trent Reznor's first post-NIN project called How To Destroy Angels. It's a collaboration with his wife....she's got a great voice. Here's the first single titled A Drowning.

Made me realize that I have a real preference for electronic music with female lead vocals. Goldfrapp, Hoverphonic, Bjork, Portishead, M.I.A., and Snake River Conspiracy to name a few.

Blame game

Who's responsible for the Deepwater oil rig explosion and subsequent oil spill in The Gulf of Mexico? A better question is who's going to pay to clean up what is most likely going to be the biggest oil spill in history? Personally, I hope that Halliburton finally gets taken to task for something considering the insane shit they got away with during the Bush Administration. We'll see how they fair against BP's massive army of lawyers and enormous pockets.

Guard Cat

I hope this video is real because it is hilarious. Don't mess with this kid because his kitty will kick your ass!

Arrrrrr!

Sometimes Chinese piracy results in great hilarity. Look at these bootleg Harry Potter "sequels" created for the Chinese market. My personal favorite, "Harry Potter and the Filler of Big."

Now that is dignified.

Check out this crazy wake in Puerto Rico....I hope I become a fully posable action figure at my funeral.

Classic

I fear that not enough people remember the Upright Citizens Brigade. Here is their finest work....Ass Pennies.

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What a great idea

Here's a fantastic product from a Russian weapons manufacturer....cruise missiles that come concealed within a shipping container. Because that's the problem I have with my cruise missile launchers, they are just too conspicuous.

There's a video of this awesome idea in action!



I wonder if Disney approved them to use the Pirates of the Caribbean music to promote their weapons platform? Probably not.

Altered States

So Arizona's new immigration laws are seriously pissing people off, and rightly so. By far my favorite sign of disapproval thus far has been the refried bean swastikas that were scrawled on the windows of the state capitol. Whoever came up with that one was a fucking genius.

Cool Tools

This may be the coolest multipurpose tool that I have ever seen.

The Switch.

Lol...

I went down the YouTube today and came out with this.

What the antichrist did I just watch?

Here's some crazy ass South African group called Die Antwoord.



I can't decide if I love it or hate it....sure as shit is odd though. I guess South Africa is getting ready to blow up world wide...kind of like New Zealand did a few years back.

Taken to task.

Watch Anderson Cooper take apart some birther asshat.



First, FTW Anderson Cooper. Second, if you believe that Barack Obama was born in Kenya then I hope you get trampled by a fucking unicorn. You are a embarrassment to you country and a miserable human being.

Ignorance is no defense, educate yourself and don't be ignorant to ACTUAL FACTS.

Now that is unusual

You have to love Craigslist, otherwise you'd miss cultural gems like this.

Tolerance

Everything I needed to know about your IQ I learned from your truck.

Yet another religion FAIL!

The winner for being the most ignorant to logic and The Scientific method is......

This guy.

Now that is by far the most stunning insight into plate tectonics and subduction zones that I have ever read. I think he better have someone check his work.

Ashy Larry

Man, Mother Nature is really pissed off this year. This volcano in Iceland is seriously awesome to watch.

Huge Brass Balls.

Delusional, party of two your table is ready.

The RIAA and the MPAA recently submitted a "wish list" of methods and technologies that they would like to see implemented to prevent theft of their members products. The Office of the Intellectual Property Enforcement Coordinator had put out a request for comments on their plan for how to better protect copyright holders works.

Needless to say some of the ideas the RIAA and MPAA put forward go from ridiculous to un-fucking-believable. Trust me, you'll want to read this one.

Poor Bastard

Sure he has this amazing yacht...but money can't buy happiness right? Whatever, I bet he has to have the smile surgically removed every night.

Apple gone crazy?

I was really shocked to see that Apple allowed the Opera we browser into the app store for the iPhone. In the past they have taken a hard line at not approving applications that "duplicated original functionality". So since the phone ships with Apple's own Safari browser how is it that they can judge Opera to NOT be duplicating the original functionality? Since its release the Opera browser has become the most downloaded application in all 22 markets that the App Store services....that's pretty crazy. I mean everyone's iPhone could already browse the web perfectly fine, why would anyone want a CHOICE of browsers? What a novel concept.

I hope the success of Opera shines a very bright spot light on Apple's draconian App Store practices. I for one would love to have the Google Voice application that Apple shot down last year for "duplicating original functionality". Exactly how many legs do they have to stand on now?

World's Best Dad

I get asked a lot why I don't have any kids. Here's a good reason, having kids that have bad taste in music and lack civility.


What a douche.

Half ass

Great article about how our screwed up tax code is the root of all our budget problems. How many of the white, middle to upper middle class, conservative tea party asshats actually pay their fair share?

It's educational

Learn something about biology...then say WTF!?

Hypocrites

Is even the Republican legend Ronald Reagan to left leaning for today's right wing asshats? For years staunch Republicans championed him as our last "great" President.

Yet when Obama signs a nuclear disarmament treaty that is nearly identical to what Reagan wanted to do almost 30 years ago he is maligned as selling our national security down the drain.

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Soiled iPad

When the Apple iPad was announced there was some interesting remarks from people "in the know" that the $499 starting prices was actually higher than the rumored launch price. With that in mind, check out this article about how much it actually costs Apple to build the iPad. It costs Apple less than $300 to build that $499 device.

Yes, I know that doesn't take into account the R&D costs and advertisement costs for the device but those arguments are total bullshit. First, Apple doesn't need to advertise any of their consumer electronics. The media gives them huge amounts of free coverage which is far more effective than any ad campaign that Apple could ever devise themselves. Apple has become the absolute masters of manipulating the media with their product secrecy and launch strategies. Second, exactly how much could the R&D for the iPad have really cost? The software is identical to that already running on the iPhone and iPod Touch so little work was required to port that to the iPad hardware. The hardware itself is evolutionary not revolutionary so that cost is probably really low as well.

So Apple probably makes a minimum of $100 profit off of each iPad they sell which has to be the absolute envy of every consumer electronics company out there. Take Sony for example, they still lose money on every PlayStation 3 sold today and it's been on the market for more than three years. Sony can do that because they make up the loss on the licensing and sale of content(games,Blu-ray,etc).

Considering that last point, Apple's profit on the hardware should REALLY piss you off. The iPad is a content consumption device and Apple is making about 30% off of every app, song, video and book that you buy on your iPad. That should also scare the living shit out of all of Apple's competitors because If they really wanted to they could drop the entry level iPad's price all the way down to $250 and they would still make bucket-fulls of money off of it. Owning the content delivery channel gives them the the ability to subsidize the price of the device to a level that no competitor could manage without taking a huge loss on every device sold.

The real John McCain?

This is laugh out loud funny shit. John McCain spent millions of campaign money trying to convince America that he was a "Maverick"....two years later he says he wasn't. WTF!

Time for Smores.

Huge Oil Tank Explosion.





Second video, this one is much closer but the camera man is an ass hat.

Wrong Hole

First off....NSFW, for total hilarity.



Best thing Scott Baio has down since Arrested Development.

The $750,000 Thrill Ride.

Take a crazy mountain road, add three Ferrari F430s and this is what you get.



I know semi-automatic "flappy paddle" gearboxes are faster but they will never replace the awesome sound of a Ferrari shifter makes while sliding into it's metal gates. It sounds like working the bolt on a Enfield rifle.

The iPad, aka Jumbo Jesus Phone

I love my iPhone. More to the point I have a love/hate but mostly love relationship with my iPhone. That said, I'm so fucking sick of the iPad that I'm going to go on some kind of mass technology murder spree. "Man Destroys Mobile Devices In Four State Rampage"...the headlines will read.

I think the mainstream press is way to far onto Apple's bandwagon this time. Here is my winners and losers style breakdown of the iPad. This will stay here for posterity's sake so a couple of years from now I can either say Fuck You, I told you so or cringe at the very mention of this post.

Losers:

• Old School "Big" Book Publishers: The "major" publishers are looking at this as their salvation from sinking print profit margins and Amazon's perceived iron grip on book pricing. The iPad may stand a decent chance of boosting book sales in the short term but reading on a LCD screen with a backlight is never going to be an ideal solution. The real hurt will come for them when they realize that Apple makes Amazon look like Mother Fucking Theresa...just ask the music industry or an App Developer that had their "naughty" app shit-canned. Once Apple owns the delivery mechanism to millions of users what will stop them from squeezing the revenues as far as they can? Nothing, that's what.
  

• App Developers: The more drunk with power Apple gets the more restrictive they will get with app approval. What's that? You'd like to develop a new web browser for our "magical" iPad? That duplicates existing functionality...denied.

• AT&T: Their 3G network can't keep up with all the iPhone users now. Just wait until everyone is streaming shit tons of video to their magical iPads.

• Video Content Creators: Why does my awesome video that I shot in 1080p HD look like such dogshit on this supposedly magical device? I thought letterboxing video went out with tube TVs, talk about a leap backward.

• Retailers: Anyone that owns a store that sells books, music, games, videos or magazines. Apple become the number one music retailer in just five years. How are stores like Sam Goody doing? Ever heard of bankruptcy?
  

• End Users - Web Browsing: Browsing the web on this thing is supposedly the "killer app". Who wants to browse at 1024X768 resolution on a 10" screen with no flash support? I'm sorry but I have a 24" monitor on my desk and I would venture that most people are used to a minimum of a 17" monitor these days. That resolution sucks balls.

• End Users - Video: Low resolution shit. Apple claims it will play "HD" video but that will only happen in a seriously letterboxed window that means that about 40% of your screen will be nothing but black nothingness. Just like the good ole days of "magical" widescreen DVDs on a 4:3 SD TV.

• End Users - Music: I'm going to go for a walk, I'll just drop this ENORMOUS FUCKING iPad in my pocket...oh wait it won't fit. Fuck it I'll just carry it. Remember when people used to get mugged for their iPods because people could be seen wearing the conspicuously white headphones? Good luck holding on to your iPad as you walk down the street. If your one of those people that sits in their house on the couch and listens to music on headphones then you need to grow up and buy a real fucking stereo.

• End Users - Books: I think I'll go outside and read this book....NOT! I really want to finish this book but after two hours of reading it feels like I have hot pokers in my fucking brain.

Winners:

• Apple: More devices = more content = more turtlenecks. Simple.

• App Developers: The ones that don't run afoul of Apple's ever changing policies stand to make a fortune.

• Game Developers: Apple has made application development very easy for large developers, porting stuff across platforms is child's play for someone like EA. More platforms equals more sales and the App store makes distribution WAY easier than hand held systems like the Nintendo DS and the PSP. Not to mention the profit margin is better.

• Magazine Publishers: Books may suffer but this device should help magazines breathe some new life into their dying format. Rich content integration like audio and video on a connected device could make for some awesome magazines. Blurring the line completely between the web and traditional print.

• End Users - Fanboys: Apple fan boys will flock to the iPad like flies on shit. By Thanksgiving you won't be able to walk into a Starbucks without seeing some hipster douchebag typing his "important" emails and inane fucking tweets from a conspicuously noticeable table. Make sure you say hi when you see me.
  

Douchebag of the Day

US Representative Eric Cantor decided that he would try to drum up sympathy for the GOP by claiming they were under attack by crazy liberals. Problem is that his facts were completely wrong....I'm sure it was an honest mistake.

The Tale of the Tape

Here's a great article on the recently passed Health Care reform bill. It was written by Dennis Kucinich the Democratic Representative from Ohio whose vote was critical in the passing of the bill. I highly recommend it.

Socialism FTW.

Next time someone starts whining about socialism just remember this little gem.

This is a big fucking deal.

Sometimes, I just love Joe Biden. Secretly I think that Obama is more like Biden then he lets on publicly.

Jon Stewart, Comedy Genius.

Comedy Central needs to give Jon Stewart a full hour for his show. The first half would be the normal "Daily Show" and the second half would just be Stewart pretending to be Glenn Beck. This is some of the best and funniest satire ever.

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Intro - Progressivism Is Cancer
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Health Care Reform

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Conservative Libertarian
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Health Care Reform

Get low.

If you can ignore the dumb first minute of this clip from Top Gun then you'll get to see some awesome low pass jet goodness.

Get to the chopper!!

The original Predator movie was one of the best action movies of the 80's, Schwarzenegger at his muscled finest. It's good enough to make you forget about the horrors of the sequels that followed. Robert Rodriguez, who has made some awesome action movies, is producing another sequel called Predators. The trailer just dropped and it looks like a true return to form for the franchise.

Predators Movie Trailer - Trailer

Meh

Between work and Plants vs. Zombies I've been too busy to post much for the last week. I did run across this gem, it is a breakdown of how much each channel in your cable "package" costs individually. Go ahead and total up how much the channels you watch ACTUALLY cost versus what you currently pay.

$5 per month for ESPN? That's fucking nuts.


RR

Paralyzed by fear

I think I have reached an all time level of apathy for the American political system. It's all Stephen Colbert's fault....

The Colbert Report	Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
Health Care Vote Information Nerve Center - Charlie Cook
www.colbertnation.com
Colbert Report Full Episodes Political Humor Skate Expectations

In the past I've complained that the problem is that the entire Legislative Branch of our government is broken. I still believe that to be true and that the Institution itself is not really at fault. The fault lies in the dominance of the two party system and the unbelievable amount of self interest exhibited by nearly every member of Congress. Re-election and carrying the flag of "the party" means more than actually performing the duty of governing for the good off all the people.

The Democrats are a bunch of limp wristed pussies that are only concerned with trying to stay in power but not ACTUALLY FUCKING DO ANYTHING ONCE THEY HAVE THE FUCKING POWER TO DO SOMETHING.

The Republicans have become a group of babies that only care about complaining that they didn't fuck things up for the last eight years, it was broken when they found it. What utter bullshit...we could have paid for Universal Health Care for a fucking decade with the money they let Bush and Cheney piss away on invading Iraq.

Here's what George Washington thought of the rise of Political Parties during is later years:

"It serves always to distract the Public Councils, and enfeeble the Public Administration. It agitates the Community with ill-founded jealousies and false alarms; kindles the animosity of one part against another, foments occasionally riot and insurrection. It opens the door to foreign influence and corruption, which find a facilitated access to the government itself through the channels of party passions. Thus the policy and the will of one country are subjected to the policy and will of another. "

Reporting Live

This is great....I love the look on the News Anchor's face. Fast forward to the 1:00 minute mark.

Sigh....

I wish I'd never grown up because if I hadn't I want to be Adam Savage from The Mythbusters. Check out on of his life long obsessions, building the perfect replica of Deckard's pistol from The Blade Runner.

Double standard

Read this fun little story.

So does this archdiocese hold their entire flock to the same standard? Do the children of divorced parents have to suffer the wrath of the church for their parents heresy? What about the children of adulterers, pedophiles and people that eat meat on Friday?

I guess the secret is to not "live in open discord with Catholic teaching" as the archdiocese outlined. There's the true method of the Catholic Church, be quiet and pretend nothing happened. Sure has worked great for them in the past. Make sure you're not seen eating meat on a Friday or they may throw your kids out of Catholic school...what bullshit.

Now this is brilliant.

I give you Godzilla Haiku. Awesome.

Talk about out of touch.

First off, eat shit Tom Delay.

What an ignorant prick. While I agree there are some serial abusers of the unemployment system I'd like to see the reaction to this of any one of the thousands of well-educated, thoroughly experienced professionals that have spent months looking for a job with no luck. I'm sure Mr. Delay is right and they would much prefer to make a quarter of their previous salary by collecting unemployment and relaxing in their soon to be foreclosed on homes.

Of course we can't all afford to voluntarily quit our jobs like you Mr. Delay and most of us don't have a job with access to tens of thousands of dollars in bribes and kickbacks either. Quitting on your terms seems so much less meaningful when all you're doing is trying to avoid getting thrown out for an ethics violations.

Freaky Friday

Check out Nana crashing the boards.....WTF.

Why not?

While agree with the Obama Administration's cancellation of the troubled Constellation program I have already blogged about my serious issues with not having a viable manned space system. It could easily be ten years until this country could field another manned flight system once the Shuttle Program ends. Couple that with estimates that the loss of Constellation and the cancellation of the Shuttle may cost as many as 27,000 jobs and it seems like a really bitter pill to swallow.

Personally I think extending the Shuttle program is the best, lowest cost option at this point. Too bad that's not likely to happen.

Awesome

This may be the coolest music video ever made....seriously.

Mother Nature.

Alligator versus Python....which one do you think will win? Video.


Not embeddable....what is this 2001?

Forget the batteries.

Porsche is showing off their new 918 Spyder Hybrid Concept car at the Geneva auto show this week and man is it fucking hot. I don't give a shit about the Hybrid part but this NEEDS to be the styling of the next Boxster/Caymen. It's just beautiful (except for the wheels, those are FUGLY.)

Cowards.

Apple has been called many things by many people but in general they are not known to be "afraid" of defending their intellectual property. In that respect it's not surprising that Apple has filed a patent infringement suit regarding their patents for the iPhone. What is surprising is who they are filing the suit against....HTC. Some of you probably said, who the fuck is HTC? HTC is a hardware manufacturer that makes the best phones that you've never heard of.

So why is Apple going after HTC? Because they make the best phones for both Google's Android OS and Microsoft's Windows Mobile platforms. Apple is taking the coward's route by not suing Google or Microsoft with their deep pockets and going after the only company that could really be hurt by the suit. Even though a fair amount of the things named in the suit are more related to the phone's operating system and not the hardware. It's a real dick move.

Holy WTF?

This is freaking hilarious....I'm intrigued and frightened.



Wouldn't it be awesome to see that guy on America Idol? I'd love to see him tear off Simon Cowell's head and drink his blood.

Seriously Conflicted

Read this Boing Boing article.

The use of laptops by school children has become a hot topic because of the hugely talked about case of school administrators spying on kids at home using laptop webcams. I think the Boing Boing article really tries to draw parallels between the recent spying case and this story from last year which I think is completely unfair.

The Philadelphia school was spying on kids using webcams on school provided computers WHILE THE KIDS WERE AT HOME. The Bronx school is using laptops IN THE CLASS ROOM. Those children could be directly observed in a public space so there is no reasonable expectation of privacy in that situation. A teacher could watch them in person just as easily as over a webcam...that is completely different than watching them in their homes.

Something else that should be considered. The school as had great success in using those laptops and views it as a way to prepare those children for their future in the workplace which is dominated by the literate use of computers. Having worked in a corporate environment I would say that making sure that these kids KNOW that their computer activity is being monitored is extremely important. I assure you it will be monitored in the workplace and the consequences of their actions in that case could result in loosing their job. They need to learn accepted and appropriate uses of their computer, there is a time and place for everything.

Break it down.

Wow. Watch at least the last five minutes of this video for Maddow's summation of the health care system in this country. The truth hurts, better make sure that you stay healthy.

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It's even got Shep Smith up in arms!!!



I hope that Obama can inspire the Democrats to ram this bill through "reconciliation" because the GOP really is just blindly sticking to the party line on this.