Hypothermia help

Here's some things you need to know in case you run into a hypothermia incident (when someone's body temperature is too cold to continue functioning correctly)

1) Healthy individuals afflicted with hypothermia will not die if treated correctly.

2) Keep the victim horizontal
&
3) Do not allow the victim to move around.
This is to prevent the cold blood that is stuck in the limbs from circulating into the rest of the (warm, conscious) body.

It is okay to apply CPR to the victim. In the absence of medical equipment, breathing warm, moist air into the victim's mouth and respiratory system is probably the best you can do.


--

11/16/09 - new URLs languages!

coming soon.. I can finally type クモ into the internet search bar (maybe クモ.com?) instead of kumo.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/10/29/internet.domains.languages/index.html


--

New Jihad Code of Ethics

Proof that history happens right here. Reading this makes me feel like I'm back in religious studies, tracking the change of Catholic Canon through the ages.

The Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) has just released a 417 page religious document titled "Corrective Studies". The most relevant portion to us would be the "Jihad has ethics and morals because it is for God. That means it is forbidden to kill women, children, elderly people, priests, messengers, traders and the like. Betrayal is prohibited and it is vital to keep promises and treat prisoners of war in a good way. Standing by those ethics is what distinguishes Muslims' jihad from the wars of other nations." part.


related works:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spiritual_Exercises_of_Ignatius_of_Loyola
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Institutes_of_the_Christian_Religion

--

"Conservative crisis"

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/01/nyregion/01upstate.html

the tl;dr : The GOP isn't willing to let a pro-abortion, pro-gay marriage candidate call themselves a Republican.

Who knows if excommunicating the moderates will be a good political decision or not... It looks like there's quite some work to do before Social Right can be untangled from Financial Right.

--

HPV vaccination for boys

The tl;dr : We should vaccinate the whole population of 11 year olds against HPVirus if we actually want to save lives.

So good I had to share it... http://slog.thestranger.com/slog/archives/2009/10/21/vaccinating-boys-against-hpv

(btw, hate to point out the obvious but I think lots of legislators would love it if more gay people died of anal cancer. That's probably why the problem continues.)


--

THE FUTURE .. but when?

So for almost two decades now, American newborns have been injected with a tiny dose of Vitamin K at birth. Vitamin K helps infants not bleed to death shortly after birth - pretty much undeniably a good thing. Thankfully, unlike vaccines, no unfounded accusations (*ahem* autism) have stuck to this practice so the injections continue to this day.

Since this practice continues for the good of newborns around the country, I'm starting to wonder when there'll be mandatory planned Growth Hormone injections. Hey, free muscle mass and bone density for everyone! If applied in the correct amounts, ... well, lets just say we haven't found any bad side effects yet. After all, most of the meat we're eating contains growth hormones (albeit for a different mammal) and all our AMERICAN flour is enriched with B vitamins and Iron.

Also I was thinking, can we all get free psychostimulant (Adderall/Ritalin) shots too? If we just throw some super-focused human beings at the problem, I'm sure it'll go away.

"Never underestimate the power of a small group of committed people to change the world. In fact, it is the only thing that ever has." (Margaret Mead)

See? It's true. Call your local public health office today!

While you're on hold, remember to thank them for putting Fluoride in the water. Instead of getting cancer (or hell, even AIDS) like they feared, people that lobbied against water fluoridation now have kids with cavities. Enjoy your freedom!

--

I hope the real GREs aren't like this

Since the non-essay part of the GRE (Graduate Record Exam) are only 60 something questions total, it's more important that any one of them is ... improper.


SPHINX : PERPLEX

(a) Oracle : Interpret
(b) Prophet : Prepare
(c) Siren : Lure
(d) Jester : Astound
(e) Minotaur : Anger


Okay, this question is only forgiven for 2 reasons:
1) This was a practice exam by Kaplan. Obviously it's here because they wanna prove how easy it is to "game" the test because, "don't be fooled!" by the fact that 4 of them are of religious/mythical significance.
2) Well, I guess all Classically-trained American schoolchildren should have learned about Sphinxes and Sirens and Minotaurs at their high-real-estate-taxes, well funded public schools, right? But wait! Answer me this!

SUN WUKONG : SUTRA

(a) NuWa : Egg
(b) King Wen : Fishing Pole
(c) Buddha : Lotus
(d) BaiSuZhen : Demon
(e) Tian : Heaven

If that was on the GRE would people's complaints be legitimate? Okay, well, I think even if


WILLIAM HOWARD TAFT : 16TH AMENDMENT

(a) Martin Van Buren : War of 1812
(b) George Washington : Cherry Tree
(c) Grover Cleveland : 18th Amendment
(d) James Madison : Bill of Rights
(e) Alexander Hamilton : Federal Reserve Bank

was on our ALL-AMERICAN GREs, there would still be complaints. Most likely "wow I didn't think I needed to know any history!" Okay, sure, this isn't the ACTs, but when was the last time you used words like Fecundity, Diluvial, Mawkish or Jejune? Why is unnecessary history any worse than unnecessary English? How are either of these things predicting how well I'll do in grad school in my first year?

I guess the true genius of the GREs/SATs is, how well can you "game" the test? Failing that, how many fancy dictionary words can you memorize for the span of 4 hours? Wow! That many!? You've obviously got the skills to pass the Bio101 final, you're in!

For $1,200 Kaplan will teach you how to "game" your GREs.
Kaplan knows, it's not about innate ability, heck, my scores were perfect but I couldn't get into college because I was a jew.
Kaplan knows, if you had $1,200 to throw around, you're gonna do good in life, kid. Start a business in your own basement if you don't. repeat until you can.

--

*Kaplan Knew... my hero passed away August 23, 2009.

another sign of eurocentrism

Eurocentrism (America's schools teaching a curriculum centered around European accomplishments/history) is very real. Think of all the famous paintings you know. What do you have, Sistine Chapel? Mona Lisa? The Scream? Do you know any famous art works from Asia or Africa? (No, visualizing a random Ming vase does not count).

A less obvious expression of Eurocentrism is in our language. When we want to sound elitist, old or funny, we talk in a mix of Old English, Shakespeare, and bible translations. Words like "thou" and "methinks" and "bless-ed is he who..."

This became obvious to me when I tried to explain the concept of "looking at the Buddha's finger". An accepted Asian/fortune cookie way of saying it would be "when the finger points to the moon, the fool looks at the finger". I had thought up "Do not be he who looks at the finger instead of the moon" and "the finger points to the moon, but you are fixated on the finger".

Maybe I'm the only one that sees the difference between these. When I learned about the Buddha's finger, I heard it explained (in English) in a way that seemed very Chinese to me. After reading various English translations of Buddhist/Zen texts, I had started to think of these concepts in a different language style. "Do not be he who..." is a Biblical style of talking and "this does this; but you are doing that." is something an Asian sage would say in an American movie. That's why they felt so wrong when I tried to use them. This translation of "the finger that points to the moon" is in a style that is really familiar and comforting to me.

After reading a lot of bible translations, seeing
"You make a big fuss about all of the different ways and methods of acquiring something that you´ll never be able to gain. Zen Master Huang-po therefore says: "That there is nothing which can be attained is not idle talk; it is the highest truth." You seek something that you´ll never be able to find because you´ve never lost it."
just didn't sound classy enough to me

That's a big problem. The parables from the bible and the Ten Commandments have a very distinct style. Same with Shakespeare and Chaucer. When we hear something that's dogma or classic literature, we expect to hear it in that style. When it's not, it just doesn't seem classy or legitimate (unless you have a lot of experience with other styles of literature - which you won't if you go through the average American curriculum).
Just seems like a good thing to realize.


--
does this make sense to anyone else?
does
"Thou shall not put to waste time spent thinking of ways to obtain that which can not be gained. For it is as the Zen Master Huang-po says: "There is nothing that can be attained on this earth". He speaks not gibberish nor false lies. You who seeks to find something that has never been lost will search until this becomes apparent to you."
sound a lot better? Oh god, you twinkie.

gender test results

(not for me, for Caster Semenya from the previous post!)

Internal male sex organs, no uterus or ovaries.


--

when gender matters

http://sports.espn.go.com/oly/trackandfield/news/story?id=4411235

I don't know how many people are aware of this, but Caster Semenya (South Africa), winner of the 800m race in this year's World Championships may lose her medal. It all depends on whether a gender test says she's actually female or not.

What the hell? I don't really agree with them dividing every sport into male and female categories, but if they didn't do that I know no woman could ever get to the top of any sport (due to a mix of social and biological reasons. Also, look at the numbers, it's pretty much a fact).

I just read in Time magazine that Ms. Semenya has "three times the testosterone as the average woman". Of course they neglected to mention how much more testosterone you need to have to be statistically significant. According to this sketchy site , women have 70 units (it's ng/dl) of testosterone while men can have from 280 to over 1000 of the stuff. Okay, so three times 70? That's only 210, still lower than what's normal for men. Shoddy jouralism there, Time.

Something else that's important - So what happens if you're not a man or a woman? Obviously they're not trying to prove that she's a man, just that she's not a woman. That's pretty much all that they CAN prove, seeing as she lacks a penis. What even happens if you fail a gender test? Do you have to run in the Special Olympics now? You can laugh off people thinking you're in the wrong bathroom, but losing a gold medal should really trigger some re-thinking of why sex and gender matters.

..foooodddd?

Sometimes when I'm eating whatever I want (and it happens to be junk food) someone will feel like saying to me "you don't know what it's like to be... on a diet/fat/aware!". My usual response would be "Sorry?" if I feel like being nice and "Maybe if you exercised/had more willpower/looked in the mirror" if I don't feel like being nice.

I think my new response will be "you don't know what it's like to not be white".

This will always work. I've only had white girls feel a need to tell others that they're offended by "insensitive" eating habits - quite possibly because when the media pushes its skinny = beautiful agenda, it's also pushing white = beautiful, making it have much less of an impact on minorities.

*waits to be proved wrong*

2nd generation

the tl;dr : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Name_Is_Khan#Newark_Airport_incident


The 1960s Civil Rights movement was pretty much run by young people (all revolutions are, aren't they?). They grew up being told to be polite to the white man. Always address him as "sir", always keep your hands where they can be seen, etc. In short, this is probably why Henry Louis Gates Jr. caused as much trouble as he did. He was the 2nd generation and he wasn't going to take that crap.

There's a lot of 2nd generation running around these days. In an incident pretty similar to the Gates one (but for Indians) Bollywood superstar Shahrukh Khan was stopped and taken in for questioning at a US airport... he was in America to make a movie about post 9-11 racial profiling. Other east-asians being held in the questioning room were even asking him for autographs. Cue protests.

--

More animal pictures from wenxuecity

some strange-looking animal >__>

Corporate Equality Index 2009

For some reason or another, we all have companies that we love to hate... Starbucks, Nike, Disney, McDonald's etc... but for those of us willing to forgive and not be stubborn asshole nonconformists trying to look cool, here are 260 top companies that have gotten 100% on the Corporate Equality Index this year.

In order to get on this list (created by the Human Rights Campaign), a company has to have "a non-discrimination policy in place covering sexual orientation and gender identity; offers full benefits to domestic partners; and actively engages with the LGBT community (through employee outreach as well as philanthropy and other engagements outside the workplace)"

Pretty high standards. Tons of liberal colleges can't even meet those. 260 is a lot of companies and I know that at least a hundred of these were in the news recently due to scandalous behavior. Hate sells, it's time to look at the 19 other sides.

As always, click the image to enlarge. More info here.





The tl;dr, i suppose, is that the following unpopular companies are damn good at getting gay-rights straight (no pun intended):

Abercrombie & Fitch
American Airlines
American Express
Anheuser-Busch
Apple
AT&T
Bank of America
Barnes & Noble
Best Buy
Bristol-Myers Squibb
Capitol One
Chevron
Chrysler
Cisco
Citigroup
Clear Channel
Clorox
Coca-Cola
Continental Airlines
Coors Brewing
Dell
Dow Chemical
DuPont
(Eastern) Kodak
eBay
EA
Eli Lilly
Ford Motor
GameStop
Gap
General Motors
GlaxoSmithKline
Goldman Sachs
Google
IBM
J.C. Penney
Lehman Brothers
Macy's
MasterCard
Microsoft
New York Times
Nike
Novartis
Oracle
Pepsi
Pfizer
Raytheon
Sears
Shell (Oil)
Starbucks
Sun Microsystems
Target
Time Warner
Toyota
UPS
Viacom
Visa
Walgreens
Walt Disney
Xerox
Yahoo!

--

congrats, Xbox360!

http://www.informationweek.com/news/personal_tech/TV_theater/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=219200466 presents a very misleading article about XBOX360 play time finally tied with Sony play time. In the US.

"How is that possible!?" is probably what we're all thinking. "The Playstation 3 is the least popular new-gen console!"

Well apparently they decided that the Playstation 1, 2 AND 3 all count as "Sony play time". Turns out the PS2 is still being played so much that it took the Xbox360 a few years to become the leading console in play time.

Also, 19% is a lot.

"More Americans are playing newer consoles than the older models, Nielsen found. The Xbox 360, PS3 and Wii made up 50% of total usage minutes in June, while last generation consoles, such as Xbox, PS2 and Gamecube, made up only 31% of the total. Older gaming consoles, including the PS One, Atari 2600, Nintendo 64, Sega Genesis and others, made up the remaining 19%."

--

from Coding Horror

The tl;dr - one online game goes down the dark path of wanting 'results' from their internet ads.


http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/001286.html

oh gosh. i'm not even sure what to tag this.

Exercise doesn't help you lose weight.

For those of us too lazy to skim over the cover of the latest issue of Time magazine (Aug 17, 2009) it says "The Myth about Exercise; of course it's good for you, but it won't make you lose weight...."




Wait/Weight, That's not what i meant to say.

The tl;dr -

• Going to the gym makes you feel good and when you feel good you want to reward yourself with something that gives you more calories than what you just burned off.
• Also, hard exercise makes you more hungry and less able to control yourself.

but seriously guys, weight isn't health.

Baked Apple Pies at MacDonald's, 1 for $.95, 2 for $1 (not including tax.) They're delicious.

--

Marion man stabbed over video game spat

MARION — A Marion man was stabbed Sunday over a dispute about a video game, a Marion Police Department official said.

Larry Jordan was taken to a Marion hospital suffering from five stab wounds, four of them to his side, and one to the back of his head, according to Sgt. Chris Smith of the Marion Police Department.

The suspect, James Harold Morris, 33, fled the scene on foot.

The incident occurred at 2:50 p.m. Sunday 225 Harlee St., Apt. B, Marion, Smith said.

According to reports, the two men were watching children play video games. When Jordan told one of the children he could not play a certain video game, Morris allegedly attacked the him.

--

i'm sorry i was tired of seeing the other post as the most recent one.

mental illness and me/you

This post may offend you. Bring it.



Friend: A doctor diagnosed me with (mental illness).
Me: I don't think you have it.


What I think---------
Friend: My art teacher says my art project looks bad.
Me: I think it looks fine.


What they hear---------
Friend: This is my excuse to not always be at full potential.
Me: You have no excuse.


Any comments?

oh good

http://www.goodnewsdaily.com/

now i won't be tempted to start my own blog just for good news

--

rom notes

               ..................
...............: STANDARD CODES ::...............
:                                               :\
:   [a?] Alternate       [p?] Pirate            :\
:   [b?] Bad Dump        [t?] Trained           :\
:   [f?] Fixed           [T-] OldTranslation    :\
:   [o?] Overdump        [T+] NewerTranslation  :\
:   [h?] Hack            (-) Unknown Year       :\
:   [!p] Pending Dump    [!] Verified Good Dump :\
:  (M#) Multilanguage (# of Languages)          :\
: (###) Checksum       (??k) ROM Size           :\
:                      (Unl) Unlicensed  :\
:...............................................:\
\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\

              .................
................: SPECIAL CODES ::...............
:                                               :\
: .-----Gameboy-----.  .----Super Nintendo----. :\
: [  [C] Color      ]  [ (BS) BS ROMs         ] :\
: [  [S] Super      ]  [ (ST) Sufami Turbo    ] :\
: [ [BF] Bung Fix   ]  [ (NP) Nintendo Power  ] :\
: `-----------------'  `----------------------' :\
:                      .--------Atari---------. :\
: .-----Genesis-----.  [ (PAL) Euro Version   ] :\
: [ (1) Japan       ]  `----------------------' :\
: [ (4) USA         ]  .---------GBA----------. :\
: [ (5) NTSC Only   ]  [ [hI??] Intro hacks   ] :\
: [ [R-] Countries  ]  [ [f_?] EEPROMV124 fix ] :\
: [ (8) PAL Only    ]  `----------------------' :\
: [ (B) non USA     ]  .--------Coleco--------. :\
: [ [c] Checksum    ]  [ (Adam) ADAM Version  ] :\
: [ [x] Bad Checksum]  `----------------------' :\
: `-----------------'                           :\
:                      .--------NES/FC--------. :\
: .--NeoGeo Pocket--.  [ (PC10) PlayChoice 10 ] :\
: [ [M] Mono Only   ]  [   (VS) Versus        ] :\
: `-----------------'  [ [hFFE] FFE Copier fmt] :\
:                      `----------------------' :\
:...............................................:\
\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\

              .................
................: COUNTRY CODES ::...............
:                                               :\
:   (1) Japan & Korea      (4) USA & BrazilNTSC :\
:   (A) Australia          (J) Japan            :\
:   (B) non USA (Genesis)  (K) Korea            :\
:   (C) China             (NL) Netherlands      :\
:   (E) Europe            (PD) Public Domain    :\
:   (F) France             (S) Spain            :\
:  (FC) French Canadian   (Sw) Sweden           :\
:  (FN) Finland            (U) USA              :\
:   (G) Germany           (UK) England          :\
:  (GR) Greece           (Unk) Unknown Country  :\
:  (HK) Hong Kong          (I) Italy  :\
:  (D)  Dutch            (Unl) Unlicensed       :\
:...............................................:\
\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\

           .......................
.............: STANDARD CODE NOTES ::............
:                                               :\
: [a] This is simply an alternate version of a  :\
:     ROM. Many games have been re-released to  :\
:     fix bugs or even to eliminate Game Genie  :\
:     codes (Yes, Nintendo hates that device).  :\
:             -------------------               :\
: [b] A bad dump often occurs with an older     :\
:     game or a faulty dumper (bad connection). :\
:     Another common source of [b] ROMs is a    :\
:     corrupted upload to a release FTP.        :\
:             -------------------               :\
: [f] A fixed game has been altered in some way :\
:     so that it will run better on a copier    :\
:     or emulator.                              :\
:             -------------------               :\
: [h] Something in this ROM is not quite as it  :\
:     should be. Often a hacked ROM simply has  :\
:     a changed header or has been enabled to   :\
:     run in different regions. Other times it  :\
:     could be a release group intro, or just   :\
:     some kind of cheating or funny hack.      :\
:             -------------------               :\
: [o] An overdumped ROM image has more data     :\
:     than is actually in the cart. The extra   :\
:     information means nothing and is removed  :\
:     from the true image.                      :\
:             -------------------               :\
: [t] A trainer is special code which executes  :\
:     before the game is begun. It allows you   :\
:     to access cheats from a menu.             :\
:             -------------------               :\
: [!] Verified good dump. Thank God for these!  :\
:...............................................:\
\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\

           ......................
.............: SPECIAL CODE NOTES ::.............
:                                               :\
: **** SNES ****                                :\
: (BS) These Japanese ROMs were distributed     :\
:      through a satellite system in Japan      :\
:      known as the Broadcast Satellaview.      :\
:      They were transmitted along with a TV    :\
:      show which was connected to the game in  :\
:      some way. These games were only playable :\
:      during the show, and thus stop after an  :\
:      hour, and many were timed so that only   :\
:      certain time periods were playable.      :\
:             -------------------               :\
: (ST) The Sufami Turbo device allowed two      :\
:      GameBoy sized carts to be plugged into   :\
:      the SNES. Certain carts combined into    :\
:      new games much like the Sonic & Knuckles :\
:      lock-on technology by Sega.              :\
:             -------------------               :\
: (NP) Nintendo Power has been known to release :\
:      games only available to its subscribers. :\
:      Most of these ROMs are Japanese, as this :\
:      practice occured mainly in Japan.        :\
:             -------------------               :\
:                                               :\
: **** Genesis ****                             :\
:  (1) Carts with this code will run on both    :\
:      Japanese and Korean machines.            :\
:             -------------------               :\
:  (4) While this code is technically the same  :\
:      as a (U) code, it is a newer header      :\
:      format and represents that the cart will :\
:      run on USA and Brazil NTSC machines.     :\
:             -------------------               :\
:  (B) This country code indicates that the     :\
:      cart will run on any non US machine.     :\
:             -------------------               :\
:  [c] This code represents a cart with known   :\
:      faulty checksum routines.                :\
:             -------------------               :\
:                                               :\
: **** GameBoy ****                             :\
: [BF] Bung released a programmable cartridge   :\
:      compatable with the GameBoy which could  :\
:      hold any data you wished to play.        :\
:      However, many games do not function on   :\
:      Bung v1.0 carts and have to be 'fixed.'  :\
:             -------------------               :\
:                                               :\
: **** Nintendo ****                            :\
: PC10 The PlayChoice 10 was an arcade unit     :\
:      which played exact copies of NES games   :\
:      in an arcade cabinet. The machines had a :\
:      choice of 10 games to choose from and    :\
:      ran for about 3 minutes on 25 cents.     :\
:             -------------------               :\
:                                               :\
:   VS The Versus system ran on similar hard-   :\
:      ware to the PC10 machines, but simply    :\
:      allowed you to play against each other.  :\
:...............................................:\
\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\

                 ...........
...................: Credits ::..................
:                                               :\
: Document written by Psych0phobiA / q^-o|o-^p  :\
:                                               :\
: All codes developed by Cowering for the       :\
: Goodxxxx series ROM file renaming utilities.  :\
:                                               :\
: Visit #rareroms on UnitedUsers in IRC!        :\
:...............................................:\
\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\

NEW SALES TAX

terrible URL in' there, but here's a simple nice FAQ for those wondering about the now MA 6.25% sales tax

http://www.mass.gov/?pageID=dorterminal&L=7&L0=Home&L1=Businesses&L2=Help+%26+Resources&L3=Legal+Library&L4=Technical+Information+Releases&L5=TIRs+-+By+Year(s)&L6=2009+Releases&sid=Ador&b=terminalcontent&f=dor_rul_reg_tir_tir_09_11&csid=Ador

How to jump start a car

the tldr; - if you need to jump start your car you better read the whole post mmkay?



Step 0: Don't do anything stupid* (see below) Both cars should be off.

Step 1: (+) cable to dead car
Step 2: (+) cable to good car
Step 3: (-) cable to good car
Step 4: (-) cable to somewhere else in the dead car, like a random nut on the engine. Sparks will happen.

Step 5: Start good car
Step 6: Wait a few minutes
Step 7: Turn off good car, or just start dead car

Step 8: Remove cables in reverse order,
(-) on ex-dead car
(-) on good car
(+) on good car
(+) on ex-dead car.


The good news: The shock you get from doing this wrong isn't enough to kill you, so don't panic too much.


* - stupid things. Don't do these:

• If your battery is cracked, leaking, or frozen, don't try to jump start it. It will just explode if you try.
• If there is corrosion around the battery, clean it off first!
  
• If your cable is heating up and the dead car isn't working yet, your cable is broken.
• Good cables are thick and cost more than $20
• Turn all the other things off, plugged-in chargers/radio/lights...
• Cars should be the same volt. Most cars are, unless it's really old.
• Make sure the brakes are on!
• Know your (+) usually red, from your (-) usually black.
  

--

AT 40 Week of July 27th, 2009

1 Lady Gaga - LoveGame
2 3Oh!3 - Don't Trust Me
3 Pitbull - I Know You Want Me (Calle Ocho)
4 Black Eyed Peas - Boom Boom Pow
5 Katy Perry - Waking Up in Vegas
6 Pink - Please Don't Leave Me
7 Black Eyed Peas - I Gotta Feeling
8 Sean Kingston - Fire Burning
9 Keri Hilson - Knock You Down
10 Beyonce - Halo
11 Shine Down - Second Chance
12 Kelly Clarkson - I Do Not Hook Up
13 Taylor Swift - You Belong With Me
14 Jeremih - Birthday Sex
15 Miley Cyrus - The Climb
16 Nickelback - If Today Was Your Last Day
17 Jordin Sparks - Battlefield
18 The Ting Tings - That's Not My Name
19 Lady Gaga - Poker Face
20 Jamie Foxx - Blame It
21 Kristinia DeBarge - Goodbye
22 The All American Rejects - Gives You Hell
23 The Fray - You Found Me
24 Flo Rida - Right Round
25 Daughtry - No Surprise
26 Jessie James - Wanted
27 Kid Cudi - Day 'n' Nite
28 Kelly Clarkson - My Life Would Suck Without You
29 Cobra Starship - Good Girls Gone Bad
30 T.I. - Dead and Gone
31 Soulja Boy - Kiss Me Thru The Phone
32 Theory of a Deadman - Not Meant To Be
33 Jonas Brothers - Paranoid
34 Matt Nathanson - Come On Get Higher
35 Kings of Leon - Use Somebody
36 Drake - Best I Ever Had
37 Britney Spears - If U See Amy
38 The Fray - Never Say Never
39 Rob Thomas - Her Diamonds
40 LMFAO - I'm In Miami Trick

jungle monkey

Wow, Henry Louis Gates now has his own tag on CNN. Congrats, man.


'Look, just because I think black people are Jungle Monkeys doesn't mean I'm a racist!'


--

I wish

I wish I was billionaire, then I'd offer the state of California $26.3 billion dollars to legalize gay marriage. Yeah, put that in your pipe and smoke it, damn potheads.

Thoughts? Is this even illegal?


--

greeeeeeen line

Boston MBTA's green line extension project has been delayed again! :D

Estimated Date of Completion: Not 1999, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2009, 2011 or 2013!!


--

new comic google themes!

I didn't even know what "Google Themes" were until today.

Comics!

--

two peices of good news

I just heard on NPR a woman saying that she graduated from a (small) school in Kentucky specifically for low-income people in the Appalachian. She said that most of the graduates can't send their kids there because they make too much money. :)

Yesterday at the movie theater, an old woman asked me if "I love you Beth Cooper" was any good. I replied that it was mostly teenagers doing dangerous things, like crashing cars. She said that she wanted a love story since her husband had passed away 6 years ago and this was the only movie showing at this time. Hours later, she returned very happy. Apparently she went into the wrong theater and saw "Up" instead. For those that don't know, "Up" can be described as an old man getting over his wife's death. It was also the third time I heard it summarized as "really funny dogs". Go Pixar :)


--

Physical power of Dental Floss

Okay, I'll admit that almost no one I know flosses after brushing their teeth. Why not!? Almost everyone I know conditions their hair after shampooing (even though I don't). It's metaphorically similar!

The physical reason to floss is that brushing your teeth only removes the bacteria from whatever surface you brushed. Bacteria is microscopic and can still crawl in-between your teeth, where the bristles on your toothbrush can't reach - I don't care how loud Oral-B advertises otherwise.

I use this metaphor on the assumption that shampoo cleans your hair and conditioner makes it look pretty. You might think brushing cleans your teeth and flossing is just some secondary helper but the metaphor works better backwards. Flossing prevents gum disease and brushing makes your teeth whiter (i.e pretty). I AM NOT RECOMMENDING YOU STOP BRUSHING YOUR TEETH.

I'm just telling you that you should floss too if you want to be healthy. What's that? Sometimes your gums bleed when you floss? That means you don't floss frequently enough! That blood is because your gums have become weakened due to bacteria. If you flossed every day (or even every few days) the bleeding will stop immediately and your gums will thank you.

What are you waiting for? Go! I wanna see some blood run.


Good news for those too lazy to floss, Mouth Rinses are just as effective at preventing gingivitis


--

Legal power of counteroffers

the tl;dr: In the real estate world, making a counteroffer renders the original offer void.

What does that mean!!??

A: Anyone that offers me $500,000 will get this house instantly [Offer]
B: How about $490,000? [Counteroffer]
A: No.
B: Okay, I'll give you $500,000 then.

At this point, person A is under no legal obligation to sell the house to B. Making a counteroffer permanently erases the original offer from the books.


--

Beat the high score!

Read up on famous murders (mostly U.S-based)

--

Historical Event Today!!

Well, first things first. I saw this on youtube:


What is it? Pretty simple, an ad for the SATs.

I know what you're thinking, "this is nothing special", right? Wrong! The College Board is advertising! Have you ever seen such a thing before? (NO IT JUST STARTED!) Sure, you've been bombarded with ads for prep-classes, online courses and study guides, but it's never been the real thing. Part of the blind elitism that lead to the popularization of the SATs was "only the best get to take this thing anyway, why advertise and let riff-raff in?", along with "prep classes?! that's just a cheap trick a jew created, there's no way you can get your score higher!"


Fast forward to 2004. Anyone remember this?

You should, it was the first of it's kind. Sure, The College Board sold copies of old tests for money in the 1980s, but this is a STUDY GUIDE. A big step for a company that refused (for 60+ years!) to admit that anything besides your genes could give you a higher score.


And on today, July 21, 2009, the Second Issue was released!



Yup, it's got the solid colorful speech bubbles and everything!

Hey, those guys shoulda listened; advertising to riff-raff always leads to trouble. (Screenshot from the official site which lets you fill in what you wanna be.)

Song of Ice and Fire

The real tl;dr - Is the music that we think "goes with" Deserts or Glaciers a socialized choice or a natural/biological choice?

Actual tl;dr - This post describes the blueprints to a psychology experiment regarding the socialization of certain styles of music with certain settings in video games.




If you're any bit familiar with videogames (henceforth referred to as the proper "video games"), you'll know what I'm talking about. In almost every video game, there are various "backdrops" like Deep in the Forest, an Underwater Palace, Muggy Desert, Trapped in the Arctic, Bustling City and/or even Outer Space. It doesn't matter if it's a fighter, shooter, adventure, puzzle, RPG, tactics or platformer, video games like to have various settings.

The other thing video games like to have is Music! Put the two together and you're going to get something you'll need to be very familiar with video games to understand: The music that goes with the "ice stage" always sounds kinda similar. At the very least, it sure doesn't sound like the "outer space theme" or the "enchanted forest battle theme".

Okay I was wrong, you don't have to be familiar with video games to understand that. It's far more common and obvious in movies. There's the creepy "don't turn around!" noise and the "okay something hilarious is about to happen" tune, not to mention the "you should be crying now" chorus is stuff we all know and see parodies of.


*Truncated. Sorry, my organizational skills are lacking. Please try to follow where this is going.


Sadly there is a deadline for this project. The video game industry is already more popular than the movie industry (unless you're this guy) and thanks to the Nintendo Wii, almost everyone has played a video game before (just like almost everyone now has seen a movie). What i'm going to need is some people that aren't familiar with too many games yet and get them to play the following game: (I made this up while meditating)

You play either a Camel or Penguin, protecting your mud-brick home/igloo from sand/snow during a sandstorm/snowstorm. Sand/snow comes in from all sides and you move your animal left/right/up/down to automatically push it away, outside your home. You play this until you either uhhh "die" or survive the two minute storm. That part doesn't matter. What matters is that you're either getting the matching background scene music, or you're getting the wrong one. After playing, will the participants be able to "correctly" identify the music choice as right or wrong?

Well, I guess there might not even be a deadline. This could probably be an alternate way to tell how socialized people are to video game music, if done every year.

On the topic of movies, I recall hearing of (no pun intended) research that showed a biological connection between music and emotions. Music that's fast makes us happy and music that's slow makes us sad. It was inferred that a slow violin makes us sadder not because we heard it whenever it was the sad part in the movie but because we naturally perceive that music as sad. I wonder if what we perceive as "Icy" or "Heated" music can also be biological?

Okay I think this post is long enough, hopefully you've read this far because you are a kind soul and not because you're confused as hell and looking for answers.


--

AT 40 Week of July 20th, 2009

1 3Oh!3 - Don't Trust Me
2 Lady Gaga - LoveGame
3 Pitbull - I Know You Want Me (Calle Ocho)
4 Black Eyed Peas - Boom Boom Pow
5 Katy Perry - Waking Up in Vegas
6 Beyonce - Halo
7 Pink - Please Don't Leave Me
8 Sean Kingston - Fire Burning
9 Kelly Clarkson - I Do Not Hook Up
10 Shine Down - Second Chance
11 Black Eyed Peas - I Gotta Feeling
12 Miley Cyrus - The Climb
13 Jeremih - Birthday Shhh*
14 Keri Hilson - Knock You Down
15 Kristinia DeBarge - Goodbye
16 Nickelback - If Today Was Your Last Day
17 Lady Gaga - Poker Face
18 Taylor Swift - You Belong With Me
19 Jordin Sparks - Battlefield
20 The Ting Tings - That's Not My Name
21 The All American Rejects - Gives You Hell
22 Jamie Foxx - Blame It
23 Flo Rida - Right Round
24 The Fray - You Found Me
25 Kid Cudi - Day 'n' Nite
26 Kelly Clarkson - My Life Would Suck Without You
27 Daughtry - No Surprise
28 Soulja Boy - Kiss Me Thru The Phone
29 T.I.- Dead and Gone
30 Jessie James - Wanted
31 Britney Spears - If U See Amy
32 Jonas Brothers - Paranoid
33 Matt Nathanson - Come On Get Higher
34 Lady Gaga - Just Dance
35 Theory of a Deadman - Not Meant To Be
36 Rob Thomas - Her Diamonds
37 Jesse McCartney - How Do You Sleep?
38 Flo Rida - Sugar feat. Wynter
39 The Fray - Never Say Never
40 Cobra Starship - Good Girls Gone Bad

* Actual song title "Birthday Sex", editied version is always aired instead.

New lowest-divorce-rate record!

The tl;dr : one in every two marriages don't end in divorce, okay?


The newest divorce rate is now...uhhhh 0.7% or 35 per 1000 people (lowest since 1970!). What does that mean? I thought "one in every two marriages will end in divorce" ?!?


Lets say the divorce rate is 50%. Well, what IS a divorce rate? Think about it, is it how many people get divorced every year? Then what's it 50% of, total marriages? So that means 50 people got divorced last year for every 100 that got married last year. If you get divorced last year, remarry, and divorce again this year do you count twice?

Maybe it means that for every 100 marriages, 50 end up not working out. That's actually exactly what it's supposed to mean. But how are you supposed to know that? By reading the future of course!

Yeah, you can't read the future. They stockpiled some data from the past and decided that "if current trends continue...it could be as high as 50%..." This was in 1996. What data were they looking at? Those from after 1970, when divorce rates were soaring. In 2001 though, the Census Bureau decided that the numbers had made a full U-turn (in retrospect, it peaked in 1981). Eight years later, many Americans still believe the divorce rate is 50%. Oh well?


More on divorce rates and excerpts from the 1996 Bureau report that started it all: http://www.divorcereform.org/rates.html

"The National Center for Health Statistics recently released a report which found that 43
percent of first marriages end in separation or divorce within 15 years. The study is based on
the National Survey of Family Growth, a nationally representative sample of women age 15 to
44 in 1995. Bramlett, Matthew and William Mosher. "First marriage dissolution, divorce, and
remariage: United States," Advance Data From Vital and Health Statistics; No.323. Hyattsville
MD: National Center for Health Statistics: 2 1.

"Data in the Census report were collected from both men and women, age 15 and over, and a
different methodology was used than in the NCHS report.

"About 50% of first marriages for men under age 45 may end in
divorce, and between 44 and 52% of women's first marriages
may end in divorce for these age groups. The likelihood of a divorce
is lowest for men and women age 60, for whom 36 % of men
and 32 percent of women may divorce from their first marriage by
the end of their lives. A similar statistical exercise was performed in
1975 using marital history data from the Current Population Survey
(CPS). Projections based on those data implied that about one-third of
married persons who were 25 to 35 years old in 1975 would end their
first marriage in divorce.

"This cohort of people, who in 1996 were about 45 to 55 years old, had
already exceeded these projections as about 40% of men and
women in these ages had divorced from their first marriage. Current
projections now indicate that the proportion could be as high as
50% for persons now in their early forties."
Rose M. Kreider and Jason M. Fields, "Number, Timing, and Duration of
Marriages and Divorces: 1996", U.S. Census Bureau Current Population Reports, February 2002, p. 18.


--

Two people with the same name get married

because they met through a facebook search: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31994977/

--

Translated Free-style Rap Battle, and Mary Sues.

Yes, it's old, but I always forget the link: Translated Free-Style Rap Battle (in a overly-fancy suburban white manner)

Easy-to-take Mary-Sue litmus test, with a link to the original. What is a mary-sue? Well, in the world of Fanfiction it's a character that the author inserts into a story that is perfect to the point of being unrealistic. The character often doesn't obey the laws of physics, won't fit in with the atmosphere of the original characters, is disliked by no one, has no physical belmishes, no mental weaknesses, etc...

I took it and got a whopping 133! (Over 35 is considered terrible)... then I realized I wasn't an original character inserted into a fanfiction.

Easter Eggs in Google Holiday Logos

Triforce hidden in various google doodles!!!

... "google doodles" .

[Edit: Okay, now it's gone?]

--

Gender Guessers

Two posts on gender in a row? Too bad!


First, http://www.mikeonads.com/2008/07/13/using-your-browser-url-history-estimate-gender/ , which is what is says... It uses your browser history to guess if you're male or female. How? Well, it knows for example www.google.com is visited by 100 females for every 98 males that come by it and Slashdot hosts a magnificent 174 males visitors for every 100 females that swing by. Then it just "checks" your browser history for popular sites that you might have visited.

A bunch of math later, it guessed that there's an 80% chance i'm male.


Secondly, the "gender guesser" looks for the use of certain words or phrases that scientists have found males and females use in differing frequencies. It's based off the Gender Genie.

Gender Guesser on the post "Why Invest": Genre: Informal / Female = 781 / Male = 1053
Difference = 272; 57.41% Verdict: Weak MALE (Weak emphasis could indicate European.)

Gender Genie on the post "Why Invest": Female Score: 609 / Male Score: 467
The Gender Genie thinks the author of this passage is: female!

Gender Genie on a recent piece of fiction I wrote: Female Score: 663 / Male Score: 813
The Gender Genie thinks the author of this passage is: male!


Crazy / fun stuff!

--

Q and A

"Do you identify as male or female?"

"Why are you asking me to pick between two shitty stereotypes?"

--

Records!

from the I-Hate-Linking Fandango Movie Blog,

'Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince' to Beat 'Twilight' in Advanced Ticket Sales

Posted by: Erik Davis on July 13, 2009

Take that Bella and Edward! Just when we all thought The Twilight Saga was poised to shove Harry Potter aside and take full command of the Tween-iverse, Fandango (hey, that's us!) is reporting that advanced ticket sales for Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince are on track to beat Twilight and take over the third spot on their all-time advanced ticket-sellers list, behind only The Dark Knight and Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith. Just check out some of these stats on the film so far …

The sixth Harry Potter movie currently represents:
• One of the fastest-selling titles in Fandango's nine year history, on track to replace Twilight as the company's third top-selling advance ticketer (following Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith and The Dark Knight, occupying the #1 and #2 spots, respectively).
• A higher number of advance tickets sold for Harry Potter 6 than sold for Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, Iron Man or Sex and the City at the same point in the sales cycle on Fandango.
• 96% of daily ticket sales on Fandango.

Advance buzz on Half-Blood Prince is extremely high, and people have been waiting an extra long time to see it (considering it was supposed to be released last November) – both of which combined make for a pretty frenzied scene as theater owners hurry to add additional shows in advance of Potter's return to theaters tomorrow at midnight.

radio is heard here

"TD Bank North has become... *long drumroll* TD Bank! Visit us at tdbanknorth.com"

wow... good to know this merger really is gonna be universal...

"reasons to keep a cat around #546"

other captions include 'for all you cat-haters, which would you rather find in your house?"
and 'shez gon' luff it wen i gif hur diz!' and "Falcon Punch!"



also, because it's the third time in a month i've had to consult wedding photos, here's a site with great wedding cake bride-and-groom toppers.

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Feel Better!

Yeah, most readers of this blog are aware that high-tech hackers aren't responsible for most cases of identity theft (nice try, mass media). Dumpster-divers and administrative oversight are the most likely culprit. Still, there's good news in all this: if a folder containing your credit card information somehow flies out of the window of the 18th floor of the Bank of America building due to someone being an idiot, the person that finds it is probably too stupid to steal your money.

"Only 2% of all data breaches result in ID fraud", says a Ponemon researcher Mike Spinney in the August 2009 issue of Smart Money Magazine. The article also says a lot of other things but I can't seem to confirm a-

Edit: Oh my god I got a reply. Turns out there is confirmation here that the state of Louisiana mailed a couple of taxpayers reminders that had another taxpayer's data on the back.

--

AT40 Week of July 13th, 2009

1 Black Eyed Peas - Boom Boom Pow
2 Beyonce - Halo
3 3Oh!3 - Don't Trust Me
4 Shine Down - Second Chance
5 Pitbull - I Know You Want Me (Calle Ocho)
6 Miley Cyrus - The Climb
7 Lady Gaga - LoveGame
8 Katy Perry - Waking Up in Vegas
9 Kelly Clarkson - I Do Not Hook Up
10 Pink - Please Don't Leave Me
11 Sean Kingston - Fire Burning
12 Lady Gaga - Poker Face
13 Kristinia DeBarge - Goodbye
14 Jamie Foxx - Blame It
15 Nickelback - If Today Was Your Last Day
16 Jeremih - Birthday Sex
17 The All American Rejects - Gives You Hell
18 Flo Rida - Right Round
19 The Fray - You Found Me
20 Kelly Clarkson - My Life Would Suck Without You
21 Keri Hilson - Knock You Down
22 Britney Spears - If U See Amy
23 The Ting Tings - That's Not My Name
24 Jordin Sparks - Battlefield
25 Kid Cudi - Day 'n' Nite
26 Black Eyed Peas - I Gotta Feeling
27 T.I. - Dead and Gone
28 Matt Nathanson - Come On Get Higher
29 Soulja Boy - Kiss Me Thru The Phone
30 Daughtry - No Surprise
31 Jessie James - Wanted
32 Flo Rida - Sugar feat. Wynter
33 Taylor Swift - Love Story
34 Taylor Swift - You Belong With Me
35 Lady Gaga - Just Dance
36 Jesse McCartney - How Do You Sleep?
37 Kanye West - Heartless
38 Jonas Brothers - Paranoid
39 Rob Thomas - Her Diamonds
40 Theory of a Deadman - Not Meant To Be

Why invest?

The tl;dr - Invest to avoid inflation.


American Media loves to give bad news. Someone's been murdered, the stock market has fallen for 5 weeks in a row, a big chain is laying off 21,000 employees. I never hear about babies being born, the stocks rising for 5 straight weeks, or new companies looking to hire (all of which happen quite often) but that's besides the point right now.

This post is about not stuffing money under your mattress. True, the mass media isn't scaring everyone to seem useful; the US economy actually isn't doing that well these days. That doesn't mean you should liquidate everything you have and put all the cash in a giant safe. If you're looking for some way to save for the future, stick to investments.

Why invest instead of hoarding them Ben Franklins? Simple. Remember when candy cost five cents? No? Okay, remember when your grandparents used to talk about candy costing five cents and retro/vintage-themed stores full of 10 Cent coca-cola posters? That you probably do. Inflation happens. If you had stashed away a nickel so that you could buy yourself some candy in the distant future, well... the only way that could work out now is if it turned out to be a Buffalo Nickel.

Seem far-fetched to you? I hope not... most of the readers of this blog have barely hit their 20s so retirement isn't setting in for at least 40 more years. When was candy five cents you ask? Well... Before World War II i suppose... (That was 60 years ago. Oops?). Still, things are going to cost more in the future. Unless your $100 bills turn out to be the holy grail of future coin collectors (bills aren't coins, don't hold your breath) saving a few of them isn't going to buy you a Playstaton 17 in the future. I mean, look at the NES! "The Control Deck retailed from US$199.99 (equivalent to US$406 today) and included the console itself, two game controllers, and a Super Mario Bros. game cartridge." That was 1985. See how 20 years passing has doubled the cost? (Lets ignore the fact that you can get this for $40 something on Ebay for now).

So I think we've figured out the answer to the question "Why Invest". Invest that nickel because a penny stock now could be worth 25 cents in 60 years, meaning you still get your candy bar. Invest because putting away $199.99 now means you can have whatever Nintendo puts out in 20 years and have $150 to spare. Invest to protect America from commies!

--

Taking Screenshots

Yeah, it's easy to take a screenshot, for those that know how (On windows there's a Prnt Scrn button on the keyboard somewhere, for Macs there's a keyboard shortcut.) but sometimes you'll notice that when you paste this screenshot into something like MSPaint it just becomes a black square or a moving video. Not a screenshot at all :(. That's probably because you're using Window's Media Player, Realplayer, or Winamp.

Thanks internet, for the solution (Eventually..)


Windows Media Player - Disable Video Acceleration from the Performance tab. Restart program/video

Realplayer - Disable Video Overlay, under Video Card Compatibility (a slider or a checkbox, depending on what version you have) under Hardware under Preferences. Restart program

Winamp (..3?) - Disable Video Overlay in Preferences, under Options. Restart program

AT40 Week of July 6th, 2009

1 Black Eyed Peas - Boom Boom Pow
2 Beyonce - Halo
3 3Oh!3 - Don't Trust Me
4 Miley Cyrus - The Climb
5 Shine Down - Second Chance
6 Pitbull - I Know You Want Me (Calle Ocho)
7 Lady Gaga - LoveGame
8 Katy Perry - Waking Up in Vegas
9 Kelly Clarkson - I Do Not Hook Up
10 Lady Gaga - Poker Face
11 Sean Kingston - Fire Burning
12 Pink - Please Don't Leave Me
13 Kristinia DeBarge - Goodbye
14 Jamie Foxx - Blame It
15 Kelly Clarkson - My Life Would Suck Without You
16 Jeremih - Birthday Sex
17 Kid Cudi - Day 'n' Nite
18 Britney Spears - If U See Amy
19 Nickelback - If Today Was Your Last Day
20 The All American Rejects - Gives You Hell
21 The Fray - You Found Me
22 Flo Rida - Right Round
23 The Ting Tings - That's Not My Name
24 Jordin Sparks - Battlefield
25 Soulja Boy - Kiss Me Thru The Phone
26 Keri Hilson - Knock You Down
27 Taylor Swift - Love Story
28 T.I. - Dead and Gone
29 Jesse McCartney - How Do You Sleep?
30 Kevin Rudolf - Welcome To The World
31 Flo Rida - Sugar feat. Wynter
32 Matt Nathanson - Come On Get Higher
33 Jessie James - Wanted
34 Black Eyed Peas - I Gotta Feeling
35 Daughtry - No Surprise
36 Lady Gaga - Just Dance
37 Kanye West - Heartless
38 Jonas Brothers - Paranoid
39 Pink - Sober
40 Rob Thomas - Her Diamonds

sad

I don't want to have 2 AT40 posts together.

AT40 Week of June 29th, 2009

1) Black Eyed Peas - Boom Boom Pow
2) Beyonce - Halo
3) Shine Down - Second Chance
4) 3Oh!3 - Don't Trust Me
5) Lady Gaga - Poker Face
6) Miley Cyrus - The Climb
7) Jamie Foxx - Blame It
8) Pitbull - I Know You Want Me (Calle Ocho)
9) Kelly Clarkson - I Do Not Hook Up
10) Lady Gaga - LoveGame
11) Pink - Please Don't Leave Me
12) Kristinia DeBarge - Goodbye
13) Katy Perry - Waking Up in Vegas
14) Britney Spears - If U See Amy
15) Kelly Clarkson - My Life Would Suck Without You
16) Flo Rida - Right Round
17) Sean Kingston - Fire Burning
18) The All American Rejects - Gives You Hell
19) The Fray - You Found Me
20) Kid Cudi - Day 'n' Nite
21) Nickelback - If Today Was Your Last Day
22) Jeremih - Birthday Sex
23) T.I. - Dead and Gone
24) Jesse McCartney - How Do You Sleep?
25) Soulja Boy - Kiss Me Thru The Phone
26) Flo Rida - Sugar feat. Wynter
27) The Ting Tings - That's Not My Name
28) Kevin Rudolf - Welcome To The World
29) Matt Nathanson - Come On Get Higher
30) Taylor Swift - Love Story
31) Lady Gaga - Just Dance
32) Jordin Sparks - Battlefield
33) Pink - Sober
34) Keri Hilson - Knock You Down
35) Jessie James - Wanted
36) Kanye - Heartless
37) Daughtry - No Surprise
38) Britney Spears - Circus
39) Jonas Brothers - Paranoid
40) Rob Thomas - Her Diamonds

commercial

Woman: Excuse me! Excuse me!
Waiter: Yes ma'am, is something wrong?
Woman: Yes, I ordered a veggie burger. I'm very eco-conscious, I hope you know. I care about my health!
Waiter: Is something wrong with it?
Woman: This isn't a veggie burger!
Waiter: Actually it is ma'am, [RP vegetarian patties] taste, look and smell just like the real thing!
Woman: Is that so?
Waiter: Yes ma'am, good for your health and good for the environment!
[other closing comments]

AT40 Week of June 22th, 2009

1 Black Eyed Peas - Boom Boom Pow
2 Beyonce - Halo
3 Lady Gaga - Poker Face
4 Shine Down - Second Chance
5 Jamie Foxx - Blame It
6 3Oh!3 - Don't Trust Me
7 Miley Cyrus - The Climb
8 Kelly Clarkson - I Do Not Hook Up
9 Britney Spears - If U See Amy
10 Pitbull - I Know You Want Me (Calle Ocho)
11 Flo Rida - Right Round
12 Lady Gaga - LoveGame
13 Kelly Clarkson - My Life Would Suck Without You
14 Pink - Please Don't Leave Me
15 The All American Rejects - Gives You Hell
16 Katy Perry - Waking Up in Vegas
17 Kristinia DeBarge - Goodbye
18 Kid Cudi - Day 'n' Nite
19 The Fray - You Found Me
20 Jesse McCartney - How Do You Sleep?
21 Soulja Boy - Kiss Me Thru The Phone
22 Flo Rida - Sugar feat. Wynter
23 T.I. - Dead and Gone
24 Sean Kingston - Fire Burning
25 Nickelback - If Today Was Your Last Day
26 Matt Nathanson - Come On Get Higher
27 Kevin Rudolf - Welcome To The World
28 Lady Gaga - Just Dance
29 The Ting Tings - That's Not My Name
30 Jeremih - Birthday Sex
31 Taylor Swift - Love Story
32 Pink - Sober
33 Kanye - Heartless
34 Britney Spears - Circus
35 ???
36 Jessie James - Wanted
37 Keri Hilson - Knock You Down
38 Jordin Sparks - Battlefield
39 ???
40 Daughtry - No Surprise

Megan Fox

This morning i heard that she was the US winner for "most beautiful woman in the world" (or something like that). The first thing i thought of was "no, that's Meg Cabot". The second was "Who the hell is Megan Fox?" Here's the wiki picture :


What the hell? Half of her face is white (bad makeup?) she seems to have no hair, a huge random tattoo, and tits showing. This is the best America can do?


But then Google images..









Are these really the same people!?

Destroying marriage

By defining something as magical as marriage to "pick one man. okay, now pick one woman. Definition achieved!" aren't conservatives the ones destroying marriage?

On the bright side, at least it's not "a white man and a white woman" anymore

--

Microsoft sues ad-clickers

Microsoft is suing three people (believed to be a mother and her two kids) for $775,000 for spending their lives clicking ads for money. (Business Week)

Radio is heard here, Radio isn't seen here!

Radio's been playing a lot of "Radio is heard here, Radio is heard Everywhere" ads recently, I wonder if the radio industry isn't getting as many advertisers as it used to?

Why do I listen to the radio? Because it has the music i like without the music VIDEOS that i hate. Okay, to be sure, some of the lyrics are pretty terrible (misogynistic), but often the lyrics are fine yet the video encourages little girls to become whores (I'm looking at you, Kelly Clarkson.) For those times,

"Radio. Hey, at least your kids can't learn how to dress like little sluts from me!" Should be their new ad :/ Some stations already run "lyrics that won't embarrass you in front of your kids" ads (untrue, thanks, Sheryl Crow), they should really capitalize on this legitimate concern! You can't see what's on the radio, making it an amazing medium from so many angles!

Radio should really serve its listeners instead of pitching to the businesses. Terrible radio ads aren't hard to come by (Bad voice acting, obvious need for visuals, too many words) these days. I've also seen radio ads with the exact same script on TV, making me wonder just how much amazing potential has been lost not making two different ads for two different mediums.

tl;dr

perez hilton tweets

tabloid-blogger Perez Hilton: "will.i.am assaulted me"

singer/actor will.i.am: "he tweeted that instead of calling the cops"

"America's Most Depressing Statistic"

A graph showing that poor kids with good SAT scores still drop out of college more than rich kids with bad SAT scores. (Be sure to read the little text too!)




From Money Magazine. Full article?
(Please don't sue me without warning first)

another ad!

Interesting ad in a lot of different financial magazines. Can you find what it's advertising? (warning, huge horizontal scroller)

addressing child abuse everywhere

since rich people abuse their kids too, this was in Businessweek magazine
(click to enlarge)

AT40 Week of June 15th, 2009

1) Black Eyed Peas - Boom Boom Pow
2) Lady Gaga - Poker Face
3) Beyonce - Halo
4) Jamie Foxx - Blame It
5) Shine Down - Second Chance
6) Miley Cyrus - The Climb
7) 3Oh!3 - Don't Trust Me
8) Kelly Clarkson - I Do Not Hook Up
9) Britney Spears - If U See Amy
10) Flo Rida - Right Round
11) The All American Rejects- Gives You Hell
12) Jesse McCartney - How Do You Sleep?
13) Kelly Clarkson - My Life Would Suck Without You
14) Kid Cudi - Day 'n' Nite
15) Soulja Boy - Kiss Me Thru The Phone
16) Flo Rida - Sugar feat. Wynter
17) Pitbull - I Know You Want Me (Calle Ocho)
18) The Fray - You Found Me
19) Pink - Please Don't Leave Me
20) T.I. - Dead and Gone
21) Kristinia DeBarge - Goodbye
22) Katy Perry - Waking Up in Vegas
23) Lady Gaga - LoveGame
24) Sean Kingston - Fire Burning
25) Matt Nathanson - Come On Get Higher
26) Nickelback - If Today Was Your Last Day
27) Lady Gaga - Just Dance
28) Taylor Swift - Love Story
29) Pink - Sober
30) Kevin Rudolf - Welcome To The World
31) The Ting Tings - That's Not My Name
32) Kanye West - Heartless
33) Jason Mraz - I'm Yours
34) Jeremih - Birthday Sex
35) Kevin Rudolf - Let It Rock
36) Britney Spears - Circus
37) Katy Perry - Hot N Cold
38) Jessie James - Wanted
39) Eminem - We Made You
40) Madcon - Beggin'

Math

so good, i had to post it everywhere. http://www.maa.org/devlin/LockhartsLament.pdf

yes, it's about math
no, it's not full of math questions
yes, you'll like it
no, it's not a short read
yes, math in school sucks
no, math's not useful in the real world
yes, math is an art
no, math is not memorizing formulas
yes, this is a tl;dr
no, you should still read the whole thing

that's amazing, all the times i wondered about the volume of shrubbery and optimal placement of sandwich condiments, i was doing math :)

it's true, i'm one of the people described in the paper as "told was good at math but was actually just good at doing what they were told" but math and i had a fallout because i decided it was too damn easy to apply formulas senselessly (also predicted in the paper).

maybe it's time to give math another chance?

--

First black Disney princess!

The Princess and the Frog. ... it's like Shrek with a minstrel show!
but it will be the first black Disney princess (and prince!)

wow, I can't wait for the first Disney gay couple (did it already happen?)

Also, Astroboy movie (sticking to it's origin, non-Disney)

Also, Up problem solved via barrel roll.

--

same product, different ad

"One day, his son would speak to the world.

He wanted them to understand.

Rosetta Stone. The fastest and easiest way to learn Chinese."



Same Rosetta Stone but in Money Magazine. Totally different. Also, was Blogger always this bad at image resolutions?

--

"Progress is Overrated"

Progress is Overrated

Has progress taken us to a better place?

I'd say it's taken us for a ride. (Probably in a carbon-coughing oil guzzler.)

Honestly, what thanks do we owe progress? We're up to our necks in landfill, down to the wire on resources, and climate change is out to get us - or at best leave us with a nasty sunburn.

Historically, civilizations are destroyed by progress. Just ask the Pharaohs. No sooner had they built those jumbo triangles and giant cement cats than they flushed themselves down the Nile.

That's why at Post Shredded Wheat, we put the "no" in innovation.

Henry Perky created the Original Shredded Wheat in 1982. One man. (Him.) One ingredient. (Wheat.) One machine. (The machine.) We didn't give it any add-ons or plug-ins. Heck, we didn't even name it.

All we did was make it Spoon Size in 1961. Did we go too far? Time will tell. But I will say our naturally fiber-rich, 100% whole grain wheat has been free of enhancement, progress and pyramids for 117 years and counting.

Frank Druffel

"We put the 'no' in innovation"


See Frank in action at ThePalaceOfLight.com




The youtube videos are nice but the magazine ads are... what?

Fat Princess. Also, condoms.

yes, this is old news.

Well, now that i've seen the trailer ( http://www.gametrailers.com/video/e3-09-fat-princess/50696 ) i can say for sure that all the flame wars over anti-fat sentiment and sexism were just a ploy by Sony to publicize the game (nice work, asshats.) This trailer shows a potentially fun real-time strategy game that could easily stand on its own, without needing to capitalize on its controvertial name. (speaking of names, Project Natal for the Xbox360? what?)

What this blog is actually about is the Trojan Condoms ad that is cut off right before the actual trailer starts. The "2Go" (http://www.trojancondoms.com/ ...hmm, interesting, that's the name of the new PSP too) is basically Trojan taking the old "keep a condom in your wallet" idea one step further by packaging 2 condoms like a sheet of allergy tablets and marketing it as specifically for your wallet. Honestly it's not that discreet, seeing as it says "ultrathin" on it twice and probably has instructions for use on the back. The only real difference is that squishing one of these is unlikely to reveal a condom-shaped indent.

Way to fail Trojan, gamers don't get sex! Though actually this is very sneaky; if they ever do they're unlikely to know that Trojans are pretty much the most advertized yet least awesome condoms ever. Whoo!


--

Unplug stuff!

The tl;dr : Unplug chargers when you're not using them, it wastes electricity. However, random small household appliances are fine when plugged in but turned off.

The second tl;dr : TVs eat up electricity when plugged in but off so that they can turn on in mere seconds. The US Department of Energy is really overstating how much leaving stuff plugged in is costing us (according to devices that track how many watts something uses per hour). However, when you consider that it's thinking about 300 million Americans, it really does add up.



Cheese and Rice, I saw this ad in China (yes, China) saying that tons of electricity is wasted if you leave cell phone chargers plugged in but not charging your cell phone. Since then I've spent the extra effort unplugging my cell phone charger and DS charger. It's actually pretty difficult because the outlet I use at home is pretty sticky and behind a lot of shit (wait, I should just move that stuff!)

The extra bit of difficulty comes from the fact that I (and probably everyone that's reading this post) is currently in their parent's home and doesn't have to pay their share of the electricity bill.
Or, if not, are spending their time in college and definitely don't have to pay the electricity bill.
With that kind of environment (no pun intended) there's really no incentive to turn the Xbox off when you're not using it blah blah blah here let's just paste some things.

By J.V. on April 21, 2008 11:01 PM

I am an electrical engineer, so I'll give you some insight on why products use "phantom power".

Most modern electronics use low-voltage DC power internally, but a wall outlet supplies higher-voltage AC power. A converter is required, and these are inefficient and usually never turn off, especially if it is an external "brick". Another issue is that if the device has internal memory or a clock, these require a trickle of power. Many electronics could be designed to use no energy at all when turned off, so if consumers start demanding it, we can vote with our dollars.

Simple appliances such as light bulbs, vacuum cleaners, toasters, and simple ovens without a clock use absolutley no energy when they are plugged in but turned off.

Many appliances like microwaves and coffee makers use very little energy when plugged in, but turned off. Around 10 cents/month maximum.

The biggest offenders are devices with external "bricks" (which run about 3-5 Watts when turned off) and high-wattage electronics such as stereos and computers (which run up to 20 Watts unplugged). Leaving a computer plugged in could cost you up to $1.50 a month even if you never turn it on.

The statistic on the DOE page that states "75% of our energy is used by devices that our switched off" is absolutely false. The real number is closer to 5%.

For more info, check out this person's fact-checking

http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/01/30/oprah-plug-in-your-toaster-most-appliances-dont-use-energy-when-turned-off/

Ramdonperson: That link is AMAZING. Another link: http://www1.eere.energy.gov/consumer/tips/home_office.html says

"There is a common misconception that screen savers reduce energy use by monitors; they do not. Automatic switching to sleep mode or manually turning monitors off is always the better energy-saving strategy."

AT 40 Week of June 8th, 2009

1) Black Eyed Peas - Boom Boom Pow
2) Lady Gaga - Poker Face
3) Jamie Foxx - Blame It
4) Beyonce - Halo
5) Shine Down - Second Chance
6) Jesse McCartney - How Do You Sleep?
7) Flo Rida - Right Round
8) The All American Rejects - Gives You Hell
9) Britney Spears - If U See Amy
10) Soulja Boy - Kiss Me Thru The Phone
11) Kelly Clarkson - I Do Not Hook Up
12) 3Oh!3 - Don't Trust Me
13) Miley Cyrus - The Climb
14) Kelly Clarkson - My Life Would Suck Without You
15) Kid Cudi - Day 'n' Nite
16) Flo Rida - Sugar feat. Wynter
17) The Fray - You Found Me
18) T.I. - Dead and Gone
19) Pink - Please Don't Leave Me
20) Pitbull - I Know You Want Me (Calle Ocho)
21) Kristinia DeBarge - Goodbye
22) Katy Perry - Waking Up in Vegas
23) Lady Gaga - Just Dance
24) Taylor Swift - Love Story
25) Lady Gaga - LoveGame
26) Matt Nathanson - Come On Get Higher
27) Pink - Sober
28) Sean Kingston - Fire Burning
29) Nickelback - If Today Was Your Last Day
30) Kevin Rudolf - Welcome To The World
31) Eminem - We Made You
32) The Ting Tings - That's Not My Name
33) Britney Spears - Circus
34) Kanye West - Heartless
35) Kevin Rudolf - Let It Rock
36) Jason Mraz - I'm Yours
37) Katy Perry - Hot N Cold
38) Ne-Yo - Mad
39) The Offspring - Kristy, Are You Doing Okay?
40) Plain White T's - 1, 2, 3, 4

better "today" than i could ever come up with...

Sup /d/. I'm new to 4chan. I'm John Suleiman, I live in Washington, and I have a bit of a problem. I went to my friend about this problem, and he told me to come to /d/. The problem is, my girlfriend has a penis. I'm 19 and we have been dating for two months, and I didn't notice it. She wants me to do anal, what do I do?

by request

"We're not ugly!" Spider B said.
"And we're really cool! You know that!" Tea added from the ceiling.
Kumo shook her head. It wasn't the time to listen to her spider friends, she had to reply to her normal friends!
But they weren't really her friends.

"Haha, Kuuuu-Mooooo, what a dumb name!" They taunted.
"I bet you can step on her like a spider too!"

"No! Leave me alone!" Kumo screamed as her classmates started to surround her. Suddenly, a shrill scream broke the chatter.

"AAAAAAHHH!!! SPIDER!! GET IT OFF!!" A girl screamed so loudly Kumo's ears started to hurt. Spider B whispered something and Kumo repeated "Watch out, or it will get into your mouth" without much enthusiam. It was enough though, while the other girl was desperately pulling the sleeves of everyone around her. Kumo took the chance to escape.

"Where have you taken all of my subjects?" The Spider Queen asked. She had made a web in the hallway window while she waited for Kumo to finally get out of the hellish middle school classroom.

"I don't know, your majesty! I'm sorry." Kumo apologized.
"I'm right here!" Spider B crawled out of a crack in the wall. "We were just helping Kumo with her bullies."
"We spiders do not help common humans." The queen replied. She turned and tapped away, eight fine feet hitting the windowsill with an elegant rhythm.

"This stinks." Kumo sighed to herself, walking home alone. "I wish I had a different name."
"Really!?" A voice replied excitedly. Kumo turned around and looked down out of habit but didn't see any spiders. Instead, there were some plain brown shoes.
"Hey, I'm up here!"
"Sorry... Who are you?"
"Isn't it obvious? Look at this!" The other girl whipped out a small pink card. It said "Bunny" in highly stylized baby blue letters. "This is my name, you wanted to trade right? I'll trade with you!"
"How do we do a trade...?" Kumo asked, finally deciding that this new girl, Bunny, must be from another school.
"We just swap name cards, duh!"
"I don't have one of those."
"Of course you do, everyone does!"
Kumo put her small hand to her chest and waited for something to happen.

When it was finally time, she removed her hand and saw a white card stuck to her palm. It said "Kumo" in small black letters.
"Great!" Bunny practically tore the card from her hand. "Well, here you go, consider it a trade!"

Kumo looked at the sad pink card that was left behind. "I guess I'm Bunny now. This name HAS to be cute enough, right?" Her parents would be mad that she changed her name without telling them first. "Maybe I'll go back to school instead of home for now." She decided.

"It's pretty late but there should still be some school clubs running..." Kumo wanted to ask one of her spider friends which places in the school still had people in it, but she couldn't find any of them. She continued to wander.
"There must be some people here!" Loud noises were coming from one of the stairways. Kumo tried to imagine the look on everyone's faces when she told them her new, cuter name.

"Kumo! Help us!!" The other students screamed at her through the glass door. This was different. She opened the door cautiously and noticed that she had pulled apart a spider web. Spiders were franctically crawling everywhere, scaring the other students into a corner of the stairwell.

A spider had reached Kumo's arm and she asked it what was wrong. There was no reply.
"You! What are you doing here!" A familar voice demanded from the top of the stairs. It was Bunny!

"I go to school here?" Kumo replied weakly.
"Not any more! I'm taking over this school and so I get to say what goes! I'm going to expell you right now!"
"Uh oh, my parents aren't going to take this news very well..." Kumo decided, a little distracted by another spider that was crawling in circles around her arm. The little spider looked familiar.
"Oh, you're Spider B, sorry I didn't recognize you earlier." She apologized to her friend.

"Kumo, do something! You're the only one not scared of spiders!" Her classmates were screaming at her again.
"No! I'm Kumo now! She's just a silly Bunny!" Bunny cried out from the top of the stairs.

"I get it, she has the Spider Queen hostage!" Kumo chided herself for taking so long to figure it out. She brushed the spiders off her clothes and ran towards one of the classrooms. Yesterday Tea told her that one of the other classes had a pet rabbit. She hoped that no one had taken it home for the weekend yet.

"The door's unlocked!" She sighed happily as the lights in the classroom automatically turned on. She ran towards the rabbit's cage and opened it, slowly taking out the large pet. It felt soft yet very awkward in her arms.
"Hi." Kumo greeted it curtly. There was no reply.
"Guess it doesn't work like that..."

"Okay Bunny, you better stop this!" Kumo called up the stairwell, pet rabbit in hand.
"My name is Kumo now, you're Bunny! Get it straight!" Bunny yelled back.
"Well I called all the bunnies from the zoo, and bunnies are bigger than spiders, so maybe you should switch names back with me." Kumo lied.
"No way! How did you do that!? I could never talk to bunnies!"
"Maybe you never tried hard enough?"
"You! Stop the other bunnies!" Bunny ordered the pet rabbit.
Kumo paused and held the rabbit to her ear. "Sorry, she only responds to people called Bunny."
"WELL THEN SWITCH BACK WITH ME!"
"Fine..." She offered up the pink card and it was quickly snatched away. Her own special card was then dropped down through the steps.
"Everyone can go home now." Kumo said to both kinds of friends.

The End.