NEW GIRL TALK ALBUM

Download links here 
Tapemonkey likes free stuff on the internets, and doesn't mind some Girl Talk Mash-Up pop fun freak out either - got get yourself some while it's hot.

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BATTLE: LOS ANGELES - now that's how you cut a teaser

Just go ahead and watch it - making similar recent fare like 'Skyline' look like the messy CGI wank it is is, this trailer popped up on Apple, Youtube and all the usual suspects yesterday, immediately piquing the interest of movie geeks across the globe.
As we gear up for a glut of Alien Invasion films, this one trailer (apparently edited by the film's director Jonathan Liebesman), has pushed its accompanying film to the forefront of expectations with two minutes of well-edited images and a very tasteful score (featuring haunting vocoder track Johann Johannsson's "Sun's Gone Dim and The Sky's Black"). The scope of the film, the promise of a human emphasis with just the right amount of Gulf-War and terrorist attack-related imagery (almost obligatory to the genre since Spielberg's WOTW), as well as a few classic sci fi tropes and UFO enthusiast theories in the opener, really puts out the challenge to all comers, including Spielberg and Abrams' upcoming 'Super 8' and Oren Peli's ( of 'Paranormal Activity' reknown) 'Area 51'. By now most film geeks have clicked the Youtube link and watched it more than once.
Here is the movie's website.

The tone matrix - you will play with it

electronic music fun times are here

more here

Rumor: Apple to Acquire Sony?

Today big gaming news comes from an unlikely source; weekly financial newspaper, Barron's. This week they speculate that Apple is in the market for a huge acquisition; naming Sony, Electronic Arts, and Disney as possible targets.

It is no secret that Apple are huge. What may come as a surprise is how large they really are. According to Barron's Apple has become the second largest company in the world; only eclipsed by ExxonMobile. Even more surprising, the technology giant is catching up to the big oil baron. Like all oversized companies, it is Apple's goal to continue their growth, and they have the money to do so. The tech giant has 51 billion dollars to invest in an acquisition. Which is enough to buy Sony or Disney.

It has been well known that Apple has been seeking ways to make inroads into the lucrative gaming market. With a market cap of 33 billion dollars, a strong brand, and high quality first party development teams, Sony seems like a smart and affordable acquisition. In addition, Sony comes with a huge manufacturing component that will help Apple bring manufacturing of their goods in-house. Other perks include a strong media distribution presence and licensing perks from Blu-ray discs. For Apple, these perks may just outweigh the headaches of Sony's persistent red ink and less profitable divisions.

Electronic Arts is also affordable, but only gives Apple a single benefit. Disney on the other hand may simply be too expensive, but does have business in video games and media distribution, and comes with a household name.

With 51 billion dollars to throw around, it would be interesting to see what strategy emerges from Cupertino, CA. We can be assured that it will be big and surprising, which is Steve Job's 'MO'.

source artucle...

Will Google TV Destroy TV?

If you don’t follow these things, Google TV is a recently announced effort from Google, Sony and others to enter the already active and increasingly chaotic world of Internet connected TV.

Yahoo, Roku, Vudu, Apple, Netflix, and others are already doing it. Google is new to the party, but a big name attracting attention. (and a new Apple TV is now rumored)

The basic idea of the connected TV is to take the kind of video watching you do on your computer and move it to the biggest and best picture, sound and seating you have in the house. The original video device. The almighty television.

You could get all the breadth, randomness, and consumer friendly economics of Internet video without the neck and back strain of “leaning forward” over a keyboard and mouse.

But does this matter? Will it change the world? The hype from Google and the others would say yes.

This is all fine for the oddball viral video and niche specialty content that doesn’t already exist on traditional television or DVD, but what would really change the industry would be getting high value network or studio products like you find on Hulu. You could cancel your cable bill and watch far fewer advertisements. Sounds great right? But…There is no free lunch. TV is expensive to make. Especially if it’s good TV. A show like Lost with visual effects, big sets, and well paid union writers, directors, and actors needs a budget. A big budget.

Where does that money come from? There’s a complicated answer to this and a simple answer. The simple answer is the money comes from you.

Just like when taxes are raised on corporations, ultimately they’ll raise prices on products and get that money from consumers. The money is in the people, and if the people stop paying, there is no other source.

The complicated answer is that it comes from you in many ways. Part of your cable bill makes its way back to the networks. The time you take watching advertising (unless you’re skipping, more on that later) is value extracted from you and sent back to the network. And the season box sets you buy or rent on DVD count as well. more...

Zero Punctuation: Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions

Zero Punctuation: Halo: Reach

Zero Punctuation: Dead Rising 2

Bioshock Infinite 10 Minute gameplay demo

With Aussie game developers 2K Games back on the help this new Bioshock is beginning to have the charm and intrigue of the first and forever classic title. With a very fresh and dynamic colour pallet along with slightly cartoon sprites it looks like a decisive but fascinating step away from Rapture. Check out the in game footage...

FREE RADIOHEAD CONCERT DVD SHOT BY FANS

Setlist:

- 15 Step
- There There
- Weird Fishes/Arpeggi
- All I Need
- Lucky
- Nude
- Morning Bell
- 2+2=5
- A Wolf at the Door
- Videotape
- (Nice Dream)
- The Gloaming
- Reckoner
- Exit Music (For a film)
- Bangers n Mash
- Bodysnatchers
- Idioteque

Encore 1

- Pyramid Song
- These Are My Twisted Words
- Airbag
- The National Anthem
- How To Disappear Completely

CLICK HERE FOR MORE

Radiohead win the Internets again.

Watch Arcade Fire’s Interactive Short Film The Wilderness Downtown

Web 2.0 is coming, and Google want it work work as badly as anyone on the planet. HTML5 and VP8 Video this "Chrome Experiment", check it out. And iindie rock group Arcade Fire are along for the ride. Not only are they collaborating with Spike Jonze on b-movie science fiction short film, but they just completed an experiment with Google Labs utilizing HTML5 tech for a music video “The Wilderness Downtown”. Choreographed windows, interactive flocking (vector based and actual birds...), custom rendered maps, real-time compositing, procedural drawing, 3D canvas rendering. Check it out and use Chrome... Firefox works ok but it's really made for Chrome.

Sunday is for Crackpot Paranoid Conspiracy Theories

Remember 'Loose Change and' those other 9/11 documentaries (like Michael Moore's 'Fahrenheit 9 11') that made all those claims about Osama Bin Laden being buddies with George Bush and their complicities in the Airline disatsers from nearly a decade below? Apparently Fidel Castro believes Bin Laden is US spy (source Boing Boing)

Why? because of documents published on WikiLeaks which claim that;

Osama bin Laden is in the pay of the CIA and that President George Bush summoned up the al-Qaida leader whenever he needed to increase the fear quotient.

It's pretty hard to fathom that Castro buys this tale entrely, but it's a hell of a story nonetheless.

For more, read this story from the Guardian Online, and the Wikileaks page Castro must have been reading.

Avatar is returning to Theatres this Christmas!

Just as we thought that the giant blue balls of Fox's marketing department were all out of juice we are thrown another 3D amazement that seems very familiar. Avatar is returning to theaters and this time it's special: 8 minutes more special in fact and if that doesn't intice you well... there's nothing else to report. You'l still have to pay $20(AU) to get in and see the thing and even though I'll most likely go and see the finest 3D film ever made it nerks me that I'll still have to pay stupidly high prices for the privilege. Wasn't $2,740,405,721 from the box office enough? What about all the people who have bought the BluRay and now will have to go get another one so they can see what they origionally paid for. Errggg.... comes out December 18th 2010.

Say the magic word: Apple sues David Copperfield

Here’s something David Copperfield can’t make disappear: a lawsuit filed by Apple in California Northern District Court. At issue: the word magic.

Apple claims ownership of magic, demanding that Copperfield immediately cease using the word, and seeking $4.2 million in punitive damages.

No question, magic has been in the air in Cupertino. Following Steve Jobs’ introduction of the “magical and revolutionary” iPad, Apple has used magic to describe iPad on its website as well as in videos, press releases, newspaper/magazine ads and TV commercials. Apple also sells a Magic Mouse, Magic Trackpad and only last week introduced the Magic Footpad. Indeed, The Academy of Magical Arts in Los Angeles tells us they’ve already discussed dropping their use of the word, simply because Apple has run it into the ground.

But David Copperfield is standing his ground. “I’m a magician. I do magic. End of story,” reads his 9-word statement. 16 words, if you include “Tell them where they can shove it,” which Copperfield gracefully added following his statement.

Apple’s press release explains, “David Copperfield has every right to entertain, but no right to confuse. In the public eye, magic equals Apple. Mr. Copperfield dilutes the Apple brand and profits by his use of an Apple asset.”

Our source inside Apple expresses frustration with the famous illusionist. “Copperfield went way over the line when he started using the magic word. That’s Apple territory. There are plenty of other words to choose from. Sorcery… legerdemain… thaumaturgy. He’s a creative fellow, he’ll figure it out. He just needs to keep his mitts off of our word.” Linky to article

Oh, and I might just add... this is all fake! Not surprising if you were paying attention... it does sound like something Apple would do though.

Grisly find in search for Japanese centenarians

A nationwide search for missing centenarians in Japan has led to another grisly discovery -- the remains of a Tokyo woman who was believed to be 104 stuffed into her son's backpack for nearly a decade.

The police find at their apartment came weeks after the discovery of the more than 30-year-old mummified corpse of a man who had been thought to be celebrating his 111th birthday sparked concern about the very old in Japan.

Officials have fanned out nationwide since then to check on the whereabouts of citizens registered to be over 100, amid concern that some relatives have failed to report their deaths in order to draw their pension payouts.

In the latest find, made by police Thursday in an apartment in Tokyo's Ota ward, the dead woman's 64-year-old son told officials that his mother had died nine years ago, but that he hadn't been able to afford a funeral for her.

Japan had more than 40,000 registered people aged over 100 at last count, but by last week, officials had found that nearly 200 of them were missing.

Full Article...

Vacume up a Galaxy, Nature Destroys Own Environment

One of the best things about modern astronomy is that we can "see" with our instruments a whole lot that our eyes could never see. This very cool new image from the Chandra X-Ray Observatory, along with a radio image from the Very Large Array, shows the galaxy-altering power of the active supermassive black hole in the center of M87.

Known for a long time to be a powerful radio source, it was found to have a supermassive black hole that was feeding on surrounding gas. Although a few billion times the mass of the sun -- which is HUGE to us -- it is just a tiny fraction of the mass of the galaxy. And yet, its actions influence the entire galaxy, as well as the cluster around it.

Whereas the radio emission comes from jets of material that are flung away from the black hole's vicinity at speeds nearing that of light, the x-ray emission comes from the hot soup of particles that pervade the galactic cluster. These interact as the radio jets appear to blow "bubbles" or cavities into the x-ray gas. Putting the pieces together provided observational evidence of the physical link between the actions of the supermassive black hole and what is going on the in the rest of the galaxy.

Full Article...

Futurama Writer Created And Proved A Brand New Math Theorem Just For Last Night’s Episode

We all knew the writing staff of Futurama was brainy, but this is something else. To work out the ridiculous brain switching plot line from last night’s hilarious episode, writer Ken Keeler (who also just happens to have a PhD in mathematics) ended up writing and proving an entirely new theorem. This is probably the most impressive bit of side work from a TV writer since a writer of Desperate Housewives discovered a new species or the staff of Full House developed a vaccine for a specific strain of syphilis.

In the episode “The Prisoner of Benda,” the Professor and Amy use a new invention to switch bodies. Unfortunately, they discover that the same two brains can’t switch twice and have to come up with some equation to prove that, with enough people switching, eventually everyone will end up in their rightful form. This, of course, leads to much hijinks as well as the grossest sex scene the show has ever done (take that, Prof. Farnsworth and Mom!).

Read more...

Check out anything to do with the show at the infosphere.

Two arrested after $50m Van Gogh painting stolen from Cairo museum

Two Italians were stopped by police at Cairo airport last night trying to flee Egypt with a Vincent van Gogh painting that had been stolen just hours earlier.

The £32 million painting, known as Poppy Flowers or Vase With Flowers, was taken from the Mahmoud Khalil Museum on the banks of the Nile.

Egypt’s culture minister Farouk Hosni said airport security confiscated the oil painting from an Italian man and a woman.

One Egyptian official, who asked not to be named, told The Mail on Sunday: ‘It is believed the thief cut the painting from the frame and hid it in his suit.’

Want more? Click here...

Zero Punctuation: Shadow of the Colossus

Game News: BioShock Infinite Announcement Launch Trailer

Bioshock has been one of the biggest gaming titles of the past few year, indoctrinating millions of avid fans for one of the best looking and Australian designed game of the past 10 years. Previously known as "Project Icarus" the team at Irrational Games have mixed things up a bit this time by setting the rock solid shooter in a city suspended in the air by giant blimps and balloons called "Columbia". Unlike the super secret underwater city of Rapture, Columbia was proudly boasted by the American government when launched in 1900. So hold onto your hats.... Big Daddy is back and this time he's been cleaned up a bit... check it out.

Google Sky... Google Plan fly to mini chopper spies

Citing a German news report, Techeye.net reports that Google has purchased small UAV "microdrone" aircraft manufactured by Germany's microdrone GmbH, perhaps for use to augment the company's Street View mapping data. Techeye says:

The UAVs being flogged are mini helicopters with cameras attached that can be flown about all over the place. They're quiet and resemble sci-fi UFOs for the vertically challenged alien.

They can fly up to 80km per hour, so Microdrone CEO Sven Juerss suggests they'll be brilliant for mapping entire neighbourhoods really quickly and relatively cheaply.

Even before Google started data mining on open web networks its Street View operations were controversial, with Google Maps picking up on people who didn't exactly want their faces plastered all over the internet. With the kind of high-angle aerial shots this sort of kit can achieve, it boggles the mind as to the sort of images that may be accidentally captured.

Our take: Skepticism is warranted, and outrage is probably premature.

Our understanding is that FAA certification procedures for civilian UAVs operating in domestic airspace are not yet in place, so it is not clear that the regular operation of such UAVs would be legal -- never mind prudent from a privacy or public-relations point of view.

Meanwhile, the Techeye report, while fascinating, is also single-sourced, with the news of the UAV sale to Google coming from the manufacturer of the UAV -- which is to say, he's hardly a disinterested conduit for information. There has been no confirmation of the sale from Google, so far as we know. (Indeed, Forbes reports a Google spokesperson says, ""This was a purchase by a Google executive with an interest in robotics for personal use.”)

So, while curious and exciting, Telstar Logistics suggests keeping cool pending further information about Google's plans and the regulatory environment that may or may not make such plans viable.

UPDATE: Our friends at BoingBoing link to more information about Google's UAV denial, as well as further detail about the air-certification challenges such UAVs would present.)

source article...

Zero Punctuation: DeathSpank & Limbo

TorrentReactor Buys and Renames Russian Town

TorrentReactor, listed among the five most popular torrent sites on the Internet, has surprised friends and foes by acquiring a small town in central Russia. The town formerly known as Gar has reportedly been bought for the equivalent of $148,000 and was quickly renamed after the Russian-based torrent site.

The last time a torrent site attempted to buy some land, the plan miserably failed. Early 2007 The Pirate Bay launched its ‘Buy Sealand” campaign. The plan was to raise enough money so they could buy the micronation of Sealand and offer “high-speed Internet access, no copyright laws and VIP accounts to The Pirate Bay.”

Within a few weeks the campaign raised some $20,000 from potential citizens, but this wasn’t enough. Sealand turned out not to be an option as it was prized at 750 million euros, which equals to nearly one billion US dollars. Other alternatives were considered but most islands lacked a proper Internet connection.

Now, three years later the Russian based torrent site Torrentreactor has reportedly bought some land of their own, without any help or funding from the outside. TorrentReactor founder Alex informed TorrentFreak about the peculiar move which puts the torrent site on the map in rural Russia.

Full article...

Facebook on ‘lockdown’ as it prepares for war with Google

It looks like Google isn’t the only one gearing up for a social network battle.

Rumors surfaced in June that the search giant was developing a Facebook competitor called Google Me, and the company’s social networking ambitions became even more certain this week with its acquisition of social app maker Slide. TechCrunch has called Google’s efforts a war on Facebook, and said Vice President of Engineering Vic Gundotra is the company’s general.

Now we’ve heard from a source close to Facebook’s plans that the social network is working hard to fend off Google. Specifically, chief executive Mark Zuckerberg has declared that the company is on “lockdown” for the next 60 days, with the office open on weekends as the company tries to revamp Photos, Groups, and Events in advance of the Google launch. We hear Zuckerberg even has a neon sign saying “Lockdown” on his office door.

The phrase is a callback to Facebook’s early days, as described in David Kirkpatrick’s book The Facebook Effect. During a lockdown, if someone wanted to leave the office Zuckerberg would reportedly pound the table and say: “‘No! We’re in lockdown! No one leaves the table until we’re done with this thing.”

source article...

Will solar storms destroy civilization?

The current "solar tsunami" may create a dazzling aurora in the night sky — but could it also mark the beginning of a long, dangerous cycle of sun storms?

A large explosion on the surface of the sun on Sunday sent a tidal wave of electrically charged particles toward Earth, say scientists. While the discharge is likely to create aurora borealis–like effects in large sections of the northern sky, it may also mark the beginning of an 11-year cycle of solar storms that have the potential to cause serious disruption of technological systems. (Watch a History Channel segment on what causes sun storms.) Here's the lowdown:

Is this week's event a solar storm?
Yes, and it's the first to be directed at Earth for "quite some time," say astronomers. It is predicted to cause a "killer light show" in northern regions of the globe, and may be visible from some parts of the United States.

What are solar storms?
Also known as a solar flare, a solar storm is a series of large explosions in the sun's atmosphere caused by magnetic instability.

Could this weekend's explosion pose a threat?
This one will provoke nothing more extreme than a dazzling light show. But scientists say this could be the start of a low in the sun's 11-year life cycle, making this potentially the first in a long season of solar storms. More serious ones could cause immense damage to our infrastructure.

How could sun storms damage our infrastructure?
A serious sun storm emits massive amounts of radiation capable of creating havoc with our technological systems. The X-rays and UV radiation emitted by powerful solar flares could, in theory, disable satellites and communications equipment.

So our cell phones might not work?
Correct. But a massive burst of energy could also fry electrical grids. Power in wide areas might fail, or surge dangerously, causing fires. Navigation systems — such as those on commercial airliners — could be disabled, and the global financial system brought to a grinding halt. Such an event, warns NASA, might "cause 20 times more economic damage than Hurricane Katrina."

Has it ever happened before?
There was a "solar tempest" in 1859 that caused telegraph wires to short out across the U.S. and Europe, starting multiple fires. With today's modern technology, the effects would be much, much worse. A minor solar flare in 1989, for instance, caused a massive power outage across Quebec, Canada.

Is there any way of stopping this?
No, but scientists can put satellites and power grids on "safe mode" if they can figure out how to predict when a sun storm will occur. NASA is collaborating with the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration to improve its space weather forecasting, and a group of scientists recently congregated in Washington, D.C. to discuss how to protect the planet from powerful bursts of energy from the sun that have the potential to devastate civilization.

source article...

The Psychology of Fanboyism

In order to understand what motivates "fanboys" and "fangirls," we investigate the behaviors behind video-game fanaticism with the help of esteemed psychologists, authors, and experts on the subject.

All gamers eventually encounter one. The fanboy and fangirl, who you can find lurking on message boards or can hear shrieking over headsets on Xbox Live, are by no means a recent phenomenon-the first recorded use of the term "fanboy" dates back nearly a century to 1919. First used to describe passionate boxing fans-and later comic-book readers who prided themselves on knowing their cherished fictional universes inside and out-the word has since devolved as a description of immature and often obnoxious behavior in the world of video games.

But what makes fanboys tick? Why do so many take such a militant stance over their video-game console of choice, especially when the differences between consoles such as the PlayStation 3 and the Xbox 360 are minute when it comes to the average gamer's concerns? The vast majority of major game releases are multiplatform titles, and they offer essentially the same experience regardless of your console of choice. So why do so many fanboys develop a strong attachment to one game platform while rejecting the other with equal passion? With the help of psychologists and authorities on the subject, we seek to learn what motivates fanboy behavior and why it has become a pejorative term.

Video games did not spawn this type of zealous behavior; they're merely the latest, most visible host for this often vicious intellectual virus. Fanboy flame wars raged years before video-gaming ultranationalists took up arms in the Nintendo Entertainment System vs. Sega Genesis days-or even when the Intellivision stoked the fires of Atari 2600 loyalists. Of course, before video games, fanaticism of this kind often took the form of religious or sports debates.

Patrick Hanlon, author of the award-winning advertising psychology book Primal Branding: Create Zealots for Your Company, Your Brand, and Your Future, suggests that this kind of behavior has been a part of humanity since cavemen argued over which type of spearhead was best suited for taking down mammoths. Furthermore, he says the closer the community around a debate like this gets, the harder it becomes to quit.

"Whenever you bundle a group of people with similar beliefs and ideals together, it becomes harder for them to leave individually," says Hanlon, who has worked with Bungie on Halo's advertising campaigns. "If they stop, they lose the respect of the other members of the community. They feel like a member of a community there and nowhere else, and this exaggerated sense of belonging is the same as the communities that battle over Democrats vs. Republicans or Mac vs. PC." He adds that this perceived loss of camaraderie can cause people to remain part of a community against their best interests. "It's the same case with any kind of zealotry."

It's easy to see why people get up in arms about religion-few things are more important to a person's sense of identity than their faith. It gets fuzzier, though, when linking that behavior to a person's allegiance to something like a video-game console.

Read the rest of the article here...

Get me a frikken lazer beam! - Intel step it up a notch with 50gbp/s data speeds.

The future is here, well nearly here.... we'll on the verge of nearly being here. Years of R&D Intel have come up with a fancy new thing call "Silicon photonics". What this means to you and me is 50gbp/s data transfer speeds using a two tone laser that pulses the 0's and 1's across a fiber optic network and it will be the only way to send your data around in 5 years. To put that into perspective that's an entire HD Blu-ray disc moved in under a second (or as Gizmodo puts it "Now imagine transferring the entire printed catalogue of the Library of Congress in a minute and a half."). And this is only the beginning... check it out.

Explanation Video



From Intel:
Today computer components are connected to each other using copper cables or traces on circuit boards. Due to the signal degradation that comes with using metals such as copper to transmit data, these cables have a limited maximum length. This limits the design of computers, forcing processors, memory and other components to be placed just inches from each other. Today's research achievement is another step toward replacing these connections with extremely thin and light optical fibers that can transfer much more data over far longer distances, radically changing the way computers of the future are designed and altering the way the datacenter of tomorrow is architected.

"Tomorrow's datacenter or supercomputer may see components spread throughout a building or even an entire campus, communicating with each other at high speed, as opposed to being confined by heavy copper cables with limited capacity and reach," according to Intel's press release.

Such quantitative increases in the power of data transmission could lead to qualitative changes in the way we use computers and the web. From telepresence to large data set distribution and analysis, the use cases are only beginning to be imagined. "At these data rates, one could imagine a wall-sized 3D display for home entertainment and videoconferencing with a resolution so high that the actors or family members appear to be in the room with you," Intel said.

Wow.... how cool is all that and the world doesn't even have it's hand's on it yet. Exciting, but nerdy stuff.

Herpes Boy Trailer launched at Comic-Con

Flashback - Steven Colbert & Steve Carell = Even Steven

As an avid watcher or The Daily Show & The Colbert Report I was delighted to see a house favorite hosting a recent episode of The Colbert Report. Steve Carell, from "40 Year Old Virgin" and "The Office" fame and old friend of the John Stuart family busted some of his old moves out and took the reigns. Damn that shit is funny...

The Colbert Report	Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
The Carell Corral
www.colbertnation.com
Colbert Report Full Episodes 2010 Election Fox News

Not realising until after watching this show that Steve Carell was even on the Daily Show (yes, I know totally lame but now I'm in the know), let alone facing off against the egocentric Colbert I had to go a hunting and below is what I found (other then a pubescent looking Stuart).

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Even Stevphen - Weather
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Tea Party

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Even Stevphen - Should Medical Marijuana be Legalized?
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Tea Party

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Even Stevphen - World's Policeman or Fireman?
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Tea Party

More?... thanks to Comedy Central for the supply of clips..

Youtubes - Life in a Day Project - COMING THIS JULY 24th!

Are You Entering YouTube's 'Life in A Day' Project? YouTube's "Life in A Day" project asks users around the world to capture their lives on camera on Saturday, July 24, 2010.

Footage will be selected to create a user-generated feature-length documentary, which will premiere at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival.

If you're taking part in YouTube's project, "20/20" wants to hear from you. Tell us what you're working on and why and a producer may contact you to be on "20/20."

Check out some videos... I think that I'll enter, sounds really interesting and who doesn't love a time capsule.



a word from Ridley Scott...



and here's a better explanation from Keven McDonald...



More info @ youtube.com/lifeinaday.

Zero Punctuation: Super Mario Galaxy 2

Booo YA! Tell it like it is Yahtzee.

Tech News - Screw the IPAD, here comes ANDROID!

We’ve rounded up what we know about upcoming Android tablets to see if any devices will give the Apple iPad a true rival. With the success of Apple’s iPad, virtually every manufacturer is brainstorming their own version attempting to ride the tablet wave. Sound familiar? The tablet market seems to be following the path of smartphones, but there is a key difference this time: Apple doesn’t have quite the head start they had back when the first iPhone was released. Android has made a big dent in the mobile industry and it’s looking to do the same for tablets. Apple sold 3 million iPads in the first 80 days and they’re expected to sell around 20 million more in 2011. If Android wants to get its foot in the door then the time is now, before they fall behind again and it takes years to catch up. More and more manufactures are unveiling plans for tablets and the vast majority are choosing Android (sans HP with their Web OS tablet). Below we’ve rounded up everything we know at this point about upcoming Android tablets and when they might hit the market. If there is a tablet we have missed, let us know and we will add it to the list!

The Pandigital Novel can be classified as an eReader but since it features a web browser and media player we think it crosses into tablet territory as well. The Novel will features a 7-inch color 800×600 touchscreen, an SD card slot for adding storage, and will integrate with the Barnes & Noble eBookstore. It will be priced at $199 and is slated to go on sale this month.

The Acer tablet looks very similar to its LumiRead e-book reader that was announced at the same event back in may. Not many details have been released but we do know that it will feature a 7-inch color display, will run Android, and has a likely Q4 release date.

More...

Movie News -The Expendable 8-Bit Game Comes to Facebook

Check it out, the mega action flick of the decade has decided to bring out an 8-bit Facebook game.

Clicky, clicky!

Tech News - Create a 3-D Hologram With Your iPad

Screw video conferencing. Toss out those 3-D glasses. We just got one step closer to making portable holographic videos a reality (something we’ve all been waiting for ever since the first Star Wars flick came out back in 1977). This new demo from Japan-based creative team Aircord labo uses nothing more than a glass prism (with “special film”), a projector, and an iPad to create a 3-D display that runs on OpenFrameworks and MaxMSP (you can download the program files here). Think that’s pretty badass? So do we. But wait, there’s more! With an installed application, the program can also respond to sound, making the 3-D holovid display interactive.

The simplicity and accessibility of this design is what makes it most exciting to us. We can’t wait to see what happens when the OpenFrameworks community takes hold of this thing and takes it for a joy ride. How long do you think it’ll be before holovids are on the iPhone? We give it 5 years.

N-3D DEMO from aircord on Vimeo.

iPhone 4 'Bursts into Flames,' Report Claims

The Boy Genius Report reports that an iPhone 4 "burst into flames".

They have photos, helpfully provided by "One of our very close AT&T sources" [translation: a retail store clerk] of the melted USB cable and the scorched 30-pin dock connector at the bottom of the phone. The phone was connected via its USB cable to the owner's computer.

Alas, they don't have any video: we have to imagine the phone's owner looking first puzzled, then horrified, then screaming as the flames "burst" and the ThisChangesEverythingAgain phone, the most advanced piece of technology on the planet as its fans reverently recite, turns into something that looks like a George Foreman compact griller.

Although BGR says there was a fire, they don't actually cite anything to back that (or the "bursting" flames assertion) up, not even a quote from the Very Close AT&T Source. According to BGR, according to their AT&T source, Apple says the cause was a defective USB cable.

"[I]t's still a little shocking to see it happen," writes "Marc", who blogged about the "flames" at Intomobile.com. "One would imagine that engineers have solved this extremely dangerous problem by now, right?"

full article...

Gaming Video - Smosh: If Video Games Were Real

Zero Punctuation : No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle

Tech News - Demo of a 3D atlas of the universe

Stardate 09082010.7... watch out for Uranus... Looks like a scene from the Jedi Temple in Coruscant.

Uh Oh, Adobe: Porn Industry Prepping To Ditch Flash

When the porn industry gets behind a tech, it tends to be a good sign. When it deserts a tech? Yeah, that’s a bad sign.

So it’s not great news for Adobe when the founder of Digital Playground, one of the biggest adult studios in the US, states in no uncertain terms in an interview with Conceivably Tech that he hates Flash and will ditch it as soon as all major browsers support HTML5.

Source

This Is How Earth’s Gravity Field Looks | Gizmodo Australia

This Is How Earth’s Gravity Field Looks | Gizmodo Australia

If you’re still sad-faced about never getting a go in Concorde we have yet more bad news – air travel is getting slower again. This time we’re warping back to 1930s flight speeds, thanks to a new wave of cargo blimps.

The modern freight blimp can sustain a top speed of around 126km/h, and according to some reports, would be able to carry twice as much cargo as a Boeing 747 – while producing 90 per cent less greenhouse emissions.

Professor Sir David King, the UK government’s former chief scientific adviser, says he thinks big, helium-powered blimps similar to the Lockheed Martin High Altitude Airship (pictured) are the eco-friendly future of air transport – and will begin to takeover the Taiwan-to-US electronics distribution routes by the end of the decade.

The Inner workings of Google

Dr Who Anime Short? Fan obsessions colorized on the screen

Wandering through the dewy fields of the Youtube I came across this little ditty. OtaKing77077's (aka Paul Michael Johnson) has taken his fandom to a new level with this amazing looking anime short that he made up away from his day job as a translator.

"I worked all night for years and years without pay. That power would set me up above the gods! And through Adobe Photoshop I shall have that power!" - OtaKing77077

Using sounds bites from the show along with Phillip Sacramento (who you may have heard recently as the voice of Solid Snake in Metal Gear: Philanthropy) and Sachika Souno this Dr Who fiesta looks amazing and really leaves me wanting more. When will the full thing be available? You posted it last year, surely it's ready by now!!! Regardless of who did the talking OtaKing has done a great job here and I hope that we see it in film festivals as one unit soon.

Part 1


Part2


and there's more on the U Tube...

Devian Art Page

Game News - Red Dead Redemption Worldwide Stats

The guys at Rockstar have been watching us, counting all of the birds we've shot, the people we've hogtied and the donkeys we're blown away. They hired the guys at GameSpy to watch us all and below are the results from the Rockstar socal club are in...



...we really are a murdering bunch of bastards

World News - Cockney to disappear 'within 30 years'

I wonder if my granddad knows about this? :?

A study by Paul Kerswill, Professor of Sociolinguistics at Lancaster University shows the Cockney accent will move further east.

In London, Cockney will be replaced by Multicultural London English - a mixture of Cockney, Bangladeshi and West Indian accents - the study shows. "It will be gone within 30 years," says Prof Kerswill.

The study, funded by the Economic and Social Research Council, says the accent ,which has been around for more than 500 years, is being replaced in London by a new hybrid language.

The new accent, known in slang terms as Jafaican, is most famously spoken by rap star Dizzee Rascal.

"Cockney in the East End is now transforming itself into Multicultural London English, a new, melting-pot mixture of all those people living here who learnt English as a second language," Prof Kerswill says.

full article...

Zero Punctuation: E3 2010

TV news - Futurama's new Ep takes on Apple

With a big old BAM from the Spice Weasel Futurama gets back into the comedic groove by taking a swing at Apple and the insane business plan they work too. Check out Ep3 of season 6... and here's a video to stave off the boredom.

Animatronic Halo Elite Costume - humongous fun times

Freak out friends and strangers with this 7+ feet tall slightly animatronic beast from the Halo games. Thanks to PeterManderFX who made this bad ass suit... what a pleasure it would be to don and go out on the town, freaking out passers by. Check out some pics and making of video, my favourite is the monster pants... oh monster pants how I would love to to wear thee.







For those impatient souls out there, It walks around right near the end of the video ...

TV News - New Adidas Commercial Kicks Intergalactic Ass!

What do you get if you mix David Beckham, Daft Punk, Snoop Dogg, Franz Beckenbauer, Noel Gallagher, Ian Brown, Ciara, FIFA, Jay Baruchel, DJ Neil Armstrong and Star Wars? That's right, an Adidas Commercial... wait,... wa??

Gaming News - XCOM Aussie Game Release

From the makers of the such game titles as Borderlands and BioShock 2K games is on the verge of releasing a fantastic looking new titles called XCOM. Set in the mid-half of last century you star as a FBI agent investigating a mysterious villainy. The trailer released at E3 is pretty cool and reminds me of "Mad Men", "Edward Scissor-hands" "War Of the Worlds" and "The Blob"... quite a mix. The franchise XCOM has been around since 1993 in multiple incantations using various genres to sell the Alien Attack story, but it has been stuck in the land of the PC for a long time. Comes 2011...

Movie News- MegaMind Trailers

New from Dreamworks comes MegaMind... for once, a successful superman like super villain. Staring Will Ferrell, Tina Fay and Brad Pitt this little ditty looks like a step up from Monsters V Aliens and will be shown in the real 3D... not the ever popular fake-D that many of the pretenders play at (Ahem - Alice in Wonderland) (check out the HD video on Apple trailers) and comes out this November.

TV News - Futurama is back! David X. Cohen on has a chat about it...

Talking with David X. Cohen is always fun, because the 'Futurama' showrunner has the same wry, geeky manner as most of the show's fans (including me). So you can do things like goof with him about adding a 'Lost'-style twist to the season finale or how the iPhone will be implanted in your eye in the future. But what he's the most good-natured about -- and most resigned to -- is the show's perpetually precarious situation.

When I spoke to Cohen earlier this week, he mentioned the fact that he was again trying to write the 26th and last episode of Comedy Central's current order to serve as both a season or series finale. And the crew and writers were again trying to figure out their next steps.

"(I)t's familiar territory for us," he said, "but because Comedy Central's airing these half this year, half next year, it's a little less of an emergency for them to make any decision if they want to order more or not. So we're very used to it, unfortunately."
Otherwise, he happily gave us a preview of what will happen during the first half of the run, which begins on June 24 at 10PM ET with a double shot of episodes. He also envisioned what a 'Futurama' feature film might look like. Interview and clips after the jump (Warning: We do talk a little about the 'Lost' finale. So if you haven't seen it, read that part at your own risk).

Do you wish sometimes that things were like more straightforward, like your cousins over at 'The Simpsons' are, where it's "season 21, season 22, here we go," you know?
Yeah. Yeah, well it's a blessing and a curse, I guess, because you work at 'The Simpsons' and you don't jump ship at some point, suddenly you're 20 years older. (chuckles) So there's something to be said for a little drama of periodic cancellation and resuscitation to liven your experiences up a little bit.

When you did that last movie to kind of land it on a cliffhanger and let people know hey, here's how it ends, whether we're back or not? What was the thought there?
Yeah, well, we're one of the few shows now that has a lot of experience writing our last episode ever, so we're currently engaged in doing that for the 3rd time, at the moment, in fact. So our goal, I've decided, in the last couple of efforts at least, is to strike a tone where I would be happy if that was our last episode, right? I shouldn't say happy, I should say satisfied, I guess. Where it's kind of a bittersweet tone and on the one hand, it could be the end of the series, but on the other hand, we don't actually have a giant anti-matter explosion that kills all of our characters beyond repair. So we've learned to leave our options open, but I never want to be presumptuous and assume that we're going to come back. It just so happens we've had the good fortune so far to return, so we've cashed in on the fact that we didn't kill all our characters off in a LOST-style shootout.

Is the next ending going to be where it's all like some sort of religious parable and Fry's really the equivalent of Jesus, I think?
All Fry needs to do really is grow a beard, I guess. He's a little Jesus-y in his general build and complexion, I guess, by your standard clichèd version, so why not.

read the full and much longer article here...

Funny - Better Call Saul!

Are you a fan of Breaking Bad? Do you think that Walter White is getting a bad wrap? Do you too need legal representation for Baby Fraud? Illegal Tiger storage? Saul can help you... Click Now...

E3 2010 - Star Wars: The Old Republic Cinematic and gameplay trailers

The MMO multiverse is about to be shaken up with the long awaited Star Wars: The Old Republic apearing on the horizon. If the gameplay is as refined as the cinematic then we're all in for a treat. This could be the game to challenge Blizzard’s World of Warcraft for online supremacy... no really... that's the word on the street and I'm inclined to believe them.

Cinematic Trailer... if you have the bandwidth watch it in HD and full screen, it looks fantastic!


Here's a walkthrough trailer from late last year. It's a little rough IMO but very interesting to watch

E3 2010 - Star Wars The Force Unleashed 2

The first Force Unleached was loads of fun all be it a little flat, but we at tapemonkey have great hope for the second installment. Check out the Cinematic Trailer and gameplay trailer below.

E3 2010 - Deus Ex: Human Revolution trailer

The third installment in the Deus Ex franchise is set 25 years before the first Deus Ex game. The cyberpunk visuals drip quality in the trailer and should provide a stunning setting for this prequel.

Zero Punctuation: Red Dead Redemption

Unreal Engine Puts BP Oil Spill Into Perspective

Se more of these great 'Finding Nemo 2' wallpapers at EL BLOG DE CHIBIBOTO




The Long term effects of Off-shore Drilling

Test mobile blogging

Machinima - An oldie but a goodie... Halo 3 Teabagging

... all of this E3 content is making me thirsty. Time for some classic Machinima...

E3 2010: first gameplay video of Valve's Portal 2

Expanding on the first game, Portal 2 looks like there's fair few new tricks to play with. The first video is a sneak peak into the story and the other two are gameplay and physics demos... Check it out...

E3 2010 - Halo: Reach Campaign Footage...take me too the Moon!

After the trailer that was launched the other day got the juices flowing now we have a cam of some actual gameplay footage. Oh Obama... look what happens when you keep man in space... SPARTIANS IN SPACE!

Video Games | Halo: Reach | E3 2010: Campaign Gameplay Part II (Cam)

XBox 360 | Playstation 3 | Nintendo Wii