jrtom

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2007/07/03/keith-olbermanns-special-comment-you-ceased-to-be-the-president-of-the-united-states/#more-18986

The man has not simply removed the gloves but also donned the brass knuckles.

(I thought it was kinder than spamming my friendslist with 10 or 15 posts in a row. Going to make the tags interesting, though...)

The Redistricting Game: http://www.redistrictinggame.com/

Haven't played it yet, but the concept--teaching about redistricting and gerrymandering by making a game out of it--is very interesting.

Kinetic Sculpture: http://www.glumbert.com/media/kineticsculpture [video]

Very cool. Actually, "kinetic" doesn't really convey it: think "auto-mobile".

Singing Tesla Coil: http://www.hauntedfrog.com/gt/movies/2007/duckon/SingingTeslaShow.html

What else need I say?

US States "renamed" for countries with similar GDPs: http://strangemaps.wordpress.com/2007/06/10/131-us-states-renamed-for-countries-with-similar-gdps/

A very interesting and informative visualization: it actually tells me about as much about the US as it does about the respective countries. The table at the bottom may be useful to give some context.

Gay Bomb: The Porno Flick [safe for work]: http://blog.wired.com/defense/2007/06/gay-bomb-the--1.html

Gay Bomb will take us into the future and the year 2012. George the Second has refused to step down as leader of the "free world", and the nations of Europe have banded together to fight the new American military dictatorship. Desperate to fend off its attackers, the US launches the experimental "gay bomb", designed to make the enemy forces drop their guns and turn fag. But the winds of fate blow in a different direction, and soon America is brought to its knees.

This is the best part: it appears that this has been seriously proposed...

Recent news headlines revealed that Pentagon insiders admitted to having truly considered the "gay bomb" as an example of non-lethal chemical warfare in the Iraq War. The Air Force asked for a $7.5 million grant to develop the idea, which was proposed to the government's highest scientific authority.

("Some people you don't need to satirize--you just quote 'em.")

http://www.airspacemag.com/issues/2007/june-july/Seti.htm

A dedicated SETI effort, i.e., one with its own facility.

http://www.makezine.com/blog/archive/2007/06/binary_marble_adding_mach.html

A mechanical binary adder, with a video of it at work. Very nicely done.

http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2007/06/second_movieplo.html

The winner of Bruce Schneier's second annual Movie-Plot Threat Contest...which makes a plausible case for banning water from airplanes.

http://www.milkandcookies.com/link/63329/detail/

A very silly music video. Requires a bit of patience; wait until it's about a minute in before you give up on it, and about 2 minutes in it gets impressive.

http://www.juxtapoz.com/jux/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1121&Itemid=50

This is truly fascinating, in the original sense of the word: it's hard to take your eyes off it. (And has a nicely complementary solo cello soundtrack.)

If I had more familiarity with art in general, I'd get all geeky about that aspect of it, but as it is I can't even guarantee that the creator of the video used paintings in chronological order (although I do recognize many of them, and I did notice a couple of obvious stylistic shifts, e.g., impressionism and modernism). Technically, though, the morphing was very nicely done.

One random observation: the morphing, which gives the impression of the face turning back and forth, reminds me of how uncomfortable some of those poses must have been for the model. :P

http://www.singinst.org/media

Has talks by several well-known people in this and related areas (Kurzweil, Hofstadter, Drexler, etc.) plus panel discussions; I'm looking forward to checking them out.

Jonathon Coulton: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ltjbnyvq_SI&mode=related&search=

Gilbert and Sullivan: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qkJdEFf_Qg4

(plus other stuff on YouTube versions but they're largely just lip-synching or other video done over the original song)

Yes vs. Sir-Mix-A-Lot's "Owner Of A Lovely Butt": http://accordionguy.blogware.com/blog/_archives/2005/3/31/498275.html

and, of course, the Latin transliteration (yes, I know I've posted it before, but I love it so very, very much): http://quislibet.livejournal.com/164084.html

Because.

It's all ewin's fault. She started me on this one:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Fe11OlMiz8

and it was all downhill from there.

That first one is Indiana University's a capella group "Straight, No Chaser" performing a really well-done parody medley on "The 12 Days of Christmas". (And not one I'd heard before, either, which is the impressive part.) This sort of thing takes a lot of talent to do well, and they've got it.

From there I went to

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JKx_BTj_-IE&mode=related&search=

which is their rendition of "This is How We Do It". Not a song I'd been familiar with, but again, a well-done performance.

I followed "related to" links once or twice to get to the Pet Shop Boys singing "Where The Street Has No Name". Which is surprisingly good if you like dance mix reimaginations of songs.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ePr53UtUkYo&mode=related&search=

And from here to them doing "Somewhere":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qS28680R6SM&mode=related&search=

By now you're probably bored, so I'll finish off with the ADD Shopping Network:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UA9KFAXizs4

Make sure you watch both the ticker and the 'ads' flashing to the left.

...but don't expect me to answer. :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JaleEmXgEvc

I'd never seen the video to this song before. I am amused.

Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain performs Nirvana's "Smells Like Teen Spirit" [Google Video]. The vocalist isn't great, but it's otherwise quite interesting as a performance.

Jake Shimabukuro plays George Harrison's "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" [Google Video]. V. impressive.

Venture Bros video [YouTube]

(If anyone's curious, that's the 'Mars' theme from Holst's The Planets.)