Archive for July, 2011
Lucifer Banned In New Zealand
Yup, that’s right, you can’t name your child (or yourself, presumably) “Lucifer” in New Zealand, per this report in the Sydney Morning Herald:
Naming your new bundle of joy Lucifer has been effectively banned by New Zealand’s names registrar after three parents had the odd request knocked back.
The country’s Registrar of Births, Deaths and Marriages has been cracking down on mothers and fathers getting too creative with their children’s names, ruling out punctuation marks such as . (Full Stop), * (Asterisk) and / (presumably ”Slash”).
The list of 102 names rejected in the past two years includes Baron, Bishop, Duke, General, Judge, Justice, King, Knight and Mr, all deemed too similar to titles.
Messiah was also turned down, as was 89, and the single letters, C, D, I and T, although Q and J were accepted after being queried.
It’s a new hard line for the agency that made headlines in 2008 when it…
The Rupert Murdoch Pie Video
The most exciting moment during the Murdochs’ parliamentary testimony in the never-ending British phone hacking saga was undoubtedly the foam pie attempt on Rupert, foiled only by the kung fu strike on would-be pieman Jonathan May-Bowles by Murdoch’s wife, Wendi. Respect to the tiger mother!
The Dragon*Con 2012 Panel
Dragon*Con 2010 served as the setting for a panel discussion entitled “2012 Theories and Myth,” featuring bestselling author Graham Hancock, renegade scholar Randall Carlson, disinformation publisher Gary Baddeley, and other special guests. Camron Wilshire of Sacred Geometry International recorded and edited the video – enjoy!
Chill Out Drinks Are The New Cool Beverage
Eunju Lie reports on the new trend in beverages for Reuters:
Sales of “relaxation drinks” with names like Vacation in a Bottle, Dream Water and Just Chill, while small, are growing. “There is clear potential for further growth in the coming years,” said Cecilia Martinez, market analyst at UK-based beverage research group Zenith International.
Relaxation drinks help the body chill out by relieving muscle tension and reducing levels of cortisone, the main stress hormone, according to a report that Martinez wrote about the drinks earlier this year.
The drinks, which evolved in Japan as far back as 2005, contain no alcohol but some have melatonin, a hormone that can cause drowsiness. The biggest relaxation brands include Innovative Beverage Group’s Drank, Purple Stuff and Jones GABA.
Another called Slow Cow is up and coming…
Anonymous Launches Social Networking Site: AnonPlus
AnonPlus is to be a new social networking site without censorship, but how different is it from other social networks? The Raw Story reports:
Infamous hacker group Anonymous launched Monday its own social network after being rejected by Google’s freshly-launched online community.
“Today we welcome you to begin anew,” the hacker alliance said at the website anonplus.com, which it described as a platform to distribute information.
“Welcome to the Revolution – a new social network where there is no fear…of censorship…of blackout…nor of holding back.”
The drive to build a social network came after the Anonymous account was suspended at the Google+ online community, which was launched last month by the Internet giant as a challenge to Facebook.
A message on the anonplus.com website promised that the Anonymous social network would be for everyone and listed online monikers of developers taking part in the project.
Rupert Murdoch’s Tabloid Hacked To Report His Death
The woes keep piling on for Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp, as the homepage of its popular Sun paper was altered to feature an amusing fake report on the mogul’s committing suicide “in his topiary garden”. The Guardian notes:
News International websites for the Times and the Sun were taken down last night after hackers targeted the Sun’s web pages and redirected traffic to another page falsely reporting that Rupert Murdoch had been found dead. The breach was apparently the first hack of a major UK newspaper’s website.
The LulzSec hacking collective hacked the tabloid’s site, and also claimed to be “sitting on their [the Sun's] emails” and that they would release the emails on Tuesday.
Acrobat Arrested After Performance Atop NYC’s Williamsburg Bridge
Perhaps channeling 1970s World Trade Center daredevil Philippe Petit, aerialist Seanna Sharpe gave a performance from high on the Williamsburg Bridge, the Wall Street Journal reports. A crowd gathered to watch before the police used two vehicles and a helicopter to catch her:
It took approximately seven minutes for Sharpe to scale the tower, followed by fifteen minutes of midair twirls and flips. During that time, she remained tethered to the bridge only by a length of silk rope she had tied to the bridge beams.
What Should Robots Smell Like?
It depends on what purpose we want them to serve. we make money not art looks at plans for several robots equipped with odor-emitting “sweat glands” which both make the machines seem more organic/alive and effect how people react to them:
Three existing industrial robots have been augmented with ’sweat glands’. Each uses a specific property of human sub-conscious behavior in response to a chemical stimulus: one makes humans about to undergo surgery more trustful, another one makes women working in production line more focused and the third one is a bomb disposal robot that emits the smell of fear.
The contrast between the physical anti-anthropomorphic nature of the machines and the olfactory anthropomorphism highlights the absurd nature of the trickery at play in all anthropomorphism.
Never Forget 9/11. Religion Was the Cause …
From NonBelievers.org, the only statement on the site. Of course, DISCUSS!
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Austerity For Everyone, Except The Defense Industry
Aaron Cynic writes at Diatribe Media:
While Congress and the President fight it out over the debt ceiling and all of America quietly shudders over whether our economy will completely default on itself, at least one industry still hums along without a care in the world.
Amidst a fiscal crisis of apparently apocalyptic proportions, where the GOP demands dollar for dollar spending cuts from the budget in order to raise our debt limit, the Pentagon asked Congress for $264 million to cover part of a $771 million overrun on the F-35 program. The Hill reports Republican Senator John McCain let the news slip via Twitter, saying “Congress notified that first F-35 jets have cost overruns of $771M. Outrageous! Pentagon asking for $264M down payment now. Disgraceful.”
Leaders of the program Lockheed Martin spat back on Twitter, contending “The F-35 team is focused on reducing costs of the jets and is showing significant improvement in…
Indian Company Produces Flat-Pack, $700 Houses
Reports Agence France-Presse via Raw Story:
The Indian company that launched the world’s cheapest car has unveiled its latest product for the fast-growing nation: a flat-pack house that costs just $700 and can be built in a week.
The Tata group, maker of the $2,500 Nano car, said that the 20-square-metre (215-square-foot) home comes from a pre-fabricated kit that includes doors, windows and a roof.
“We have already prepared two-three different designs based on discussions with users and are gathering more feedback,” Sumitesh Das, the head of the project at Tata, told reporters in Hyderabad.
“Hopefully, in the next six-eight months we should be able to roll it out in the market nationally.”
The basic model of a so-called “Nano” house will cost 32,000 rupees ($720) and will use coconut fibre or jute for wall cladding and interiors. It has a life expectancy of 20 years.
Congressman Paul Ryan Hands Cold War Victory to the Ruskies
Well, there it is folks. Plain as day: Wisconsin Congressman Paul Ryan’s “Roadmap to Ruin” austerity program sh*tcanned the U.S. Spaceshuttle program and left us dependent upon the charity of ex-KGB chief Vladimir Putin.
No you wouldn’t hear much about that from the Fox News(tm) Politburo. Seems that we have to rely on our Aussie cousins to get the scoop.
It’s true. Now without an independent space program of our own, we’ll be at the tender mercies of the apparatchiks in Moscow to support our telecommunications satellite infrastructure.
Now I don’t have definitive proof yet that Paul Ryan is a sleeper agent for Uncle Vanya, but all signs point to yes. In debt ceiling talks this week his lot are trying to force American-born grandmothers to give up their cat food money in order to support the vodka habits of his Wall Street buddies like Frenchman “Fabulous” Fab Torre.
Iranian Activists Accuse Government of Handing Out Condoms So Political Prisoners Can Be Raped
Photo: Ehsan Iran (CC)
“If the inmate is not powerful enough or guards would not take care of him, he will be certainly raped. Prison guards ignore those who are seen with condoms simply because they were given out to them by the guards at first place” … Saeed Kamali Dehghan reports in the Guardian:
Prison guards in Iran are giving condoms to criminals and encouraging them to systematically rape young opposition activists locked up with them, according to accounts from inside the country’s jail system.
A series of dramatic letters written by prisoners and families of imprisoned activists allege that authorities are intentionally facilitating mass rape and using it as a form of punishment.
Mehdi Mahmoudian, an outspoken member of Iran’s Participation Front, a reformist political party, is among those prisoners who have succeeded in smuggling out letters revealing the extent of rape inside some of the most notorious prisons.
Mahmoudian was arrested in…
Pastafarian Wins Right To Wear Pasta Strainer On Head In Driver’s License
This is my kind of “religious freedom” — an Austrian has won his legal battle to appear with his faith’s headgear — a colander — on his government ID. The BBC reports:
A self-confessed atheist, Niko Alm first applied for the license three years ago after reading that headgear was allowed in official pictures only for confessional reasons. Mr Alm said the sieve was a requirement of his religion, pastafarianism.
After receiving his application the Austrian authorities had required him to obtain a doctor’s certificate that he was “psychologically fit” to drive.
Mr Alm’s pastafarian-style application for a driving licence was a response to the Austrian recognition of confessional headgear in official photographs. The licence took three years to come through and, according to Mr Alm, he was asked to submit to a medical interview to check on his mental fitness to drive but – straining credulity — his efforts have finally paid off.
‘News of the World’ Phone-Hacking Whistleblower Found Dead
Not thought to be suspicious but is unexplained. Hell of a dark omen with Rupert Murdoch due to appear before Parliament tomorrow. Amelia Hill, James Robinson, Caroline Davies report in the Guardian:
Sean Hoare, the former News of the World showbiz reporter who was the first named journalist to allege Andy Coulson was aware of phone hacking by his staff, has been found dead, the Guardian has learned.
Hoare, who worked on the Sun and the News of the World with Coulson before being dismissed for drink and drugs problems, is said to have been found dead at his Watford home.
Hertfordshire police would not confirm his identity, but the force said in a statement: “At 10.40am today [Monday 18 July] police were called to Langley Road, Watford, following the concerns for the welfare of a man who lives at an address on the street. Upon police and ambulance arrival at a property, the body of…
How To Destroy Your Laptop In A Pinch
Attention cyber criminals, subversives, and ne’er-do-wells: place this handy sticker in the correct spot on your computer, just in case. Via DesignTaxi:
Your laptop, with all its sensitive data and/or ill-gotten gains, is about to be confiscated by the authorities, who are banging on the door. There’s no time to reformat it—you’ve got to destroy it, fast. This sticker will help you do just that, provided you’ve a drill by your side. (And which self-respecting cyber criminal wouldn’t?)
Meant to be placed directly above your laptop’s hard disk, the sticker sports a crosshair with which you can accurately destroy any digital evidence the cops are after.
Randy Sarafan, who created the stickers, advises to “research the build of your laptop and locate the position of your hard drive…The hard drive should look like a rectangular box with a centered circle somewhere upon it,” he said.
Stick the sticker’s drill guide slightly off center of…
GOP Hopes To Slash Funding For Mass Transit, Biking, Walking
What’s the wave of the future of transportation? Highways! At least that’s the case according to our Republican-controlled Congress, who are eager to wipe out federal funding of public transit and bike- and pedestrian-friendly infrastructure with a new six-year transportation bill. Streetsblog writes:
There has been speculation for months now that the House Republicans’ transportation bill proposal would be terrible for transit, biking, and walking. And sure enough, John Mica didn’t disappoint. The proposed bill, which has a working title of “A New Direction,” is decidedly pro-highway and anti- just about everything else.
The chair of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee yesterday released a six-year reauthorization proposal that would slash overall transportation funding 33 percent and eliminate dedicated funds for biking and walking.
As The World Marks International Mandela Day, Mandela’s Legacy Is Debated: Which Narrative Will Prevail?
At 94, Nelson Mandela is still kicking, inspiring an international day of community service on Juy 18th in his name. This seems to be an idea that Barack Obama borrowed for similar events in the USA.
While activists, athletes and entertainers are honoring him by responding to his call for engagement, journalists in the obit departments of the world’s news networks are quietly, even secretly, combing their archives for footage and tributes that will air when he moves on to the next world. They are getting ready and seem to think it will happen sooner rather than later.
I have already seen a program length obit that a major network has ready to go.
Barring some major disaster at the same time, Mandela’s death may receive more visibility than the achievements of his long life.
The question is: which Mandela will be memorialized? Will it be he leader who built a movement and a military…
Woman Arrested For Groping TSA Agent At Checkpoint
Not sure if this woman’s actions were intended as an interesting sociological experiment, a political statement, or just disorderly hooliganism. Anyway, she did a nice job of “flipping the script” as they say. Via NPR:
Authorities say a Colorado woman who allegedly groped a female Transportation Security Administration agent at Phoenix’s international airport is facing a felony count of sexual abuse.
Phoenix police say 61-year-old Yukari Mihamae is accused of grabbing the left breast of the unidentified TSA agent Thursday afternoon at an airport checkpoint.
TSA staff say Mihamae refused to be go through passenger screening and became argumentative before she squeezed and twisted the agent’s breast with both hands. Mihamae lives in Longmont, Colo., and is self-employed.
