I pose that as a serious question. Why aren’t you watching “The IT Crowd” right now? It has everything a young American nerd could dream of; two IT slackers working mundane jobs in the basement of a corporate headquarters surrounded by the tech of old while they do very little work, and its British!
We were all saddened by the announcement that Starz’ Party Down was canceled, let alone pulled off Netflix, but all three seasons of IT Crowd are up there right now.
This Jen, is the Internet is quite possibly the best exchange in the series. Embedding has been disabled, but check it out – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QAUyaELfwBo
Above is my own tribute to the show, a personally built internet box, its purpose… to blink on and off, eventually I should put it back on top of the Empire State Building, thats where it gets the best reception.
Paste has an excellent write up of the reasons you should be watching it instead of reading this article.
Growing up in Alaska, I can say I’ve seen my fair share of batteries die due to crappy weather. But how do they stack up to aging pop stars, extremely well apparently.
Fresh off their OK Go powered Rube Goldberg machine, LA-based arts and technology collective Syyn Labs lined up 24 cars, placed them in a keyboard configuration and let one-hit-wonder Gary Newman take the helm of the gigantic instrument.
The horns were replaced with an MP3 player hooked up to each set of car speakers and powered by one DieHard battery. When Newman hit the corresponding key, a car’s lights and sound system would blare.
[Syyn Labs via Gadget Lab]
Just when you thought it was safe to roam the streets again… BUMP BUMP BAHHHHHHHH QUADCOPTERS TURN THE CORNER, GRAB YOU BY EACH OF YOUR ARMS AND FLY YOU TO AN UNIDENTIFIED MILITARY BASE WHERE NOBODY IS SEEN OR HEARD FROM AGAIN!
Wait, no they don’t. If you don’t remember, in late May, a video demo was posted online from the University of Pennsylvania’s GRASP Lab that shows an autonomous quadrotor helicopter flipping through small openings and strange angles. Now they can team up with each other and pick up objects. Not only can they pick them up, they can each grab an end of something *cough a person* and figure out how to fly as one large helicopter, not three smaller ones.
Yes, I don’t believe they are coming after me anytime soon, I’ve been working to destroy this technology for years… and I know just where to look. To Philadelphia!
[Engadget]
Vimeo announced Tuesday it will allow users to apply Creative Commons to their uploaded videos. When uploading a video, users will be given a choice between the six major Creative Commons licenses: Attribution, Attribution Share Alike, Attribution No Derivatives, Attribution Non-Commercial Share Alike, Attribution Non-Commercial No Derivatives.
The option can be set when uploading a video or afterwards and will show up on the video page where others can see if they are allowed to download the source file.
Currently, there isn’t any way to search Vimeo’s library for Creative Commons content, but Marketing Director Deborah Szajngarten told CNET it is on the way.
Vimeo has tried to keep up to competetor YouTube over the years, and has tried to stay on top of implementing new technologies: 1080 HD uploads, HTML5 streaming and user video analytics.
[CNET]
Personal magnetic levitation has to be out there somewhere right? I watched Back To The Future 2: Electric Boogaloo with the promise that by 2015 the Jaws franchise would have continued to pick up steam, and that hoverboards would be everywhere. Fortunately for me, there is a good start roaming the streets of Illinois. Andres Guzman-Ballen, a computer engineering major at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign has created a motorized skateboard powered by an Arduino and controlled with a Playstation controller.
[via Adafruit]
A New York man who claims to own an 84% stake in Facebook has had a temporary restraining order placed on the transfer of Facebook’s assets. On June 30th, Paul D. Ceglia filed a suit in New York Supreme court, claiming that a 2003 contract he signed with Facebook founder and Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg entitles him to ownership of the company and monetary damages.
Per the Wall Street Journal:
In his suit, Mr. Ceglia claims he signed a contract with Mr. Zuckerberg on April 28, 2003, to develop and design a website, paying a $1,000 fee but getting a 50% stake in the product. The contract stipulated that Mr. Ceglia would get an additional 1% interest in the business for every day after Jan. 1, 2004, until it was completed.
This account conflicts with how Zuckerberg claims to have built Facebook out of a site called Facemash in Late 2003… thefacebook.com wasn’t registered till January 2004. In 2009, New York’s Attorney General Andrew Cuomo accused Mr. Ceglia of defrauding customers of his wood-pellet fuel company. The state claimed that he took more than $200,000 from consumers and then failed to deliver any products or refunds.
Facebook has called the lawsuit frivolous and has requested it be moved to federal court.
[WSJ]
For years, I the general public has been told time and time again that sticking cell phones up to our heads will give us brain cancer, and it is only NOW that I learn that it could keep chronic diseases in check, way to even the score doctors.
Dr. Richard Katz of George Washington Hospital is trying to work with patients to use what he calls “medical minutes.” Take Tyrone Harvey for example, who has had trouble keeping his diabetes in check since learning he had the disease seven years ago after getting so sick he was hospitalized for a week.
“In May, through a study Katz began with Howard University Hospital’s diabetes clinic, Harvey received a Web-based personal health record that he clicks onto using his cell phone, to record his daily blood sugar measurements.
If Harvey enters a reading higher or lower than pre-set danger thresholds, a text message automatically pings a warning, telling him what to do. And at checkups, doctors will use the personal health record, created by Indiana-based NoMoreClipboard.com, to track all his fluctations and decide what next steps to advise.”
Everybody has some sort of phone strapped to themselves at all times, why not start putting them to use for a change. The most my phone does to keep me fit is having me avert my eyes every time Run Keeper accidently starts because I haven’t taken 3 quick steps in months without being chased.
[AP via CBS News]
Ever have an experience on twitter where a celebrity actually writes back to you? It comes with that nice and fuzzy feeling that comes with someone barely acknowledging you existence can do. Well the guy from the new Old Spice commercials has officially killed any joy I would receive from getting an @nickrbrewer with personalized YouTube replies straight to from the bathroom.
The campaign builds upon the initial commercial where he lists off questions with rapid responses. And this isn’t limited to only Twitter, he has also responded to Yahoo Answers, comments on blog posts, and YouTube itself. Be sure to check out his response to Kevin Rose, yes, we know you know exactly what is going to drop next on the internet for the coming decade, but you aren’t 98% muscle and 1% cartilage are you.