Fun Stuff

As far as I can tell, this is for real

/ Shane / 1 Comment

Warning, the following baby-tossing video is extremely difficult to watch:

It absolutely seems fake, but Gawker has covered it extensively, and it seems to be legit, as far as they can tell.

It’s amazing how you just have this gut reaction to seeing a baby treated in such a fashion. I think it is something biological; it’s like we see it and we fear for the survival of our species (both for that individual baby, and society as a whole to have produced a person that would even want to throw a baby around like that!). Sara said it made her feel sick to her stomach.

The thing that’s not really covered in any of the information I’ve read about it, is why you would even want to throw your baby around like that. Even if you somehow convinced me that it was safe, that it didn’t hurt the baby, and in fact the baby didn’t mind (which is not what it sounds like from that video), you still haven’t convinced me that there is any benefit to it. What’s the purpose? To get your baby used to roller coasters? Prevent a fear of heights? No other form of weight training can give you quite the same rippling biceps? Even if it brings you and the baby “closer together”, isn’t there about a hundred better ways you could have accomplished that?

Link via Greg.

George Lucas should hire this guy

/ Shane / Leave a comment

Full disclosure, I didn’t think Episode 1 was all that awful. I think people had very, very high expectations and the movie couldn’t possibly live up to them.

That being said, it wasn’t that amazing either. There was certainly something…missing. I couldn’t say exactly what, until I watched this quick (12 minute) video. This guy totally nails it. It’s kind of surprising how little he would actually change, and how much better it would make the movie. I don’t know if it is because the movie was approached more from a merchandising point of view than from a purely storytelling point of view, if this guy just has more of a feel for story than Lucas does, or if hindsight is just 20/20.

Anyway, enjoy:

Link via somebody, on Facebook I think, but I couldn’t find it anymore.

So THAT’S what you do with old CDs

/ Shane / Leave a comment

There was a time in college when my friends and I found ourselves in possession of several trash bags full of worthless cds. We never really knew exactly what to do with them, other than throw them at things (and people). Well, if I had it to do all over again, now I know what to do with them: make ridiculously awesome sculptures.

It’s amazing what you can do with a lot of time, a lot of artistic talent, and a lot of cds, none of which I have at the moment.

Click, *Boom*

/ Shane / Leave a comment

This email will self-destruct in 5 seconds…

Self-destructing emails, available for free at One Share. It works like this:

You put in a message of any kind on their website. The data is encrypted, and stored that way on their server, so even One Share can’t read the message themselves. A special hyperlink is sent to you. When someone clicks on the hyperlink, it decodes your data, showing it to the users, and then deletes the information from their server. That way, even if someone else manages to get the link, it has already self-destructed, and they cannot access your data.

This seems really cool, and I’m sure it has some kind of application that I just can’t think of right now. Obviously it is good for sending sensitive or one-time-only emails, however, I very rarely need to send anybody on a Mission Impossible-style mission or assassination attempt, and I do not communicate with Charlie’s Angels. Therefore, I can only think of three possible uses:

  1. You could put things that you don’t want to store on your computer up there, such as a list of all your passwords, and then email yourself the link. If you forget your password, you could get it from that link.
  2. You could use it as a one-time FTP server, sending someone something, but ensuring that it doesn’t hang around on the public Internet for all time.
  3. You could run for public office and then use it to email people pictures of your junk, without the possibility of the media intercepting it (or at least without them intercepting it without you knowing it).

Any other ways you can think of? Again, this seems cool, but I don’t know why.

Least Helpful

/ Shane / Leave a comment

Certainly, it is very helpful to look at reviews before buying something. Sometimes reviews are useful, and sometimes they’re not. A lot of sites even let you mark if a review is helpful or not. But what about the *least* helpful reviews?

I’ve certainly encountered very unhelpful reviews. For example, you’re looking for information on a product, and someone gives it a one star rating because of the return policy of the company. Not helpful. Well, someone bothered to aggregate all of these unhelpful reviews into one location. Marvel in the stupidity.

For example, the guy who used Rit Dye to dye his hair:

I guess, to some people, that might actually be a helpful review. How about this one?

Maybe it’s just children’s literature in general?

I’ve read both of these books to my kids. What a bad parent I am! I wish I would have read the reviews first!

Oh well, at least they’re not part of the liberal conspiracy, like Holiday Inn.

Link via Eliza.