I'm not even sure what game this is parodying - but I liked it.
... more inside ...

The incredible irony of Tucker Carlson lecturing a serious print reporter on "journalistic ethics" had my jaw dropping. And of course the Clinton advisor afterwards agrees with Tucker. These people are cut from the same cloth.

My grandfather was an old country lawyer from Oklahoma. During the day he spent a lot of time at the courthouse with clients. But in the evenings and weekends he was a crackpot scientist. He had lots of ideas that he was continuously trying out on me. He was a Christian and a member of the free-masons - so many of his ideas were a mix of science and religion.

He had an idea that the parting of the Red Sea was caused by a close pass-by of Mars that that made a gravitational pull on the waters, somehow splitting the Red Sea for Moses and the Israelites. That was one of his ideas.

I seem to have inherited the genes- because when I'm doing the dishes or riding the train to work- I get these ideas that kind of roll around in my brain.

Here's one I had today:

Shoelaces are coated with a slightly slippery plastic sealant to make them come undone, even if you double-knot them. This is so you will step on them, wearing them out- having to purchase new ones. It's a conspiracy.

Here's a bigger one. Doesn't it seem kind of ridiculous that huge brachiosauruses the size of sky-scrapers walked the earth, and now we have no mammalian analog or even evolutionary remnants of these super-giant reptiles? My idea is that a body that size would be impossible today on earth. Now I'm no paleontologist,- but I play one on the VideoSift - and I think that it's too much weight and meat to be supported:



So, I think that gravity was less back in Jurassic times. Why? Because 1,000 tons of space dust falls on the earth every year. I've had too much wine to do the math - but I have done the math at other times - and believe me, that's a lot of dust since Jurassic times.

Now. I'm going to bed. I've run out of wine.

I haven't been as present around the Sift these last couple of weeks - I've gone back to work for at least the next six months. It's depressing and bleak after 7 months of working on projects from home, but it had to be done.

I'll be around in the Australian evenings while most of you are embedded in your beds - but my overall time will be curtailed.

The nice thing is that the Sift seems to function exactly the same without my presence. I know, totally shocking - being a cyber-solipsist I thought for sure the site would disappear unless I was here pressing the reload button on recent comments every 30 seconds.

It's almost 2 years since the inception of VideoSift - and I don't think I've engaged in a proper rant in that time. It's high time I spacked out - it's cathartic.

I understand that there are a lot of passionate people in this community. It's one of my favourite things about this place. I actually like reading 5 paragraph long comments- it's never TLDR for me.

But if you feel passionately about an issue pertaining to this community- why not make a Sift Talk post about it? I get some fairly well thought out, interesting screeds in my profile. They might pertain to unfair derision and violations of privacy, the unfairness of mob justice or the ILLUSION OF SIFTOCRACY.

Not to say that I don't like having conversations with you - I do - but for big stuff that effects the rules, philosophy or culture of the site- I think it's better out than in. Have the cojones or ovarias to put it out there for everyone to discuss. - especially if it pertains to me. I have a reasonably thick skin- and I'm not immune to fuck-ups. I can also be an arrogant prick. Look, here's an example:

Darwin save the Sift from angry, idealistic young men who see the world in shades of black and white.

I was ambling down the halls of my local shopping centre today- on my way to a long black with a side of milk- when this new shop caught my attention. To be honest, I'm kind of surprised that it got the go-ahead from the shopping centre management- sure it's cheeky, but yeah basing your whole brand around a pun with "shit" seems a bit off. mmmm, nothing goes better together than the shit and sheets- ask any rest home worker, and they'll agree.

I never get a call in the middle of the night. My family in the US have Australian time down pat- and know when to call me at a reasonable hour.

In fact, the last time I got a 3AM call, it was September 11, 2001. I watched CNN till dawn. (it was piped live through all Australian networks)

So, when I awoke from a deep sleep last night to the phone ringing, my first thought was bad news. In fact, the very first thought that entered my head, even before I was fully awake was- "they got Obama". Weird, huh?

I suppose it's all of the comparisons to JFK, RFK and MLK - besides being great orators- those guys have one thing in common.

My second thought was that it was Lucky, telling me the Sift had been hacked by Russian pirates and was now serving trojans to all comers.

Turned out that it was some ad sales dude from the US wanting us to host their ads on VideoSift- sales people think the world works on a single time zone.

Persephone got up to take the call- her legs work better after a quick wake up than mine. She told me who it was, and I think I might have told them to fuck off or something. Sorry Mr. ad salesman- whoever you were.

If you've been following the drama of the mysterious law clerk- this is the last chapter.
I received a PDF letter by email today from Hansen, Jacobson, Teller, Hoberman, Newman & Richman. The offending post is ...[drum roll]
Sam Raimi's "Within the Woods".
The letter informs me that Sam Raimi did not give permission for the film to streamed or published on the Internet.
So, it's coming down now - sorry Sam, I didn't actually watch it- but I bet I would have liked it more than Spiderman 3.

This collection of weird old ads was very interesting.  This one was my favorite:

 

My mom used to mix Dr. Pepper with milk in my sippy cup.  But she's from Oklahoma - and I thought it might have been a poor Southern thing.

With the new year comes change.  It looks like I'll be heading back to work in the next few weeks.  I had a great contract last year that allowed me to take several months off - but  the time has finally come.

No, VideoSift does not support any full-time employees yet - though I look forward to the day when it will.  (and it will)  So, you'll probably be seeing a bit less of me around during the Australia day- but I'll still be here in the evenings - and most likely - into the wee hours.

E to VideoSift
    
We would like a video removed due to copyright infringement.  My
lawyer boss would like to know your address and/or facsimile number to
send out a formal cease/desist letter for our client .

Pls. provide me with the requested info. to xxxx@xxx.com.  Thanks
much

---

Brian Houston to E

We don't have a fax, and we are not in the United States- however if you would like to tell me the content you are referring to, I'll see that it gets taken down.

Also, just a heads up.  We don't actually host any video- we just embed from sites like YouTube et al.  You will need to contact those sites to see that it is actually deleted.

Regards,

Brian Houston

---

 
 E to Brian Houston
    
Thank you.  We will send out the letter to you next week via email.

We will also contact Youtube and google.

---

Brian Houston to E
    
That's ridiculous.  Why don't you just tell me what you want taken down, and I'll remove it?

---

E to Brian Houston
    
It's not ridiculous because I DON'T send out the letter.  The attorney wants to write you on behalf of our client and include the website info. and sign it.   I am just doing the research for our client.

Hope you understand.

---

Brian Houston to E    
    
OK fine - I'll look forward to the letter - though we probably could have saved your client a billable hour with the attorney if you just told me what the offending content was, and I took it down- we're pretty responsive that way.   Suit yourself.

Cheers

---

E to Brian Houston

Thank you again, we will send the letter next week.

---

Brian Houston to E

Honestly, how can your expect me to give you any information beyond my email address - in response to an anonymous email without your own credentials or contact information provided.  Sorry, but that's creepy.  Whatever your percentage is, I hope it's small - because I'm half convinced that this is some kind of scam run out of Nigeria.

Regardless, we will respond to your letter.   We do our best to  respect copyright holder wishes on clips - even though we do not host them.

 

 

---

E to Brian Houston

 

 Sorry but trust me it is not a scam whatsoever and I belong to a real law office.
Will reply with letter next week and I'm glad you will do your utmost to handle our copyright issues.

Best,
Exxxx
Legal Asst. to Jxxx Mxxx, Esq.

Wet and muddy rainforest camping.  2 Days in the mountains behind the Gold Coast, here in Queensland.  The highlight was a walk through the rainforst canopy at O'Reilly's.  The bridge felt kind of Indiana Jonesish- and it was a good 40 feet to the forest floor.

 

In the middle of the walk, there's a ladder that takes you up to a platform at the very, very tippy top of one of the biggest trees in the forest.

 At the end of the walk there's an area where the local wild birds are accustomed to coming in and feeding from the hikers.  (Birdseed is sold nearby)  There were King parrots and whatever this thing is on my hand, everywhere.

The kids loved it, and a nice soggy time was had by all - though it's good to be home. 

 

Christmas in Australia means lots of fresh summer fruit.  We bought this tray of organic mangos. 

The presents have been wrapped, the turkey is brining, the Charles Darwin ornaments hung.   (just kidding, no Darwin-  but we do have Kali the destroyer on the tree)

 I've got my cap, or kercheif- one of those.   One more sleep 'till the big day.  Hope you all have a great blustery day up North- after we open presents, we're heading to the beach for a swim... but I'll be dreaming of something else:

 

via reddit via Popurls

I have been reading about Google's new translation bots that you can inject into a Gtalk conversation.  I tried them out with my friend Hosokawa in Osaka.  The results were less than perfect.  The way it works is that you invite the bots in to your group chat to act as translators.  There is a bot en2ja for the english to Japanese translation and another, ja2en for translating the other way.

Here's a partial transcript:

 me: How is the weather?
 en2ja: 天気予報はどのようにしますか？
12:42 PM toyohiko: 今日の大阪の天気は曇りです。
 en2ja: 今日の大阪の天気は曇りですます。
 ja2en: Today's weather is cloudy Osaka.
 me: Is it cold?
 en2ja: それは、寒いの？
 toyohiko: 寒いけれども昨日よりは暖かい。
 en2ja: 寒いけれども昨日よりは暖かいます。
 ja2en: But yesterday was warm from the cold.
12:43 PM me: It is hot and humid here today.
 en2ja: それは高温多湿本日ここにいます。
 toyohiko: 気温は？
 en2ja: 気温はか？
 ja2en: Temperature?
 toyohiko: こちらの気温は18度ぐらいです。
 en2ja: こちらの気温は18度ぐらいですます。
 ja2en: The temperature was 18 degrees much more.
 me: Hold on, I'll check my widget.
 en2ja: ちょっと待って、私が私のウィジットをチェックします。
12:44 PM me: It is 29 degrees here.
 en2ja: それは29度です。
 me: Any snow this year?
 en2ja: 今年はどんな雪ですか？
 toyohiko: 雪はまったく降りません。
 en2ja: 雪はまったく降りませんます。
 ja2en: Snow was降RIMASEN.
12:45 PM me: I understand.
 en2ja: 分かりました。
 toyohiko: 梅雨ですか？
 ja2en: The rainy season?
 en2ja: 梅雨ですかか？
 me: Summer is the rainy season here.
 en2ja: ここでは、夏の雨季にします。
 me: We are getting a lot of rain recently.
 en2ja: 私たちは、多くの雨が最近取得します。
12:46 PM toyohiko: こちらは雨も雪もふりません。
 en2ja: こちらは雨も雪もふりませんます。
 ja2en: More rain and snow is also FURIMASEN.
 toyohiko: 降りません
 ja2en: 降RIMASEN
12:47 PM toyohiko: 降ることはありません。
 en2ja: 降ることはありませんます。
 ja2en: It is not down.
 me: haha. Bad robot!
 en2ja: だってします。ロボット悪い！
12:48 PM me: What will you do for the coming holiday?
 en2ja: 何をするために、今後の休日ですか？
 toyohiko: 明日から3連休だけど予定はありませんよ。
 en2ja: 明日から3連休だけど予定はありませんよます。
 ja2en: Tomorrow from the three-day weekend, but I have no plans.
12:49 PM me: We are staying home too.
 en2ja: 私たちはあまりにもホームに滞在します。
 me: The roads are crazy this time of year.
 en2ja: 道路がクレイジー年のこの時期にします。
12:50 PM toyohiko: クレイジー？　　渋滞？
 en2ja: クレイジーですか？渋滞ですか？
 ja2en: Crazy? Congestion?
 me: Yes. and bad drivers.
 ja2en: Yes. Drivers and bad.
 en2ja: はい。悪いとドライバがあります。
 toyohiko: 運転が下手な人が多いのですか？
 en2ja: 運転が下手な人が多いのですかか？
 ja2en: Driving is a lot of poor people?
12:51 PM me: no.
 en2ja: ありませんします。
 me: Terrible drivers.
 en2ja: ひどいドライバがあります。
 me: That's better.
 en2ja: それは良くなりました。
 me: You should come to Australia some time.
 en2ja: オーストラリアのいくつかの時間になる必要があります。
 me: I would like to show you around.
 en2ja: あなたの周りに表示したいと思います。
12:54 PM en2ja has left
  ja2en@bot.talk.google.com has left
 me: Nooo! come back.
 en2ja: nooo ！戻ってきました。

 The technology has a long way to go - but I'm going to say 10 years before Google makes near-perfect on-the-fly tranlation work.

The next money bomb has begun. Here's the official site for it. And here's a live stream for Ron Paul radio.
You can watch the graphs go up here.

All shirts are officially in the mail today.  It took a little longer than I thought- as I wanted to wait until our fundraiser was finished.

I noticed a couple of interesting things on getting the shirts together to mail.  The first is that as a group we seem to skew to the large size, with lots of Ls and XLs.  

The other thing I noticed was that many US people didn't provide the country name when they gave me the address, though everyone from other countries always included it.  ... Just thought that was interesting.

 

I'm ready to send off some t-shirts.

 Here's the top-15 as it stands now:

 I'll be putting a message in each of your profiles with a request for an address and size-if you don't want a shirt or don't want to give your address - I totally understand - and no hard feelings at all.  Please respond within the next 48 hours - as I'd like to get these in the mail to avoid the Christmas rush!

 Sizes are XL, L, M, S.  They don't shrink much at all.

 

 

 As you may remember- our recent batch of t-shirts got pulled from our fulfillment company.  I think we managed to violate the copyright of YouTube and the Buggles at the same time. ;-)

 So now we have all of these shirts laying around.

 If only I knew of some deserving people who would appreciate them ...

 

Untitled from dagmaggot on Vimeo.

So here's the deal.  We want to say thanks to the prominent Sifters who have made VideoSift what it is today.  I'll be sending shirts to everyone on the Top 15 as it reads at midnight December 1st. 

 The rest of the shirts will be used as awards for meritorious service to the Sift and prizes for upcoming community competitions.  

 We will have another go at t-shirts, but there will never be another set like these limited edition ones.  They've destroyed the screen and this is it.  (You might want to just wrap it in plastic an bequeath it to your grandchildren )

It's such a simple game but I've been sucked in.  I started using the "maze" strategy, thinking it should be the way to go, because it keeps the little baddies on the screen the longest.  I was never able to finish the medium difficulty setting though.

 This video below gave me the strategy I needed - I can finish the medium level every time, and have almost finished the "100" challenge.

   If you get tired of the simple scribbly graphics of the original Desktop Tower Defense- here's a knock-off  that has more realistic graphics, terrains and sounds.