I have been visiting that "Let's Compare" channel like over a year so far. I remember those table tops. Also, I recently saw these other reviews:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZu-0KafeCM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dxquNvgrJUI



Oh, I was an Atari 2600 player!

I had some nostalgia fever recently and ran across these "Let's Compare" videos a day before seeing your Pac-Man homebrew submission, so I had to post this.

Had you not seen that channel before? Between YouTube and emulators it's fun to revisit the old favourites, and the ones you may have missed. Can you guess which company I was a fan of way back when?

Almost forgot to mention I had that Pac-Man table top game they show at the end.

OK. Looking extremely closely and using paper to block out the image, I have to say they fudged things on some of them.
I saw two grey pills the whole time.
The colored tiles fade to grey as they "mask off" the other tiles, they start no where near the shade of grey they end up as, their color has faded a lot in the process.
The grey tiles on the floor also change shades as they are 'masked off' quite clearly. I went 1/4 speed, and also tried masking them off myself, they clearly faked this one.
I put a straight edge on the checker board and sure enough, those lines are slightly curved....just barely but they are.
The two table tops are NOT the same size at first, I measured and the vertical table is definitely longer on the long side. That one's obvious. (EDIT:I'm wrong about that)
The spinning dots does work for me, as do convex images and auditory illusions.
So I'm not ready to call 'fake' on this, but IMO it's fudged badly.

Not to defend the study which could be flawed as any study (and many are) but your analysis ignored a part that they did emphasize in this and the original experiment with children...strangeness.

They're not at home and they introduce the aspect of a stranger intentionally to play on the social constructs that we as humans use and are thus trying to understand in the animals we keep as pets.

Being in a foreign environment with strangers present is an automatic trigger for social animals (even adult humans will tend to cling to a familiar face at a foreign social gathering) and so if that social connection exists in a similar way between cats and humans one would hope to see it manifest itself as well.

I imagine if you did this with kittens and their mothers or vice versa you would likely see the results they were looking for. Which would beg the question: how different is the relationship between the cat family and the relationship of that cat to its human owner?

In the end I don't think people are arguing that cats don't care at all but instead when compared to the relationship between human/human and human/dog perhaps it is just not the same.

Would you argue that a horse, bird, fish, or snake can "love" a human as deeply as a cat? I've seen all of those show affection towards human owners. If not then what is the scale with which we measure an animals affinity for us relative to each other if not their intense desire to associate with us specifically as their owner?

I also find it interesting that I can't recall hearing cat owners point out a showing of affection by cats that we don't find in dogs although I HAVE heard of uniquely cat methods of revenge (jaws and claws being equal I've never heard of dogs using table tops to terrify cell phones and other treasured human items). So you could almost argue that if cats don't love humans more than dogs they may dislike us more than dogs in their efforts to devise methods of inflicting pain on us.

I'd also like to point out on a personal note that even in an adult human, if I took them somewhere and they walked away, watched me leave, then come back, all the while never knowing why we were there, with whom they're now left with, or if I was ever coming back....and the person didn't even care to greet me upon my return then I wouldn't exactly say that person cared about me at all much less liked me or loved me....just saying.
.

Soooo.....why make a tiny forge for a table-top when you could go the short distance further and build a more efficient and safer example?
I trust home-project enthusiasts with this how-to video like I trust an Alabama neighbor with deep-frying a turkey in the driveway next door.

He's got a great show on youtube called Table Top where he and 3 random other celebrities (internet or otherwise) play various table top games. It's really fun

I just watched 30 minutes of other people playing table top games. Going to play videogames on my own now.

LIVING THE DREAAAAAMMMM

Ok, I know this is not going to come across well but I'm not really that impressed with a 4th grader going down a ski jump. Between 2nd and 9th grade. I really did not know much fear. Really, none of the kids I hung out with did. Scraps, cuts and bruises were badges of we had fun. Hell at the little clinic/Doc's office in the area almost all of us knew the doctors and nurses on a first name bases. The 9th grade was the big learning experience. Misjudged a table top jump that went in to a 40 foot drop in to a bowl.(BMX) I personally do not remember what happened but what I was told is I clipped a tree, spun, bounced off several more, went through a heavy thicket of dead wood 30 something feet in to a dried up creek. I woke up 2 weeks later and was told I had had a compound fracture left arm, broken collar bone, punctured lung and broken ankle. I'll tell you I damn well learned to fear after that. But, then Got a car not to long after that and forgot everything had to learn fear again. Of course the hard way.

But the POV camera was cool.

Robin Williams is a major long term gamer, and not just video games.

He plays the Warhammer table top miniature game - he apparently has a massive Ork army.

For what it is worth, he used to frequent the Games Workshop store at the Metreon in San Francisco for his Warhammer fix and sometimes go across to the Portal One video arcade there as well where he would play DDR with his kids.

rychan - I upvoted your comment. I continue to be astonished at how many people really believe these hoaxes. I think the camera should have shown what's under the table. Why did the lid need to be tilted and come close to the table top?

But your logic is flawed. You say "no black civilisation has flourished therefore black civilisations are failures of their own device."

If i knocked down every house of cards built on a SurfaceSmooth™ table top, would that mean that SurfaceSmooth™ table tops are poor surfaces for card-house building?

You have provided nothing to demonstrate that these black civilisations have failed because of their own shortcomings. I'm not getting involved in whether you're racist or not. Your logic doesn't work though.

I spent way to much time behind a magnifying glass, and far too much money on the table top version of this game as a kid. Now i just wish i had a black lotus to sell to recoup the years of ubernerdom.

You're a yob or you're a wanker -
Take your fucking choice
So who is your favourite genius
James Hird or James Joyce?
You ever seen a live performance?
Join the wanker club
You thought I meant table top dancing?
You're a yobbo, bub

What are ya? Yob or wanker?

Wankers once used mobile phones
But now that's sorta changing
And yobs once lived in cottage homes -
Ain't social change amazing?
If a yob and wanker want a girl
The wanker guy will get her -
Both of them are equally ugly
But the wanker hides it better

What are ya? Yob or wanker?

A wanker fights inequality
And for people's rights;
A wanker fights class prejudice
A yobbo just fights
Yob or wanker - wanker or yob
Pass me the brush to tar ya:
Make your choice then live your life;
Come on pal, what are ya?

Politics for a majority of Americans is a matter of table top issues, what affects their conversations at the dinner table. Like taxes, gay rights, abortion and so on.

The concepts of constitutional abuse, wiretapping, habeas corpus, FISA and so on are at most times beyond their understanding. Because the media doesn't clarify on these issues, nor do most believe that the government could do these things.

Depressing.

i want one! at my work deskwith evrything hidden and stored out of sight, no wires, no cables, just the table top interface
soon they will develop this so that it can fit in thin spaces, such as embedded in a wall or any other surface (or even flexible!!!) i want one of those gigantic wall sized ones from perceptivepixel