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Greenpeace: "Mister Splashy Pants the whale - you named him, now save him"

Looks like the 'whale name' Mr. Splashy Pants won! Greenpeace is now encouraging us to save him.

To learn how to save a whale named Mr. Splashy Pants...
go HERE!


Okay, all kidding aside to actually save him go Here

Oh, and that neat button is available here: http://www.cafepress.com/greenpeace

Vote Mister Splashy Pants in '08

Greenpeace is having a whale naming competition. "More than 11,000 possible whale names were submitted but we are now down to the last 30 possible whale names..."
No signing up, no nuthin', just ROCK THE VOTE! It would be wrong for me to influence your decision, but, er... um... COME ON! "VOTE"

Thank You Science For What We Are About To Receive

In promoting their “How It’s Made Marathon” The Science Channel recommends the following...

“This Thanksgiving, when you’re doling out the gratitude, don’t forget to thank science for everything on the table.”

You heard what the man said and thats The Science Channel talking. Finally, some rational thinking. Thank God. DAMMIT!
Way Ahead Of You Science Channel. I am SO volunteering to say grace this year. :)
Marathon begins 7pm on Thanksgiving.

When Attenborough Says So... it IS so.

An Ad That Resonates With This Viewer (or My Ad's On Vibrate For You)

There’s this company called Marathon Oil Corporation and they’ve been running an ad like crazy. It’s standard stuff following in the foot steps of British Petroleum. Female employee says “I’m proud of what we are doing here in Garyville, LA... cleanest, safest, newest...” You know the drill. I understand softening the image of an oil corporation and have no comment on the tactic.

But I brought up the ad for some damn reason right? Right. About seven seconds into the ad there is a note that seems a little out of place in the pretty little background melody. It’s sort of a low tone. What is so cool about this tone is how well it mimics the sound of a cell phone vibrating in a jacket pocket somewhere. Every time the commercial plays I look up and wonder where my phone is and why the ringer isn’t on. Then I realize “its that damn Marathon commercial again.” Nice Job Marathon/whomever made your ad. It is a total attention grabber. I wish I could play the ad for you folks here, but alas I cannot find it and it might not come across as well on your computers audio.

I guess I am mainly curious if anyone else has noticed the phenomenon. If ya have leave a comment. Thanks.

UPDATE: Turns out Marathon has always been a forerunner in television advertising... "1963 Marathon Ad"

The New Honda Fit Ads Stink

Is Honda serious with this ad? THE SUPER GAS-PASSER? I mean isn’t that the guy who used to fart God Save The Queen on the Howard Stern Show.
Well, we are either looking at one of those hilarious car company blunders like poor sales of the Chevy Nova in Spain where No-Va translates to No Go. (never really happened)... Or this is an attempt to go viral and get unsuspecting, sucker bloggers to draw attention to Honda's new Fit...
DAMMIT!

Expect A Lot More Mac-Ups

It looks like one of the things I adore about Apple products has come back to bite me in the arse. Simplicity of design. The iPhone is the epitome of simplicity. Turn it off and you’ve got an onyx slab with a chrome rim. This simplicity of design has made it possible for every Tom, Dick and Harry (with Photoshop, "The Gimp" or MS Paint) to be able to do a “mock-up” of an Apple product with little to no effort. With that in mind I have done a “Mac-Up” of the iSwitch.

Boston Continues To Mistake LEDs for WMDs

Boston is at it again. An MIT student wearing a home made LED T-Shirt (NOT pictured above. thats just my take) has been arrested at gunpoint and faces "bomb hoax" charges.
It is however unfair to be exclusively angry with the city of Boston. In Google News countless headlines proclaim things like "Woman arrested at Logan Airport with fake bomb strapped to chest." Here is a link to a much more accurate headline "MIT Sophomore Arrested at Logan For Wearing LED Device."

Digg On The Word

If I haven't already mentioned it. Digg.com is site I use to find many of the precious nuggets of whale vomit the Internet has to offer. Tonight Digg.com was given the distinction of being mentioned on the left sided, left side of "The Word" on the Colbert Report. Sure it was used to call out the users of Digg.com as lazy, armchair activists, but we aint proud. \o/ digg.com \o/

Is Amex Protected From Unexpected Problems. or Bashing The Tina Fey Amex Ad. or Get A Job Dave You're Scaring Us.

Tina Fey AmEx commercial
Uploaded by nycspitters

Did you ever see an ad on television and it just doesn't get its message across. Maybe I just watch too much TV... No, I definitely watch too much TV, but these problems in ads always catch my attention. Sometimes an important line is hard to understand or the message is lost in bad editing, but most times I see the ad again a few days later and its been repaired and I think “nice, they noticed it too.”

Well, Amex’s new Tina Fey ad is chock full of these errors and yet it keeps running as is. I am amazed at how faulty this ad is and just had to run through the list of what needs to be fixed.

1. “Change the bear to a shark.” This line is mumbled quickly and I doubt most are catching what it is on the first listen.
2. “These are my divorce papers.” Beside the line being swallowed. The joke is that the papers were not handed to Tina, but she has grabbed them out of habit and comments on how funny they are, but the poor cut in which she takes the papers does not illustrate well that they were not intended for her review. We might piece together the joke better if the closing line “they’re hilarious” was more comprehendible.
3. “Miss Fey, the snake wrangler got bit again.” Another line delivered quickly and clumsily.
4. “Which flute too den a moopie sketch.” After ten attempts I am still unsure what this guy is saying. Obviously “which flute” is all that matters, but I cant help wonder what comes between those words and “sketch.”
5. Finally, Amex calls to ask Tina if she used the card to purchase 14,000 racquet balls. Ok, nice of them to call, but are we supposed to be impressed at their ability to catch such an outlandish charge? More racquet balls than Tina could use in her lifetime? (at 5 balls a weekend for the next 50 years)

Yes, this is all nitpicking, but I love Amex. (I will love them even more when they get me back 200 bucks back for my iPhone purchase) I expect more from them. I also love Tina Fey. She deserves better. Amex's Ellen Degeneres ad was flawless and even won an Emmy. Pull it together guys. This kind of shoddy work makes me think you may be slipping.

T-Shirts And Stuff

“A long time ago... You ran out of clean shirts. Let your geek flag fly with these awesome nerdy tees.”

That’s the headline? Really? “A long time ago... You ran out of clean shirts?” No wonder this is their last issue.
According to the right-hand corner of the October issue of STUFF Magazine they are calling it quits... But not before FEATURING my At-At Boo Boo (or as its legally called Boo Boo Walker) smack dab in the middle of their STAR WEARS piece. Sweet action! (Sweet Action, now that was a mag. Where the hell did they go?)

The Star Wars based Boo Boo Walker t-shirt is available in the form of tees, and hoodies at Go Ape Shirts.

CBGB Founder, Hilly Kristal Dies at Age 75

"Hilly was a father to so many of us whacky punk rockers.

We'll all miss him very, very much. Thanks for everything Hilly.

A private memorial service is planned. A public memorial will be held
at a later date. Contributions in Hilly's honor may be made in his
name to the American Cancer Society or to the Hilly Kristal Foundation for
Musicians and Artists (168 Second Avenue, PMB 207, New York, NY 10003)."

Post stolen verbatim from Richard Bucchus' Bicycle Diaries.

The Peter Griffin Emoticon

Just when you thought there were no more possible emoticons I give you The Peter Grifficon!
8u)3
The discovery took place when I attempted to put a beard on a smiley using the number sign and neglected to hit the shift key.

StrasseWaffe (or Google Street View Troop Surge)

You know Google Street View means business when you see them amassing a fleet 30 strong. This is merely the squadron of CCCCs (Chevy Cobalt Camera Cars) that happened to get spotted and reported to Gizmodo.com. Who knows what armies are being amassed by Google in the dark corners of the globe. My advice to you all is to remember to look left then right and left again to check for CCCCs before you... Exit porn shops and strip joints, pay drug dealers and hookers or even scratch/pick your nose for that matter.

Walking On Water (Environmental Infraction From Ralph Lauren)

The Manhattan Ralph Lauren Rugby store (why the word rugby even enters into it is beyond me) has got a whole lot of nerve when it comes to dressing their stores windows. I enjoy the convenience of bottled water and buy it often, but at this point it is fairly common knowledge that imported bottled water has a terrible impact on the environment. So who could possibly think it is reasonable to use 256 bottles of the stuff as window dressing for their pretentious store? I guess the same folks who think a window with 24 box fans running all day every day is also a great idea.

Get Over Yourself (Pale Blue Film)

Carl Sagan’s words. Clips from 64 films. Music by Mogwai. And a single photo of a “pale blue dot” taken by Voyager I from 4 billion miles away. These things combine to provide us with perhaps more perspective than we can possibly bare.

Thank you Pale Blue Films.

GOOGLE MAPS STREET VIEW! (Or The Google Has Landed!)

My friend RR and I always talked about driving around Manhattan with a camera on our roof, crisscrossing every street snapping photos until we had a virtual, walk-thru map of the city. Now, nearly 10 years later BEHOLD Google Maps STREET VIEW. Just go to maps.google.com. Click on STREET VIEW, zoom in enough to pick a street outlined in blue and BLAMMO you are on that street. And once you have planted your virtual feet on the virtual street you can choose a direction and start walking. I don't know what cities are completed but Manhattan, New York is and Portland, Maine is not. Oh my science this is cool!
By the way that’s the NYC Hell’s Angels Club House up there on the right. (click pic for larger)

At At Boo Boo Doing It On The Paper (Happy 30th Star Wars) FREE WALLPAPERS

Hey 30 years of Star Wars! Holy crap I am ancient. But I am cool too. So I am blogging about the 30 years of Star Wars. Okay, I’m not cool either. Regardless I would like to do my part and give something back. The links below will take you to the Free At At Boo Boo Walker Wallpapers. My own design which was converted into a T-shirt by GoApeShirts.com. There are no ads or logos on these wallpapers so just download and enjoy on me.

2 Styles available in 2560x1600, 1280x1024 and 1600x1200.
Art Style 1280x1024
Art Style 1600x1200
Art Style 2560x1600
Real Style 1280x1024
Real Style 1600x1200
Real Style 2560x1600

Tattoogle (Best/Worst Tattoo Ever)

Oh my dear, dear friend. What have you done? I said get something Geek Chic not Geek FREAK! I wonder where she will put Yahoo!

Make it. Print it. Pack it. F#@k it.

I have decided to post this picture in lieu of an elaborate shooting spree I was planning. If you’ve ever been to a Kinko’s you know the feeling.

Dave Chappelle knows what I’m talking about... Here (skip ahead a bit)

"So Close, So Close, Yet So Far Away"

Everybody is so excited about Gliese 581! The headlines say things like... “Scientists find most Earth-like planet yet!”
And they go on to say things like... "this planet will most probably be a very important target of future space missions."

Really? Future space missions? Maybe EXTREMELY distant future space missions. Do the people writing this crap have any notion how far away this planet is? First keep this in mind: so far our record for traveling in space is 1.3 billion miles. (And that's in orbit.) Now look, a light year is about 6 trillion miles. So we are talking about a planet 120 Trillion miles away. A distance I regrettably believe we will never ever come close to traveling. And yet 120 Trillion miles is a laughably short distance to travel and expect to find the incredible combinations of factors that can produce life. Looking to Gliese 581 for life is akin to looking for the holy grail in your pockets.

Don't get me wrong. I say keep looking, keep reaching, dreaming, spending whatever it takes. But I just want to remind everyone that our sun is like a grain of sand on an inconceivably large beach and we haven't made it a mentionable fraction of the distance to even our neighboring grain of sand.

Read about it at World-Science.net

Best Description Of War Ever

The following is an exerpt from Slaugherhouse 5 by Kurt Vonnegut who has died at age 84. The book is about a guy named Billy Pilgram who has become dissjointed in time and does not experience time linearly as we do. At some point Billy watches a WWII film on the TV in reverse... From end to beginning with this simple yet wonderful description. I had to share it. (again)

American planes, full of holes and wounded men and corpses took off backwards from an airfield in England. Over France, a few German fighter planes flew at them backwards, sucked bullets and shell fragments from some of the planes and crewmen. They did the same for wrecked American bombers on the ground, and those planes flew up backwards to join the formation.

The formation flew backwards over a German city that was in flames. The bombers opened their bomb bay doors, exerted a miraculous magnetism which shrunk the fires, gathered them into cylindrical steel containers, and lifted the containers into the bellies of the planes. The containers were stored neatly in racks. The Germans below had miraculous devices of their own, which were long steel tubes. They used them to suck more fragments from the crewmen and planes. But there were still a few wounded Americans, though, and some of the bombers were in bad repair. Over France, though, German fighters came up again, made everything and everybody as good as new.

When the bombers got back to their base, the steel cylinders were taken from the racks and shipped back to the United States of America, where factories were operating night and day, dismantling the cylinders, separating the dangerous contents into minerals. Touchingly, it was mainly women who did this work. The minerals were then shipped to specialists in remote areas. It was their business to put them into the ground, to hide them cleverly, so they would never hurt anybody ever again.

Writer Kurt Vonnegut dies at 84

What's Another Word For Thesaurus?

Turns out the Dictionary/Thesaurus widget on my Mac is a bit opinionated. I love it.
Check out the Thesaurus' sample sentence.

Reality Virtualy

What the? Is this some unfinished CGI? Nope. Wonder woman’s car? Nope, it’s a 1:1 scale Subaru Impreza wire frame sculpture by British artist Benedict Radcliffe and in no uncertain terms it freakin’ rules! More pics HERE.

“Not Bird, Nor Plane, Nor Even Frog... No Wait It IS A FROG!"

Looks like Go Ape Shirts has another winning t-shirt on its hands. Superfrog Found! is a tee by Blair Sayer and Graye Smith. I have already ordered mine. I suggest you do the same. And for those of you who don’t get the headline here is the full original quote:

"Not bird, nor plane, nor even frog, it's just little 'ole me, Underdog!"

GE Uses DVRs To Make Commercials LONGER!

During SNL last night there was a GE commercial. It was a sort of nauseating, CGI, 'super frog's eye view' journey through how GE makes life better for everyone. At the very end a half a dozen frames went by so fast that their content was imperceptible. So of course my ReplayTV (Tivo like DVR that actually came first) is put into action and viewing the portion frame by frame I was treated to the story of The Frog Prince as told by the frog or The Ugly Princess. More interestingly GE has decided to say “So you’ve got a device that can skip commercials... Bet we can make you watch our commercial even longer.” My hat is off to GE. I had been waiting for some DVR countering innovation. As I mentioned HEREover a year ago. Oh, and GE has details here HERE

Gimme Some Credit

You know you did a good job parodying a genre when a song you wrote for an imaginary band which would eventually become an imaginary super band gets picked up for an actual American Express commercial. Gimme Some Money is a song by The Thamesmen, a band that never existed and went on to never actually be Spinal Tap. Sweet.

Thamesmen performing Gimme Some Money on GoogleVideo

Why Didn’t I Think Of That? OH WAIT I DID! The Upside Down Cell phone

I had a bad feeling as soon as I saw the words “Irish inventor patents upside down cell phone” on Digg.com. I clicked the link and just as I suspected the picture at Core77.com showed me what I came up with almost 3 years ago. Oh well at least I have a record of it... Dammit! Now that I look at Blogger and Flickr (where I uploaded my picture to) I see that the dates are editable in both cases. Oh well you will have to take my word on it.
Where I wrote about it on GNF.
Where I posted a picture on flickr.com

Come Together. Right Now.

Looks like Apple Computer (as in Apple Inc., as in Macs) and Apple Corps as in (Where advertisers go for Beatles songs that sell cars and sneakers) have settled their pesky trademark dispute. You can read about it HERE at BusinessWeek.com. But if you are clicking that link to see if you can finally download Revolver off of iTunes don’t bother. The two Apples may have kissed, but they have not made-up. How 'Bout Them Apples!

Aqua Teen Terror Force

Ha! Look at that. Now that is effective marketing! Way too effective perhaps. Adult Swim of Cartoon Network scared the crap out of Boston today. Some simple "Light Brite style" boards were scattered around half a dozen cities to promote Aqua Teen Hunger Force (more likley their upcoming movie.) The boards laid undisturbed in Boston for 3 weeks and then suddenly the calls started coming in. My guess is either someone decided to help "blow up" the campaign. Or someone who didn't like the campaign was hoping to make trouble for the company responsible. The story is here at The Bostonist

UPDATE: Innocent victims of uneccesary bomb scare lose all of my respect by portraying themselves as complete asses at press confrence. See it here.

SIRRY LABBITS

I could not help but go for the evil bunny trifecta today. With that in mind I present to you Japanese musical mad-scientists...

DEATH RABBITS! WARNING: Direct link to fairly harmless MySpace Page.

If you dare sample a track I recommend Kichiku Hitsugi Etsuhari COMPLEX. It is awesome... or horrible... I am not sure. We can only hope that they are sponsored by a army of hair care companies. This concludes my pointless Death Rabbit series. Good night and good humor.

More Death Rabbits

Witness the lapin carnage that is ODE TO JOY!!!!!!

Brought to you by Project K

Cute And Deadly

Frisky Dingo is the best thing from Adult Swim (Cartoon Network) since Venture Brothers. All 13 episodes are available on iTunes. Two bucks each or buy the season for 14.99.

Direct iTunes Link

Be All That You Can Be

I am a graphic designer so I can print up a believable business card for any purpose nearly as fast as Jim Rockford. And yet I have never had a good reason to do so, but if you are shadier than me and find yourself needing to come across as an official in the fields of... Corrections, Highway Patrol, Homeland Security, Police, Security Private, or Sheriff. This site seems ready to oblige.

gfx.ecardbuilder.com (CAUTION: link goes directly to official cards.)

Am I going to order any? Hell no! I am probably already looking at an unsettling visit from guys with actual business cards just for posting this story.

Why Daddy Why?!

I was under the impression that geeks and nerds were really hitting their stride in the public eye. Terms like “Geek-Chic,” celebrities like Jack Black and Demetri Martin all had me thinking we were getting some respect. Then I get a slap in the face from GoDaddy.com. In a place where a geek should feel safe and in his element (a domain registry website) I was brutally attacked.

GoDaddy.com (as well as other companies) makes suggestions when the URL you are trying to snag is already taken. You try HobbitFans.com and they reply “HobbitFans.com is already taken. How about HobbitHome.com or HobbitSite.com?. It’s a helpful feature I suppose, but when you search GeekNerd.com and get DorkLoser.com as a suggested alternate well that’s just hurtful. >sniff<

Verizon... Free At Last, Free At Last...

Let’s say you find yourself trying to get out of your Verizon contract. Why? I don’t know. Let’s say you want to switch to a cooler phone that doesn’t work on their network. What phone? I don’t Know. Let’s say the Apple iPhone ... Which in fact only works on Cingular (soon to be called AT&T.)

If you break your contract early they will cry like infants, but more importantly they will fine you big bucks. But you knew that. What you may not have known is that if they change your service cost, in any way, it constitutes a breach on their end and you are no longer legally bound to them. That is why they will hate me for showing you THIS. .

It is a quiet little announcement that they are raising the cost of text messaging by a nickel. Not a big increase, but enough for you to break-up with them guilt (and cost) free. The folks at digg.com (where I discovered this) recommend that you really stick to your guns when using this loophole... Verizon will fight you on it.

UPDATE: From The Consumerist

Hey, Leave That Robot Alone!

Above is my favorite Robot to date. The Big Dog from Boston Dynamics The reason I am so excited about this particular robot is that it isn’t being remotely operated or following a pre-determined script of moves like some kind of over thought Big Trak.This robot is dealing with life on the fly... To the point that when its handlers cruelly try to kick it over its response is eerily lifelike.

Best Description Of War Ever

I am currently reading Slaughterhouse - Five. Maybe the best stocking stuffer I have received. The book is about a guy named Billy Pilgram who has become dissjointed in time and does not experience time linearly as we do. At some point Billy watches a WWII film on the TV in reverse... From end to beginning with this simple yet wonderful description. I had to share it.

American planes, full of holes and wounded men and corpses took off backwards from an airfield in England. Over France, a few German fighter planes flew at them backwards, sucked bullets and shell fragments from some of the planes and crewmen. They did the same for wrecked American bombers on the ground, and those planes flew up backwards to join the formation.

The formation flew backwards over a German city that was in flames. The bombers opened their bomb bay doors, exerted a miraculous magnetism which shrunk the fires, gathered them into cylindrical steel containers, and lifted the containers into the bellies of the planes. The containers were stored neatly in racks. The Germans below had miraculous devices of their own, which were long steel tubes. They used them to suck more fragments from the crewmen and planes. But there were still a few wounded Americans, though, and some of the bombers were in bad repair. Over France, though, German fighters came up again, made everything and everybody as good as new.

When the bombers got back to their base, the steel cylinders were taken from the racks and shipped back to the United States of America, where factories were operating night and day, dismantling the cylinders, separating the dangerous contents into minerals. Touchingly, it was mainly women who did this work. The minerals were then shipped to specialists in remote areas. It was their business to put them into the ground, to hide them cleverly, so they would never hurt anybody ever again.