The image to my left was posted on the Arrive Alive website from an anonymous citizen. As you’ll see, a very sturdy looking informal dwelling – with matching mini outside toilet – has been built entirely from official South African road signs. You see kids, this is exactly the reason why you simply cannot leave your house without a decent GPS in this country.
Man, Budweiser really wants you to drink their beer. I’m not going to, but I appreciate the effort they’re putting into the European re-branding initiative – like with this 7-meter Astroturf pool table, with built in fridge, that they put together for playing ‘poolball’ on. Take a look! It’s pretty rad.
Hemingway drank cocktails. I’m just saying that now so that any concerns about masculinity and ‘girly drinks’ are shelved from the get-go. Multimedia artist Marcos Lutyens has set up an installation that projects arsty scans from EEG headsets worn by people drinking Absolut vodka, and if boozey brain-waves isn’t art then I don’t know what is.
In what’s been the most radical political shift in about a century, Canadians yesterday voted the Conservative Party into a 100-seat majority – meaning first time in history, the New Democratic Party will form the Official Opposition. Former Prime Minister Harper’s government was forced into an election after a no-confidence vote in parliament.
But seriously! Lagerfield had a candy sculpture of Baptiste Giabiconi comissioned to promote Magnum ice cream. It’s wearing white briefs, and is placed inside of a room made of chocolate. There are so many comments to make about this that I am just going to report the facts and let you guys run with it, okay?
And you thought it was just Apple and Google! Gosh. TomTom has admitted that its satellite navigation devices can track users and report to third parties about how fast they’re going – like the police, for instance. Your TomTom is a speed camera now.Yay future.
German actress Antje Traue has been cast as ‘Faora,’ villainous accomplice to the no-less-ridiculous-sounding Zod in the Zack Snyder-directed Superman reboot. Since we’re now assured at least one slow-motion high-definition Traue scene, the reboot might be worth looking at, Snyder notwithstanding.
South African author Lauren Beukes’ novel Zoo City has won the 2011 Arthur C. Clarke Award, awarded to the best science fiction novel of the year published in the UK. This is a sort of huge deal – past winners of the award include Kuzuo Ishiguro, Iain M Banks, and China Mieville.
SpaceX – the guys who last year became the first to launch a private spaceship into orbit and bring it home – are planning on sending humans to Mars within 10 to 20 years, according to a Wall Street Journal interview with CEO Elon Musk. These guys have an X in their name, so we should take them seriously.
Don’t you just love a good small town monster story? If any of you drove through the Karoo over the Easter weekend, you may have been lucky enough to catch a glimpse of the shape-shifting creature which has reportedly been terrorising the town of Steytlerville since the end of March.
A couple of videos of young women dancing without shirts at a traditional Thai festival have gone viral – and despite the fact that this festival is one honouring Thai goddesses that are often depicted dancing without shirts, authorities have condemned the act, fining the dancers and threatening the photographer with jail time.
Old Spice has launched a new marketing campaign for its ‘Jungle Wilderness’ scent, featuring a vague parody of manly mascot Isaiah Mustafa. I mean, it’s funny and good but mostly I feel a big ol’ Isaiah Mustafa-shaped vacuum when watching this. Click through, though. Moustaches.
Today is the 20th of April and I have no idea what that means, but here Riki “Garfunkel” Lindhome and Kate “Oates” Micucci sing about the difficulties involved in trying to of obtain medical marijuana in California, directed by Raul B Fernandez. It’s cute, and enjoyable for regular and chemically-enhanced viewing.
The Syrian government yesterday passed a bill lifting the country’s decades-old emergency law, some hours after protesters were fired upon by security forces. This follows weeks of pro-reform demonstrations and protests. Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad has at this point not yet signed the bill into legislation.
A number of bloggers have been making reference to a ‘Jasmine Revolution,’ wherein Chinese citizens show discontent for local corruption by walking around crowded public areas on Sunday afternoons. This never happened, but Sunday walks did. Authorities are convinced that the protest is still happening.
Five years after their last big push against online gambling, which resulted in PartyGamings jump to German servers, the US Department of Justice is again making inroads – last Friday taking over the URLs for PokerStars, Full Tilt, & Absolute Poker, and seeking US $3 billion in civil penalties.
The opening of Burberry’s flagship Beijing store was marked by a holographic runway show. Holographic models walked through the virtual images of one another, flickering up and down the catwalk, and disappearing in pyrotechnic bursts. Also, Edie Campbell turned into Jourdan Dunn mid-stride – no spice.
Richard Metzger, television host and author, recently received an email from Facebook letting him know that a photo of his had been taken down for violating “Facebook’s Statement of Rights and Responsibilities,” which prohibits “nudity, or any kind of graphic or sexually suggestive content.” The photo in question was of two men kissing.
A life-sized, functional, AT-AT Walker. From The Empire Strikes Back. You know – those big walking four-legged suckers. If you’re still reading this I assume you know what I’m talking about, so click through to read about a giant nerd’s awesome plan to crowdsource building this thing.
Following President Vaclav Klaus’ pen theft during a trade ceremony with Chile, a 5 000-strong Facebook campaign has been launched in the Czech Republic to mail pens and stationery to his offices, because, “Mr. president obviously has nothing to write with.” As yet, there is no word on whether these pens are encrusted with semi-precious Chilean stones.
A resident of Temple City, California, is accused of running a fake military recruitment centre, where Chinese would-be-immigrants were made to pay to join a “special forces reserve” unit that would supposedly improve their chances of becoming US citizens. The “unit” is well known in Los Angeles, and was assumed to be genuine.
Donald Trump is many things. Once man’s tycoon is another’s cantankerous old curmudgeon. Our opinion of the man falls somewhere in between those two markers. Trump’s latest obsession is taking a permanent marker to negative press.
Classy. Mike Lazaridis, CEO of the Canadian firm behind Blackberry, was interviewed by the BBC yesterday; when asked about the problems they’d had with Indian and Middle East governments, who’d demanded greater access to the security system used by Blackberry, Lazaridis said the question was unfair and walked out on the interview.
Saru has announced that Port Elizabeth will host the South African leg of the HSBC Sevens World Series for the next four years, starting from the 2011/2012 season. The city of George has hosted the event for the last nine seasons. Good for you, Eastern Cape.
Which puts us behind Iran. The Global Peace Index, put together by the Institute for Economics & Peace, is apparently made up of a couple of factors – including levels of democracy and transparency, education and national wellbeing. Top three are New Zealand, Iceland and Japan, with Iraq coming in last (149th place).
Well done, internet. It’s nice to know that we have more or less global, instant information sharing networks set up so that people can take photos of Hollywood starlets and pasting their faces over Steve Buscemi’s creepy handbag eyes, and then set up a popular website devoted to that sole pursuit.
Following a military assault on his residence in Abidjan, Ivory Coast politician Laurent Gbagbo has surrendered and been placed under UN guard, thus ceding power to his UN-recognised successor, Alassane Ouattara; this after Gbagbo’s refusal to accept defeat in November’s presidential poll.
The University of Illinois, collaborating with the Equid Research and Conservation lab at Princeton, have put together software that can uniquely identify any striped, spotted or otherwise marked animal with a clear digital photo. Like a barcode!
With this whole ‘viral’ thing, many marketing departments are desperately trying to produce the kinds of advertising that get the internet’s attention – often with depressing results. Fortunately, the ad for the Washington Lottery is awesome; it has two dudes jousting on segways. Not totally sure how that sells lottery tickets, but hey.
Hello! It’s Friday, everything is awful except this. A German dude who entertains himself by building slingshots and posting videos of them online has built a crossbow that shoots machetes because if you really need a reason to build a machete crossbow, something is broken inside of you. Please, enjoy.