Fuck Jar Jar Binks!
In this video, comedian Ron Funches breaks down which awesome African American characters to cosplay — and which ones to avoid at all costs — at this year’s San Diego Comic Con.
submitted via Laughing Squid Tips
Mbedard.hearn
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29 Jul 17:45
The Dos and Don’ts of African American Cosplay by Ron Funches
by Kimber Streams
Mbedard.hearnFuck Jar Jar Binks!
Abigail.raymond likes this
29 Jul 16:58
Massive Salad Towers Created at Pizza Hut Salad Bars in China
by Kimber Streams
Mbedard.hearnI totally saw someone doing this in Chengdu (Sichuan Province) when we were there back in 2006. It was amazing, and I got my photo taken with her. :)
In China, Pizza Hut customers were only allowed one plate and make one trip to the salad bar, which spawned a fad of creating massive salad towers. Eventually, in 2009 Pizza Hut announced that it would be removing salad bars from its restaurants entirely. Kotaku‘s Bryan Ashcraft has more on the life and death of this trend.
video via China Soul
photos via lixiang0769
via Kotaku
Mbedard.hearn, Matthew.w.stephan likes this
17 Jul 17:50
Are You Listening?
by Kevin
Mbedard.hearnMore about baseball <=> life, but this time in comic form.
I think I’ve said enough in the comic. I hope everyone made it this far.
Rog did an amazing job, so I do want to thank him for his hard work on this comic, as well as not killing me for going over the top.
I hope this is the turning point…and I hope the guys are listening, even if they can’t hear me.
16 Jul 22:44
cdza Combines Performing Artists & Instruments into ‘Musical Puns’
by EDW Lynch
Mbedard.hearn likes this
16 Jul 21:15
Mike Ehrmann/Getty Images
Keeping Score: How To Understand Baseball
Mbedard.hearnThis is a nice little meditation on baseball/life, which is both annoying and pleasant... and makes me ask: why is it that we have so many articles that are meditations on baseball and life?
Keeping Score: How To Understand Baseball
by Alva Noë
In Thursday's New York Times there's an article on keeping a score card by hand at baseball games. Who does it anymore? Fewer and fewer people, according to the article. Why bother when you can enjoy a live play-by-play on your handheld device? And if you insist on keeping score yourself, there are apps you can download that make it much easier than doing it by hand.
Maybe the biggest reason so few people keep score these days — or even stay put in their seats watching the game for more than a few innings at a time — is that a day at the ballpark isn't just about baseball anymore (if it ever was). Games and videos on the scoreboard, music, high-priced fancy food and drink, shops and playgrounds. And then, of course, so many of us have complete multi-purpose entertainment systems in our pockets. All these compete with the baseball for your attention.
But you do still see a few old codgers — and the occasional young one, like my son — sitting there with a score sheet spread out on his or her lap, carefully writing down the plays. The real old timers may be be listening to the game on the radio (although these days, more likely than not, live-streamed over the internet).
Why? Why keep score?
The answer, I believe, goes way beyond baseball. Score keeping is a conceptually fascinating practice that has much to teach us.
One person interviewed in the Times article said he had no interest in the "hard work" of keeping score. "Too much to write down. I have live ESPN gamecast. It keeps me updated."
This brings us to the heart of the matter. This guy got it all wrong. Score keeping is hard work. But we don't keep score to keep track, or to keep updated.
Consider, first, that keeping score is not just a matter of recording the game. It is, rather, a way of thinking about the game. The score keeper asks, what is happening? Is that an earned run? Did the runner reach first on a fielder's choice, or did he get a hit? Is that a sacrifice, or was the batter bunting for a hit? In order to keep score, you need to make these kinds of decisions. And in order to make these kinds of decisions you need to be closely engaged with the game. You need to pay attention. You need to understand what is going on. You need to have skill. You need to care.
Notice that you can't write everything down. Do you score every pitch? Even the foul balls? Do you note down where the fielders are positioned at each moment in the game? Do you keep track of the amount of time between pitches?
You can't write everything down. But nor do you need to. Writing the game — keeping score — isn't about reproducing the game. It's about understanding the game. Thinking about it. Keeping score.
(What you decide to keep track of will depend on your interests. The pitching coach — or the pitcher's mom — will carefully score each pitch.)
But there is a second point that deserves our attention. The score keeper doesn't stand apart from the game, merely describing it. The game consists of what the players are doing. But it is the score keeper who decides, literally, what the players are doing. For example, the score keeper asks: Should the third-baseman have fielded that grounder? If so, then he just committed an error. For the rest of us, this can have the consequence that the pitcher's no hitter is intact. The activity of keeping score is internal to the game itself.
Now, in practice, we treat one person's score card — that of the official score keeper — as canonical. So, in a sense, when the rest of us keep score, we are just taking notes. But the official score keeper, in contrast, is doing something very different: he is shaping events in real time as they occur. The official scorer isn't just keeping score, he is, if you'll permit the word play, composing one.
Yes. But at the same time let us note that the official score keeper's authority is purely conventional. He has no special powers and no privileged access to the events on the field. And surely we can allow that it is possible for him to be mistaken.
This means that we can't let ourselves off the hook. There is no official telling of the French Revolution or the Iraq War; how could there be? Each of us has the right, but also, in some sense, the obligation, to make sense of events as we know them. And so, I think, with baseball. Neither the folks at ESPN, nor the official scorer, have the authority to decide history for you and me. In baseball, as in life, each of us has to keep his or her own scorecard. If we want to know what's going on, that is.
Which brings us to a final, crucial point.
Keeping score, in baseball, or in life, is a knowledge-making activity. It is, we might say, a form of research. We can get by just fine reading-along on ESPN gamecast, or taking the evening newscast at face value. For most of us, most of the time, that's the best we can manage. But there is another option: we can keep score, that is, we can write the events that matter to us; we can make knowledge and history.
How you keep score — using an app, or writing it out by hand — strikes me as entirely irrelevant. But that we keep score, or that, at the very least, we recognize that the score needs keeping — that we can't, however much we might like, abdicate our authority to make sense of what is going on — is crucial.
It would indeed be a dark consequence of life in the digital age if we forgot that keeping score is more than keeping track and that each of us has the power to keep score.
You can keep up with more of what Alva Noë is thinking on Facebook and on Twitter: @alvanoe
Copyright 2013 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.9())
15 Jul 22:38
What If Every Pixar Movie Is Actually Connected
by Kimber Streams
Jon Negroni has created The Pixar Theory, a theory that every animated Pixar film takes place in the same universe and is all part of the same timeline in which intelligent animals, sentient machines, and humans coexist. The idea was inspired by a Cracked video about the apocalyptic themes in Pixar films, and Negroni fleshed out the idea by organizing all of the films into a timeline and explaining how they’re all connected. According to Negroni’s theory, Brave comes first in the Pixar universe and helps explain how animals developed intelligence, and Monsters Inc. is the last in the timeline and is the result of the cross-breeding of humans and animals following the first apocalypse that took place before the events of Wall-E. To read up on the full theory, head over to Negroni’s website.
image via Jon Negroni
Matthew.w.stephan likes this
15 Jul 22:20
Who Would You Shoot?
by Guest Blogger Lauren McGuire
In 2002, a study by Joshua Correll and colleagues, called The Police Officer’s Dilemma, was published. In the study, researchers reported that they presented photos of black and white men holding either a gun or a non-threatening object (like a wallet) in a video game style setting. Participants were asked to make a rapid decision to “shoot” or “don’t shoot” each of the men based on whether the target was armed.
They found that people hesitated longer to shoot an armed white target (and they were more likely to accidentally not shoot). Participants were quicker and more accurate with black armed targets but there were more “false alarms” (shooting them when they were unarmed). These effects were present even though participants did not hold any explicit discriminatory views and wanted to treat all targets fairly.
The effect we see here is a subconscious but measurable preference to give white men the benefit of the doubt in these ambiguous situations. Decision times can vary by a fraction of a second, but that fraction can mean life or death for the person on the other end of the gun.
A terrible reminder of this bias was brought back into the headlines on March 2nd when a black student in Gainesville Florida was shot in the face with a rifle by a police officer. The conditions surrounding the shooting are murky, as the police are extremely hesitant to release details.
It appears that Kofi Adu-Brempong, an international graduate student and teacher’s assistant, was in a stress-induced panic and was worried about his student visa. On the day of the incident, his neighbors heard yelling in his apartment and called the police. It has been suggested that he may have suffered from some mental health problems that related to his panics (although this is not known for sure) and that he had resisted police in the past.
Even so, when the police arrived they broke down his door, citing that they did not know if there was someone else in danger inside the apartment. Adu refused to cooperate and the situation escalated to the point where police tried to subdue him with a tazer and a bean-bag gun. Then a policeman shot him. Adu is now in the hospital in critical condition and has sustained serious damages to his tongue and lower jaw. The police claimed that Adu was wielding a lead pipe and a knife and started violently threatening them with the weapons.
In fact, there was no lead pipe and there was no knife in his hand. When the police approached Adu after he had been shot, the pipe showed itself to be a cane- a cane that Adu constantly used due to a case of childhood polio. And the knife they saw in his hand was actually sitting on the kitchen counter.
Instances like these are tragic reminders of the mistakes that can be made in split second decisions and how race can play into those decisions.
This post originally appeared in 2010. Re-posted in solidarity with the African American community; regardless of the truth of the Martin/Zimmerman confrontation, it’s hard not to interpret the finding of not-guilty as anything but a continuance of the criminal justice system’s failure to ensure justice for young Black men.
Lauren McGuire is an assistant to a disability activist. She’s just launched her own blog, The Fatal Foxtrot, that is focused on the awkward passage into adulthood.
12 Jul 00:21
Anti-Asian Racism in the Aftermath of the Crash Landing at SFO
by Lisa Wade, PhD
In case you were wondering if the racist “Asians can’t drive” stereotype was alive and well, here are some select tweets from the collection at Public Shaming (h/t to @Kevin_Stainback):
And some couldn’t stop themselves from making fun of how some Asian people look:
More, including accusations of North Korean terrorism, at Public Shaming, one of the most deeply disappointing sites on the web.
11 Jul 21:53
Muskoxen, Wrangel Island
This Month in Photo of the Day: Animal Pictures
Two bull muskoxen size each other up. In September, with mating season under way, bulls engage in frequent head-butting confrontations to establish dominance.
See more pictures from the May 2013 feature story "Russian Refuge."
Explore 125 years of National Geographic »
Mbedard.hearn likes this
11 Jul 17:53
Happy Tears, Man! Happy Tears!
Submitted by: Unknown
Tagged:
jesus
, Prop 8
, jesus christ
, gay marriage
, Mike Huckabee
, DOMA
, scotus
, jesus wept
, failbook
, g rated
Mbedard.hearn, John Hollowell and 11 others like this
10 Jul 16:30
Prison Hunger Strikes Go Big
by Brian Leubitz
Prison officials say 30,000 inmates refused food
by Brian Leubitz
Hunger strikes two years ago drew attention to the prisons, this year, they are bigger:
California officials Monday said 30,000 inmates refused meals at the start of what could be the largest prison protest in state history.Inmates in two-thirds of the state's 33 prisons, and at all four out-of-state private prisons, refused both breakfast and lunch on Monday, said corrections spokeswoman Terry Thornton. In addition, 2,300 prisoners failed to go to work or attend their prison classes, either refusing or in some cases saying they were sick.(Paige St. John / LAT)
Full numbers are a little fuzzier based on how you count who is on a hunger strike. However, prison officials certainly take the issue seriously, and made some changes after the 2011 strike. This one seems primarily focused on long term isolation for possible gang affiliation, but the issues are generally broader than the one issue. As the hunger strike continues, more information about prisoner concerns as well as safety concerns from the prison system will get a lot more attention.
10 Jul 16:30
Protests prompt delay of Yosemite overhaul plan
by
By Alexei Koseff
The National Park Service will take five more months to complete a river protection plan that would result in changes to popular tourist amenities.
WASHINGTON — Facing flak for proposing to eliminate some popular tourist amenities in Yosemite National Park, the National Park Service said it needed five more months to finish a plan to "protect and enhance" the Merced River, which runs for 81 miles inside the park.
WASHINGTON — Facing flak for proposing to eliminate some popular tourist amenities in Yosemite National Park, the National Park Service said it needed five more months to finish a plan to "protect and enhance" the Merced River, which runs for 81 miles inside the park.
10 Jul 16:30
Abortion and preterm births studied
by
By Melissa Healy
Premature births to women who have a history of abortion are shown to decline as the use of medicine-induced terminations has grown, researchers report.
In a finding likely to reignite debate over proposed new limits on abortion, British researchers have found that years ago, women who terminated a pregnancy increased their risk of giving birth prematurely in subsequent pregnancies, but that with modern procedures the danger has all but vanished.
In a finding likely to reignite debate over proposed new limits on abortion, British researchers have found that years ago, women who terminated a pregnancy increased their risk of giving birth prematurely in subsequent pregnancies, but that with modern procedures the danger has all but vanished.
10 Jul 16:29
Fun Fun Fun Fest 8 Announces 2013 Lineup Including Television, Ice T and Body Count, & Slayer
by Matt Atkin
The 8th Annual Fun Fun Fun Fest 2013 Lineup has been leaked in parts over the past couple of weeks, and it seems that someone just couldn’t wait to get this year’s bill out there for everyone to see. FFFF8 has just leaked the full list of artists set to be performing, an entire day before the previously scheduled lineup announcement. Check out the absolutely stacked lineup inside.
FFFF8’s 2013 lineup announcement comes a day early, following a two-part leak earlier this month (Part I and Part II). The full lineup will most undoubtedly be worth the price of admission, featuring notable performances from M.I.A. Slayer, Snoop Dogg (note the lack of feline), Ice T, Jurassic 5, FLAG, The Dismemberment Plan, Death Grips, and even more yet to be announced.
The festival, which will feature an expanded comedy and actions sports experience, will take place at Auditorium Shores in Austin, TX this November 8th – 10th. Tickets for the event go on sale Thursday, July 10th at 10:00am CT, and can be purchased directly from the festival’s official website.
See the full lineup for this year’s FFFF8 below:
Fun Fun Fun Fest 2013 Lineup
M.I.A.
Slayer
MGMT
Jurassic 5
Snoop Dogg
Descendents
Ice-T
Television
FLAG
The Dismemberment Plan
Death Grips
Cut Copy
Quicksand
Simian Mobile Disco
Deerhunter
Johnny Marr
Lupe Fiasco
Big K.R.I.T.
Bill Callahan
Kurt Vile and the Violators
Cloud Nothings
Little Boots
Washed Out
Action Bronson
Bonobo
Chromatics
Chelsea Light Moving
Mac DeMarco
Thee Oh Sees
The Men
Star Slinger
Code Orange Kids
White Lung
Also performing:
RJD2
Judge
The Polyphonic Spree
Daniel Johnston
Gojira, Melt Banana
Cro-Mags
Blake Schwarzenbach (of Jawbreaker/Jets to Brazil/Forgetters)
The Underachievers
The Julie Ruin
Pelican
King Khan and the Shrines
Tycho
Big Freedia
Ceremony
Big Black Delta
Mykki Blanco
Quasi
Beach Fossils
Active Child
Lemuria
Merchandise
Small Black
Ratking
Even more artists and comedians TBA!
09 Jul 16:09
"Rooting for this man in 2013 is like rooting for Pfizer.
by Hamilton Nolan
"Rooting for this man in 2013 is like rooting for Pfizer. Or PepsiCo. Or PRISM." Chris Richards' review of Jay-Z's new album is ferociously accurate.
    
|
03 Jul 17:27
Homemade Remake of the Death Star Trench Run Scene in ‘Star Wars’ Starring Chris Hardwick
by Justin Page
The climactic Death Star trench run scene in Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope has been given a homemade remake in a new Cinefix episode of Homemade Movies starring Chris Hardwick and Jonah Ray of Nerdist. It was directed by Pasadena, California-based animator and musician Dustin McLean of DustFilms. Previously we wrote about Dustin and his homemade remake video series.
This is an exact shot-for-shot recreation made entirely at home without fancy CGI or visual effects. Made entirely with trash barrels, cardboard, toys, and love. May the DIY force be with you!
Here are the behind-the-scenes and side by side comparison videos from CineFix:
videos via CineFix
submitted via Laughing Squid Tips
Mbedard.hearn likes this
03 Jul 16:53
Read more of the article here.
Wis. court upholds convictions of parents who prayed for dying girl instead of going to doctor
A mother and father who prayed instead of seeking medical help as their daughter died in front of them were properly convicted of homicide, the Wisconsin Supreme Court ruled Wednesday.
Read more of the article here.
02 Jul 21:12
A solid solution
by M.H. | SEATTLE
LITHIUM-ION batteries are hot stuff. Affordable, relatively lightweight and packing a lot of energy, they are the power source of choice for everything from mobile phones to electric cars. Unfortunately, the heat can be more than figurative. Occasionally, such batteries suffer malfunctions that lead to smoke, flames and even explosions. In gadgets, such meltdowns can be distressing and dangerous. In aircraft, they can be fatal. Earlier this year airlines grounded their entire fleet of Boeing’s next-generation 787 passenger jet after the lithium-ion batteries installed in two planes caught fire. Last month they have been permitted back in the air after being retrofitted with a protection system in the form of a tough steel box that vents directly outside in the event of a fire.
A more comforting solution, of course, would be to build a lithium-ion battery that could not burst into flames in the first place. Katie Zhong at Washington State University might have just such a device. For the last few years, she has been working on battery technology for flexible and bendable electronic gadgets. By blending a polymer called polyethylene oxide (PEO) with natural soy protein, she had made a solid electrolyte for lithium ion batteries that could be bent or stretched to twice its normal size without...Continue reading
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02 Jul 19:48
“The Worst Thing” Begins Monday
by Ted Rall
My award-winning first graphic novel, “Real Americans Admit: The Worst Thing I’ve Ever Done!” from 1996, begins serialization at GoComics.com this coming Monday, July 8th. I’ll post the direct link when it becomes available. Strips will appear daily Monday through Friday.
Fascinated by Sartre’s observation that we are judged by our worst acts, I began asking people around me about their worst deeds. Soon it expanded into a project; I took out ads in newspapers, chatted up airplane seatmates, you name it. Eventually I collected some 540 stories — and distilled the best 23 into the book.
It’s a cult item, sometimes hard to find and definitely out of print, so I hope you’ll take this trip down memory lane into the mid-1990s, when alternative cartooning was finding its legs into the world of graphic novels. (This was the first graphic novel by an altie editorial cartoonist.)
Mbedard.hearn, Jjjorn likes this
28 May 17:20
SHIRT CLUB v2 IS AFLIGHT!!!
SUBSCRIPTIONS OPEN NOW THROUGH MIDNIGHT, JUN. 9th...
(Individual Weekly shirt orders begin the night of The Venture Bros. Season 5 premiere)
(click it!)
WE LOVE YOU,
JP
After a 5 year hiatus, Astrobase Go has brought back Shirt Club to celebrate the much anticipated Venture Bros. Season 5. Destined to be the greatest moment in animation history (until the premiere of Season 6), Season 5 starts off with a bang, then a shirt comes flying out!
Little has changed with Shirt Club, and that which has changed is for the better!
Each shirt is STILL only available for one week, and then immediately discontinued.
Each shirt is STILL made to order, and the Astrobase will only print what is ordered.
Each shirt is STILL designed (from concept to final) by Doc Hammer and/or Jackson Publick.
Each shirt STILL dons a design specific to the episode it is sold in conjunction with.
What has improved?
Each shirt is NOW packed and shipped by paid professionals, freeing up interns to learn animation and the fine art of running errands for those who are comfortably on payroll.
Each shirt is NOW less expensive than they were for the first Shirt Club. I know! That's nuts! Does the Astrobase love you more now than they did 5 years ago? Yes they do!
Each shirt NOW comes with $1.00 in official HankCo. Hank Bucks! What are Hank Bucks? It's fake money with Hank's face on it, and it may someday be redeemable for merchandise, prizes, or whatever!
You know the score. Opportunity has knocked twice. You snooze, you lose. Venture fans, this is your proudest moment! You know that Official Venture T-shirts are as rare and beautiful as albinos, and ones created by the actual Venture brothers are even more rare, and like five times more beautiful… What are you going to do? Answer: SHIRT CLUB!
HERE IS HOW THE VENTURE BROS. SHIRT of the week CLUB WORKS:
Each week we premiere a brand new episode of The Venture Bros. television program, we will premiere a brand new t-shirt design to go with it RIGHT HERE. The shirt will be on sale for one week only--until the next episode and the next shirt premiere.
We'll only print as many shirts of each design as we receive orders for (okay, we'll probably make a couple for ourselves, too) and once the ad for a shirt is removed, that shirt will never be available again.
Venture Bros. Shirt Club shirts will all be printed on only the finest American Apparel shirts available, and each is priced at $20 ($22 for 2XL + up).
This season, we have 8 brand new episodes premiering. Which means we'll be premiering 9 new t-shirts. Wait, what? Exactly! In honor of our hour-long, double-length season premiere (and our general indecisiveness), we're releasing 2 shirts for that episode.
2 WAYS TO ENJOY SHIRT CLUB:
1. A LA CARTE
Each week, a new shirt will be offered for sale at the low low price of $20 ($22 for 2XL + up). Simply check this page every week, order the shirt(s) you like, and enjoy!
…or, for the frugal completists, True Venturoos and Honorary AstroBase Cadet Candidates alike…
2. SUBSCRIBE NOW TO THE FULL SEASON OF SHIRT CLUB!
For the low, low price of $165 ($180 for 2XL sized subscribers) you will automatically receive ALL 9 Venture Bros. Shirt Club shirts, week by week, as they're produced--assuring you will never ever miss a Shirt Club shirt!
Not only will you save time and money over the cost of ordering each shirt individually, but you'll also receive the "NOW IN GLORIOUS EXTRA-COLOR" BONUS T-SHIRT, ABSOLUTELY FREE. This navy blue beauty features the titular Venture Brothers, our dubiously quotable tag line, and is available to SHIRT CLUB SUBSCRIBERS ONLY, making it the most limited and exclusive shirt. Did we mention it's FREE with every subscription?
SO WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR? When we say "Subscribe Now," we mean it! Because subscriptions to The Venture Bros. Shirt Club will ONLY BE AVAILABLE FROM NOW UNTIL 11:59PM (EST) on JUNE 7th. That's when the first week's shirts disappear--and so does your chance to subscribe to the full season of The Venture Bros. Shirt Club, save all that money, and be the proud, elite owner of the Venture Bros. "Glorious Extra Color" T-Shirt!
THE FINE PRINT
SHIPPING
All Venture Bros. Shirt Club shirts will be shipped via First Class U.S. Mail. Domestic shipping is included in the price of every shirt. For international orders, a $9.00 (USD) surcharge will be added to the price. Please allow 2-4 weeks for delivery.
THE BRAND YOU TRUST, THE FIT YOU DESIRE
All Venture Bros. Shirt Club shirts are printed on stylishly fitted, American Apparel brand t-shirts, which are made right here in the US of A. American Apparel shirts are sized very accurately for a "fitted look," so we've included the American Apparel size charts so you can order with confidence. Because…
REFUNDS/EXCHANGES
Shirt Club shirts are non-refundable and we do not accept exchanges (we're seriously too busy making a TV show to deal with all that paperwork).
PROBLEM?
In the unlikely event of a screw-up on our end, however--say, we send you the wrong size or something--we will of course exchange the offending item for the proper one, at our expense. Please contact us at VBShirtClub@titmouse.net to alert us to the problem, and someone will get back to you a.s.a.p. This email address is only for Shirt Club members and staff to conduct official Shirt Club business, however. Please do not send fan mail, hate mail, questions about Dean's hair, Hatred's tits, or requests to "bring back Triana's hot friend" to this address.
CANCELLATION
The Venture Bros. Shirt (of the week) Club doesn't want you if you don't want us. So if you unwisely choose to opt out of your subscription, we will grudgingly refund your money minus the FULL REGULAR PRICE ($20/$22 for 2XL/3XL) of any shirts that have been produced up to that point--and you will NOT receive your super-limited edition subscribers' exclusive "Glorious Extra Color" t-shirt. Because the bonus shirts are shipping last this season. Because bonus shirts are for closers. The loyal, the hearty, the "in-it-for-the-long-haul" super-fans. When you wear one, this is how people will see you.
(Individual Weekly shirt orders begin the night of The Venture Bros. Season 5 premiere)
(click it!)
WE LOVE YOU,
JP
After a 5 year hiatus, Astrobase Go has brought back Shirt Club to celebrate the much anticipated Venture Bros. Season 5. Destined to be the greatest moment in animation history (until the premiere of Season 6), Season 5 starts off with a bang, then a shirt comes flying out!
Little has changed with Shirt Club, and that which has changed is for the better!
Each shirt is STILL only available for one week, and then immediately discontinued.
Each shirt is STILL made to order, and the Astrobase will only print what is ordered.
Each shirt is STILL designed (from concept to final) by Doc Hammer and/or Jackson Publick.
Each shirt STILL dons a design specific to the episode it is sold in conjunction with.
What has improved?
Each shirt is NOW packed and shipped by paid professionals, freeing up interns to learn animation and the fine art of running errands for those who are comfortably on payroll.
Each shirt is NOW less expensive than they were for the first Shirt Club. I know! That's nuts! Does the Astrobase love you more now than they did 5 years ago? Yes they do!
Each shirt NOW comes with $1.00 in official HankCo. Hank Bucks! What are Hank Bucks? It's fake money with Hank's face on it, and it may someday be redeemable for merchandise, prizes, or whatever!
You know the score. Opportunity has knocked twice. You snooze, you lose. Venture fans, this is your proudest moment! You know that Official Venture T-shirts are as rare and beautiful as albinos, and ones created by the actual Venture brothers are even more rare, and like five times more beautiful… What are you going to do? Answer: SHIRT CLUB!
HERE IS HOW THE VENTURE BROS. SHIRT of the week CLUB WORKS:
Each week we premiere a brand new episode of The Venture Bros. television program, we will premiere a brand new t-shirt design to go with it RIGHT HERE. The shirt will be on sale for one week only--until the next episode and the next shirt premiere.
We'll only print as many shirts of each design as we receive orders for (okay, we'll probably make a couple for ourselves, too) and once the ad for a shirt is removed, that shirt will never be available again.
Venture Bros. Shirt Club shirts will all be printed on only the finest American Apparel shirts available, and each is priced at $20 ($22 for 2XL + up).
This season, we have 8 brand new episodes premiering. Which means we'll be premiering 9 new t-shirts. Wait, what? Exactly! In honor of our hour-long, double-length season premiere (and our general indecisiveness), we're releasing 2 shirts for that episode.
2 WAYS TO ENJOY SHIRT CLUB:
1. A LA CARTE
Each week, a new shirt will be offered for sale at the low low price of $20 ($22 for 2XL + up). Simply check this page every week, order the shirt(s) you like, and enjoy!
…or, for the frugal completists, True Venturoos and Honorary AstroBase Cadet Candidates alike…
2. SUBSCRIBE NOW TO THE FULL SEASON OF SHIRT CLUB!
For the low, low price of $165 ($180 for 2XL sized subscribers) you will automatically receive ALL 9 Venture Bros. Shirt Club shirts, week by week, as they're produced--assuring you will never ever miss a Shirt Club shirt!
Not only will you save time and money over the cost of ordering each shirt individually, but you'll also receive the "NOW IN GLORIOUS EXTRA-COLOR" BONUS T-SHIRT, ABSOLUTELY FREE. This navy blue beauty features the titular Venture Brothers, our dubiously quotable tag line, and is available to SHIRT CLUB SUBSCRIBERS ONLY, making it the most limited and exclusive shirt. Did we mention it's FREE with every subscription?
SO WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR? When we say "Subscribe Now," we mean it! Because subscriptions to The Venture Bros. Shirt Club will ONLY BE AVAILABLE FROM NOW UNTIL 11:59PM (EST) on JUNE 7th. That's when the first week's shirts disappear--and so does your chance to subscribe to the full season of The Venture Bros. Shirt Club, save all that money, and be the proud, elite owner of the Venture Bros. "Glorious Extra Color" T-Shirt!
THE FINE PRINT
SHIPPING
All Venture Bros. Shirt Club shirts will be shipped via First Class U.S. Mail. Domestic shipping is included in the price of every shirt. For international orders, a $9.00 (USD) surcharge will be added to the price. Please allow 2-4 weeks for delivery.
THE BRAND YOU TRUST, THE FIT YOU DESIRE
All Venture Bros. Shirt Club shirts are printed on stylishly fitted, American Apparel brand t-shirts, which are made right here in the US of A. American Apparel shirts are sized very accurately for a "fitted look," so we've included the American Apparel size charts so you can order with confidence. Because…
REFUNDS/EXCHANGES
Shirt Club shirts are non-refundable and we do not accept exchanges (we're seriously too busy making a TV show to deal with all that paperwork).
PROBLEM?
In the unlikely event of a screw-up on our end, however--say, we send you the wrong size or something--we will of course exchange the offending item for the proper one, at our expense. Please contact us at VBShirtClub@titmouse.net to alert us to the problem, and someone will get back to you a.s.a.p. This email address is only for Shirt Club members and staff to conduct official Shirt Club business, however. Please do not send fan mail, hate mail, questions about Dean's hair, Hatred's tits, or requests to "bring back Triana's hot friend" to this address.
CANCELLATION
The Venture Bros. Shirt (of the week) Club doesn't want you if you don't want us. So if you unwisely choose to opt out of your subscription, we will grudgingly refund your money minus the FULL REGULAR PRICE ($20/$22 for 2XL/3XL) of any shirts that have been produced up to that point--and you will NOT receive your super-limited edition subscribers' exclusive "Glorious Extra Color" t-shirt. Because the bonus shirts are shipping last this season. Because bonus shirts are for closers. The loyal, the hearty, the "in-it-for-the-long-haul" super-fans. When you wear one, this is how people will see you.
Mbedard.hearn, Lblock likes this
09 May 15:39
Sanford and the Electoral Effect of Sex Scandals
by By NATE SILVER
It would be wrong to conclude that voters did not punish Mark Sanford at all for his extramarital affair.
07 May 20:05
Literally
by G.F. | SEATTLE
AS INVENTIONS go, Stephen Hershman's really cuts the mustard. And stacks of paper, chequing-account ledgers, compact discs (as well as floppy ones, should anybody still have them), credit cards, folders and much else besides—though, cleverly, not fingers or clothes. Mr Hershman has spent the past six years perfecting his self-service shredder so that it could be safely installed in groceries and department stores. Now he and his partner are ready to start ripping across America.
The custom-built Shred Stop is slightly bigger than an office photocopier. The price is $2.50 per minute, but material may be fed in quite rapidly; it can cope with 50 sheets of paper at a go. This works out to about $0.75 per pound ($1.65 per kilogram) for an average customer. Efficient types who make clever use of a 30-second pause button to organise batches can shred a pound for as little as $0.50. This makes the Shred Stop competitive with or even cheaper than drop-off services where the material is put into locked bins and picked up regularly for destruction.
The amount of plastic and other materials is about 3%, the rest being high-quality paper. This allows the shredded and compacted effluvium to be treated as top-class raw material by recycling firms. Iron Mountain, a corporate shredding contractor, empties and services the kiosks, which automatically update the Shred Stop's website to show how full a unit's hopper is and let customers know which ones to avoid if carrying shedloads of stuff. Mr Hershman says customers will travel up to a few miles to use the kiosk, and that his system remains a reasonable investment of time for up to a few boxes, after which he recommends working with Iron Mountain or other contractors.
Mr Hershman and his partner originally conceived of the system as a freestanding outdoor shop in a grocery parking lot, such as the photo and locksmith drive-through services of yore. But markets typically do not own their parking lots, and such little shops have become unpopular over time. Instead, stores now offer a variety of new kiosks to attract customers and revenue, such as CoinStar for processing pocket change into cash or retail credits, and RedBox for DVD rentals.
Recently, Shred Stop entered agreements to put devices in Seattle-area stores run by Safeway and the Kroger chain, which operates thousands of shops across America. The first units will be shipped out of the region shortly, first to San Francisco. With the fear of identity theft constantly stoked by the media (not entirely gratuitously, it must be said), the Shred Shop has its work cut out.
Mbedard.hearn likes this
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