Shared posts
Sea of Thieves Season 10 will finally introduce private PvE servers
Mastodon releases major improvements to search, onboarding, and more
Cutting Up a Huge Lego Salmon
In this ASMR stop motion cooking video, a chef butchers a huge Lego salmon and prepares a salmon and rice bowl. This video is surprisingly visceral, what with the sound effects and the (Lego) blood.
This reminds me more than a little of the sushi scene in Isle of Dogs. (thx, caroline)
Tags: cooking · food · Lego · stop motion · videoMeFi: Comics. Often dirty. Indexed.
Boss Fight 3D Render Challenge
Netflix’s Live-Action One Piece Has Been Renewed For Season 2 With Chopper
Netflix’s live-action adaptation of One Piece has been renewed for a second season.
In a message posted to the One Piece X account, series creator Eiichiro Oda shared a message with fans. Oda noted he’d spent a long time working with Netflix and Tomorrow Studios on the project, and that people seemed to be enjoying the project, which made it worth it. Oda thanked both longtime fans and new watchers. He then explained that Netflix has decided to renew the show for Season 2, though he did not specify any sort of release date or anything else. He said the scripts would take time to get ready and asked for fans to be patient. Oda also teased Tony Tony Chopper’s debut.
Related: Netflix’s One Piece Is the Perfect Introduction to the Series
ONE PIECE HAS BEEN RENEWED!
And now a message directly from Oda-Sensei pic.twitter.com/VvsZ4CdaEq
— Netflix (@netflix) September 14, 2023
Adapted from Oda’s best-selling manga series of the same name, Netflix’s One Piece follows the Straw Hat Pirates on their journey to get the titular treasure, with the group’s leader Monkey D. Luffy wanting to become the “King of the Pirates.” After consuming a powerful and mysterious Devil Fruit, Luffy gains the power to elongate and stretch his limbs. He’s joined on his quest by Nami, Roronoa Zoro, Usopp, and Sanji. While there were initially doubts due to the streaming service’s bad record with live-action anime adaptations, the series received rave reviews and currently sits at an 85 percent on Rotten Tomatoes. Critics noted that the show did an excellent job of adapting Oda’s original work, which was likely due to the creator’s heavy influence over the series itself. Overall, One Piece has seemingly done quite well in viewership, as Netflix is not often so quick to renew shows, and many of its other live-action adaptations of anime have failed to make an impact.
One Piece Season 1 is available to watch on Netflix now and runs for eight episodes.
Student-Built EV Car Goes 0-62 mph in Record 0.956 Seconds
A group of students from ETH Zurich and Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts recently set a record for the fastest 0-62mph time with their hand-built electric car: 0.956 seconds. The 309-lb car got up to 62mph in just 40.3 feet, which is ~10 feet shorter than the width of a basketball court. The old record was 1.46 seconds, which this car just absolutely obliterated. For reference, the Tesla Plaid's 0-60 time is 1.99 seconds.
The video of their run is kind of amazing...the car is just so ludicrously quick that I started giggling when it leapt off the line.
Tags: cars · EVs · videoA Fun Run Down the Mountain
People ask me why I ski.1 A: Because sometimes it's as insanely fun as this guy makes it look.
He. Skis. THROUGH THE MOUNTAIN. Also, if you can, pause it right after he jumps off the lift platform...the kid on the lift with his dad is like ( ﾟoﾟ).
No one has ever asked me this. No one ever asks people questions like this. "People ask me..." is a phrase writers use to create a sense of an ongoing story. It's better than "This is a cool video"...you can only use that one so many times. ↩
[This was originally posted on January 20, 2015.]
Tags:Candide Thovex skiing sports video
Elon Musk’s DIY Twitter datacenter migration disaster
MeFi: "I found it interesting and rewarding"
Ray published his thread July 28th, 2023.
If you liked this you might also like "Rät" and "Divine Comedy of the Tech Sisterhood".
Brick your Xbox the right way with this MEGA Xbox 360 Building Set
High-profile streamers bail on MrBeast-promoted Creator League after learning there are blockchains involved
A group of high-profile streamers and social media influencers agreed to join eFuse's "Creator League", where they would lead community e-sports teams. The project was announced on September 2, and was promoted by mega-influencer MrBeast. Only days later, the project has been put on hold after some of those influencers balked once they learned blockchains were involved.
YouTuber CDawgVA publicly withdrew from the project on September 3, writing, "I was not told or made aware at any point that there was Blockchain technology and was only made aware of that information when the event went live. I was given assurances that it had nothing to do with NFT's. Given my vocal hatred of such tech, I would never agree to join had I known that."
The creator of the OTK Network, which had agreed to participate in the League, wrote: "We were told there was no NFT/crypto component but looks like that may not be the case."
Creator League issued a statement attempting to downplay its blockchain usage, emphasizing that people who purchased "Creator Passes" were not buying cryptocurrency or NFTs. "The Creator League is not an NFT project and we have never sold tokens," they insisted. "Those buyers who remain uncomfortable with the blockchain technology can request a refund," they continued.
Now, Creator League has been postponed. eFuse, the company behind it, has also just announced a 30% layoff amid company restructuring.
Stolen LastPass vaults possibly cracked to enable crypto thefts
In November 2022, popular password management tool LastPass disclosed that hackers had stolen "password vaults" containing data belonging to more than 25 million users. Although the vaults themselves are encrypted, some experts now believe that these vaults are being cracked to enable access to crypto credentials stored within.
A report by cybersecurity expert Brian Krebs outlines how various experts have come to this conclusion after analyzing a long string of crypto thefts perpetrated against people with otherwise strong security practices. Altogether, the thefts suspected to have been enabled by the LastPass breach amount to more than $35 million.
- "Experts Fear Crooks are Cracking Keys Stolen in LastPass Breach" , Krebs on Security
MeFi: "[T]he transformation of the internet into this shitty mall."
The Infinite Hotel Paradox
In a lecture given in 1924, German mathematician David Hilbert introduced the idea of the paradox of the Grand Hotel, which might help you wrap your head around the concept of infinity. (Spoiler alert: it probably won't help...that's the paradox.) In his book One Two Three... Infinity, George Gamow describes Hilbert's paradox:
Let us imagine a hotel with a finite number of rooms, and assume that all the rooms are occupied. A new guest arrives and asks for a room. "Sorry," says the proprietor, "but all the rooms are occupied." Now let us imagine a hotel with an infinite number of rooms, and all the rooms are occupied. To this hotel, too, comes a new guest and asks for a room.
"But of course!" exclaims the proprietor, and he moves the person previously occupying room N1 into room N2, the person from room N2 into room N3, the person from room N3 into room N4, and so on.... And the new customer receives room N1, which became free as the result of these transpositions.
Let us imagine now a hotel with an infinite number of rooms, all taken up, and an infinite number of new guests who come in and ask for rooms.
"Certainly, gentlemen," says the proprietor, "just wait a minute."
He moves the occupant of N1 into N2, the occupant of N2 into N4, and occupant of N3 into N6, and so on, and so on...
Now all odd-numbered rooms became free and the infinite of new guests can easily be accommodated in them.
This TED video created by Jeff Dekofsky explains that there are similar strategies for finding space in such a hotel for infinite numbers of infinite groups of people and even infinite amounts of infinite numbers of infinite groups of people (and so on, and so on...) and is very much worth watching:
(via brain pickings)
[This was originally posted on February 19, 2015.]
Tags:David Hilbert George Gamow infinity Jeff Dekofsky mathematics video
Badger Badger Badger Turns 20
Saints Row, Red Faction Studio Volition Closed
Volition, the studio behind the Saints Row and Red Faction series, has been closed.
On X, Ryan T. Brown shared a report that the staff at Volition have been hit with mass layoffs, as their parent company, Embracer, has shuttered the studio. Ryan Hoss, who was a VFX Artist at Volition, also shared on X that he lost his job and that the studio has been closed. Around the time of those tweets, Volition posted an update on its LinkedIn profile confirming the news.
Volition staff on Twitter are reporting that parent company Embracer has just closed the 30-year-old studio behind Saint's Row and Red Faction, with mass layoffs #VolitionJobs pic.twitter.com/cCgDa20dfM
— Ryan T. Brown
(@Toadsanime) August 31, 2023
I have been affected by today's full studio closure of Volition. So proud of the work me and my team did during my 7 years there.
Having said that, I'm looking for a new position as a senior/lead VFX artist or art manager. Any leads would be appreciated. #gamedev #volitionjobs
— Ryan Hoss (@smb_ryan) August 31, 2023
Volition Games is closing, effective immediately https://t.co/Dob9NBW7He pic.twitter.com/5dr7zbHcgA
— Wario64 (@Wario64) August 31, 2023
The post reads, “The Volition team has proudly created world-class entertainment for fans around the globe for 30 years. We’ve been driven by a passion for our community and always worked to deliver joy, surprise, and delight.” The post went on to say that in June, Embracer announced restructuring, which resulted in Volition’s closure effective immediately.
Originally part of Mike Kulas and Matt Toschlog’s Parallax Software, Volition was founded in 1993. Over the decades, the studio had become known for such beloved franchise as Saints Row and Red Faction. The team also developed one my personal favorite forgotten classics, Summoner, which released on the PlayStation 2 in 2000. Hearing news of such a storied studio’s closing is absolutely heartbreaking. Our hearts go out to everyone affected by the closure. Currently, the hashtag #VolitonJobs is being posted on X to help those who were laid off find new work.
KEEP READING: Saints Row Update Will Fix the Game with 200+ Improvements & New Features
a clock where the time is in a song title
Thank Goodness You’re Here!
Inside the AI Porn Marketplace Where Everything and Everyone Is for Sale
Three Quick Links for Thursday Night
MerijnVery excited for the Wes Anderson adaptation of my favorite Roald Dahl story!!
In a Gallup poll on the perceived safety of 16 US cities, Republicans were 29% less likely to rate cities as safe compared to Democrats. In 2006, the gap was only 2%. An entire generation of voters brainwashed by Fox News, et al.
Wes Anderson's adaptation of Roald Dahl's The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar will be out on Netflix on Sept 27. It's only 39 minutes long and stars Benedict Cumberbatch & Ralph Fiennes.
Threads now has a web interface for use on desktop/laptop computers. Here's my account there if you'd like to follow.
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What Does One Piece Mean To Me?
I’ve been a fan of One Piece for most of my life. It’s surreal to look back and think about how the terribly dubbed anime I used to watch on Toonami has become one of the most prolific series of all time. Even looking beyond the anime industry, One Piece is one of the best-selling book series of all time, rivaling the likes of Harry Potter. Now, the series is entering what’s being referred to as its “Final Saga,” and even after decades at the top, One Piece remains a global phenomenon.
This month sees the release of Netflix’s attempt to adapt One Piece into live-action, and to say that I am approaching it with caution is an understatement. I’m not looking at the series from a place of utter fan devotion. I understand the Netflix series needs to make sacrifices and alterations and to have astronomical expectations would only do me a disservice. After all, this is the same company that decided to give the green light to their attempts at Death Note and Cowboy Bebop. If it’s great, then I’ll be sure to give praise where it is due, but I’m not exactly holding my breath for perfection. Competency, yes, but nothing more.
It’s safe to say then that I’ve had One Piece on the brain. I’ve decided to reread the manga, which now has 103 volumes in print in the United States, and I’ve just been filled with a wave of nostalgia as I’ve done so. I can remember where I was at certain points in my life, the friends I’ve made and lost, and just how One Piece has always been there for me in some way, shape, or form. So in lieu of offering some deep analysis of what the story of One Piece is, which would take multiple columns and thousands upon thousands of words, I’d rather talk about what One Piece is to me, as a fan who has been there since the very beginning.
In 2003, my mom brought my brother and me to a local comic book store, a store called New World Manga that I still visit to this day. Back then, my brother and I really only went to pick up Yu-Gi-Oh cards, but my mom wanted me to buy a book so I wouldn’t just be spending my allowance money on some cheap piece of cardboard I’d forget about in a week. So I browsed until I saw a book I remembered seeing in a copy of my brother’s Shonen Jump magazine. The series had goofy characters with wacky powers like the cartoons I watched every Saturday morning. I picked up the first two volumes of One Piece. From the moment I read it, I knew One Piece was an adventure series unlike any other.
The premise is that a young pirate named Monkey D. Luffy wants to become the greatest pirate of them all: The King of the Pirates. To do that, he needs to find the One Piece, which was hidden by former King of the Pirates Gol D. Roger. Luffy assembles his crew, sails the seas, and beats up bad guys using powers he got from eating the Gum-Gum Fruit. These powers allow him to stretch his body as if he were made of rubber.
I had never read anything like it before. Keep in mind, by this point I was still reading books with a lot of pictures in them, but American picture books always felt so static and bare. One Piece was kinetic. Each panel felt alive and full of personality, from the goofy faces Luffy and his friends would make to the frenetic and oftentimes brutal action. There was blood in this series, and it didn’t shy away from making our heroes lose. This wasn’t just a simple story where the good guy saves the day every single time. Luffy and his friends would be beaten, and they would strive to get better to overcome those odds. Needless to say, I was hooked.
I would go to the comic store every few months to grab a new volume. Even when my brother stopped playing Yu-Gi-Oh and had no reason to go anymore, I still went to get the latest volume. I watched the the anime as it aired, then read each of the chapters the episode adapted. I scoured the internet and researched stuff that I hadn’t read in those volumes, helping me develop my media literacy skills. By the time I was in middle school and the manga was reaching the end of the “Alabasta” arc, I was stunned to learn about an arc called “Water 7” and how that arc apparently was even better than “Alabasta” (and it is). But for all of my love of these adventures and brilliant moments of catharsis when Luffy defeated the villain of the arc, I didn’t really have anyone to share it with.
There are two big reasons I hypothesize why One Piece never caught on in the States in the 200os. The first of which was the abysmal 4Kids dub. To make a long story short, 4Kids was a company that released heavily censored versions of anime to fit into a children’s cartoon block. References to death were a no-go, as were guns and any form of extreme violence. It gave us some wonderful bits of absurdity, like Brock from Pokemon calling rice balls “jelly doughnuts,” Yu-Gi-Oh fabricating the Shadow Realm as a substitute for death, and One Piece having a myriad of alternations that changed character backstories, gave some lovably terrible accents, and just made the series come across as too kiddy. While Naruto and Bleach received more faithful dubs and weren’t compromised in their presentation to Western markets, One Piece was all but destroyed due to 4Kids realizing that unless the series was heavily edited, they wouldn’t be able to present it.
That was undeniably a major roadblock that set me back. Here I was liking this show people called childish, while the real teenagers would talk exclusively about Naruto. The other shoe dropped when we reached 2010. Because of the glacial release schedule of Shonen Jump and Viz Media at the time, One Piece in the West was leagues behind what was happening in Japan. So in late 2009, the publisher announced a major push to catch up to Japan, and in six months, they would be publish 30 volumes of One Piece. I could keep up when it was one volume released every three months, but the rate Viz was going at was impossible for me to keep up with. I was in high school and between buying games and saving up, I couldn’t justify spending $300 on One Piece volumes, so I dropped the series for most of high school. I was content to have my memories of One Piece be the 4Kids dub and leave it as a permanent fixture of my childhood.
A friend of mine later told me about fansubs. I couldn’t tell you the site, it’s probably defunct now, but he said I could read all of One Piece there for free, and they even had chapters that weren’t published yet. I read everything I could over the course of a winter break just so I could catch up to the Japanese release schedule and follow along from there. I decided to buy those 30ish volumes whenever I had the chance, opting to go for single volumes instead of the 3-in-1s so I could have a vivid and lively shelf. In college, I continued to read One Piece as each volume came out and slowly but surely filled in the wholes of my collection, all the while recommending the series to my friends. No one would take me up on it, though my roommate and I struck a deal that when One Piece ended, I would loan him every single volume of the manga for him to read as long as he didn’t engage with the series until then. He agreed, and that deal is still alive to this day.
The only person who took me up on my offer to get into One Piece was the woman I’m currently dating. When we were first talking, she was interested in getting into anime and didn’t know where to start. Me, being the sadistic fellow I am, recommended that she should watch One Piece. It was the pandemic, after all, and there wasn’t really much to watch. She wanted to watch a long show to pass the time, and by that point, it was approaching 1,000 episodes, so why not? It met her criteria. And so she did. She watched every single episode over the course of six months, all to make sure she could watch the 1,000th episode as it aired. Why? Because it aired on her birthday, and she wanted to celebrate with One Piece.
Now, whenever I recommend One Piece to a person, I always provide them with the means to access it. I’ve recommended it to multiple people now who have either watched it from my Crunchyroll account or read the volumes I loaned them, and they all have loved it. Without the asterisks of the 4Kids dub and being relatively on par with the Japanese releases, One Piece is more accessible than ever. It’s still a mammoth of a task to sell someone on dedicating months, if not years, of their lives, to catching up to a fantasy series that has been ongoing since the ’90s and shows very little sign of ending any time soon. Theoretically, though, it’s easier now than ever now to sell your soul to Eiichiro Oda’s masterpiece.
But that’s one of the most beautiful things about the series — it’s always there. I’ve lived in several countries, held down numerous jobs, wrote for several different outlets, and One Piece has always been constant. It hasn’t defined my life, but it has been an element that factored into my upbringing. I wouldn’t be into anime today if it wasn’t for One Piece piquing my interest all of those years ago. Even though I can’t remember concretely, it was also probably influential in helping shape my reading abilities and gave me the wide vocabulary I have now.
I’m happy now that One Piece has become one of the defining pillars of the anime industry. While other series have seen their stars rise and fall, One Piece continues to shine. Hell, One Piece recently broke Crunchyroll because of the debut of Luffy’s Gear 5 power-up. One Piece just elicits joy in those who experience it. The world is massive, and I wish when I was growing up I had the communities today to discuss the latest chapters or episodes, but I don’t regret not having them. I still was able to find enjoyment in Luffy’s epic journey to become the greatest pirate in the world, and I’ll be there to see the final panel when it’s all over. One can hope that the Netflix series will be able to encourage more people to get into the series, but if not, then I’ll still keep recommending the manga to newcomers. Why mess with perfection?
Cypher protocol exploited for around $1 million
The Solana-based Cypher protocol, a decentralized futures exchange, froze its smart contract after an attacker stole a little more than $1 million in Solana tokens and the USDC stablecoin.
The project attempted to contact the hacker to negotiate the return of some of the funds. Meanwhile, various community members sent NFTs to the attacker wallet, requesting the return of the funds. One of them tried to convince the hacker, writing that they believed the attacker's identity could be discovered because they used centralized exchanges with KYC to try to withdraw funds. Another simply said "give it back you shitlord".
MeFi: Chandrayaan-3 has landed; India has made it to the moon
Nothing Is Certain But Scams And Taxes
Quake 2 Remaster Bundles in Quake 64 and New Content from Wolfenstein Dev, Out Now
Rumors regarding the existence of a Quake 2 remaster have been proven true, as an upgraded version of id Software’s first-person shooter sequel is now available for players on PC via Steam, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X | S as well as Game Pass. Bethesda’s surprise release arrives as part of QuakeCon 2023, giving players flashbacks to when the Quake remaster surprise launched in 2021. Just like the original’s rerelease, this new version of the sequel gives players access to The Reckoning and Ground Zero mission packs, while adding in a new expansion from Wolfenstein developer MachineGames called Call of the Machine. Players can download the Quake 2 remaster on their preferred platform for $9.99.
“A brand-new Quake 2 experience from MachineGames consisting of 28 campaign levels and one multiplayer deathmatch map,” the game’s Steam page says when describing Call of the Machine. “In the depths of Strogg space lies the Machine, a singularity capable of collapsing the fabric of reality. Fight across time and space to find the Strogg-Maker, destroy it, and change the destiny of man and machine.”
Additionally, players who pick up this enhanced version of Quake 2 gain access to Quake 64 at no extra charge. Cross-play for local and online multiplayer is also supported across every platform, with PlayStation and Switch players able to take advantage of motion controls. Of course, the Quake 2 remaster has improved visuals across the board, including 4K and widescreen resolution support, enhanced models, cleaner enemy animations, improved enemy AI, and more. You can see the trailer for today’s surprise remaster below.
For more on the Quake 2 remaster and QuakeCon 2023, be sure to stay tuned for updates.
Circuit Symbols
MerijnI've always been bad with electricity so these ring true, haha
