bernot

Holy skeksis, this insanely detailed Dark Crystal cake makes me want to throw all other cakes on the ground. Just about every character from the '80s puppet epic is represented in fondant, and the whole thing is balancing on the famous crystal. WONDERFUL!

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so, one of the admins here, who shall remain nameless, was giving me shit about the number tumblrs and twitter feeds and rss feeds that I follow.  she was going on about how hard it is to keep track of them.  it seems that she only follows a few people so that she can have some sense of what goes on at their tumblr / twitter / blog.  my outlook is different.  I don’t think there are enough hours in the day for me to wrap my brain around more than a dozen accounts.  so, rather than me trying to have any control (and I’m as eager a control-freak as anyone else), I know when I don’t have a fucking chance in hell of keeping up.

so, I embrace a different strategy: give up any illusion of control / continuity / order.  I liken these media streams as streams of water or rivers.  when I have time or a desire to see what’s going on, I just log in and take in what is going by.  like I was sitting by a river with my toes in the water and experiencing the water not as a captured body but as a passing one. 

I like the great number of constant ideas and voices going by.  I never know what will be on the dash when I log in and I can spend hours finding all sorts of things, in patterns that I doubt I could ever contrive deliberately.

I don’t think that I miss any more than if I were limiting my focus to a smaller set of accounts.  to me, I would rather take my chances at experiencing a random little from a great number of voices than to have a detailed awareness of only a few.

like a river, I can either watch voices and ideas go by, or I can jump in and see where the current of one particular thing takes me.

neither idea is true or real, and neither is better.  it’s just that the river suits me…and provides my partner in crime no end of glee in mocking me. 

meh.  at least I gave her a hobby.

This forest area is obviously Herzog’s least favorite. 

Delightfully bonkers director Werner Herzog sees the world (particularly the nature-ey parts of it) as a vast merciless hell steeped in malice and death, so it stands to reason he’d probably have an affinity for Dark Souls II, a merciless hellscape of a game filled with only malice and death. So yeah, somebody made a YouTube video of “Werner Herzog” narrating Dark Souls II footage and it’s kind of perfect (even if the Herzog impersonator sometimes sounds a little more Spanish than German).

Check it out below…

)

Of course we assume Dark Souls would be Herzog’s favorite series, but in reality he’s probably totally into, like, Pokemon or something.

“I look into the eyes of the Pokemon, into the eyes of the Pikachu or Charmander, and I see a bottomless, fiendish stupidity and cruelty. Pokemon are the most horrifying, cannibalistic, nightmare creatures ever conceived by the hand of God. The fact they delight children so disgusts, but does not shock me.”

via Kotaku

lifeonmars70s:

Madeline Smith, Pippa Steele and Janet Key at Elstree Studios in 1970; Mr. Forbush and the Penguins was shooting on a neighboring soundstage to the Vampire Lovers. Sourced from HAMMER GLAMOUR “CLASSIC IMAGES FROM THE ARCHIVE OF HAMMER FILMS” By Marcus Hearn (Titan Books)

I just came across this cool old time-lapse video made by scientists from the US Geological Survey: The collapse of the crater floor of the Puʻu ʻŌʻō, one of the cones of the Kīlauea volcano in Hawaii.

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The things you learn about pornography in other countries when you’re forced to read the news. According to the National Post, three Canadian adult film networks are in a little bit of trouble for failing to meet the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission’s strict requirements regarding homegrown content. Specifically, porn networks must feature at least 35% Canadian-made erotica in their daily programming, which amounts to 8.5 hours out of a 24-hour day. And you know that someone, somewhere in Canada, is sitting there watching each network and counting every second.

The specific culprits are AOV Adult Movie Channel, XXX Action Clips and Maleflixxx, which, as Hank Hooper would put it, is a fellas that like fellas network, and they’re all owned by Channel Zero. The issue was addressed as Channel Zero attempted to renew each network’s licenses, and the Mounties or whoever said, “Wait just a minute there, if you don’t mind, please, you hosers.”

In previous filings to the CRTC, however, the company has claimed its deficit of Canadian erotica was simply a clerical error.

In a 2012 note to regulators, Jennifer Chen, a Channel Zero vice-president, wrote, “The non-compliance is a result of an error, on our part.”

Admittedly, Channel Zero had only been missing the CanCon threshold by minutes of erotica a day.

“The programming strategy has been adjusted accordingly in light of this information,” wrote Ms. Chen. (Via the National Post)

Interestingly, Quebec has actually become one of the biggest players in the adult film game, behind Amsterdam and Los Angeles, and it might even benefit from the fact that L.A.’s condom laws have companies and producers high-tailing it to Las Vegas and beyond. Still, the most remarkable thing about this story is that while prudish organizations in the U.S. are trying to end porn forever and make sure that nobody is exposed to such lewd behavior and alleged filth, the CRTC’s biggest problem with it all is that not enough of it was made in house. God bless you, Canada, from your delicious syrup to your pornographic patriotism.

(GIF via)

In an effort to better understand animated images’ ability to “convey emotion, empathy, and context in a subtle way,” a pair of MIT researchers created GIFGIF. The site presents you with two randomly selected animated GIFs, and asks which better conveys a specific emotion, like fear, shame, excitement, or amusement. The goal is to use the responses to create a system by which GIFs can be categorized by the emotions they elicit in the viewer. The website Giphy already does this pretty well, but relies on manually entered tags rather than crowdsourced data.

“When you are sent a reaction GIF, it takes only a few seconds for you to ‘get it’,” Travis Rich, one of the researchers, told Wired UK. “GIFs convey emotions quickly and powerfully. GIFs are sent around on email chains, included in news articles, and are at the core of huge internet cultures. They are used to express every range of experience from the joy of the perfect burrito to the heartache of a devastating breakup. So long as we say that language is the meaningful communication of information, GIFs are the alphabet of internet culture.”

If you’d like to participate, you can do so here.

The post Be a Part of MIT’s GIF Study appeared first on ANIMAL.

This idea was written down for a while before I decided to just go for it. I’m not sure why he’s a hedgehog instead of just a white dude, but for some reason I think it works. 

Goat Simulator may have started as a joke, but it’s become a full-fledged game. And yes, it’s coming soon. Very soon. On what is arguably the perfect date for a wonky physics game about trashing parties and licking things.

Yes, Goat Simulator will be arriving April 1st, according to Coffee Stain Studios. And it will be arriving on Steam, no less. And now it even has objectives and stuff!

Essentially, your goal, as a goat, is to destroy stuff in the most elaborate way possible. Destroying a table will get you points, destroying a table by crashing into it from above or hitting it with the axe stuck to your tongue will get you more points. The development team has compared it to the Tony Hawk franchise, and that seems bizarrely apt; as a game, the appeal is less mastery and more figuring out how to do the most ridiculous thing possible in the most ridiculous way possible.

So, if you want to get some goat, which is sadly not Goat Simulator’s tagline, keep an eye out on Steam April 1st. And remember, it’s Steam Workshop compatible, so you can start building new objects and levels immediately. Yes, you can build your town, or your office, or the Citadel, and then trash it with a goat. Truly, we live in a Golden Age of gaming.

Via The Escapist

1971: Osama bin Laden (second from right in green top and blue trousers) on a visit to Falun, Sweden. That year 23 members of the wealthy Bin Laden family visited Falun combining a business visit to close a deal with Volvo.

From a contemporary newspaper report on the visit of the wealthy Arab Family:

ARAB CELEBRITY VISIT
Yesterday Salem bin Ladin visited Falun on a combined business and pleasure trip through Europe. He was accompanied by 22 members of his family, which in total consists of 54 children. The young sheikh, who is 26 years old, arrived in his private jet to Borlange airport, while the rest of the family arrived by car. He has visited the club Ophelia in Falun. The young sheikh is reported to be a big fan of discos and has visited the discos of Falun at various times in the past, however not together with his family.

The sheikh is said to be owner of a big and successful construction company in his home country, Saudi Arabia. In Gothenburg it is said that he surprised Volvo by entering their office and ordering a large number of trucks for his company.

— Dalarnes Tidningar September 7, 1971.

(via)

[Reposted from prucilla via granini]

CNN reports that the practice of taking selfies, photos in which a person uses his or her phone’s camera to take a picture of themselves and friends (usually crowded in closely), is spreading head lice. What do you think, Disinfonauts? Credible or more ridiculous scaremongering from this increasingly irrelevant media giant? Why lice? Why not the flu or head colds? Is it that the louse “ick” factor is more likely to – ahem – turn heads?

The post ‘Selfies’ Are Spreading Lice, According to CNN appeared first on disinformation.

Satiric Genius Patrick Howley has discovered a fun little web toy that tells you “the partisan affiliation of baby names.” The widget, a bit of fluff from campaign analytics outfit “Clarity Labs,” is pretty simple — put in a first name and it will match the name to the number of registered voters and their party affiliation. And what do we learn from this exercise?

Fifty-five point five percent of the 1,559 registered voters named ‘Adolf’ are Democrats, compared to 48.5 percent who are Republicans … “Fidel” clocked in at 72.8 percent Democrat, “Benito” at 72 percent, “Slobodan” at 61 percent, “Genghis” at 73 percent, “Vladimir” at 59.7 percent, “Idi” at 82 percent, and “Saddam” at 81.2 percent.

Your editrix has asked us to point out here that she thought she got pregnant in Havana once, but she did not, and so did not gift the world with the greatest baby name past present or future, “Fidel Schoenkopf-Takizawa.” And now she is sad.

Not mentioned by Howley: 73.8% of voters named “Jesus” are just all right with being Democrats. And, perhaps related to that first result, Democrats have a firm hold (79.5%) on the first name “Godwin.”

A few more surprising results:

• While a majority of those named “Ronald” are indeed Republicans, it’s only 53% to 47%.
• There are only 63 registered voters named “Mitt.” 56.4% of them are Democrats anyway.
• There are way more Democrats named “Sarah” (54.4% of 806,471) than “Hillary” (54.9% of 27,919).
• “Karl” is not a very Marxist name (53% Republican) though “Groucho” is (65% Dem, out of 10 voters — huh?)
• “Cletus” is a narrowly more-Republican name (51.9%), as are “Skeeter” (52.%) and “Bubba” (54.4%).
• “Tucker” is about as Republican as you’d expect: 55%
• “Dwight” is more Democratic somehow (54.4%), even though any kids named after the character on The Office have yet to reach voting age.
• Wonkette is full of Democratic names — “Rebecca” (a squeaker at 50.9% D to 49.1% R), “Lisa” (53.1%), and “Alex” (58.6%). Our one outlier is “Gary,” who will be severely chastised for having a Republican name (55.9% R). Also, Yr Doktor Zoom is clearly schizoid depending on whether you go with his given name (54.4% Dem) or the name he uses in Real Life (53.7% Rep). Our other pseudonymous regulars, DDM and Major Major Major Major, have solidly middle-of the road first names that are both almost equally used by both parties.
• “God” is a Democrat — 86% of the time (out of 21 registered voters.)
• “Reince” isn’t even in the database.

[Clarity Campaigns via Daily Caller via tip from "Adolf" Chascates]

canogar:

Mike Bouchet, 2011.

via http://blog.iso50.com/2009/09/25/book-worship/

tashabilities:

OMG, they are just adorable! 

hyperscraps:

missmonstermel:

winneganfake:

agender-unicorn:

skepticalwitch:

calypsos-island:

twohourartist:

isitsafe:

fandomsbecrazy:

oMFG I just came downstairs and I found my sister with a lighter and I told her she can’t use fire and that it could catch the house on fire. She said that she was doing something important so I asked “what the hell is so important that you need fire for!?” and she told me with serious face ” I am using black magic to summon demons to get the mean girls at my school.” i can’t fucking breathe. I sat and watched her ritual hahahahaha shes fucking 10 years old 

This should be a wake-up call to her parents.

She obviously needs help.

Her parents should to talk to her about those mean girls,

and teach her that she can’t summon demons with just candles.

You need at least a pentagram drawn in a perfect circle

with goat or lamb blood,

and a proper incantation from a book of dark magick.

This is great way to to teach your child early on

about geometry and foreign languages.

Good art lesson too. Drawing perfect circles is hard

dOES NO ONE ELSE FIND THIS EXTREMELY DISTURBING 

Actually I find this girl fantastic. Ending bullying one curse at a time.

She might want to hold off on summoning demons until she’s a bit more mature but yes curse those fuckers you go, girl 

Now hang on, just hang on a moment there. Let’s make one thing clear right now:

There is not a goddamned thing wrong with calling on someone bigger and stronger then you for help if need be. 

If that stronger someone just happens to have tentacles and two-foot-long fangs, well, that’s more the problem of certain mean girls, I’d say. 

Here kid, i drew you a new pal. You summoned a demon, you got one. Sorry i couldn’t put more time into this sketch but his name is Bill.

I love everything about this post

Do not calle up That which you can not put downe!

[Reposted from MerelyGifted via wandi]

The Runaway Mouse, by Margaret Brown (Random House, 1961)

spiritofsalem:

hells ya

spectacularuniverse:

I’ve seen this photograph very frequently on tumblr and Facebook, always with the simple caption, “Ghost Heart”. What exactly is a ghost heart?

More than 3,200 people are on the waiting list for a heart transplant in the United States. Some won’t survive the wait. Last year, 340 died before a new heart was found.

The solution: Take a pig heart, soak it in an ingredient commonly found in shampoo and wash away the cells until you’re left with a protein scaffold that is to a heart what two-by-four framing is to a house.

Then inject that ghost heart, as it’s called, with hundreds of millions of blood or bone-marrow stem cells from a person who needs a heart transplant, place it in a bioreactor - a box with artificial lungs and tubes that pump oxygen and blood into it - and wait as the ghost heart begins to mature into a new, beating human heart.

Doris Taylor, director of regenerative medicine research at the Texas Heart Institute at St. Luke’s Episcopal Hospital in Houston, has been working on this— first using rat hearts, then pig hearts and human hearts - for years.

The process is called decellularization and it is a tissue engineering technique designed to strip out the cells from a donor organ, leaving nothing but connective tissue that used to hold the cells in place. 

This scaffold of connective tissue - called a “ghost organ” for its pale and almost translucent appearance - can then be reseeded with a patient’s own cells, with the goal of regenerating an organ that can be transplanted into the patient without fear of tissue rejection.

This ghost heart is ready to be injected with a transplant recipient’s stem cells so a new heart - one that won’t be rejected - can be grown.


(Source)

we-did-an-internet:

arcaneimages:

This taxidermy was found inside a late 19th-century French mansion which has been sealed up for more than 100 years. Via National Geographic.

Good to know people were just as weird before the internet.

“

[There is a] general principle of internet language these days that the more overwhelmed with emotions you are, the less sensical your sentence structure gets, which I’ve described elsewhere as “stylized verbal incoherence mirroring emotional incoherence” and which leads us to expressions like “feels,” “I can’t even/I’ve lost the ability to can,” and “because reasons.”

Contrast this with first-generation internet language, demonstrated by LOLcat or 1337speak, and in general characterized by abbreviations containing numbers and single letters, often in caps (C U L8R), smilies containing noses, and words containing deliberate misspellings.

We’ve now moved on: broadly speaking, second-generation internet language plays with grammar instead of spelling. If you’re a doomsayer, the innovative syntax is one more thing to throw up your hands about, but compared to a decade or two ago, the spelling has gotten shockingly conventional.

In this sense, doge really is the next generation of LOLcat, in terms of a pet-based snapshot of a certain era in internet language. We’ve kept the idea that animals speak like an exaggerated version of an internet-savvy human, but as our definitions of what it means to be a human on the internet have changed, so too have the voices that we give our animals. Wow.

”

-

A Linguist Explains the Grammar of Doge. Wow.

This is my favourite part, if I do say so myself. See also the summary doge macro.

(via allthingslinguistic)

Very amaze. Wow. Such cool.

(Yes, yes, I’m sure someone already said exactly this :-D)

Ronco presents STALK ROCK conceived and written by @DjRotaryRachel