I am not sure how this one went under my radar but this is a really stunningly interesting show. The hero is a rich globe trotting playboy industrialist. He has a moment of ...something... that changes his view of things and decides he needs to do some good. He decides to help people in some of the most unpleasant places. The thing I like is they did not suddenly make the guy upstanding and good. He bribes people, makes mistakes, has sex with anything that will let him, and makes deals with drug dealers all while trying to do this one good thing. This would have been interesting as a movie but they have made it the basis of a show.

Anyways I thought I would point you lot towards the show. Go and watch it so they will make more of it cause I am eating it up so far.

Muhahahahahaha!!!!

The Tyger
by William Blake

Tyger! Tyger! burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

In what distant deeps or skies
Burnt the fire of thine eyes?
On what wings dare he aspire?
What the hand, dare sieze the fire?

And what shoulder, & what art,
Could twist the sinews of thy heart?
And when thy heart began to beat,
What dread hand? & what dread feet?

What the hammer? what the chain?
In what furnace was thy brain?
What the anvil? what dread grasp
Dare its deadly terrors clasp?

When the stars threw down their spears,
And water'd heaven with their tears,
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the Lamb make thee?

Tyger! Tyger! burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?

Work brings the awesome new trailer. Come take a look at what we have been working on.

Presented for your approval....Web Site Story. It really is quite well done.

Tuesday morning, 1LT Daniel Choi will face charges of "moral and professional dereliction" because he admitted that he's gay. In all likelihood, he'll be fired from the Army because he had the audacity to do what he was taught at West Point, ie, maintain his honor and refuse to lie.

The Courage Campaign is looking for 100,000 signatures in support of LT Choi prior to his trial. You can sign the petition here.

One should not speak ill of the dead. Michael Jackson died today. Rather than comment on the train wreck his life had become. I thought I would look at the stuff that made me like him when I was a kid. I liked the Jackson 5 cartoon reruns for one. I did listen to his music in the 80's like everyone but it didn't blow me away. But the Wiz....now that was awesome. I remember just impressed the hell out of me. Jackson for whatever his later faults could sing. I found this and thought i would share. This is the sort of thing he should be remembered for. His singing and his performing.

There is some great amount of satisfaction to be had in rolling through battlegrounds on WoW killing some horde with a proper partner in crime. Got to love rolling with the good guys!

heh.



It is possible there may be some blatant baiting going on here.  Smack talk may not reflect the actual beliefs of the poster.  Any and all resemblance to moral absolutism is purely coincidental.   Your millage may vary.  All sales are final.  Extensive usage of WoW may cause sleep disorders, strange eating habits,  lack of social life,  lack of productivity,  short temper,  yelling at computer screens,  and incontinence.  Consult your doctor before taking.  All sales are final.

Verifying nerd credentials. I should point out I knew the answer to every question that Hodgeman through out here.

If anyone is on twitter, set your location to Tehran and your time zone to GMT +3.30. Security forces are hunting for bloggers using location/timezone searches. The more people at this location, the more of a logjam it creates for forces trying to shut Iranians' access to the internet down. Cut & paste & please pass it on.

Twitter captures Iran's rebels
A MAN bled to death on a street in Tehran on Monday. As one bystander tenderly held his head, five others held out their cameras.

They captured photos and videos of the man and of the blood that stained his white shirt. On Wednesday afternoon, an anonymous individual uploaded the video to YouTube, where it was viewed by thousands and shared by bloggers.

YouTube said it had relaxed its usual restrictions on violent videos to allow the images from Iran to reach the world.

On Wednesday, the Revolutionary Guard warned that protesters trying to stoke tensions using internet sites like Twitter would be subject to retribution.

Opposition presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi is using his public profile page on Facebook to organise protests. US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has defended US efforts to ensure the Twitter social networking service remains available for use by protesters, even as Tehran complained about US interference in its affairs.

"I wouldn't know a Twitter from a tweeter, but, apparently, it is very important," Mrs Clinton said.

She said she considered it important to keep "that line of communication open and enabling people to share information, particularly at a time when there (were) not many other sources of information".

Cyber-sympathisers from around the world have been battling online to help Iranian protesters dodge censorship, transmit news of clashes and avoid capture.

"The revolution may not be televised in Iran but it may well be tweeted," a Twitter user said on Wednesday.

Online allies have set up scores of "proxy servers", internet-linked computers that can be used by people inside Iran to get around blocks imposed to stifle the spread of news about election protests.

For days, Twitter users have been changing time and location settings to make it appear they are messaging from Tehran to make it harder for authorities to find those really tweeting from that country.



http://www.theage.com.au/world/twitter-captures-irans-rebels-20090618-clx3.html

It bothers me a little how much I enjoy this mashup.

There was apparently an article in Wirdec about our game and our experience with the ESRB. It is a pretty cool read.

http://www.wired.com/gamelife/2009/06/fallen-earth/

"In Fallen Earth, an MMO where players struggle for survival in a no-holds-barred, post-apocalyptic world, the developers thought that they could never have enough cadavers.

But they were wrong. You can have enough dead bodies — the Entertainment Software Rating Board told them so. The independent body that assigns game ratings in the U.S. ruled that Fallen Earth’s piles of corpses were just too much for a Teen rating, says the developer of the upcoming PC game. The game has received a Mature rating as a result.

“There’s one town that’s literally hung with 200 corpses,” said the game’s lead designer Lee Hammock while demoing the game at E3. “(The ESRB) was like, ‘That’s too many corpses. You hit your limit.’”

Post by </a></b></a>one_hoopy_frood, via caudelac (keep in mind that this is a re-post, and thus some of the statements herein represent the original poster, more than myself. That said, I think that it is important to get these things out and said, better than via a link):






If you are reading this right now, you have more luxury than someone in Iran could ever hope for right now. If you are watching TV or a video on youtube, updating your status on Facebook, Tweeting, or even texting your friend, you are lucky. If you are safe in your home, and were able to sleep last night without the sounds of screaming from the rooftops, you need to know and understand what is happening to people just like you in Iran right now.






They are not the enemy. They are a people whose election has been stolen. For the first time in a long time, a voice for change struck the youth of Iran, just as it did for many people in the United States only seven months ago. Hossein Mousavi gained the support of millions of people in Iran as a Presidential candidate. He stands for progressiveness. He supports good relations with the West, and the rest of the world. He is supported with fervor as he challenges the oppressive regime of Mahmoud Amedinejad.*


On Friday, millions of people waited for hours in line to vote in Iran's Presidential election. Later that night, as votes came in, Mousavi was alerted that he was winning by a two-thirds margin. Then there was a change. Suddenly, it was Ahmedinejad who had 68% of the vote - in areas which have been firmly against his political party, he overwhelmingly won. Within three hours, millions of votes were supposedly counted - the victor was Ahmedinejad. Immediately fraud was suspected - there was no way he could have won by this great a margin with such oppposition. Since then, reports have been coming in of burned ballots, or in some cases numbers being given without any being counted at all. None of this is confirmed, but what happened next seems to do the trick.

The people of Iran took the streets and rooftops. They shout "Death to the dictator" and "Allah o akbar." They join together to protest. Peacefully. The police attack some, but they stay strong. Riots happen, and the shouting continues all night. Text messaging was disabled, as was satellite; websites which can spread information such as Twitter, Facebook, Youtube, and the BBC are blocked in the country. At five in the morning, Arabic speaking soldiers (the people of Iran speak Farsi) stormed a university in the capital city of Tehran. While sleeping in their dormitories, five students were killed. Others were wounded. These soldiers are thought to have been brought in by Ahmedinejad from Lebanon. Today, 192 of the university's faculty have resigned in protest.





Mousavi requested that they government allow a peaceful rally to occur this morning - the request was denied. Many thought that it would not happen. Nevertheless, first a few thousand people showed up in the streets of Tehran. At this point, it is estimated that 1 to 2 million people were there. (Personal note: I've heard reports that it might have been 3 million-- but nothing is confirmed at this point). Mousavi spoke on the top of a car. The police stood by. For a few hours, everything was peaceful. Right now, the same cannot be said. Reports of injuries, shootings, and killings are flooding the internet. Twitter has been an invaluable source - those in Iran who still know how to access it are updating regularly with picture evidence. Women are being brutally beat.

Tonight will be another night without rest for so many in Iran, no older than I. Tonight there is a Green Revolution.

For more information:

PICTURES:
Here - from Boston.com
Here - on Flickr
Here - _sober's twitpics. There's a lot of good twitpic photostreams of things going on.


NEW INFORMATION:
Andrew Sullivan's Daily Dish - near constant updates
ONTD_political live post - Collated information, pictures & etc in the comments

ON TWITTER:
@StopAhmadi
@Persiankiwi
@ProtesterHelp
@IranElection09
@IranRiggedElect
@Change_For_Iran <-- no tweets for a while, which is worrying :(
@NextRevolution <-- absolutely heartbreaking

ETA: SIGN THE GLOBAL PETITION! 25,000 signatures and growing! http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/protest-against-the-june-2009-coup-detat-in-iran.html





دنیارابگوییدچطورآنهاانتخاباتمان دزدیده اند
Tell the world how they have stolen our election.




(original post by [info]one_hoopy_frood here - please repost!)
*ETA: I'll comment that, as regards to how Mousavi will get on with the West, nothing is firm or certain. However, in the likelihood that the incumbent cheated, it really doesn't matter what the numbers say-- he ought to be ousted for that criminality. If you would have won, and you cheat anyway, you still ought lose.

• Mood: angry

Before I go to bed I thought I would share something I saw on Boing Boing. There is a new website which is destined to be one of my regular stops.

http://atlasobscura.com/

The site is all about the obscure and odd places on the map. They cover places you might not find on a tour but our none the less fascinating.

here are my two favorites

http://atlasobscura.com/places/gates-hell
The gates of hell is a pit in the Karakum desert in Turkmenistan. The pit has been on fire for 38 years.

http://atlasobscura.com/places/fireflies-great-smoky-mountains
This is a place not to terribly far from my old stomping grounds in Tennessee. The fireflies in this section of the mountains blink on and off in synchronized timing. They are all on at the same time and all off.

Pretty cool site. I reckon a number of you will find it as awesome as I do.

It is a horror I had to share. You cant look away. It is mostly work safe though maybe not mind safe.

For all the ladies out there

http://tacticalcorsets.com/#corsets

A 14 year old kid survives a meteor hit.





http://www.telegraph.co.uk/scienceandtechnology/science/space/5511619/14-year-old-hit-by-30000-mph-space-meteorite.html


Gerrit Blank, 14, was on his way to school when he saw "ball of light" heading straight towards him from the sky.

A red hot, pea-sized piece of rock then hit his hand before bouncing off and causing a foot wide crater in the ground.


The teenager survived the strike, the chances of which are just 1 in a million - but with a nasty three-inch long scar on his hand.

( Read more... )

More coverage from E3 on our game. They get to us about time stamp 5:30. And hey it is G4TV's MMO report doing the interview.