Way up there with super cool things like batman is this. Globecast. Its a podcast that has no origin as 19 individuals work together to produce a collaborative podcast every fortnight. The site is now taking submissions for people to podcast for their country.
What is it?
A fortnightly released podcast, with content from 19 countries around the world. Each country’s contributor has one minute to talk about anything they please, be it their country, current events, a joke, an opinion piece… anything!
Can I represent my country ?
You sure can! We have just begun accepting submissions. You must submit 200 words explaining why you would be the best choice from your country.
What is involved in contributing?
You will be required to submit a 1 minute mp3, ogg or wav file on a fortnightly basis. You must agree that the content of podcast will be released under a Creative Commons licence onto the internet. Your content must not involve or advertise any commercial entity or organisation, or contain any copyrighted material. You must be able to speak English.
[Globalcast]
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I thought I’d written about the Space Elevator before, but a quick search with the snazzy search box to your right revealed that in fact I haven’t and so here it is.
The space elevator seems like an idea out of a science fiction movie. Put simply its a giant elevator from earth running up to a satellite in space. As crazy as it sounds, a lot of people believe it could work. The technology is based on nanotubes, and they believe that they could create a ribbon cable that could hold a tremendous amount of weight. A runner car will then go up and down on this cable.
Sound unbelievable? They’re hoping to have one operational by 2018. Thats only just over 10 years ago. I think they’re a bit hopeful myself, but even if it takes 30 years, it’s still before I turn 50. And that’s farking cool.
For more information though, and not me rambling about something I find incredibly cool off the top of my head, check out the wikipedia entry on it here.
But why did I start rambling about this today? Because they’ve just pulled off a test run using a large helium baloon and a small robot runner on the cable. The entire experiment went off beautifully. All the info on that is here… damn I can’t wait to hear that elevator music…
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Ever seen an ice cream vending machine and though to yourself that ‘Gee, you don’t see them around very much? Well, there’s a few vending machines around a little more obscure then your ice cream vending machine. Topping the list of vending machines from the twighlight zone we have:
- Eggs
- Rice
- Pornography
- Fresh Vegetables
- Video Games
- And… Used Panties!
[Link]
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It may be the oddest tale to emerge from the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Armed dolphins, trained by the US military to shoot terrorists and pinpoint spies underwater, may be missing in the Gulf of Mexico. Experts who have studied the US navy’s cetacean training exercises claim the 36 mammals could be carrying ‘toxic dart’ guns. Divers and surfers risk attack, they claim, from a species considered to be among the planet’s smartest. The US navy admits it has been training dolphins for military purposes, but has refused to confirm that any are missing. Dolphins have been trained in attack-and-kill missions since the Cold War. The US Atlantic bottlenose dolphins have apparently been taught to shoot terrorists attacking military vessels.
Their coastal compound was breached during the storm, sweeping them out to sea. But those who have studied the controversial use of dolphins in the US defence programme claim it is vital they are caught quickly. Leo Sheridan, 72, a respected accident investigator who has worked for government and industry, said he had received intelligence from sources close to the US government’s marine fisheries service confirming dolphins had escaped.
[Link]
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The Herald Sun, Australia’s biggest-selling daily newspaper, reports that no legal method exists for Australian iPod owners to fill their player with music. And they could face court with anti-piracy groups refusing to rule out suing users of the popular player.
None of the tunes available from legal download internet sites are compatible with the Apple iPod music players. The common method of "ripping" tunes on to an iPod from the user’s own CD collection is illegal — as a breach of copyright laws.
And unlike Britain and the US, Australia does not yet have an Apple iTunes store for iPod-compatible legal downloads. An estimated million people nationwide have already bought and put music on their iPods.
But all methods of filling the player with music are illegal, which means Australia’s hundreds of thousands of iPod users are all technically criminals. While no one in Australia has yet been sued for transferring tunes from CDs to iPods, Music Industry Piracy Investigations say that may not always be the case.
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We did a story a whilst back on two gay penguins
Well, it turns out they’ve broken up:
" Roy and Silo, the two famous gay penguins at New York’s Central Park Zoo, are no longer a pair. Silo has gone straight. They broke up after six years together. Once, they were provided a donated egg. They sat on it and hatched it and this was celebrated as some kind of penguin lifestyle choice in the New York Times on Feb. 7, 2004, under the headline "The Love that Dare Not Squeak Its Name." But that’s so over.
These days, Silo has a girlfriend. And Roy? Well, lately he has been observed hanging around a few sexually immature penguins, but he has no real prospects. It seems Roy is a troubled penguin. "Silo found a young female. Her name is Scrappy," Rob Gramzay, the zoo’s senior penguin keeper, told me in a phone interview on Tuesday. "They had an egg. It didn’t work out and they might try again."
And Roy?
"Roy didn’t really find anybody. He hung out with a few birds, half of them were female, half were male," Gramzay said. "He’s not in a nesting situation. It’s more for camaraderie.""
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We don’t do much on gaming here at sandstorming. Mostly because I don’t really game, and doc well… he plays counterstrike… and its older than the internet so it’s more like Jesus than a computer game. That aside, a video of Direct X 10 in action has been leaked. Direct X is basically a graphics engine that games run on. This provides the features that allow programmers to make the games look pretty, and well, to me direct X 10 almost looks real.
Video Footage
Thread About it on Neowin
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Here’s to putting the science in Tech and Science for a change. These photos are simply incredible, they’re a species of ray, closely related to the manta ray that jump up into the air and seem to acheieve flight. Noone seems to have any idea as to why they do it, with theories ranging from ‘just for fun’ to ‘clean barnacles off themselves’. The photos however is what makes the article so amazing.
"Then again, it’s hard not to believe this behavior is not some manner of play—it certainly looks that way. Among fish, mobula rays have disproportionately large and complex brains. In fact, the weight of their brains relative to their body weight is comparable to many mammals.
Some mobulids, manta rays in particular, are known to exhibit un-fishlike playful behavior amongst themselves and with human divers. Some of these creatures will seek out human contact and will approach divers to solicit attention, a scratch, or just apparently, to feel a diver’s bubbles against their skin.
But the mobulas that I paddle among seem to be indifferent to my presence, caught up perhaps in their own little form of rapture. Sometimes they land so close to my kayak that I scramble more than once to put my lens under a shirt before the splash hits me. Other times I can feel them thump against the bottom of my kayak. I have to wonder if they even know I am here just as I wonder if they will be here in the coming seasons."
[Link]
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Chuck Norris as a KID!! Read all about it here!
Chuck Norris reads these facts on TV!! Read all about it here!
Chuck Norris Responds! Read all about it here!
A Note About the Following:
This was posted from a chain email I was sent. I only posted it on the site at the time because it was that good, and the biggest list I had ever seen. Now in April 2006, this post has almost 400 comments, is the most read page on the site, and is linked to all across the web including wikipedia. I’ve now started adding all the comments to the original list. Enjoy!
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Original list, plus good original suggestions in comment up to 392
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- While playing the role of a Texas Ranger, Chuck Norris used live ammunition during all shoot outs. When the director explained that he can’t do that, he replied, “Of course I can, I’m Chuck Norris,” and roundhouse kicked him in the face.
- When his martial arts prowess fails to resolve a situation, Chuck Norris plays dead. When playing dead doesn’t work, he plays zombie.
- Chuck Norris was the original treasure in National Treasure.
- It is common knowledge that there are three sides to the force: The Light Side, The Dark Side, and Chuck Norris.
- Scientists used to believe that a diamond was the world’s hardest substance. But then they met Chuck Norris, who gave them a roundhouse kick to the face so hard, and with so much heat and pressure that the scientists turned into artificial Chuck Norrisi.
- Chuck Norris ate his weight at Godfathers pizza.
- Chuck Norris carries a messenger bag. If you call it a purse, he pulls a baby out of the bag and throws it at you. The baby will blow up upon impact.
- Chuck Norris has a stare that turns goat piss into gasoline.
Read the rest of this entry »
415 Comments
I’ve been watching this site for months now, but hadn’t got around to posting anything on it. Years ago I used to read grouphug.us. It was basically an anonymous confession site that allowed people to confess whatever they like. Some were innocent enough ‘i still dream about my ex girlfriend’ but some were much deeper, people who wanted to kill themselves or cheated on their wives. It was interesting seeing the innerworkings of other people’s minds.
PostSecret takes it to a whole other level. The sites creator basically encourages people to create their own post cards based on a secret. Most of them are brilliantly created, all very well thought out, and always fascinating to read.
[Link]
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