With all the sadness and trauma going on in the world at the moment, it is worth reflecting on the death of a very important person, which almost went unnoticed last week. Larry LaPrise, the man that wrote "The Hokey Pokey" died peacefully at the age of 93. The most traumatic part for his family was getting him into the coffin. They put his left leg in. And then the trouble started…
(I’m doing exams, don’t expect any updates until Thursday)
6 Comments
Wasps aren’t exactly man’s best friends, but when it comes to sniffing out trouble, some scientists think they’re better, cheaper and easier to train than hounds.
Scientists from the University of Georgia and USDA Agricultural Research Service are training a strain of the insects to detect everything from concealed explosives, drugs and human remains to — hopefully — diseases like cancer. The results will be published in the journal Biotechnology Progress in the next few months, and is already available online.
[Link]
Comments Off
A woman rented a Citroen C4 in Budapest. She drove from Budapest to Pécs. Approximately 220km. In 1st gear. She thought it was automatic. These are the insurance photo’s of the engine and the bonnet. [Via]
6 Comments
It’s finally here. Apple have launched their Australian iTunes store. You can access it by selecting Australia as your country down the bottom of the iStore in iTunes. iUnderstand? This now gives Australians their first legal way of placing music on their iPods. Pricing at the moment stands at:
- $1.69 a song
- $16.99 an album
- $3.39 for a music video
Now whilst I’d probably pay $1.69 for a song, $16.99 for an album I can get for $20 at Big W or Target, with a cover, high qual cd (as opposed to a scratchy CD-R), and all the extra info and liftouts that come with, I can’t see myself buying any albums off iTunes in the near future.
The new store does not sell TV episodes, a feature recently introduced into the US iTunes store. This leaves Australians with no legal way to access shows not shown in Australia, or heavily delayed. Forget following lost with your cousin in America, he’s going to holing up in an underground bunker while your wondering where that polar bear came from and wondering what’s in the hatch!
8 Comments
Music may one day be very close to a woman’s chest, with BT futurology which manufactures computer chips that store music, creating a MP3 player that can be implanted into a woman’s breasts.
And while one breast could hold an MP3 player, the other the person’s favourite music collection.
BT Laboratories’ analyst Ian Pearson said flexible plastic electronics would sit inside the breast. A signal would be relayed to headphones, while the device would be controlled by Bluetooth using a panel on the wrist.
"It is now very hard for me to thing of breast implants as just decorative. If a woman has something implanted permanently, it might as well do something useful," The Sun quoted Ian Pearson as saying.
The senors around the body linked through the electrical impulses in the chips may also be able to warn wearers about heart murmurs, blood pressure increases, diabetes and breast cancer.
The company said it could be available within 15 years.
[Link]
Mmm, now that’s a dream woman. MP3 with Bluetooth capable boobies.
3 Comments
This is an interesting little article on Times.com about upcoming pieces of technology. It isn’t all tech stuff though, they even look at ways of removing fat from deep fried foods. Now whilst this didn’t blow my mind as they promised, I did find it quite and interesting read
[Link]
Comments Off
I found this cartoon whilst browsing IRC images, and thought it summed up the GTA Hot Coffee mod controversy pretty nicely:
A bit old now, but with this recent news explosion about Jack Thompson (one of the first people to attack the game for its hidden content) I thought I’d post it.
(Plus, I was feeling guilty about not posting anything for ages.)
Don’t forget to visit our Jack Thompson Random Fact Generator!
3 Comments
For those of you who haven’t noticed, we aren’t big fans of Bush here at sandstorming. We do, however, still believe a great deal in supporting the troops who have to back up his often incredibly poor desicion making. Tadpole, who helped contribute to our domain name story last week is an American who is about to be deployed in Afghanistan, and in good blogger style he’s going to keep up the blogging whilst he’s there. So if your after a direct, unbiased report straight from the middle east, check his blog out!
[Link]
17 Comments
I thought I’d write something quickly on the whole Jack Thompson issue. This thing is huge all over the internet at the moment, but if you don’t know what I am talking about, read this article first. In a nutshell, he is the guy that leads all the pointless video game lawsuits in the US against the likes of GTA and The Sims II. Now he’s finally gone a few steps too far and with a push from Gabe from Pennyarcade, and the ‘thousands of nerds’ he controls, Jack Thompson is now under investigation. As for why I am writing this post about stuff I said you probably already know, well I want to link you all to this. Its in the style of the Chuck Norris and Vin Diesel quote generator, and go and add your own funny quotes and link whoever you like to it.
[Link]
Comments Off
Got a birthday coming up? Suspect people might sing you happy birthday? Well, if your in a public place when it happens, you might just be infringing Time Warners intellectual property!
The melody for Happy Birthday was first penned by two sisters from Kentucky, Mildred J. Hill and Patty Smith Hill. The song was called Good Morning to All, but bore the recognizable melody. The tune was first published in 1893 in the book Song Stories for the Kindergarten. The melody has since passed into the public domain, and is safe to hum in public without permission.
While it is not entirely clear who first wrote down the words for Happy Birthday, it showed up in a few places before Jessica Hill (another Hill sister) was able to demonstrate undeniable similarities between Good Morning to All and Happy Birthday and to secure the copyright to the song.
Working with the Clayton F. Summy Publishing Company, Jessica Hill published and copyrighted Happy Birthday in 1935. While the copyright should have expired in 1991, copyright has been extended repeatedly over the last quarter of the twentieth century and the copyright for Happy Birthday is now not due to expire until at least 2030.
The Clayton F. Summy Company is no longer independent, but, through a chain of purchases, the copyright for Happy Birthday To You lies securely in the hands of the Time Warner company. Happy Birthday’s copyright is licensed and enforced by ASCAP, and the simple little ditty brings in more than USD $2 million in annual royalties.
[Link]
1 Comment
Next Page »
