Whoa. I lost contact with Rick almost 10 years ago, and this popped up in my Twitter stream today:
technoweenie feeling reflective for some reason, check out this blog post about my first telnet session: http://bit.ly/cST50P thanks, @stuloh :)
Chat Roulette has been getting a lot of coverage lately. There’s also a Tumblr site called Chatroulolz (sometimes NSFW) which is capturing strange pictures from the surreal, weird, but often amusing world of Chat Roulette. Reddit also has their own version.
This concept would have made a great sci-fi story in the past… but now it’s 2010 and it’s real and it’s too late.
It’s worth checking it out for the sheer curiosity factor, but be prepared to see a lot of dicks (in all senses of the word). There’s also a Chat Roulette drinking game. (I notice you have to drink a fair bit if you spot an Aussie on there.)
Update (2/22): Penny Arcade weighs in.
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(1)Diversity is restored this season.
Black couple? Check.
Asian couple? Check.
Pair of ambitious women? Check.
Pair of strong men? Check.
Lesbian couple? Check.
Brothers? Check (but, in a twist, only one is gay).
But, this season also brings…
71 year old triathlete and granddaughter
Former Big Brother winner and housemate
“World Champion” professional cowboys
World series winning team coach
Miss Teen South Carolina
First challenge is: make your way from downtown LA to LAX… using public transport. Brutal.
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(0)Got an email from my dad the other day saying that the tree outside his workplace had fallen down. Then I looked at the photo he attached. That gum tree was a pretty big sucker. If it had fallen the other way… well, let’s just say that dad would have been able to go on holiday for a few weeks. He even got quoted in the local papers about it (page 6)!
The landmark 20th season of Survivor is a special “Heroes and Villains” season. Set in Samoa, they’ve brought back 10 of the most well-liked and 10 of the most devious survivors.
It promises to be a fascinating and really entertaining season. The survivors are all experienced hands. Some are back for the third time, others have played together on the same season. With that comes natural alliances, people trying to mix up their gameplay style, and a whole new set of team dynamics. Continued after the jump (contains spoilers).
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stuloh Link to live online streaming feed for the Winter Olympics opening ceremony: http://fsfa.co.uk/
stuloh Crim matters, pro bono, no fee, interviewing your partner about his affair... what kind of biglaw firm is Sterling Huddle anyway? #deepend
Warren Buffett recently interviewed former Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson at the Greater Omaha Chamber of Commerce annual meeting in Omaha. Which is timely, given my recent Paulson- and Buffett-related posts. In the hour-long interview, Buffett asks Paulson a variety of questions about his new book, China, Bush, investing, and other interesting topics. As the moderator at the says when he brought the interview to a close: “I know one way to get unpopular is to interrupt a conversation like that.”
The NY Times has an article about how several people singing Sinatra’s “My Way” have been killed in the karaoke bars of the Philippines. Not while singing any other song. Just while singing “My Way”.
The killings have produced urban legends about the song and left Filipinos groping for answers. Are the killings the natural byproduct of the country’s culture of violence, drinking and machismo? Or is there something inherently sinister in the song?
Whatever the reason, many karaoke bars have removed the song from their playbooks. And the country’s many Sinatra lovers, like Mr. Gregorio here in this city in the southernmost Philippines, are practicing self-censorship out of perceived self-preservation.
The article also describes one creative method Filipinos have used to diffuse potentially lethal tensions in certain karaoke bars:
A subset of karaoke bars with G.R.O.’s — short for guest relations officers, a euphemism for female prostitutes — often employ gay men, who are seen as neutral, to defuse the undercurrent of tension among the male patrons. Since the gay men are not considered rivals for the women’s attention — or rivals in singing, which karaoke machines score and rank — they can use humor to forestall macho face-offs among the patrons.
Akio Toyoda, the President of Toyota, recently bowed at a press conference to express an apology in relation to the troubles they have been having with their cars. Bowing is a meaning-filled action in Japan, and the Times wrote a short guide on it:
There is the momentarily-held 10-degrees (gosh, was that your toe I trod on?), the briefly-held 25-degrees (sorry, we’ve run out of tuna) the 2-second, 45 degrees (I know you’re the Best Man, but the flight is cancelled) the 5-second 45 degrees (I’ve just backed over your dog, boss), the 20-second 90 degrees (our widget blinds kids) and the “dogeza” kneel on the floor (evacuate your village, the plant is exploding).
So when Toyoda-san made a brief dip, people criticised him for not being sufficiently contrite. The LA Times suggested this explanation:
But Akio Toyoda, grandson of the founder of the Japanese automaker now battling to save its global image from the stain of safety problems, did not deliver the deeper, longer bow that some expected. Bend too low, hold the pose too long, and Toyoda might have found himself in sticky legal trouble, his ritual of apology construed as a sign that the company accepted its culpability in the mess over all those defects.
Imagine that… a few more degrees lower, a few more seconds longer, and blam!, you’re suddenly up for billions of yen in damages. You wouldn’t want to be drunk when you make that bow.
stuloh Smallville is doing product placements for Windows 7?! How bizarre.
stuloh 74-53 Stanford, full time. http://twitpic.com/11fzzn
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