heretic's linkblog of fun

photos

noreply@blogger.com (200ok) — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 05:38:30 PST

Brisbane Skyline on Flickr
LDL4_2973 on Flickr
Breakfast on the Bridge - Sydney Crave Festival 2009 on Flickr
English Russia | Cloudy Weather (fantastic photos, very Bladerunner)

around the traps

noreply@blogger.com (200ok) — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 05:19:31 PST

The Jalopy Journal | Time Lapse – On The Road. Time lapse of a guy driving across America in a convertible.
AC/DC used as Guantanamo torture tool by US government | Music | News.com.au: WHAT do Neil Diamond, AC/DC, Marilyn Manson, Eminem, Christina Aguilera and Don McLean have in common? They were all used as instruments of torture by the US government.
Aussies don't click with display advertising - Digital Media: Australia and New Zealand are among the least likely nations to click or dwell on online display advertising, according the Eyeblaster 2009 Global Benchmark Report.

No, really, there's an ad company called Eyeblaster. Nobody in the industry appears to find that problematic.

In less mature markets, where users are novice in online advertising, they receive ads with more open arms. When the market matures, the users’ fatigue together with increased competition for their attention reduces engagement significantly. The users’ propensity to engage with ads should be taken into account when comparing benchmarks between geographies and verticals.

Translated that means people only click for a little while, then they get the shits and just ignore the ads. What this all means is the online advertising industry is fundamentally flawed (and always was), as it relies on clicks as a key metric. No other advertising medium tracks an equivalent, instead you have to measure something worth knowing - like brand awareness and association after a campaign.
Breakfast on the Sydney Harbour Bridge on Vimeo. Time lapse of the Sydney Harbour Bridge being covered in real grass for the Breakfast on the Bridge event.

cups in a row

noreply@blogger.com (200ok) — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 04:54:44 PDT

From the coffee festival. More shots at Aroma Festival 2009.

around the traps

noreply@blogger.com (200ok) — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 07:01:15 PDT

So you have a lamp made of bones and skulls that you just don't need any more. What do you do? Free to a Good Gothic Home on Flickr
According to this TED talk, open plan noise makes you 66% less productive. ....I fucking KNEW it! Rest of the talk is great too.

...now I'm off to crank up Confusion.
Easily distracted: why it's hard to focus, and what to do about it | Psychology Today: The challenge is that we have not realized the true cost of distractions: they use up what is actually a limited supply of attention each day, and make us far less effective if we need to do deeper thinking work. For example, a university of London study found that being always connected impacts your IQ equivalent to losing a night's sleep or taking up marijuana.
The 4WD with seats made of whale penis: A Russian armoured-car builder is boasting that its latest vehicle has seats covered with whale-penis leather. ... because nothing adds that touch of class to your armoured car like the vague feeling of being karmically buggered by a whale.
Freudenstein: ABC boss Scott’s paid content claims are laughably inaccurate - mUmBRELLA: As the head of a company that takes in excess of $800 million every year from Australian taxpayers, (Scott’s) claim that the ABC’s online news content ‘will certainly be free’ is as laughable as it is disingenuous. Similarly, he has some gall to criticise the ‘old proprietorial model’, which he says ‘operated as a form of protection from harsh realities the businesses might otherwise have faced’, since this precisely describes the ABC’s government-owned model.
Simonova is an Ukrainian artist who won Ukraine's Got Talent 2009. She uses a giant light box, dramatic music, imagination and "sand painting" skills to interpret Germany's invasion and occupation of Ukraine during WWII:

around the traps

noreply@blogger.com (200ok) — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 05:56:17 PDT

the good samaritan: julia in australia attended a new year’s eve party in an affluent neighborhood. the next morning, after she came to, she realized her digital camera was missing. when she back to search for it, she found this sign posted up all around the local park.
YouTube - LEAKED: New iPhone Commercial. There's an app for EVERYTHING!
Where The Buffalo Roamed | Weather Sealed: Behold, a visualization of the contiguous United States, colored by distance to the nearest domestic McDonald’s!
I think what fascinates me about maps like this is the amazing split down the middle that shows up - eg. compare with Watching the Growth of Walmart Across America | FlowingData.
Ironic Sans: Idea: A new typography term
Hey Hey red-faced over blackface skit - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation). *facepalm* ARGGH, I can't believe they were so fucking stupid to do that. Of all the acts in their vault they bring that one back? ...and judging by the comments, there's no shortage of morons out there in tvland who can't understand why it's a problem. I despair.
The fun theory: change behaviour by making the better option more fun.

yoyu

noreply@blogger.com (200ok) — Sat, 10 Oct 2009 02:36:07 PDT

I was introduced to a great concept yesterday: yoyu. I was at the Web Directions South conference and Kelly Goto mentioned it in her opening keynote for day two.

It turns out that yoyu is kind of hard to find using Google. In fact one friend observed Yoyu cannot be found with Google, which seems kind of appropriate ;)

As it turns out the first useful link I found was Kelly's mother talking about it:

There is a Japanese word, "yoyu". We use the word often. It means to have extra preparation.

...

"Yoyu" also has the implication of calmness one feels when they are extra prepared. It is that space between "Get Ready" and "Go" – the space "Get set" or "Be ready" or "feel confident". For instance, I might say, "He/she lacks yoyu." when I see someone leading a frazzled existence. I might tell our daughters to consider scheduling their lives with a little more yoyu. Therefore, I would use the word more for a lifestyle suggestion. It’s a big picture word.
yoyu | goto company

In a linked post, Kelly explains it as the time ‘in-between’ things, allowing moments to relax, regroup and prepare for next appointment, deadline or arrival. We do not have a word like this in English. It is a very significant cultural difference.

I think many of us have lives which lack yoyu.

photos

noreply@blogger.com (200ok) — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 06:43:19 PDT

Crane on Flickr
(silos) on Flickr
Sydney’s Apocalyptic Red Dawn | Boudist Photos (more of Dan Boud's dust storm pics)
English Russia | The Haunted Cars
English Russia | Stone Trees of Yakutsk
View of Sydney at sunset from my hotel room. on Flickr
Tweeps App on Flickr
Sun Storm on Flickr

change

noreply@blogger.com (200ok) — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 05:45:54 PDT

Typcut #0002: Are You Happy? | Blog.H34 : Music, Design, Culture

around the traps

noreply@blogger.com (200ok) — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 06:23:21 PDT

The Most Controversial Magazine Covers of All Time | Webdesigner Depot
Names that are better than "iSnack 2.0"; iSnack was a registered name before Kraft closed comp | Article | The Punch.
YouTube - 所ジョージ sokontokoro motorshow 2/2 (really crazy car mods)
English Russia | The White Citizens (polar bears on construction sites)
Doritos Concept (packaging)
How the city hurts your brain - The Boston Globe: When a park is properly designed, it can improve the function of the brain within minutes. As the Berman study demonstrates, just looking at a natural scene can lead to higher scores on tests of attention and memory.
why i am not afraid to take your money, by amanda fucking palmer: if you think i’m going to pass up a chance to put my hat back down in front of the collected audience on my virtual sidewalk and ask them to give their hard-earned money directly to me instead of to roadrunner records, warner music group, ticketmaster, and everyone else out there who’s been shamelessly raping both fan and artist for years, you’re crazy.
Pirate Party Australia Plans Election Onslaught: After winning 7.1 per cent of Swedish votes in this year's European Parliament elections, The Pirate Party has opened up a branch in Australia and plans to contest the next federal election. The party, which will campaign on a platform of anti-internet censorship and the decriminalisation of non-commercial file sharing, has already signed up 550 members, enough for it to register as a party with the Australian Electoral Commission.
Internet overtakes television to become biggest advertising sector in the UK | Media | The Guardian: The UK has become the first major economy where advertisers spend more on internet advertising than on television advertising, with a record £1.75bn online spend in the first six months of the year. This has some pretty huge implications. I wonder if the people who were smug about the plight of newspapers will be so sanguine if their supply of soap operas goes behind a paywall?
Jackman & Craig -- Can You Hear Us Now? | TMZ.com

I don't know how it has taken so long for me to discover trollcats! I opened this at work and nearly choked on my lunch, laughing so hard... Fairly unambiguous reaction to your utterance trollcat:

photos

noreply@blogger.com (200ok) — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 08:16:24 PDT

Blacktown, Australia on Flickr
Coffee on Flickr
cre.ations.net - Creation: Long Exposure Pictures
Schwedter Str - Prenzlauer Berg on Flickr (cool bit of street art)
Dust storm: Sydney's Red Dawn 1 on Flickr, Sydney's Red Dawn 2 on Flickr, . on Flickr, Luna Park, Sydney on Flickr
Blade-runner-esque - a gallery on Flickr

around the traps

noreply@blogger.com (200ok) — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 08:56:23 PDT

Taggers are the trolls of the graf world. By and large when people talk about graffiti being 'vandalism' what has happened is taggers have scrawled over someone's expensive new fence, shopfront, etc - sites that are aggressive, places you know someone cares about and will be forced to spend money cleaning and repainting. Compare this with graffiti artists who choose bare, unloved walls (did you really prefer the bare concrete underpass?). I tend to think of tagging as the angriest and most destructive form of street art, a kind of territorial pissing of the have-not which says 'you may have this, but i can take it away'. Taggers do this not only to mainstream property, but to other graffiti as well. It creates a rift in the world of graffiti. But you can't reason with them: Dear Bitch Ass Tagger on Flickr. The taggers response to a letter from a graffiti artist? They tagged it of course.
GRAFFITI_MELBOURNE_0909_853 on Flickr
http://img.metro.co.uk/i/pix/cartoons/nemi/nemi0809_600x194.gif
LOL Blues Brothers:
Splunge: 24/08/09 13:30:16 Got accosted by some annoying religious zealots on my lunch break. They wanted to answer any questions I might have about why God lets bad things happen to good people. I challenged them to explain what kind of vindictive God would allow Internet Explorer 6 to have a 17% share of the browser market. They had no answer.
Too true:

have a slack as fuck day! ;)

noreply@blogger.com (200ok) — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 21:50:29 PDT

9/9/9

pink girl

noreply@blogger.com (200ok) — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 05:10:23 PDT

around the traps

noreply@blogger.com (200ok) — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 05:10:00 PDT

Dinner at El Bulli: The Greatest Restaurant in the World - The Amateur Gourmet... crazy.
Best hoodie ever: ThinkGeek :: Hello My Name Is Inigo Montoya Hoodie
Hilarious: YouTube - 1930s Futuristic Fashion Predictions. Oh swish!
Six Fonts That Piss People Off | Design & Innovation | Fast Company
The Jalopy Journal - How A Differential Works, which is more interesting than it sounds ;)
I fail to see... I Can Has Cheezburger?
hmmm..lets see, standard master lock... – I Can Has Cheezburger?

around the traps

noreply@blogger.com (200ok) — Sat, 29 Aug 2009 06:13:23 PDT

I'll die before the endgame, says Terry Pratchett in call for law to allow assisted suicides in UK | Mail Online: 'I believe that if the burden gets too great, those who wish should be allowed to be shown the door,' he said. 'In my case, in the fullness of time, I hope it will be in the garden under an English sky. Or, if wet, the library.' ... Pterry's journey is heart wrenching, but he obviously intends to make a difference in the world (and jokes) to the very end.
Derek Powazek - Programmers are Tiny Gods: Like designers, if you give a programmer a problem with parameters, they’ll apply every bit of genius they have to solve it in the best possible way. If you tell them how to do it, you’ll suffer the wrath of an angry God. Understanding geeks 101: if you do not understand what they do, just describe what you need and explain why you need it. If something's frustrating, you can say so but try to do it as unemotionally as possible - "...and that is frustrating because then we have to manually cross check with a printout" or whatever. Because then they have a clear problem to solve. Don't make it personal. The geeks generally know 100 ways the system could be better for every 1 you can think of; and there'll be a reason why they're not fixed - probably a reason the geeks have bitched about in the pub. So don't act like they're too stupid to know the bloody system's not perfect.
Video: Moldover CD case rocks a light theremin, our socks: The awesome part is the custom-designed circuit board that accompanies the CD and lists the tracks while doubling as a theremin instrument with headphone jack -- all in a standard-size jewel case. Hit the on button and start making 'music' by waving your hand in front of the light sensors.
AMC - Blogs - SciFi Scanner - John Scalzi's Guide to the Most Epic FAILs in Star Wars Design and The Inbox Of Nardo Pace, The Empire's Worst Engineer
yeah, I know I’ve had too much ‘nip to drive – I Can Has Cheezburger?... mostly because that cat appears to be the My Cat Hate You cat ("Meow, asshole") after a bender with Zelda ("Flibberdy gibbut hot bam whiskey fizzle WAH!").
xkcd - A Webcomic - Tech Support Cheat Sheet.... true, so true.
Hobbit Huts in Latvia | English Russia
Shakesville: Cat Experiments: Livs—who, unlike any other cat I've ever had, has been fascinated with mirrors and her own reflection since she was a kitten—had seemingly come around to the French door to check out her reflection and examine how it looked and moved when she moved, then gone back to the front door and compare it with the image of the visiting cat she was seeing through the window. Only when she was satisfied it was a different cat did she start communicating with it.
Microsoft apologizes for race-swap photo incident | cNet. Apparently MS employ at least one complete fucking tool in Poland.
World Science Festival 2009: Bobby McFerrin Demonstrates the Power of the Pentatonic Scale. Most interesting bit is really at the end, I wish the clip went on into the discussion!
RISK VS. REWARD – I Can Has Cheezburger?, Were you going for clown couture? – I Can Has Cheezburger?

around the traps

noreply@blogger.com (200ok) — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 07:42:47 PDT

Where 14 Of The Top Internet Businesses Got Started | Income Diary
Living Root Bridges: The living bridges of Cherrapunji, India are made from the roots of the Ficus elastica tree.
Kill Your Darlings - book cover designs that were killed off in favour of the final version.
Tippy never fails to be amazed at the amount of havoc one well-placed roller skate can cause. – I Can Has Cheezburger?
Another job well done! | Picture Is Unrelated
American Copywriter - Evolution of Evony ads (progressively NSFW): If you've seen any page on the Web that concerns video games, you've probably seen an advertisement or two for Evony, which is a free online multiplayer strategy game that is, by all accounts, pretty decent. Their banner ads, on the other hand, have gotten pretty indecent as of late. I have noticed these bloody ads - often on otherwise tame sites - and they really have gotten worse. This is the sort of thing that brings out the ad blocker.

Lastly... I've tried to describe this a few times. The first time I saw That 1 Guy (at the Troubadour in Brisbane) he opened with this song, and the room was absolutely, totally and utterly spellbound. When he finished there was a hushed pause before applause erupted. It was an incredible start to an absolutely magical gig.

This video doesn't reproduce how perfect that moment was, nor does it really show just how epic the bass is when it really kicks in. But it does give a good idea what the magic pipe is all about, how he plays it, and the way he builds up a sound:

mmm, pizza

noreply@blogger.com (200ok) — Wed, 19 Aug 2009 06:30:12 PDT

Homemade pizza with friends... awesome :)

around the traps

noreply@blogger.com (200ok) — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 07:53:15 PDT

Office on the Forest's Edge - Workspaces - Lifehacker. I'm unconvinced about the setup, but the space is fantastic.
Dark Roasted Blend: Jet Engines on Trucks (For Fun and Profit)
These Donkey Kong Shelves Set a Pretty High Bar for Shelving - Donkey Kong - Gizmodo. Yes, yes they do.
HEY-IT - We want to get rid of IE6! Posters for workplaces locked down to IE6.
Why Music Moves Us: Scientific American: music seems to offer a novel system of communication rooted in emotions rather than in meaning. Recent data show, for example, that music reliably conveys certain sentiments: what we feel when we hear a piece of music is remarkably similar to what everybody else in the room is experiencing.
I was wondering if eating coffee beans gives you more, less or the same kind of caffeine hit as drinking espresso. That is, do you get more from extracting espresso from lots of beans, or ingesting a small number of entire beans. According to the following links the beans have a bigger kick, although it depends on the 'serving size'. little_details: Coffee beans and caffeine content/effects; Candy coated coffee beans | i, Pundit; Nutrition Facts and Analysis for Candies, milk chocolate coated coffee beans.

photos

noreply@blogger.com (200ok) — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 23:38:28 PDT

foggy night on Flickr
298:365 on Flickr (great cat photo)
ru_stickers: Стикеры CATSO
photographers: (peeking from under an umbrella in the snow)
Constant Elevation on Flickr
IMG_1721.JPG on Flickr - Photo Sharing! (absolutely amazing sunrise over sydney harbour)
photographers: (blinds)
Beautiful Freaky Surf Shots Surfing Photo Collection
Street art, Perth (chupa chups)

frustrated?

noreply@blogger.com (200ok) — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 05:16:56 PDT

Brisbane street art (2005).

around the traps

noreply@blogger.com (200ok) — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 05:15:24 PDT

Past Blast – Jeffrey Zeldman Presents The Daily Report: If your old work doesn’t shame you, you’re not growing.
Five Senses Latte Art - a set on Flickr including a freakin latte art DRAGON, which is damn cool, and a pac man.
The Longest Way 1.0 - one year walk/beard grow time lapse on Vimeo
TechEBlog | High-Speed Camera Captures Grenade Exploding - it blows up... like a balloon.
FISTICUP™
Once again youtube proves there's nothing so insane a snowboarder (and a guy in an impreza) won't try it:

around the traps

noreply@blogger.com (200ok) — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 07:40:49 PDT

A Softer World: 465 - Give me liberty...
Delicate Genius Blog | BlindSearch: the results are in. BlindSearch is a blind search comparison between Google, Yahoo and Bing. Users rate which results they prefer before finding out which engine produced the results. After 559,239 queries the results are Google: 41%, Bing: 31%, Yahoo: 28%. I've said it before, Google is not invincible - it's possible for other companies to build a better search; or even just simply for Google to just lose its marketshare for some other reason entirely. Will it be the Bing and Bingo-powered Yahoo search? Well I'd be surprised, but it's feasible. Something, one day, will defeat Google's dominance. I'm not trying to be nasty or gleeful, and I can also imagine Google (Search) being killed by some other product produced by Google. But we should always remember that the previous search giants were killed by a couple of college kids with a great idea.
Op-Ed Columnist - Swan Songs? - NYTimes.com, mostly for the graphic of music sales ('value of units') according to media. CDs are dying out, but according to this it's just the same as 8-track, LP and cassettes. The difference this time is that the music industry isn't making money off the new medium. They fucked up completely and instead of selling music on the new medium, they tried to suppress the new medium and sue everyone using it. Imagine if they'd done that with CDs?
BBC NEWS | Europe | Turkey demolition goes wrong - it's really quite extraordinary to see the building just roll over like that. Guess it was built tougher than they realised!
History of the Australian web revealed - mUmBRELLA: An ambitious website showing an animation of the growth of web usage in Australia has today gone live. ...the visualisation is interesting (click through to play with it directly), but it's hard to make much immediate sense of anything other than the biggest players. Also keep in mind this is based on Nielsen data so it's only tracking the really big sites that happened to use Nielsen for stats. For all that, it's still interesting...

grin

noreply@blogger.com (200ok) — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 04:23:54 PDT

Street art, Brisbane (2005).

around the traps

noreply@blogger.com (200ok) — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 04:22:53 PDT

25 Various Styles of The Wizard of Oz Illustrations | The Design Inspiration
Major banks reviewing their overdrawn charges | Banking | News.com.au, no doubt they'll raise interest rates next week to ensure they maintain their billion dollar profits.
Google's New Australian Offices Produces Pong Over Pyrmont... hmm, the mystery stink. Pretty sure we encountered the foul beast in carpark of the IGA one time. The smell was unholy.
Get Great Gadgets. And Keep Them. - Last Year's Model
I Am Obsessed With Food | Top Aussie Online Resources for Foodies
Official Google Blog: I now pronounce you monetized: a YouTube video case study. YouTube made some mo-nay. Pretty sure the people who made the video made nah-thing. But at least they didn't get sued for creating something which made the 'rights holders' lots of money.
ondiraiduveau's collections on Flickr - a huge collection of classic pinups, illustrations, movie posters, book covers, etc...

around the traps

noreply@blogger.com (200ok) — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 04:42:11 PDT

Living with FPS Disease:
Ninja Business Cards | Card Observer
TV networks hit by $300m revenue drop - mUmBRELLA. I wonder if that spend will ever move to online media - and if that might lead to more money put into online advertising creative. Currently online is treated like the fast food of advertising. Shitty banners, crappy design, 30sec TV ads dumped into prerolls (anything above about 5sec is too long online)... it's not taken seriously. When online ads get the same care and attention as magazine ads, people might start noticing online ads in some relatively positive manner (instead of screaming at page takeovers).
And to avoid staying serious for more than 30 seconds, a lolcat:
YouTube - jimathers's Channel - foamy the squirrel archive. foamy overload! :D
Next stop, clay tablets where Dan looks at ways to store data on paper. A bold new computer metaphor which discusses the evolution of computers... or rather the lack therof.
The Computer Hardware Chart Identifies Your PC's Parts - Computer Hardware - Lifehacker, Top 10 Wallpaper Tools & Tweaks - Wallpaper - Lifehacker
Linos (tiny portable record player). Very neat bit of design.
Inside Sony's Blu-ray factory | NEWS.com.au (gallery)
Dark Roasted Blend: Britain’s Colourful Pub Signs, Part 1
LED Colorblind | Colblindor - Color Blindness viewed through Colorblind Eyes
Maker's Schedule, Manager's Schedule: When you're operating on the maker's schedule, meetings are a disaster. A single meeting can blow a whole afternoon, by breaking it into two pieces each too small to do anything hard in. Plus you have to remember to go to the meeting. That's no problem for someone on the manager's schedule. There's always something coming on the next hour; the only question is what. But when someone on the maker's schedule has a meeting, they have to think about it.
Slipstream - Streaming Services May Soothe the Music Industry - NYTimes.com: 'Piracy is essentially the consumer’s wish to have everything on demand. It's not like people want to necessarily have it for free,' Mr. Ek said. The problem is that there have not been commercial services 'that allowed people to discover new music and easily share music with friends,' he said.