whizziwig's shared items in Google Reader

Lloyd Dobler Mob Invades New York For 'Say Anything' Anniversary

Kevin Kelly — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 08:18:00 PST

The 20th Anniversary Edition Blu-ray and DVD of Say Anything came out yesterday, and to mark the occasion, numerous men with lots of free time dressed up in trench coats and hoisted boomboxes above their heads and marched throughout New York City serenading people with the strains of Peter Gabriel's "In Your Eyes," and a cover version of the same song by The Lloyd Dobler Effect. Check them out in the gallery below.

Damn, that movie came out 20 years ago? That makes me feel incredibly old. The first time I saw that movie will be forever burned into my brain since it was my first and only date with the captain of the women's volleyball team in high school. However, the movie on Blu-ray looks better than it ever did back in theaters, circa 1989, and hopefully it'll inspire legions of Lloyd Dobler fans for years to come that will fare better than I did.

The Blu-ray version of the movie is a 1080p high-definition upgrade of the original DVD release from 2002, along with a newly remastered 5.1 audio mix. In addition to the upgraded image and sound, this includes all the features from the previous version (commentary from Cameron Crowe, John Cusack, Ione Skye, deleted scenes, and more), along with three new featurettes. The best of the bunch is "An Iconic Film Revisited: Say Anything... 20 Years Later" featuring new interviews with Crowe, Cusack, Skye, John Mahoney, and Nancy Wilson.

Gallery: Say Anything Lloyd Dobler Mob

Filed under: Comedy, Drama, Romance, Home Entertainment, Movie Marketing

Permalink | Email this | Comments

Layers come to Google Maps for BlackBerry

elaine — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 13:54:17 PDT

[Cross-posted from the Google Mobile Blog]

We're excited to announce that version 3.2 of Google Maps for mobile is now available for BlackBerry. This release contains many of the same features we recently launched on Windows Mobile and S60, including Layers.

Layers make it easy to view various types of information on your map and are especially helpful in situations when you're traveling somewhere new. For example, you can turn on the Wikipedia layer to read entries about nearby places, then use the transit lines layer to help map out a route. Or you can use the My Maps feature of Google Maps to create a collection of places you're planning to visit on your trip and then use Google Maps for mobile to access it from the road. You can also turn on the Google Latitude layer to see your friends' locations.

My coworker Mat is a big fan of Layers and made the below video to show you how he uses the feature. Check out the video, and get the latest version of Google Maps for your phone by visiting m.google.com/maps from your phone's browser.

Posted by Michelle Chen, Software Engineer

Change your Mac's volume a 'quarter box' at a time

(author unknown) — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 09:58:14 PDT

If you hold down Option + Shift while pressing the volume keys, the volume will change by a quarter of a box with each press. This offers more fine-grained control over your Mac’s audio output.

Uh-Oh: Shabbat Elevators Not So Kosher?

Jen Chung — Sat, 10 Oct 2009 15:26:23 PDT

In some buildings, there are shabbat (or shabbos) elevators that stop on every floor, allowing observant Jews to travel on them without worrying about breaking the Sabbath and using technology. However, a recent ruling in Israel appears to ban use of Shabbat elevators and even suggests they may be a "desecration of the Sabbath." But New York Jews don't seem that worried—one told the NY Times, "One of the wonderful things about Judaism is that there are competing opinions about everything."

Impossible to Resist: Apple Cider Doughnuts

Emma Christensen — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 11:11:30 PDT

The way we see it, if you drive out to an orchard and spend a wholesome afternoon picking apples, you've earned a doughnut at the end of the day. Besides apple cider doughnuts are as seasonal as the apples they're made from, so you should get them while you can - unless, of course, you make them yourself!

Read Full Post

The Incredible Machine Mega Pack - GOG.com

(author unknown) — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 22:26:05 PDT

Shared by whizziwig
buy me!

The premier destination for DRM-free classic PC games like Fallout, Duke Nukem 3D and more. Buy classic PC games, download games, get free games.

The System 281: Singletasking

admin — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 10:03:38 PDT

Do you ever singletask anymore?

UPDATE: Thanks to everyone who followed Leo Laporte here! If you’re new to the comic, check out the first comic. Or maybe the other comics with rules and terms, all along similar lines. Or the comic archive. Oh, and like Leo, I’m also on Twitter.

Students Turn Out — And Westboro Leaves - The Local - Fort-Greene Blog - NYTimes.com

(author unknown) — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 19:41:34 PDT

FORT GREENE: Hate-mongering Kansans begin their assault

(author unknown) — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 15:26:55 PDT

Shared by whizziwig
so glad I wasn't home for this

Note: More media content is available for this story at BrooklynPaper.com.

By Gersh Kuntzman and David Chiu

The Brooklyn Paper

A Kansas-based anti-gay Baptist church began its promised three-day assault on Brooklyn with a brief rally this afternoon at a Fort Greene high school, two days before they vow to picket at three Jewish synagogues in Brownstone Brooklyn over those institutions’ apparent godlessness.

About five members of the Westboro Baptist Church, whose mission is represented clearly in its Web site address, www.godhatesfags.com, rallied for about 15 minutes outside Brooklyn Technical HS, holding signs reading, “Fags are beasts” and “God is your enemy.”

It is unclear why the church chose Brooklyn Tech, but its Web site suggested that the school teaches that “it’s OK to be gay.”

“WBC will teach the rebels of Brooklyn what good looks like, and you had better behave,” the church said.

During the protest, students remained across the street from the protesters, some yelling, “Go home!” There was no violence.

“I find it disgusting that people can come to a public school, especially one as diverse as Brooklyn Tech, and express hate,” said James, 17, who declined to give his last name.

The bigots will protest on Saturday in front of Congregation Beth Elohim on Eighth Avenue in Park Slope at 9:45 am, at Union Temple on Eastern Parkway in Prospect Heights at 10 am and the Kane Street Synagogue in Cobble Hill at 12:30 pm on the eve of Yom Kippur, the holiest day on the Jewish calendar.

On Wednesday, church spokeswoman Shirley Phelps-Roper said the rallies were not anti-Jewish or anti-gay.

“How about we call it an ‘Obey your God’ rally?” she said. “You Jews and gays have got to put away your false gods, your idols and your filthy way of life.”

She added that “God hates the disobedient.”

“We picked these weekends because these are the high holidays,” she said. “You Jews broke the covenant with God. The beast is going to bring the nations to march upon Jerusalem. Your houses will be destroyed and your women ravaged. It’s going to make the Holocaust, the Babylonian captivity and the destruction of the Temple look like a tea party.”

The Anti-Defamation League, which has been monitoring the group for several years, said that Westboro tends to protest groups that “they think support homosexuality or otherwise subvert what they believe is God’s law.”

That even extends to the families of dead soldiers. Church members have made headlines for protesting at the funerals of military personnel, claiming that the soldiers’ deaths were dishonorable because they fought to defend a country that allows homosexuals to openly enjoy their sexuality.

Rabbi Andy Bachman of Congregation Beth Elohim prepared his congregation for the assault in a letter sent late on Tuesday that praised his temple as a “community that celebrates the strength of diversity” and a place “for individuals and families of all backgrounds to grow and to learn” — a possible reference to the focus of the Baptist group’s anger.

The next day, Bachman told The Brooklyn Paper that he had no idea why the Baptist fringe group is targeting local shuls on Saturday.

“If you look at their Web site, they are equal opportunity haters,” he said. “They are living inside some kind a time warp in which they feel they have the legitimacy to speak on an ancient Biblical notion of what God wanted or, more precisely, what ancient people thought God wanted from humanity.

“They have ignored the last 3,000 years of development of human civilization — that’s what makes their message so shocking,” he added.

Bachman said his temple had consulted with the NYPD and other congregations that had been the target of Westboro protests and determined that the best response is to not respond at all.

“We will essentially ignore it,” he said, just a few feet from the temple’s facade, which features the names of such hardly controversial religious figures as Abraham, Joshua, Samuel, Elijah, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Esther and Ruth.

He also said that the bat mitzvah ceremony of Natalie Chertoff would go on as planned.

“She’s amazing,” he said. “Here’s a teenager who’s strong and confident. And she’s seeing [the protest] as a lesson that people will attempt to do hateful things, but our eternal message as Jews is affirming life in the face of hate. That’s been our key to survival.”

Bachman said he did not anticipate violence from his congregation, but the NYPD will nonetheless be out in full force. Phelps-Roper, the Westboro spokeswoman, laughed at the suggestion that Brooklynites would react violently.

“Don’t flatter yourself, Brooklyn,” she said. “We serve the living God. You mess with us, you’ll get double destruction for what you do.”

Comment on this story.

Gay People Can Quote The Bible Too

editor@thestranger.com (Dan Savage) — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 09:04:14 PDT

Via The High Definite.

[ Subscribe to the comments on this story ]

Sick and Wrong

(author unknown) — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 22:03:12 PDT

Shared by whizziwig
stab stab stab. this is the most disheartening thing I've read all year, and I just finished reading about industrial farming.

Matt Taibbi takes a look at the health care reform circus in Congress. It doesn't come off looking much better than Goldman Sachs. (more inside)
Another favor to industry buried in the bills involves the issue of choice. From the outset, Democrats have been careful to make sure that a revamped system would not in any way force citizens to give up their existing health care plans. As Obama told the American Medical Association in June, "If you like your doctor, you will be able to keep your doctor, period. If you like your health care plan, you'll be able to keep your health care plan, period. No one will take it away, no matter what."

That sounds great, particularly in conjunction with the new set of standards for employer-provided insurance outlined in the House version of reform. Under the bill — known as HR 3200 — employers must provide "essential benefits" to workers or face a stiff penalty. "Essential benefits" includes elements often missing in the fly-by-night plans offered by big employers: drug benefits, outpatient care, hospitalization, mental health, the works. If your employer does not offer acceptable coverage, you then have the right to go into one of the state-run insurance "exchanges," where you can select from a number of insurance plans, including the public option.

There's a flip side, though: If your employer offers you acceptable care and you reject it, you are barred from buying insurance in the insurance "exchange." In other words, you must take the insurance offered to you at work. And that might have made sense if, as decreed in the House version, employers actually had to offer good care. But in the Senate version passed by the HELP committee, there is no real requirement for employers to provide any kind of minimal level of care. On the contrary, employers who currently offer sub-par coverage will have their shitty plans protected by a grandfather clause. Which means …

"If you have coverage you like, you can keep it," says Sen. Sanders. "But if you have coverage you don't like, you gotta keep it."

Downloadable Paper iPhone Dock

Jaime — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 13:00:09 PDT

Julien Madérou has designed a paper iPhone dock that you can download and make yourself!

http://www.dessinemoiunobjet.com

©2009 Design Milk | Posted by Jaime in Art, Technology | Permalink | 4 comments

Sponsored Topics: IPhone - Dock - Handhelds - Smartphones - Wallpapers and Themes

The selective pressure of magical thinking is strong. Oh wait.

(author unknown) — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 18:02:59 PDT

Shared by whizziwig
no no no no no

Charles Darwin film 'too controversial for religious America'

Creation, starring Paul Bettany, details Darwin's "struggle between faith and reason" as he wrote On The Origin of Species. It depicts him as a man who loses faith in God following the death of his beloved 10-year-old daughter, Annie.
The film was chosen to open the Toronto Film Festival and has its British premiere on Sunday. It has been sold in almost every territory around the world, from Australia to Scandinavia.
However, US distributors have resolutely passed on a film which will prove hugely divisive in a country where, according to a Gallup poll conducted in February, only 39 per cent of Americans believe in the theory of evolution.

Ourousoff Weighs In On Barclay's Center Design

Brownstoner — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 05:15:07 PDT

The results, unveiled on Wednesday, are somewhat more promising. Some of Mr. Gehry’s original ideas, like opening views from the sidewalk into the arena, have been restored. Mr. Ratner has reduced the size of the structure, moving team offices to another site. And Shop has wrapped it in an appealing rust-colored steel skin, which will make it less harsh on the eye. But it still falls short of the high architectural standards set by the design the city was originally promised. And too many questions remain unanswered about the overall plan — in particular, when and whether Mr. Ratner’s company, Forest City Ratner, will ever build the surrounding buildings, and, assuming it does, who will design them. Without them the cohesion of the original plan falls apart. - New York Times, 9/10/09

Pollan Boycotts Whole Foods Boycott

Alexandra Vallis — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 16:11:02 PDT

Michael Pollan is not joining the Whole Food boycott, even though he disagrees with CEO John Mackey’s views. “Mackey is wrong on health care, but Whole Foods is often right about food,” Pollan writes for the conservative website New Majority. “Their support for the farmers matters more to me than the political views of their founder.” [New Majority via Ethicurean]

Whatever happened to acid rain?

Nina Shen Rastogi — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 12:11:08 PDT

Why do we never hear about acid rain anymore? Did it just go away?

[more ...]

With Tenants Moving Out, A Last Look Inside 5 Pointz

(author unknown) — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 20:20:03 PDT

Shared by whizziwig
OH NOOOOOOOOOO.

Four months after the stairway collapse at 5 Pointz, artists in the Jackson Avenue Studios are in the final stages of vacating. Owners closed the building in July after they were told by the Department of Buildings that a new certificate of occupancy would have to be issued. In a letter to his tenants, Jerry Wolkoff said, "by reason of the requirements of the New York City building code it is both physically and financially impossible for us to obtain a new certificate of occupancy for these buildings."

Despite getting a fresh coat of exterior paint, everyone has to be out by this Saturday, August 22nd. After that, the owners said he may turn it back into a factory for now.

We stopped by Sunday to take one last look inside the hallways, stairwell and roof of the Long Island City building.

Bill Clinton on DADT and DOMA

John Aravosis (DC) — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 07:38:06 PDT

Bill Clinton was asked today at the Netroots Nation conference about Don't Ask Don't Tell and DOMA, both of which happened under his watch. Here is what he said, courtesy of a rush transcript provided by gay journalist Rex Wockner:

Netroots Nation '09 convention
Aug. 13, 2009
David L. Lawrence Convention Center
Pittsburgh, PA

Lane Hudson (screaming from the audience): Mr. President, will you call for a repeal of DOMA and Don't Ask Don't Tell right now? Please.

Bill Clinton: ... You want to talk about Don't Ask Don't Tell, I'll tell you exactly what happened. You couldn't deliver me any support in the Congress and they voted by a veto-proof majority in both houses against my attempt to let gays serve in the military, and the media supported them. They raised all kinds of devilment. And all most of you did was to attack me instead of getting me some support in the Congress. Now that's the truth.

Secondly -- it's true! You know, you may have noticed that presidents aren't dictators. They voted -- they were about to vote for the old policy by margins exceeding 80 percent in the House and exceeding 70 percent in the Senate. The gave test votes out there to send me a message that they were going to reverse any attempt I made by executive order to force them to accept gays in the military. And let me remind you that the public opinion now is more strongly in our favor than it was 16 years ago, and I have continued supporting it. That John Shalikashvili, who was chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff under me, was against Don't Ask -- was against letting gays serve -- is now in favor of it. This is a different world. That's the point I'm trying to make.

Let me also say something that never got sufficient publicity at the time: When General Colin Powell came up with this Don't Ask Don't Tell, it was defined while he was chairman much differently than it was implemented. He said: 'If you will accept this, here's what we'll do. We will not pursue anyone. Any military members out of uniform will be free to march in gay rights parades, go to gay bars, go to political meetings. Whatever mailings they get, whatever they do in their private lives, none of this will be a basis for dismissal.' It all turned out to be a fraud because of the enormous reaction against it among the middle-level officers and down after it was promulgated and Colin was gone. So nobody regrets how this was implemented any more than I do. But the Congress also put that into law by a veto-proof majority, and many of your friends voted for that, believing the explanation about how it would be eliminated. So, I hated what happened. I regret it. But I didn't have, I didn't think at the time, any choice if I wanted any progress to be made at all. Look, I think it's ridiculous. Can you believe they spent -- whatever they spent -- $150,000 to get rid of a valued Arabic speaker recently?

And, you know, the thing that changed me forever on Don't Ask Don't Tell was when I learned that 130 gay service people were allowed to serve and risk their lives in the first Gulf War, and all their commanders knew they were gay; they let them go out there and risk their lives because they needed them, and then as soon as the first Gulf War was over, they kicked them out. That's all I needed to know, that's all anybody needs to know, to know that this policy should be changed.

Now, while we're at it, let me just say one thing about DOMA, since you -- the reason I signed DOMA was -- and I said when I signed it -- that I thought the question of whether gays should marry should be left up to states and to religious organizations, and if any church or other religious body wanted to recognize gay marriage, they ought to. We were attempting at the time, in a very reactionary Congress, to head off an attempt to send a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage to the states. And if you look at the 11 referenda much later -- in 2004, in the election -- which the Republicans put on the ballot to try to get the base vote for President Bush up, I think it's obvious that something had to be done to try to keep the Republican Congress from presenting that. The President doesn't even get to veto that. The Congress can refer constitutional amendments to the states. I didn't like signing DOMA and I certainly didn't like the constraints that were put on benefits, and I've done everything I could -- and I am proud to say that the State Department was the first federal department to restore benefits to gay partners in the Obama administration, and I think we are going forward in the right direction now for federal employees. ...

But, actually, all these things illustrate the point I'm trying to make. America has rapidly moved to a different place on a lot of these issues, and so what we have to decide is what we are going to do about it. Right now, the Republicans are sitting around rooting for the president to fail, as nearly as I can see.

Medical Papers By Ghostwriters Pushed Hormone Therapy

timothy — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 14:50:00 PDT

krou writes "The New York Times reports on newly released court documents that show how pharmaceutical company Wyeth paid a medical communications firm to use ghost writers in drafting and publishing 26 papers between 1998 and 2005 backing the usage of hormone replacement therapy in women. The articles appeared in 18 journals, such as The American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology and The International Journal of Cardiology. The papers 'emphasized the benefits and de-emphasized the risks of taking hormones to protect against maladies like aging skin, heart disease and dementia,' and the apparent 'medical consensus benefited Wyeth ... as sales of its hormone drugs, called Premarin and Prempro, soared to nearly $2 billion in 2001.' The apparent consensus crumbled after a federal study in 2002 'found that menopausal women who took certain hormones had an increased risk of invasive breast cancer, heart disease and stroke.'"

Oooh, fancy.

Corinna Psomadakis — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 20:29:28 PDT

Dress-up day at Thing Labs. Mint Plaza. We be chillin on the roof deck.