My Slice of the Globe

It’s Friday, my work computer’s hard drive has crashed, and so it’s time for a little levity. A friend emailed this out earlier this week, I had never heard of the group before and the song is catchy as well as the flash animation to go with it. So Happy Friday (Be sure to use headphones if you are at work) :

The Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny

Apparently the judge who presided over the Dan Brown plagiarism trial decided to have a little fun in the wording of his judgement. The Judge decided to embed a secret code in it. An article concerning this can be found at :

CNN

If you would like to take a crack at decrypting the code embedded in the 71 page ruling, you may find it at :

Her Majesty’s Courts Service

The EFF is putting together a petition to take to Congress that will hopefully help stem the RIAA lawsuit rampage. If you are interested in taking a look at the Petition and/or signing it, please go to :

https://www.eff.org/share/petition/

If you are concerned about having your name shown on the internet, just check the “Do not display on website” box and your name will not be shown online but still available in the actual printed copy to be delivered to congress.

BTW, if you are interested, the latest person to be sued by RIAA was a dead Grandmother:

The Register Article 

In an attempt to make money from its archives, the Smithsonian has signed an exclusive deal with Showtime Networks. This deals gives Showtime exclusive access to the Smithsonian film archives. All filmmakers wishing to use this “public domain” material must get the material through Showtime and create it through them or not use the material. The deal also restricts access to Smithsonian personnel for filmmakers. Yes this does look as bad as it sounds.
Read more here :
Washington Post
EFF
ABC News

Looks like Google launched their online calendar program this evening. Seems pretty spiffy. You can find it at :

http://calendar.google.com

Quick Feature Rundown :

Imports  from:

• Microsoft Outlook
• Yahoo! Calendar
• Apple iCal

Notifications :

• Email
• Pop-up, if app is open
• SMS, text message

General :

• You can create multiple calendars
• You can share a calendar
• You can make a calendar private or public
• You can create invites (Evite competition, anyone?)

Will revisit in a few days after I have played with it some.

It’s the weekend and if you’re looking for a movie perhaps this list may help you setup your netflix queue, blockbuster visit, Tivo, or even next possible purchase. Empire online put together this list of the 50 greatest indie films, which I originally noticed sometime this week on digg.com. I’ve only seen a handful of these movies on the list but haven’t been disappointed in the ones I have seen. Movies on the list that I can very much vouch for :

Movies that I keep meaning to see :

• Being John Malkovich
• THX-1138
• The Blair Witch Project
• City Of God
• Reservoir Dogs

I’ve been told so many times that I should see Reservoir Dogs, that I’ve lost count. And yes I know I need to see it, and yes I know apparently it would be a movie I would be “totally in to”. The opportunity just hasn’t presented itself. And a warning on “Lost in Translation”, you have to be in the right mood to enjoy it.
See you at the Movies!

As seen on WilWheaton.net, Joshua Ellis, who is an independant journalist, went to the Trinity Test Site (the site of the first nuclear bomb test), this year to go take a look. The site is open to the public 2 days of every year. He describes what he saw in pictures and words, and has also given some historical context for it all. It is a good read and his article can be found here :

http://www.zenarchery.com/trinity/

Please go take a look and feel free to leave some feedback.

A British court has thrown out the lawsuit against Dan Brown. Here is more info from the LA Times.

Time for another quiz. Are you ready? Here is my result :

Official Survivor Congratulations! You scored 78%!

Whether through ferocity or quickness, you made it out. You made the right choice most of the time, but you probably screwed up somewhere. Nobody’s perfect, at least you’re alive.

As seen on HardOCP.com, ever want to play a first person shooter, in your browser. Well some one has coded up a 7MB shockwave execcutable and yes it does include multiplayer among other features. Take a look over at :

 http://www.rasterwerks.com/game/phosphor/beta1.asp

Just when you thought your contextual relationship needs were not being met, Google comes to the rescue :

http://www.google.com/romance/