Category: Friday Linky

Late last night I finished up the last chunk of major urgent work. Now to breathe deep and figure out what else needs doing, then maybe, just maybe, I get to move into a more normal sort of February.
So here come the linky. Ahhh, I love ’em so!
Fake Delicious. Friend of FTM Mallika has started a blog about stuff that looks like food BUT IS NOT ACTUALLY FOOD. Even I think this is crazy but it’s also completely amazing.
Exploring and understanding the Beatles through amazing, well-designed infographics.
The actual play of chess flies over my head, but I enjoy reading about it. The wikipedia article on The Immortal Game, a legendary match from 1851, is a great read, and includes an animation of the entire game so chess-heads can watch as it develops.
Tim Denee designed a calendar. If I had an A3 printer I would so print this out, it looks great. Not that I ever really use calendars. Anyway. It’s calibrated to New Zealand, by the way.
This one time, the television talked to Simon Pegg.
The New York Times writes a lengthy exploration of the strange saga of Little Green Footballs, which was for a long time a home for the most virulent anti-Muslim bigotry on the ‘net, but in recent times has cut ties with the American right-wing. Fascinating for its specifics, about this site and these people, and its generalities, about how stuff works in the political blogosphere. Cultural anthropologists will be fascinated.
Hidden in the entries of the OED is a secret history of typography.
And finally… The Estonians

*deep breath*
R2D2 weighs less than your cellphone.
Wgtn abstract cartoonist Draw’s weather animation. Except I can’t get it to work on the link? It worked in the RSS feed. Anyway, maybe you’ll get lucky.
This deserves a whole big post or two of its own, but I can’t even keep up with it myself right now: The Case of the Midnight Note, a transmedia private detective story set in a mash-up of Wgtn 2010 and Chicago 1930. There’s twitter, photos, video, comics, and some audience interactive stuff where bartenders in Wgtn bars have had clues for patrons who ask them something in-character. Highly cool. A dramatic moment!
What parts of the body do different music genres sing about?
He-Man art gallery. Check out the artworks (big page).
Encyclopedia of tie knots
Jack Kirby designed costumes for a 1969 show of Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar.
Chimpanzees ritualistically dance in front of big fires.
*dives*

Because timb asked for it, some very quick linky from the files…
100 cupcakes, each depicting a different game
Nakatomi Space – Die Hard, the Israeli Defence Force, and what they mean for architecture
Photos of William Burroughs’ stuff
A 1972 (?) book about what life would be like in 2010
There! Now leave me to my madness!

First: sign the Avaaz petition for a deal in Copenhagen. Several world leaders asked Avaaz to do this to lend weight to the negotiations; so far over 13 million people have signed. That’s a lot of people. They’re aiming for 15 million. Sign here.
Best photoblog of the year? Sketchy Santas:

Amazon’s gigantic warehouse. It’s big. No elves though.
The amazing Kate Beaton does some Xmas-themed comics
Santa Baby (Eartha Kitt)
World’s smallest snowman!
Still looking for gifts? How about Gnome Chomsky? Or a heartfelt album by Ken? Or how about you make a replica of a famous science-fiction vehicle like these superfans did?
And finally, readers, I have two gifts for you:
Chris Walken reads the lyrics to Lady Gaga’s ‘Poker Face’
Carrie Fisher and her stunt double catch some rays on the Jabba’s barge set. And you know what that means.

Exit your show like I exit the turnpike
Google Street View now extends into the ruins of Pompeii
Web Site Story – some of this is so perfect it hurts.
This is getting much buzz right now, a promo for a potential show named Slingers, to try and garner enough support to actually make the show. It’s got a groovy, effortless charm to it. I guess you’d call it Ocean’s 11 Go To Space Casino:

SLINGERS from Mike Sizemore on Vimeo.

Xmas present option: art book by Paul Bourne, who renders amazing CGI environments and characters.
Tor.com hosts a Lovecraft art-a-thon. Neat stuff here.
Oh, I do love this rather a lot. Old net-heads who, like me, are Aliens geeks might recall the mid-90s site Wierzbowski Hunters (lovingly maintained in its original vintage) dedicated to celebrating the most unknown of the Colonial Marines in Jim Cameron’s film: Pt Wierzbowski, played by stuntman Trevor Steedman. Wierz went down somewhere in the confusing action of the film, and was presumed dead – but these fans have decided to create a different future for the character. Aliens Epilogue is a fan film now in production in which Trevor Steedman reprises his role as Wierzbowski, and it may well be the entire reason the internets were invented. Here’s the trailer:

The NY Tribune in 1910 imagines burglary in the future, Popular Mechanics in the 50s just doesn’t give a damn about anything, and Modern Mechanix in 1929 features a women’s beauty treatment that seems to involve putting your face in a giant radioactive ribcage.
How the sun moves in the sky

David Bowie writes back to his first American fan. He seems very excited!
And finally… new Barbie has pooper scooper and dog that poos everywhere.

So I was only on for a flash, but I was on, and more importantly the show I wrote and am co-directing got a big glamour play. So good! Can’t sell tickets if people haven’t heard about it, after all!
Anyway, some hasty linky for your Friday:
Re-creating a Matrix scene with Lego:

Incredible short piece of journalism about restorative justice in action – not glowing, not snarky, just completely real. Kudos to Stuff.co.nz for running this with such prominence, it’s the kind of thing that gets buried or ignored all too often.
Mother Jones article on NZ’s climate change refugees from Tuvalu.
The AV Club’s been doing their decade best-of. Best films of the decade, Best TV of the decade, Best Books, and more. Check it all out for some smart commentary about what culture has been doing the last ten years.
Historical photos with superheroes ‘shopped in. But kinda good.
And finally… Celestial Soul Portraits. Whoa.

Alan Moore’s new zine Dodgem Logic has an online space with lotsa free music and stuff. But it keeps jamming up my internets something chronic. Maybe you’ll have better luck?
Brizzly, the service that jams together Twitter and Facebook, is now open for everyone to sign up. So I signed up. Interesting. Don’t know if I’ll stick with it, but interesting.
You mighta seen this clip of the dude swimming with the leopard seal – but have you seen this clip of the penguin being chased around by the pack of orca?
The 50 most interesting articles on Wikipedia. Haven’t even read the list yet myself, let alone followed the links, but there must be some cool stuff there.
Creepy Albert Einstein robot.
Lady Gaga performing back when she had a normal name, before the marketers got a hold of her.
The next two have been all over the net, for very good reason. I’m gonna embed here so y’all have no excuse not to watch these.
First, NZ’s own book council has an incredible trailer for Maurice Gee’s “Going West”:

Second, brand new Muppets: their take on Bohemian Rhapsody. Divine.

An acid trip – illustrated.
Matt C’s Murray the Sex Machine (nice work Matt!)
The Event – a collaborative fiction by five Wellington writers, including the abovementioned Matt C – is now complete, and it seems to be a wild and creepy tale. I need to catch up on the second half of it, but it looks amazing. Go check it out.
And finally… the Daily Bunny, which is exactly what it sounds like.

Foreigners: big talking point news in NZ right now is whether the gigantic creepy Santa in the centre of our biggest city will unwrap the bandages on his face to reveal a disturbing winking eye. We are a strange wee country.

From Black and WTF
Love this: a huge collection of 80s straight-to-video box art. I remember some of these from those weird little corner video stores you used to get in the 80s.
Johann Hari’s Independent article about jihadists who have changed their mind about jihad deserves as wide an audience as possible.
Jonny Nexus’s entertaining gods-play-D&D novel Game Night is being serialized free on EN World. First chapter is here.
Awesome: Kid Beyond performs Portishead’s “Wandering Star” all by himself.

Did you hear that story the other week about the remnants of a lost army being found in the Egyptian desert? Turns out it’s probably a wind-up. Rogue Classicism has the knowledge.
And finally… Clive Barker’s Hellraiser, in lego. Surprisingly disturbing.

Slinky Malinki is a great name for a cat, it really is.
It’s my older brother’s birthday today. Happy birthday big bro. Here is something cool from your year of birth.

In odd game-to-media adaptation news:
Ridley Scott’s movie based on Monopoly – the plot! (Aside: Check out this Cornell University study revealing that between 2% and 20% of Monopoly games can never end!)
What’s the next project for Dave Gibbons, genius artist best known for making Watchmen with Alan Moore? How about a new adventure based on everyone’s second-favourite built-in Windows procrastination tool, Minesweeper!
(Man, I’ve just realized that the Asteroids movie would be perfect for Michael Bay. The source material literally consists of nothing but big rocks exploding, and then a spaceship exploding at the end. PERFECT.)
Whoa. Some movie exec thought it would be a good idea to get H.R. Giger to redesign the Batmobile. Not the best idea actually
Hey, write your own Ain’t It Cool News movie review with this handy template!
Awesome clip of Mos Def, Black Thought and Eminem freestyling (in the “I’m cool” mode of Cypher, not the “you suxxor” mode of Battling)
For anyone visiting London: the ultimate uncluttered tube map. I might have used this…
Reading the Maps has been knocking out incredibly content-rich, thoughtful posts about events in NZ and around the world. Check out this response to the scandal of students dressing up like Nazis, and this wry discussion of whether Pope Ratzinger is actually a Marxist. Essential reading for the NZ crowd, I reckon.
And finally… would you buy a used car from this Cuban gynaecologist?

Yesterday I listened carefully to the fireworks. They were very loud. But I was working so I didn’t see anything. Listening was actually quite fun though, once I realized what they were and that the world wasn’t ending.
Celebrate the fact that the world isn’t ending with these educational linky experiences!
82-yo Ralph Stanley singing “O Death”, in sight of his brother’s grave, asking death to pass him by another year. (got this one from Making Light, I recall)

MightyGodKing photoshops some board games boxes so their titles are more honest.
Buncha Stanford students went to the Galapagos Islands and presented their ruminations on evolution through the medium of hippity-hop music. Both sublime and ridiculous.

Did ya see these Facebook updates from superheros? (Each update can be clicked through to context if you don’t get the reference, too, so everyone can play!)
Liu Bolin – the Invisible Man! Amazing stuff.
Watched some of Pulp Fiction not too long ago. It holds up well, though the scenes between Bruce Willis’ boxer and his girlfriend were even annoyinger, and the script really does use the N-word more than it needs to. But one thing it did have was acutely smart sound design, which is maybe why this works so well: music created out of Pulp Fiction audio samples.
Karen Healey explains why Tessa Duder’s Alex books were so great. NZ teen fiction classics that I’ve never read, but I expect a lot of readers have.
I’m kinda enamoured of the Dangerous Minds blog at the moment – exploring lots of cool stuff. Like these animated stereoviews of Japan from around the turn of last century. Like the artificial hymen. And Tom Lehrer! Worth adding to your regular visits, I reckon.
And how about this list of true historical swordswomen?
And finally… oh man, this is the internettiest thing ever: unused Prince tickets.