July 24, 2007
Once again the devil urinates in my teapot
"It is understood that Eircom has made approaches at different levels to other operators as well as large IT companies and telecoms businesses, including Orange, another major global telecoms player."
If I end up back in the employ of the company I've been trying to leave for the past few years, I'll eat my own legs.
April 03, 2006
April Fools 2006
Here's a list of some hoax April Fool articles run by UK newspapers over the weekend. Someone-who-shall-remain-nameless was (temporarily) sucked in by the Express's Biscuit Highway story, and I admit I was suckered by the Observer's claim that Chris Martin had gone Tory (although only for the first paragraph, honest.) This has to be my favourite 2006 hoax though, if only because it'd be cool if it were true.
December 01, 2005
Neuter them
Donald Trump has signed a deal with Warner Music to distribute official Trump mobile content. For starters there will be vocal ringtones like, "Always stay focused. Also you're getting a phone call, focus on that" and "You're getting a phone call and believe me it better be important, I have no time for small talk and neither do you":
I've been spending the last hour trying to figure out what kind of person would want a Donald Trump ringtone, and whether they should be neutered as a result. I suspect the answer is 'yes'.
September 25, 2005
DHL Amazon idiocy
Last Friday DHL delivered a book from Amazon to my home address. As I wasn't in, the driver stowed the book - get this - on a rain-soaked floor under a plastic tub in my back yard. It had been raining for most of the morning and, by the time I found the parcel, the cardboard packaging had practically turned to mush and the book itself was badly rain-damaged. I spoke to DHL about this idiocy and they claimed that their contract with Amazon allows them to leave parcels at the delivery address, even if no-one answers the door. In other words it was Amazon's problem, not theirs (even though a DHL driver had left the parcel outside in the rain.) Now I have to go through the hassle of dealing with Amazon customer services (notoriously useless) in order to get a replacement item. The whole experience sucks, and could easily be resolved if Amazon/DHL wrapped purchases in rain-proof plastic. Has anyone else encountered this problem? Let me know how it panned out.
September 06, 2005
Bring back National Service
Wasn't it Woodstock 2 that descended into total anarchy? Seems like Reading Festival got quite close this year. Alongside all the reported 'youthful high spirits' there was a variety of more unpleasant activities, including one girl who was paralysed after an attack by a tent-jumping mob, and a bloke who lost his scrotum in a gas canister explosion. Read this for more gruesome detail.
August 25, 2005
Fenriz wouldn't like it
For how much longer will BM be flavour of the month? Clothing label Silas and Maria - responsible for the appropriation of BM imagery to brand a line of soft furnishings - decked out their three Japan-based shops with a variety of cool / nerdish / psychotic metal grafitti.
Nagoya entrance
Nagoya interior
Osaka stairwell
Tokyo interior
Tokyo shop window
August 15, 2005
Perhaps he found new ways to motivate them...
This is quite old news now but I still think it's cool. In Star Wars Galaxies, Alpha Company, 203rd Tatooine Expeditionary Stormtrooper Legion is a group of Empire-loving players who have displayed impressive loyalty and discipline. They’ve recruited competent people and taken out a good number of rebels. To reward them, SWG sent Darth Vader to meet with them. Here are the screenshots.
February 14, 2005
Hippy Assault Vehicle
I Flickered 'camouflage' and got this image returned. A thing of beauty. If anyone's stuck on what to get for my birthday... See the original here.
August 23, 2004
Star Estimator
Determine the similarity between you and top celebrities of the World! Submit a photo of yourself and let Analogia determine which celebs you look most like. Apparently I bear a passing resemblance to Mark Wahlberg, Ed Harris and Patrick Stewart. Then I tried it a second time and got Robbie Williams as a match. It's also fun to submit images like this. Sorry Mr McKellen. Anyway, integrate a service like this with Flickr and you're onto a winner.
July 16, 2004
More one-line pitches
Patriot Gladiators: Puny Asian contestants are demolished by A1-grade Yank beefcake.
Weakest Link / Distraction (Patriot version): Contestants given secret password which they have to keep secret under Abu Gharaib / Japanese Endurance style torture (electric shock, sleep deprivation, held indefinitely without trial etc.)
Call My Bluff (New Labour version): Host reveals policy, soundbite, or embarassing contradiction. 3 New Labour MPs then explain it differently. Opposite team has to guess the truth (assuming they're not all bluffing).
Call My Bluff (American Foreign Policy / WMD version): Two competitors sit opposite each other with separate gunk tank above each. Each competitor can see the contents of the tank above his opponent, but not his own tank. The audience can see neither. The tanks are randomly filled with gunk of varying degrees of nastiness, or not filled at all. They can then bluff and threaten each other and try to persuade the audience as to how nasty their opponents gunk is. The audience vote as to which competitor is a danger to humanity. The other competitor then gets gunked, unless there was no gunk there, in which case the entire audience gets gunked.
Extreme I'm a Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here: A bus load of Z-list celebs / Big Brother contestants are left to fend for themselves in a region of the world still inhabited by hostile Stone Age tribesmen (eg. the Sentinel Islands, still unexplored because the Sentinelese have speared every foreigner that ever landed, or the Head-hunting cannibals of Papua New Guinea, or South Central L.A.). Bleeding edge surveillance technology allows us to watch their demise, or bet who gets it next etc.
Why Don't You (Anti-Global Protest Remix): Informative childrens show encouraging direct action against corporate plutocrats, corrupt government etc. Make-it-yourself section shows them how to make ersatz explosives, stun guns, etc. out of old egg cartons and Fairy liquid bottles.
University Challenge (Show me the funding version): Students funding & fees for uni (~10K - 60K) converted to £1 coins, which trickle away hourglass fashion as they take too long to answer piss-simple questions. Winner gets all the other students 'trickled' nuggets plus a Mickey Mouse degree from some US theology college and a guaranteed job in McDonalds.
Pets Win Prizes / Naked Chef / Animal Hospital / Tomorrows World: The unlucky pet which loses Pets Win Prizes gets turned into a sumptuous main course by Jamie "Fat Tongue" Oliver, after which Rolf Harris gets to attempt to save the animal by stitching it back together / cloning it / transplanting any missing bits etc.
All suggested by Terwoby.
July 15, 2004
One-line pitches
New TV programme pitches:
"All New Jim'll Fix It" with Jamie Oliver. At the start of the show Jimmy Saville morphs Doctor Who-like into the new fat-tongued presenter. Note: must reprise the cool chair with secret compartments.
"Ray Mears's Urban Survival": portly survivalist Ray Mears attempts to survive a full week in a range of metropolitan occupations, including city trader, traffic warden, taxi driver and pimp.
"Gordon Ramsey joins the Paras": Ramsey trains with the Paras for a month, to see how he likes being shouted at 24 hours a day. Will he cope or will be cry like a big girl?
"Extreme One Man and His Dog": shepherd and sheepdog must use their skill and judgement to negotiate the herd through a range of challenging courses, including: minefields, lava flows, frozen lakes etc. Commentary by John Motson.
"Robot Wars Patriot": teams of nerds build exploding robots for infiltrating terrorist cells by remote control. Whichever team delivers the ordnance first wins.