Scientology Fights Back?

Well, almost. Sort of. Kinda. LOL.

Alien Autopsy in Area 51?

Naturally, I assume this is a fake video. Still, an interesting one to watch. The alien conspiracy of Rosewell, New Mexico, doesn't seem to die. So here it is (or not): an autopsy of an alien in Area 51.

>> Lots of links about Area 51

MAD Magazine's Fold-Ins - Interactive Presentation

I've got stacks of MAD magazine in my house - all dusty but still very funny (mostly).

A cool part of MAD has always been the fold-in, which often depicted political and social satire.

Now, NY Times presents Al Jaffee's fold-ins, from the 1960s to the present, in interactive form.

Isaac Newton's Dark Secret: The Scientist who Tried to Produce the Philosopher's Stone

Too many conspiracy theories lately. Too much of the Knights Templar and Free Masons and all that. Some of the stories may be true - but who's to tell? We'll never actually know - exactly as we won't know if the landing of the moon was fake.

Still, if someone says that Issac Newton had a few dark secrets up his sleeve, I might check it out.

A page of Newton's notebook has been decoded - or say the site claims: "[The Notebook is] more like an enigma wrapped in a mystery riddled with a number of misleading clues". The page consists of some very cryptic text - related to Alchemy, of all things. You can take a look at the page, in an interactive window, with notes and explanations.

Historian Bill Newman says that "If you look at the experimental notebooks that he kept for about 30 years, it really is impossible to avoid the conclusion that he was trying to produce the philosophers' stone. But I don't think he was doing it to gain monetary wealth".

The philosophers' stone was thought to be an agent of universal transmutation. It also was viewed as an agent that could "cure" metals of their impurities and cure human beings of their illnesses.

An Amazing Collection of Photoshop Video Tutorials

You probably won't be able to use these techniques with the new and free Photoshop Express, but it's still a very good collection.

A myriad of videos, demonstrating different Photoshop tutorials, performed by people who really know their stuff. From Speed Painting to Retouching and Effects. Very useful and interesting!

8 Reasons Why you Should NEVER Take your Kids to the Zoo

Thinking of taking your children to the zoo? Think again!

Warning - Annoying Music!

Best 15 Science Fiction Book Series?

An interesting list has appeared on The List Universe: Top 15 Science Fiction Book Series.

I find it a very interesting list. I have been looking for something new to read, and I guess I just might pick something for this post.

Still, I think Dune should have been ranked higher! For me, it's the best series of books ever. I even chose the first, Dune, as my One Book. Not an easy choice, I tell ya. Ender's game wasn't such an amazing story, in my opinion, so I would have given it a lower place in the list.

All in all, a cool list and worth a look.

67 Celebrities that Follow Scientology

There's Tom Cruise and John Travolta, of course. Will Smith was the latest suspect, but he denied a connection with the Church of Scientology. They are not alone, of course. Many known entertainers are scientologists.

The Top Socialite brings you a list of 67 celebrities who are known scientologists. Some are very familiar, like Beck, Erika Christensen, Jason Lee, Jeffrey Tambor, Jenna Elfman and Juliette Lewis. Some are less known, but all of them are a part of the cult that is Scientology.

They are all over the place: Scientology Kindergartens Revealed in Tel Aviv

The Israeli newspaper Yediot Achronot exposed at least three kindergartens operating in the Tel Aviv area that are affiliated with the Church of Scientology.

One of the kindergartens has over 90 kids in it and has been granted a license by Israel's Ministry of Education.

It appears that the Israeli government didn't know about the relations with Scientology of one of the kindergarten when granting a license.

An Education Ministry said that the kindergarten has since denied any ties to the Church of Scientology, but that its license will be reviewed thoroughly.

Brent Spiner's Dreamland: A Biased Review

Yes, I'm a huge fan of Mr. Spiner. So this is a very biased review of his new CD.

Ever since I first heard Ol' Yellow Eyes is Back, I have been waiting to hear more of Brent Spiner's musical creations. A lot of people know Brent Spiner as Data of Star Trek: The Next Generation, or from his appearance in different movies. Actually, Brent is a multi-talent, and he is a great singer, as well as a wonderful actor.

Brent Spiner's official website was launched about 2 months ago, and with it the information about Dreamland - Brent's new CD.

Dreamland is a combination concept album and radio show. It's really an entire story, told in dialogs and songs. Brent sings along with Maude Maggart, whom he describes as "a sensational singer". Brent says that when he heard Maude, he was "knocked out". He looked up her website, bought her CDs, and thought, "It's gotta be her or I'll be so disappointed".

Maude and Brent are a great couple. The CD is absolutely wonderful and moving. The songs are sweet and charming, Maude is a great singer, and Brent's voice is beautiful. The storyline is very romantic, and funny at times. No big surprises to my taste, and the end is happy as it should be.

The story was written by Brent himself, and was arranged, orchestrated and conducted by John McKinney.

Dreamland is a pleasant, sweet listening experience. It's not your usual song-after-song CD, and it needs your attention in order for you to enjoy it. I heard it on the road and loved it. If you are a Brent Spiner fan, then this CD will make you very happy.

You can buy the CD or download the songs in Brent Spiner's Official Website.

The Cutest Food Fight in the World

Officepoltergeist: And Here I thought Back Orifice was Dead

The 90s were a lot of fun. All you needed to entertain yourself was a bit of viciousness, a stupid co-worker and a piece of genius-software that was called Back Orifice.

Back Orifice (and its many take-offs) was designed for remote system administration. It enables a user to control a computer running Windows from a remote location. In plain words - you install it on a person's computer and you can drive them NUTS by making their PC pop up weird error messages, open their CD tray, spy on them and even shut down their computer.

Very quickly, the anti-virus industry categorized Back Orifice as malware and added it to their quarantine lists. In other words, it will be very hard to install Back Orifice on a regular computer these days.

It appears that all hop is not lost for the script kiddies. They can try Officepoltergeist. This open-source software "allows you to take limited control of another person's computer", but the makers claim it's not Spyware, and that it "does not allow remote users to read data or execute potentially harmful commands".

OfficePoltergeist sets up a small server running on the victim's machine. The program, which hides in memory while it runs, waits silently for a connection on port 666. Any proper firewall should be able to prevent its use, but hey - not everybody uses a firewall!

Downloads:

OfficePoltergeist Controller - controls the poltergeist

OfficePoltergeist Server - runs on the victim's machine

mem86control.exe - same as above, only named something clever to evade detection

Have fun, you evil bastards :)

The Last Message of Arthur C. Clarke

Arthur C. Clarke has Passed Away

Yet another legend has passed away from the face of the earth: Science fiction author Arthur C. Clarke died at age 90.

After a diverse career as a writer, underwater explorer, space promoter and science populariser, Clarke said he would like to be remembered primarily as a writer and wished for peace in his adopted home Sri Lanka where had lived since 1956. Clarke was mostly known for his creation "2001: A Space Odyssey".

Clarke was knighted in 1998. He wrote dozens of novels and collections of short stories and more than 30 nonfiction works during his career, and served as a television commentator during several of the Apollo moon missions.

Among his novels: Prelude to Space, The Sands of Mars, Islands in the Sky, Childhood's End, Earthlight, The Deep Range, Dolphin Island, Glide Path, 2001: A Space Odyssey, 2010: Odyssey Two, The Songs of Distant Earth, 2061: Odyssey Three, The Ghost from the Grand Banks, The Hammer of God and much more.

"Its origin and purpose still a total mystery"

>> Arthur C. Clarke, 1917-2008
>> Arthur C. Clarke on Wikipedia
>> Sir Arthur C. Clarke Fan Site

Flickr Video on its Way?

Reports and rumors around the net are talking about an upcoming Flickr Video service.

CNET reports that Flickr Video is due this April (Which is 2 weeks from now, mind you). Flickr Video is not supposed to replace Yahoo Video. So, is Yahoo/Flickr going to compete directly with YouTube? Can it be done via Flickr at all?

Flickr isn't just a photo-sharing site. It's a community, and a very vociferous one, as well. Will they accept the addition of videos, or will they bail on Flickr, looking for a quieter realm for storing their photos?

I have been a Flickr and YouTube user for a while. If Flickr launches a good video service, I might start using it instead of YouTube - but winning over the regular YouTube user isn't going to be easy. Users don't switch easily between services, even free ones. I wonder if pro-Flickr users are going to get some benefits, and how all of this is going to look.

In any case, it's always good to hear about new developments and new services. Keeps everything more interesting and dynamic. I guess I'll be following this subject as well.

Judge Denies Scientology's Request for an Injunction against Anonymous Demonstrations

Another small win for Anonymous: Scientology can't have a court order restraining Anonymous protesters this weekend: "This court is mindful of the anxiety that may be caused by anonymous threats of violence, or as a series of seemingly unconnected incidents, be they on the Internet or otherwise. However, the jurisdiction of the court must only be exercised to specifically restrain those known individuals that are shown to have some reasonable nexus to the actual threats complained of in the petition."

The Church of Scientology tried to prevent Anonymous from protesting on the birthday of the Church's leader, the late Ron L. Hubbard. The lawsuit alleged that Scientology churches around the world have been bombarded with harassing phone calls, obscene e-mails, bomb threats and death threats by members of Anonymous.

Anonymous condemned acts or threats of violence that may have occurred and said they were not the work of Anonymous. They urged demonstrators this weekend to protest peacefully and legally.

The Zombies are Back! Boxhead has a New Game

If you planned to get some work done during the weekend, you might as well forget about it.

Boxhead released a new game - Boxhead: The Zombie Wars. If you ever played one of their previous zombie games, you know how addictive and violent they could get. Violent in taking away your time, that is.

Things are a bit more complicated in this new game, which involves new enemies, new weapons and a whole new barricade-mode game. It's not easy. It's fast-moving and full of action. It's going to kill my weekend and I have a lot of things to do!!!

Damn :)

Revenge of the Orca

Beware of Willy!

Anonymous Announces Anonycon

Anonymous keep to their word. They promised another move against Scientology around the middle of March, and here it comes.

Anonymous announces Anonycon - a happening, gathering or what ever you want to call it, against Scientology.

The event will take place in Washington DC, on March 22nd. If Anonymous can gather the same amount of demonstrators as last time, I think it would be called a success.

>> Read more about the battle between Anonymous and Scientology

The Black Propaganda of Scientology

Wikileaks reveals 208 pages relating to Scientology's former "Office of Special Affairs" employee Frank Oliver.

According to Wikileaks, the documents are dated between 1986 and 1992, when, according to the file, Frank Oliver was declared a "suppressive person" and ex-communicated. Starting on page 107, the document shows that the Church of Scientology was actively engaged in black propaganda (especially concerning psychiatry), "fair game" and infiltration.

There's a PDF for download there, but I couldn't get it. I keep getting error messages, related to traffic problems of the site. I'll try getting the file later and see what it says.

Yet More Proof that Vista is a Piece of Shit

The hell that a simple computer user goes through with Vista is hard to describe. A while back, a friend of mine needed my help - his laptop was sluggish and buggy, although it was a new one. The obvious culprit was Vista. After a long, hard battle, I managed to get his computer to a manageable level.

The troubles didn't end there. He wasn't the only one with Vista problems. Complaints about the new Microsoft junk-OS are all over the place - friends, colleagues, bloggers, surfers - all tell the tale of the Vista Horror Show. My friend and his laptop finally gave up. I "upgraded" him back to XP, and all is well, for now.

And lo and behold - even Microsoft employees can't handle the piece of crap that's Vista. Internal e-mails of Microsoft employees, published online by The New York Times, reveal that corporate vice president for Windows product management Mike Nash, says he "got burned" after purchasing a notebook computer advertised as "Vista Capable" that was actually incapable of running Vista.

Nash wasn't the only one - Microsoft's chief operating officer, Jon Shirley, chose not to install Vista after discovering it was not compatible with his printer and two scanners.

So, even Microsoft can't handle Vista. Why should we, then?

99 Words for Boobs

My 14 All-Time Favorite Internet Video Clips

I watch a lot of online clips. I get them from many places. Mostly it's because I enjoy discovering new, funny, amazing or horrifying clips. It's also my job to know what's hot on the net, so I have to keep updated.

Most of the time, I see a clip, enjoy it and forget about it. The flow of information on the web doesn't allow for too much attention of the net's tidbits. Still, every now and then there are clips you remember (mostly the funny ones, I admit) and go back to watch over and over again.

Here is a list of my current 14 favorites. When I present a "YouTube tour" to a friend, I usually show them at least 2-3 of these clips. Of course, this list is only correct for the time being. Times change and clips come and go, but for the time being, here they are:

#14

Bianca Ryan's first audition on America's Got talent - When I first saw this clip, I was SURE it was lip-syncing. I mean - a voice like that, coming out of a small child - it really blew my mind. Every time I watch her I get the shivers. She is truly amazing. No wonder she took the first place. Still, I haven't heard anything good from her ever since. I hope she comes up with a good CD soon.

http://www.youtube.com/v/ozDh4NQveJs

#13

Einstein, the Amazing Parrot - Animals always steal the attention. Talented, unique animals are something you remember. There she is, then - the amazing African Gray Parrot.

http://www.youtube.com/v/wnTT7u5U4Yo

#12

The kid with the most evil parents on earth - It's hilarious, but very cruel. Parents scare the shit out of their child, using the computer. Mean. But funny. But still MEAN!

http://www.youtube.com/v/fRulvYAAs28

#11

Sparta - The Mean Kitty Song - Talk about incredible User Generated Content. I remember seeing this clip when it just had 250,000 views, and I watched it go through the roof. A winning combination of a cute cat, a cute guy and a cute song.

http://www.youtube.com/v/Qit3ALTelOo

#10

Brent Spiner and the Hilarious Theater Story - Brent Spiner is one of my favorite actors. He is talented and funny, and also an amazing singer (His new CD, Dreamland, is available for sale in his new official site). Some of you might not know this, but Brent is a well-experienced theater actor. Sometimes, extremely funny shit can happen on theaters, mind you.

http://www.youtube.com/v/-nFmUuRlLkM

#9

Achmed, The Dead Terrorist - I admit, I was really late picking up this stupidly funny ventriloquist act. Nonetheless, I consider it one of my faves. It has over 36 million views on YouTube. Amazing.

http://www.youtube.com/v/1uwOL4rB-go

#8

The Stoned Smurfs - "Ha-Dardasatlanim" (הדרדסטלנים) - OK, this is in Hebrew, so most of you won't understand what it's about. Basically a genius parody about some of our beloved childhood TV series, plus some shrewd remarks on the pot-heads culture. This is actually the 2nd clip of this "mini-series" - I think it a hell of a lot better than the first.

http://www.youtube.com/v/9AkUeOcbUu8

#7

Amen Brothers - The world's most important drum loop - This clip is not your average YouTube thing. For starters, it's not funny and contains no animals. It actually contains nothing but a mysterious voice that tells the story of a single drum loop that has influenced the music industry in amazing ways. Give it the 18 minutes it demands. It's worth it.

http://www.youtube.com/v/5SaFTm2bcac

#6

Hayagur Ra-Ev (היגור רעב) - Yet another Hebrew creation, from the much earlier days of the net. A simple, ugly flash movie, that makes me tremble with laughter every time I see it.

http://www.youtube.com/v/Xg89GFw2gas

#5

Why You shouldn't Throw Paper-clips at your Co-workers - Simple, violent, hysterical and represents something that most of us wanted to do at some point of our lives.

http://www.youtube.com/v/l3KIxzCqYqM

#4

Kevin Smith lets a stupid idiot HAVE IT - I adore Kevin Smith. He is talented, funny and original. He is also a great story teller, which is why his lectures draw out such big crowds. He usually answers questions in those lectures, and as you know - there are assholes everywhere. Kevin gets an asshole question, and answers right back. Best snappy comeback EVER.

http://www.youtube.com/v/ou2mVnElp6c

#3

Bad Day at the Office - Sure, it's a commercial. But it's a damn good one, and represents well some of the terrible frustrations of a cubical slave (ah, sorry, "WORKER").

http://www.youtube.com/v/GhnLZ3Ryccg

#2

Wake Up Cat - This is a fairly recent one. It's animated, clever, has a cat in it and is generally telling the real story about cats, the way only true cat-owners can identify with. I believe it's all true.

http://www.youtube.com/v/GmwqpHsMExg

#1

The Internet is for Porn - This clip just sums it up so well. And it contains WoW characters. What else do you need? A catchy song by Avenue Q, cool animation by some computer geek and a phrase that says it all - THE INTERNET IS FOR PORN. The rest is just for background.

http://www.youtube.com/v/jhTxRssxfuI

Honorable Mentions: Terry Fator, Taylor Ware, Evolution of Dance, Sarah Silverman is fucking Matt Damon, Jimmy Kimmel is fucking Ben Affleck.

100 Retro Nintendo Games You can Play Online For Free

The days of the 8-bit were the best. Zelda kept us busy for hours, years before anyone thought up the weird name Wii. There were also Mario Bros., of course, and many more games.

For those of you who don't know it yet - you don't really need a Nintendo console anymore. If you wanna play one of the cool retro Nintendo games, all you have to do is click here - and get 100 Nintnedo Games you can play online - for free!

Have fun!!!

When Photoshopping goes Too Far

It's really hard to convey the power of Photoshop to the average Joe. I mean, we want to believe that all those models are slim, trim and with perfect skin. We base a lot of our lives on that assumption, because a lot of us WANT to look like the hotties on a magazine cover.

You can do practically anything with Photoshop - remove extra weight, make the skin appear glamorous, change length of body parts, change eye and hair color, and much more. The tutorials are out there. You don't even have to be a professional graphics designer.

Sometimes, however, things go wrong when you use Photoshop carelessly. This is what THIS blog (Photoshop Disasters) is all about. A series of photos shows you what happens when you overdo it with the retouching. Freaky things happen - people lose their belly-button, limbs appear alien-like, heads disappear and much more. Amusing and a bit scary. There isn't reality anymore. Just a show.

Another Murderous Record: 1,100-Pound Shark Caught in the Mediterranean Sea

This is not good or thrilling news. But it is news, nonetheless.

A fisherman in the Mediterranean Sea caught a shark, weighing 1,100 pounds, just off the coast of Tunisia.

Locals said it was the biggest fish ever caught out of Tunisia.

After it was brought to shore, the fish was quickly purchased and cut into dozens of pieces. The shark was sold at a nearby fish market.

The exact type of the shark is not known. Looks like a Great White (Carcharodon carcharias) or Mako Shark - but we'll never know, of course.

Amazing 12 Years Old Cupstacker

Cup Stacking. This sort of... hmmm... sport (?) always amazed me. The speed of hand needed here is incredible, but aside from that - it just seems like, well, a weird choice of hobby. Ah, well. Who am I to judge.

Gosh, there's even a World Sport Stacking Association (WSSA). The world is full of surprises.

Learn how to Play the Guitar - Online

Masahble has posted another cool article: 11 Resources For Learning Guitar On The Web.

Guitars are popular instruments - they are easy to obtain and carry (unlike drums, for example) and you can get a good start easily enough.

The web offers many ways and places to learn how to play the guitar - mostly for free. There are also many sites that offer score sheets and tabs - free of charge. Check out these sites for score sheets:

• Anyscore
• Free Scores
• 8notes
• Free Guitar Tabs
• Guitartabs.net
• Free-Tabs

Hockey: Jack Johnson Tackles Ryan Smyth

Ouch, that has to HURT:

BOOM! Top 10 Amazing Chemistry Videos

Oh, yeah, nothing like a good home-made explosion to make my day.

Wired.com has posted a list of 10 cool chemistry videos. These include some sick experiments like "Gummy Bear Dies a Fiery Death in Potassium Chlorate" and "Elephant Toothpaste" (Jeez).

Have Fun!