A Different Drummer

AJ- Pat Robertson showcases my problem with the Evangelical Right; divisive, demonising and explaining God on a blackboard

AJ- Dear Corporate Community, when you do things like this I get the impression that you are evil, or at best amoral bacteria-like functionaries living off whatever energy society allows you to steal.

TG- I think I have linked to it before, but as a reminder, We Make Money Not Art is one of the coolest art/creativity blogs in the 'sphere.

TG- This is meta-awesome: 2006's list of lists, a collection of all the different "2006 Best of X" or "Top 10 X" for the year.

TG- For fans of beautiful things, the new Sony Bravia commercial ("Paint") is absolutely gorgeous. And if you have been living on the moon (or a place with no internet) for the last year, here is the amazing original "balls" commercial . Two of the prettiest commercials you will ever see.

PB - Not a big soccer fan, but here is to the greatest hungarian soocerplayer.Ever . Rest in peace.

PB - A hungarian site, but just cool videos for a night with nothing to do . And if videos, don't miss this BBC interviewing a cabdriver instead of an IT expert. And also, some dudes who use their bikes for flying.

PB -The 13 Most Embarrassing Web Moments

TG- I was randomly watching a few minutes of a Spanish Leage football game yesterday, and in the small time frame that I was checking it out, Ronaldhino scored this amazing goal, one of the best I have ever seen - the man is a freak, not to mention looking like a cross between a spider and a horse.....

AJ- National Geographic inquires (and aims to debunk) "chi"- the energy/force described in martial arts. Youtube video with George Dillman- 9th degree blackbelt .

"A Russian cosmonaut set a new record for the longest golf drive in history today after hitting a lightweight ball while tethered to the outside of the International Space Station (ISS).....

The cosmic golf drive was part of a commercial agreement between the Russian Federal Space Agency and the Canadian golf firm, Element 21....

For the stunt, a makeshift tee box was set up outside space station's Pirs docking compartment. During the shot, Lopez-Alegria held Tyurin's feet, which were affixed to a ladder. Tyurin carried three golf balls, but only had time to hit one of them before ground flight controllers instructed the spacewalkers to proceed to their other tasks....."

SANA: Syrian National News Agency Inquires About Pierre Gemayel's Assassination 55 mins Before it Occurs!!

Al Seyassah daily learned from authoritative sources in Beirut, that one of the editors of the Syrian National News Agency (SANA) placed a phone call to a pro-Syrian Lebanese newspaper at 3:05 pm on Tuesday. The caller inquired about the details of the assassination of Lebanese Minister for Industry Pierre Gemayel, raising eyebrows at the Lebanese newpaper. The timing of phone call was 55 minutes before the assassination was carried out.

"NOEL Gallagher of the British rock band Oasis told soldiers fighting in Iraq to stop complaining when they get wounded.............

In a wide-ranging rant, the fired-up 39-year-old also turned his guns on British Prime Minister Tony Blair, environmentalists, Elton John, his brother Liam - the lead singer in the band - and predicted his own daughter would become a “mental, axe-wielding, cyber-punk lunatic”

AJ- Jesus Camp, a documentary about a charismatic Christian summer camp for children to learn about their "prophetic gifts" and how they can "take back America for Christ." Their chief "prophet" preaches a message urging children to join the fight to end abortion. He prays for George W. Bush to have the strength to appoint "righteous judges" who will overturn Roe v. Wade. By the end of the sermon, the children are chanting, "Righteous judges! Righteous judges!" At one point Pastor Fischer states, "I want to see young people who are as committed to the cause of Jesus Christ as the young people are to the cause of Islam," she tells the camera. "I want to see them radically laying down their lives for the gospel, as they are over in Pakistan and Israel and Palestine." The Guardian. Trailer.

TG - Heh. Slashdot.org, the geeky industrial strength web community, just reached 16,777,216 comments, which is 2²⁴, the limit for their SQL database. Fear not though, they are powering through a newer, geekier solution as we speak...

PB - A quick video, on how to win a million bucks the coolest way possible.

AJ- Some techy business PC World's 25 Worst Tech Products of All Time. Yes Realplayer you deserve to die and I hope you burn in hell. "Just how bad is Big Rigs: Over the Road Racing? It's as bad as your mind will allow you to comprehend."

AJ- Brilliant Minds Forecast the Next 50 Years . New Scientist asked over 70 of the world's most brilliant scientists for their ideas on.... the future.

AJ- I've been enthralled by the World Press Photo Exhibition for the last few years here in Amsterdam- where it exhibits in the Oude Kerk (Old Church) in the Red Light.

PB - HP tries to make a new brand image with Jay-Z in it's ads - and comments

PB - On some more ads, check out Dylan in Vitoria Secret's new campaign (yeah Bob Dylan)

PB - A tribute to Johnny Cash done in the way fit for the man, singing "but I shot a man in Reno, jus tto watch him die" in Folsom Prison

PB - I know it's almost boring, but here again Bush stupidity, indeed the apple and the tree it falls from.

TG- Nice Middle East news and blog roundup from Arabist.net

TG- AOL released 3 months worth of its customers' search records a few months ago, and the goons at somethingawful.com did some hilarious analysis, well worth checking out...

"....But since President Janez Drnovsek experienced a spiritual rebirth, baffled Slovenians have been warned that they are living on the edge of the apocalypse.

Frequently dressed in Indian clothes and sometimes playing the flute with laurel leaves in his hair, the president has cast off the trappings of power. After he was diagnosed with kidney cancer, Drnovsek, 56, left his presidential palace in Ljubljana, sacked most of his staff and moved with his dog to a mountain cabin near the village of Zaplana, where he grows organic food and bakes his own bread.

Having rejected conventional medicine in favour of herbal therapies and a vegan diet, he has become a tireless crusader against “all things evil”, warning that the world is about to end."

"The men, a tall, handsome, noble race, are treated like dogs. I shall never forget riding through the crowded bazaars, my interpreter, or laquais-de-place, ahead of me to clear the way— when he took his whip, and struck it over the shoulders of a man who could not or would not make way!

The man turned round—an old, venerable, handsome face, with awfully sad eyes, and a beard long and quite grey. He did not make the least complaint, but slunk out of the way, piteously shaking his shoulder. The sight of that indignity gave me a sickening feeling of disgust. I shouted out to the cursed lackey to hold his hand, and forbade him ever in my presence to strike old or young more; but everybody is doing it. The whip is in everybody’s hands: the Pasha’s running footman, as he goes bustling through the bazaar; the doctor’s attendant, as he soberly threads the crowd on his mare; the negro slave, who is riding by himself, the most insolent of all, strikes and slashes about without mercy, and you never hear a single complaint.

How to describe the beauty of the streets to you!—the fantastic splendour; the variety of the houses, and archways, and hanging roofs, and balconies, and porches; the delightful accidents of light and shade which chequer them: the noise, the bustle, the brilliancy of the crowd; the interminable vast bazaars with their barbaric splendour. There is a fortune to be made for painters in Cairo, and materials for a whole Academy of them. I never saw such a variety of architecture, of life, of picturesqueness, of brilliant colour, and light and shade. There is a picture in every street, and at every bazaar stall. Some of these our celebrated water-colour painter, Mr. Lewis, has produced with admirable truth and exceeding minuteness and beauty; but there is room for a hundred to follow him; and should any artist (by some rare occurrence) read this, who has leisure, and wants to break new ground, let him take heart, and try a winter in Cairo, where there is the finest climate and the best subjects for his pencil.

A series of studies of negroes alone would form a picturebook, delightfully grotesque. Mounting my donkey today, I took a ride to the desolate noble old buildings outside the city, known as the Tombs of the Caliphs. Every one of these edifices, with their domes, and courts, and minarets, is strange and beautiful. In one of them there was an encampment of negro slaves newly arrived: some scores of them were huddled against the sunny wall; two or three of their masters lounged about the court, or lay smoking upon carpets. There was one of these fellows, a straight-nosed ebony-faced Abyssinian, with an expression of such sinister good-humour in his handsome face as would form a perfect type of villany. He sat leering at me, over his carpet, as I endeavoured to get a sketch of that incarnate rascality. “Give me some money,” said the fellow. “I know what you are about. You will sell my picture for money when you get back to Europe; let me have some of it now!” But the very rude and humble designer was quite unable to depict such a consummation and perfection of roguery; so flung him a cigar, which he began to smoke, grinning at the giver. I requested the interpreter to inform him, by way of assurance of my disinterestedness, that his face was a great deal too ugly to be popular in Europe, and that was the particular reason why I had selected it."

"There was an age when our mothers went to university and worked without the veil. It is in that spirit that we grew up. So why this regression?"

“Morals and conscience ... are the strongest hijab (headscarf). That’s my personal opinion and I have not called on anyone to take off the hijab,”

"In his appeal, Hassan urged the minister not to encourage 'the culture of removing clothes'.

'We urge you to keep your clothes on, and to encourage (people) to keep wearing their clothes because our Zionist and US enemy is determined to strip them piece by piece."

As part of this seach, I found a great website, reviewme.com. The basic concept is that you sign up for an account, register your site, and then based on a few different stats for your website (traffic/link rankings from Technorati, Alexa etc) your site is assigned a ranking, from one to five stars. Your ranking is associated with a certain sum of money, and basically from then onwards you are given offers to review different products and services on your site, and you get paid per review.

My blog scored a two star ranking, which means I can get paid $30 per review. And this is my first review, a review of reviewme.com! Its pretty meta, but hey, for 30 bucks, I’ll get as meta as you want to go. I am curious to see whether I can score many more reviews from the site, but even if this one is the only one I ever do, it's still the most valuable blog posting I’ve ever written…..

So one a scale of one to ten, where one is this site paid me nothing to write a review, and ten is this site paid me thirty bucks to write a review, I rate reviewme.com a healthy ten out of ten.

"I was there 2day it was awful. Hundreds of plain clothed officers prevented demonstrations in front of the cinema. Ppl tried 2 enter the cafe next door where every1 was gatherin but were stopped by the police. Some ppl had 2 climb through the window to get in. Itwas clear it was going 2 get violent and it did. The police watched and laughed verbally harassing women inside the cafe as they watched horrified at a woman being surrounded by 5 or 6 plain clothed police officers who dived on her and started to beat her up she was arrested along with another girl and a boy. I heard another person was arrested but I am not sure. And all of that 4 what? I won't go in to details but this just proves the point Egypt is not safe for women its not safe for any1. Wen will women get their rights? Wen the prime commiters of violence and harassment r the police and cental intelligence?

"Amnesty International considers Tal'at Sadat to be a prisoner of conscience imprisoned solely for the peaceful exercise of his right to freedom of expression and is calling for his immediate and unconditional release. The organization is awaiting further details of the charges against Abdel Karim Sulaiman Amer but is concerned that he may also be a prisoner of conscience who is being prosecuted on account of the peaceful expression of his views about Islam and the al-Azhar religous authorities.

Amnesty International is calling on the Egyptian authorities to review or abolish legislation that, in violation of international standards, stipulates prison sentences for acts which constitute nothing more than the exercise of the rights of freedom of thought, conscience and religion."

"His analysis is fascinating. Muslim fundamentalists believe, he insists, that Saudi Arabia's petroleum-based wealth is a divine gift, and that Saudi influence is sanctioned by Allah. Thus the extreme brand of Sunni Islam that spread from the Kingdom to the rest of the Islamic world is regarded not merely as one interpretation of the religion but the only genuine interpretation. The expansion of violent and regressive Islam, he continues, began in the late 1970s, and can be traced precisely to the growing financial clout of Saudi Arabia.

"We're not talking about a fringe cult here," he tells me. "Salafist [fundamentalist] Islam is the dominant version of the religion and is taught in almost every Islamic university in the world. It is puritanical, extreme and does, yes, mean that women can be beaten, apostates killed and Jews called pigs and monkeys."

TG - Super stylin' graphic tribute to Naguib Mahfouz , via the always interesting cartoonist Cairo Freeze

TG - I'm loving this super addictive "Lunar Lander" flash based online mini-game

AJ- " "The Real Jesus forgives your Jesus for being a greedy Republican warmonger", badges, stickers etc.

AJ- Reading about Fundamentalist Christians in the US (dispensationalist for you theology nerds), who are against the UN ("the Antichrist will appear to the world as a peacemaker", duh), reject the idea that a lasting peace can be attained by human effort in the Middle East, believe instead that "wars and rumors of wars" (cf. Matt 24:6) will increase as the end times approach, and refute attempts to create church organizations that cross denominational boundaries such as the World Council of Churches as it gives a satanically inspired illusion of "false unity". Bill Hicks rails on fundamentalists in the Whitehouse back with Bush Senior.

TG - If you thing being revealed as a big meth snorting, gay hooker shagging hypocrite isnt embarassing enough, watch this clip of Pastor Ted Haggard getting schooled large-style by Richard Dawkins. Zing!

PB- On a lighter note, check on, how to make a Playstation ad :-)

PB- A new way of making music is 3D enviroment . Well if minimal-techno is your music, funky anyway

PB- Random pages for the days of boredom

TG- My Youtube favourites as requested by Peter - Invisible Boards , Amazing reversed Pharcyde clip , OK Go "Here it goes again" clip (treadmills)

AJ - The Much Hyped HBO Documentary "Hacking Democracy" is now here on google video. "In the 2000 presidential election, an electronic voting machine recorded minus 16,022 votes for Al Gore in Volusia County, Fla". They should upgrade technology and security from Gameboy to Playstation.

AJ- Free psychedelic lectures from Leary, RAW, Watts, etc. A collection of free video and audio lectures by psychedelic pioneers Alan Watts, Terence McKenna, Robert Anton Wilson and Timothy Leary.Link (via Reality Carnival and Boing Boing)

AJ- By chance, Brodie and I both picked up the same book on the weekend. Flow by Mihály Csíkszentmihályi - Psych Head at Uni of Chicago. In Flow he argues from a psychological perspective that humans that experience most happiness in a state of flow--a Zen-like state of total oneness with the activity at hand and the situation. This is Dharma for the 21st century.

TG- Check out this kid going fucking batshit crazy after he finds a rare collectable Pokemon card..

TG- Borat gets interviewed by Alan Colmes on Fox News . Weird alterna-reality, seeing Borat interviewed in a news style setting with no audience and no laughing....I think Borat being interviewed by Stephen Colbert would be a meta-reality tipping point

PB - Check out how hip-hop has changed , viewed as a mid-aged black american female: "They came for the skeezers but I didn't speak up because I'm no skeezer, they came for the freaks, but I said nothing because I'm not a freak. They came for the bitches and the hos and the tricks. And by the time we realized they were talking about bitches from 8 to 80, our daughters and our mommas and their own damn mommas, rap music had earned the imprimatur of MTV and Martha Stewart and even the Pillsbury Doughboy"

AJ- The Dark Tower of Mordor Pyongyang, video of the The Ryugyong Hotel - a towering (330m) windowless, empty concrete shell that was once intended for use to hold aloft a flaming eye as a hotel, in the Potong-gang District of Pyongyang, North Korea. It cost 2% of the North Korean GDP to build in a time of prevailing famine.

AJ- Celebrate People! The Republican Elephant Beast is Dead! The Daily Show celebrates the Republican demise in congress on election night - with just a touch of Schadenfreude. Or as a Torrent File . If you dont know how to use torrents this link will help you get more stuff through the tubes.

BEIT HANOUN, Gaza Strip: Israeli tank shells ripped through a residential neighborhood in the northern Gaza Strip early Wednesday, killing at least 18 members of an extended family, including 10 children, as they slept, health officials said.

"Abbas accused Israel of trying to destroy peace, not promote it.

"This is no doubt a terrible, despicable crime that Israel has committed against our people," he told Palestine TV. "We tell the Israelis, you are not seeking peace at all, but are destroying all chances for peace. You must therefore bear all the consequences of these crimes."

Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni said Israel "has no intention of harming innocent people," but "to our great regret, in the course of the fighting, regrettable things sometimes happen, such as the incident this morning."

"The crisis Israel is facing is much deeper than we feared, in almost every respect."

"The deaths of young people are a terrible, screaming waste, but no less terrible is the feeling that, for many years, the State of Israel is wasting not only the lives of her sons, but also the miracle [of the creation of the state], the opportunity to create an enlightened and democratic nation here."

Grossman called on Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to talk to the Palestinians about "their deep wounds and their grief." He encouraged Olmert to "understand their ongoing suffering. Doing so will in no way diminish your or Israel's status in future negotiations."

"Israeli snipers killed two Palestinians in Gaza on Saturday, one of them a 12-year-old girl, Palestinian sources said......The 12-year-old girl was killed by a single bullet to the head, local hospital workers said.

An Israeli army spokesman said a sniper had spotted an armed fighter and had fired at him but that the girl was killed as the armed man got out of the line of fire."

"A “women in black” silent stand will be held next Thursday 9 November from 12-2 @ the Press Syndicate to resent the Eid Events at Downtown."

hinduzion: maybe its not just men, maybe its the fucked up religion of islam. think about it.

Ric: "It's not about Islam? I haven't observed the Jewish or Christian "youths" hitting the streets for gang rape over here in the US. It's aaaaalllll about Islam."

mahdihotline and some anonymous genius both use some truly amazing logic to deduce that Forsoothsayer herself is "sick" and just as bad as the idiot Sheikh Hilali in Australia

ERA: "Been learning more about islam over the last year and am still having some tough sledding over how primitive and misogynistic it is and will always remain"

Robert , from the delightful "Bombislam.com" : "Islam is the cancer, Nukes are the answer"

Ex-Centrist: "The blog writer seems baffled as to why this happened. The answer is simple: it's the madness and sickness of Islam."