Gynomite’s Reading Room!
The newly crowned world’s tallest building, in Dubai, has been broken in- it just had its first suicide.
A lovely little interview with Kumail at Serial Optimist.
Is the PlayStation Network back up yet?
Blame hipsters for everything, it’s the new hotness.
Councilwoman Diana Reyna theorized that “hipsters” may be part of the cause for the inconsistency of the Census numbers, stating that some of them “only want to be counted in their home state.” She also added that they might not participate in the Census because it wouldn’t be “cool.”
Here’s a lovely little piece praising the writing in Portal 2, and here’s hoping that more games will put effort into their writing from now on.
Who eats better: American prisoners or American school children? (Hint- no one would be posting this if it was the school children)
Straight out of some bad sketch comedy show, gang members in Miami mistake two deaf men for rival gang members and stab them. Gangs really need to be a bit more selective.
This is an amazing piece of film taken from a camera strapped to a streetcar in San Francisco in 1905. It’s positively hypnotic, and the Air song playing doesn’t hurt. Amazing.
Feedback!
So I have a few jobs right now, and my newest one is that I am a writer/producer for a G4 podcast and webseries called Feedback. This week was my first week actually on the show (rather than writing the script and sitting in the corner), so if you have a few minutes, go watch me talk about video games with Adam Sessler, Kevin Kelly, and Steve Johnson!
Link!
Puss in Boots.
Try and sleep after watching this.
Christopher Walken in the 1988 kids movie Puss in Boots. Big ups to Carlos, who showed me this clip and then said “These boots were made for Walken”, which made me howl with furious delight.
Gynomite’s Reading Room!
This was one of my favorite websites for years, but she hasn’t updated it since 2008. If you weren’t into it three years ago, please go and enjoy the archives of Pathetic Geek Stories.
Seven deadly sins of social networking security. If you’re a teenager, pay attention. If the Internet had been around when I was a teenager, I’d probably still be unable to get a job.
Your weekly roundup of all the things happening at Nerdist Theater at Meltdown! Go go, and see the fruits of my (and countless others’) labor.
This guy provides a service where he can remove traces of you online, partially by setting up dummy Facebook accounts for you.
Please watch this Devo video made with a 360 camera- they recorded an entire room of things to watch, and you get to decide what to look at. I found out about this because G4 is recording a video with the camera at Meltdown. Fucking amazing technology.
Animals with stuffed animals. You’re welcome.
My favorite weird thing found at Meltdown Comics this week, and posted originally to Nerdist.
These things are delicious. Just a personal PSA about good snacks from the people behind Fig Newtons.
Damn do I love Shiloh Jolie-Pitt.
Final UK pictures- this time, it’s Londonal
Somehow I forgot to post my non-Doctor Who pics of London, so for those of you who have been waiting with baited breath, or for those of you who are my Mom and/or my friends, enjoy!
Hyde Park!Inside Harrods, the fanciest department store on Earth, there is a Krispy Kreme. They consider it exotic. Score one for Winston Salem.
This was an arcade at Camden Locke, where there are ton of amazing flea markets.
Modern Voodoo
I read a Stephen King story in Night Shift called “I Know What You Need“, about a girl who meets a guy who somehow seems to magically know exactly what she wants and needs at every point in time. He knows what makes her laugh, he knows what kind of ice cream she likes, he knows her favorite movies, and she feels lucky to find a man who seems to be so perfect for her, until… *spoiler alert* she finds out later that he used voodoo to find out all these things about her because he was obsessed with her. The girl then has to decide whether or not she wants to stay in a relationship with someone who is perfect for her because of black magic and not because their personalities gel.
The story was originally published in Cosmopolitan in 1976- hilarious to think that the vapid self-esteem-destroying mag we all know today once premiered a Stephen King story. I kind of love the idea that way back in 1976, all Stephen King could think of to explain how someone would know all your likes and dislikes was voodoo. Today, all you’d have to do is a little bit of Internet recognizance on Twitter, Facebook, and possibly a blog, and you’d know everything to become someone’s perfect mate.
Favorite movies, how you spend your time, TV preferences, pop culture obsessions, who you’re friends with, your moods- forget not putting your phone number or embarrassing photos online, think about how much could you be exploited just by studying how you broadcast yourself online.
This is a thing I think about a lot- how much of our personalities and how we choose our friends are derived from the entertainment we choose to consume? Are we so directed by how we spend our leisure time that it ends up dictating our style, our sense of humor, our way of looking at the world, or does a certain type of personality naturally select itself to certain types of entertainment? Is it just easier to find like-minded people at ComicCon, or a football game? If you meet someone and find out they’re into Doctor Who and Miike Snow, you might feel a kinship with them, but does that always translate into being compatible with them?
My guess is probably.
So look out, ladies and gents. Facebook and Twitter is the new voodoo, but make sure you find out about a person’s values, dreams, and fears too. That shit is just as important as which Doctor they prefer.
Gynomite’s Reading Room!
Some of our pals in NYC were featured in a Paper Magazine article about “Twitter Cliques”. They were called the goof troop, of course.
A delightfully in-depth interview with creator of Community Dan Harmon about Magnitude, the one man party machine.
Photo-realistic pencil drawings. The celeb ones are amazing.
The guy who did Mike Tyson’s face tattoo wants to halt the production of Hangover 2. Barring that, he wants a shit load of money.
The kinda-drunk single Mom from Louie is the voice of Bobby from King of the Hill. You’re welcome. Find out more about famous voiceover actors here!
The kitty-cat head on collision.
Gynomite’s Reading Room!
The Willis Test- take love songs and switch the genders in them, see how pathetic and bizarre they sound. Thanks Jezebel!
You know all that footage on Osama Night of New Yorkers celebrating at Ground Zero. Well here’s what the rest of New York looked like.
Can someone please explain to me how and why Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson knew about Bin Laden’s death before anyone else?
Stay away from bath salts you guys- that drug is like crystal meth on crystal meth.
Kids at The University of Alaska are very very bored.
Cox said unusual things end up in sewer drains all the time. But the wave of socks has come at an alarming rate — the maintenance staff has a 30-gallon bucket that’s nearly full of socks retrieved from the system. The socks are mainly children’s sizes, and Cox said the strange habit must be costing a fortune.
The raspberry jam mystery: coming soon to a theater near you.
Names.
Discoveries of a Has-Been
I’ve loved this band for a while, but I never thought to look them up on YouTube until today- this is Chicago band Russian Circles performing Death Rides a Horse live.
