another Sony Bravia ad coming...

First it was bouncing superballs in San Francisco, then it was exploding streams of paint, now it's play-doh bunnies.

Not a guide dog, but a guide horse

A "Guide Miniature pony", actually.

One person's trash is another's art

Or, in some cases, it merely depends on how you view the trash.

Fwd: Time-waster of the day

From: Rebecca Merhar

this is my favorite game

http://amanita-design.net/samorost-1/

Fwd: Time-waster of the day

The game is called Manifold, and it allows you to bend gravity to your will.

Arrow keys or A, W, D control motion, space bar retrieves anomalies.

Instructions for creating anomalies is a bit fuzzy -- think of them as things that the little guy throws -- thus, you click where you want him to aim and drag the mouse to set the direction the anomaly bends gravity. BUT, even though the guy throws in that direction, the anomaly is created at the first place the throw hits (which may not be where you mouse-clicked!) 

HINT -- gravity doesn't have to work only up and down; maybe you want to push the little guy ahead or slow him down instead?

Electronic bubblewrap toy

Japanese toymaker Bandai's Mugen Puchi-Puchi is a handheld electronic gizmo that makes the sound of popping bubblewrap when you press on the plastic bubbles.  For courtesy, the manufacturer claims the sound is automatically turned off when the toy is used on the train. (?)

http://www.boingboing.net/2007/09/20/electronic-bubblewra.html

Kasparov versus the World

"In 1999, world chess champion Garry Kasparov, widely acknowledged as the greatest player in the history of the game, agreed to participate in a chess match sponsored by Microsoft, playing against "the World". One move was to be made each 24 hours, with the World's move being decided by a vote; anyone at all was allowed to vote on the World Team's next move.

The game was staggering. After 62 moves of innovative chess, in which the balance of the game changed several times, the World Team finally resigned. Kasparov revealed that during the game he often couldn't tell who was winning and who was losing, and that it wasn't until after the 51st move that the balance swung decisively in his favor. After the game, Kasparov wrote an entire book about it. He claimed to have expended more energy on this one game than on any other in his career, including world championship games."

http://michaelnielsen.org/blog/?p=267#comments

The most difficult graduate examination you'll ever see

All Soul's College in Oxford is a bit odd.  L144M in endowment, no undergraduate students, and only 76 graduate fellows.  While most fellows who join the college are postdocs and are elected by its current members, every year two graduate students - who might be as young as 21 - are admitted as Prize Fellows chosen through a famous exam.

The end of civilization, as we know it.

Researchers at the University of Cincinatti have developed a software 'bot which has taken the art of Artificial Intelligence in a whole new direction.  It understands 'knock knock' jokes.

Julia Taylor, a doctoral student researching humor in robots, had the only-a-lowly-research-student-would-do-it task of training the software application by feeding it jokes until it understood them.  Let us all hope that her post-doc plans do not have anything to do with puns.

http://www.uc.edu/news/NR.asp?id=6139

The unhappier your are, the more Ice Cream you get

Dr. Whippy, had people queue despite the wet wet weather in the streets of Linz during ars electronica. The machine proffers soft scoop ice cream according to the perceived unhappiness level of the customer.

"Employing voice stress analysis of the user's answers to specific questions, varying degrees of unhappiness are measured and the counteractive quantity of ice cream is dispensed: The more unhappy you are, the more ice cream you need."

The project, developed by Demitrios Kargotis, was partly funded by the Royal College of Art-Platform 11. Technical Assistance: Bjorn Franke. Images courtesy of Noam Toran. A few more taken in Linz.

http://www.we-make-money-not-art.com/archives/009721.php

Time-waster of the day

You really have too much time on your hands.  This will fix that problem.

World's most bizarre statues

Some are actually rather amusing, but I'm known for my odd sense of humor.

Time-waster of the day

Roll the block over the squares, what could be easier?

The Ultimate tree house

Free Spirit Spheres