Stuff Ben Found

Canoe

2010-03-27T05:01:00.001+10:00

Merry Christmas

2008-12-24T21:43:00.001+10:00

Mario Kart

2008-12-05T11:03:00.002+10:00

Have you ever want to play Mario Kart in real life? Remi Gaillard has made your dreams a reality. The best part is at the end and it involves police.

Jones Big Ass Truck Rental and Storage

2008-12-05T10:53:00.003+10:00

Jones uses all the best sales techniques for his business.
- have "ass" in your business name
- say you are drunk in your advertising
- "Drunk Discount Sale" promotions
- appeal to the everyman, "You got an elephant, I got space!"

Video of rare squid

2008-11-28T16:42:00.004+10:00

The mysterious magnapinna squid has been captured on video by a remote submersible while filming an oil rig 2.5km underwater. The video can be seen on the National Geographic site courtesy of the Shell oil company.

'Good Game' in 1984

2008-11-21T14:18:00.005+10:00

Fans of Good Game should enjoy this vid below. I recommend start the viewing at the 4 minute mark. It's pretty long so run through the synopsis I've given below to see the times for the highlights.

Synopsis

0:00-2:10 : Introduction: check out how much fun they have playing pong. I hope their ties don't get in the way.

2:11-3:59 : Backwards Compable: History of games (until 1984)

4:00- 11:02: Gamer Interviews:
Interview Steve Kitchen about Atari 2600 game Space Shuttle. These guys are fantastic, the game is 8k and the manual is 30 pages long and it took him 1.5 years of research.

11:02- 12:51: Gamer Interviews:
Interview with Chris Crawford about Atari 2600 game Excaliber. A 'huge game' of 66k that requires 'disk swapping'.

13:05-22:25: Gamer Interviews:
Watch the person who founded Electronic Arts talk about his philosophy on games; "Simple, hot and deep".....I kid you not. (watch 14:31 onwards) The game "Pinball Construction Set" looks revolutionary, I guess that is why Bill Budge was honored at the 59th Annual Technology & Engineering Emmy Awards for "User Generated Content/Game Modification .

22:25-23:24: End Credits

23:25- 28:53 Gamer News: - new 'portable printer', new PC codename 'POPCORN', PC communications via 'MODEMS', world's first Robot Bartender

Obi-Wan Cannoli

2008-10-27T11:15:00.003+10:00

Food dressed up in Star Wars outfits, it's worth watching.

Poker

2008-10-24T14:19:00.004+10:00

If you like poker but don't have pay tv, youtube comes to the rescue. Some guy puts the episodes up soon after they are broadcast in Australia.

Here is the first vid of the biggest poker game of 2008.

Doggies!

2008-10-20T12:27:00.003+10:00

What is better than pictures of doggies? Pictures of upside down doggies!

Love those red DTs

2008-10-17T15:39:00.004+10:00

I haven't found anything great lately.

I'd thought I'd post this video clip because the song is awesome and so is the set design.

VP Debate

2008-10-07T14:20:00.002+10:00

View the Saturday Night Live VP debate here.

Baby Got Back

2008-09-18T19:58:00.007+10:00

I missed this when it was hip and happening on the net. So here is Jonathon Coulton's folk version of baby got back.

Molly's ukulele brilliance

2008-09-18T19:58:00.003+10:00

Molly (or sweetafton23 on youtube) will definitely make you smile. Spend some listening to her cover Tom Cruise Crazy and her original songs including MyHope in which she hopes that the current MySpace craze will embarrass future parents.

Inappropriate design

2008-09-15T12:35:00.003+10:00

I think there is something disturbing about this inflatable slide for kiddies.

Copy Proofing is a good idea

2008-09-11T02:19:00.003+10:00

Taken from B3ta newsletter #344.

"Why is copy proofing a good idea?"

hint:
Check out the Windows tabs of the developer's screenshot / top banner.

Gremlin Fan Film

2008-09-11T02:13:00.004+10:00

A fan has made a great video with Gremlins digitally added into memorable scenes from many movies. The Raiders of the Lost Ark part is great. The making of film is interesting also.

Segway crash test

2008-08-18T17:51:00.003+10:00

The magic starts at 1:25 on this video.

Scary

2008-08-18T17:08:00.002+10:00

Science is fighting hard to win it's battles; global warming, evolution.... Now comes news of a new battle to be fought.

Polar bears are cute

2008-08-15T16:23:00.001+10:00

Polar Bear Doesnt Need to Flush - Watch more free videos

Pedestrian crossing abuse

2008-07-15T18:56:00.002+10:00

From B3ta.

A crowd of arty types lies in wait for cars at a zebra crossing - then parades across in an almost unending stream of funny costumes and wacky characters. The drivers seem to take it in good spirits though - perhaps it's because they're French.

PEOPLE ARE STRANGE (REMI GAILLARD)
Caricato da nqtv

Fancy Cardboard Chair

2008-07-15T17:10:00.001+10:00

A design student created a cardboard chair called Flexible Love.

Ryan will never live this down.

2008-07-04T12:59:00.003+10:00

Does anyone else see anything wrong with this ad? Ryan's fruit rocket. I've sent it in to the Gruen Transfer.

Wouldn't the parents of the poor kid say something?

"Believe me, it's torture"

2008-07-04T12:41:00.003+10:00

A columnist is waterboarded and reports how it feels. 17 seconds was enough to give him nightmares and small panic attacks days after the event. There is a video footage but I would read the article first.

Skincare

2008-06-30T13:07:00.000+10:00

Google Maps

2008-06-25T23:50:00.000+10:00

The Chaser treatment on the GodHatesSweden.com preacher

2008-06-24T12:04:00.002+10:00

Heres the link to the video.

Gruen Transfer

2008-06-09T14:19:00.006+10:00

The ABC has a new show The Gruen Transfer. It pokes fun at advertising and has a competition to create your own ad from their video footage and sound effects. These are my contributions thus far.

Andrew's academia

2008-05-19T12:28:00.003+10:00

I'm sure Andrew is secretly studying chemistry and not doing his PhD in NZ. There has to be a connection between him and this paper which was published in 2004.

Focus Groups

2008-05-19T12:25:00.000+10:00

Thanks B3ta newsletter #328!

Internet goodness

2008-04-29T22:08:00.002+10:00

The intertron can give you many feelings. Some wrong¹ and some good.

Talking to people overseas for free using skype gives you that good "the world is so small, everything is so connected, I am skynet" feeling. It's been a while since I've felt that feeling, but using this and this have given it back to me.

Hey kidlets, what is wrong with the proposed logo for the UK Office of Governement Commerce?

Read about this marketing folly and bungled logo attempt here.

Thanks go to b3ta since I pinched all these links from their newsletter.

¹Don't ever do an image search for "that's wrong"...bad things appear.

Bogans

2008-04-29T11:26:00.003+10:00

Before committing oneself to Andrew's call to arms you must prepare yourself for the foul beasts that lay within the Gate.

Unfortunate address

2008-04-29T10:01:00.001+10:00

Is this where all the bogans originated from? Unleashed from Bogan Gate, NSW?

View Larger Map

Logic Puzzle Hint

2008-04-14T14:39:00.002+10:00

The three gods.

Staged?

2008-04-09T14:19:00.001+10:00

I can't work out if this was staged or not.

Transcript for those without sound:

Reporter: Brian is 1990 graduate of Northern and he is going to tell us a little bit about this amazing structure.

Brian: As you can see it's the leaning tower of Pisa. It's about 12000 blocks, it took over 2 weekends to build, and I'm really excited because next week the Guinness book of world records team are going to come to evaluate it. I'm really looking forward to that.

.....
.....
Brian: Oh! oh!
Reporter: Geez Brian, I don't know what to say.

Interest Rates

2008-04-09T13:09:00.002+10:00

Everyone wants to save money to pay for the latest rate rises and saving that spare change is boring. I'm sick of stapling my $5 notes to the cat and I need to put coffee in that mug that currently has all the shrapnel from the wallet. So I need somewhere to store my spare change. Lucky for me, some fancy pants inventor in Japan came up with a new awesome money box.

Pure Pwnage

2008-04-07T12:15:00.005+10:00

Andrew's spelling of "ownage" reminds me of something I used to watch a few years back. It's still funny. Welcome to the funny videos of Pure Pwnage. Here is first episode of the first season.

As an aside, as I linked to in my comment "ownage" can have many spellings. My spelling is the old school spelling, Wikipedia explains it:

Owned has now spread beyond computer and gaming contexts and become part of standard slang, where it typically entails defeat or humiliation, usually in an amusing way or through the dominance of an opposing party.[7] Other variations of the word owned include own3d, 0wn3d and oaned,[7] terms which incorporate elements of leetspeak.

At some point, the variant term "pwned" appeared in the same subculture (generally thought to have been invented by Paul Semenets; this alteration originated from typos that occurred when hasty gamers tried typing too fast on the keyboard, thus missing the "o" and typing "p" instead).

Too much cute

2008-04-04T16:58:00.001+10:00

Enough cutsey poo videos.

Animal vs Human cage fighting!

Star Trek XI

2008-02-27T18:36:00.002+10:00

Like any big nerd I was excited to hear that another Star Trek film is being made, and its being directed by by Lost co-creator J. J. Abrams. I was even more surprised to see a trailer on you tube.

Pahl the butcher

2008-02-27T17:58:00.003+10:00

Pahl is an enterprising butcher that has come up with many disturbing ideas to sell more of his meats especially for special occasions.

- birth of a baby
- valentines day
- wedding
- for the lady (not safe for work)
- for the man (very wrong and not safe for work)
- shaped like a dog
- shaped like a cat
- shaped like a turtle
- more birthday

Some new engrish

2008-02-18T15:28:00.001+10:00

Some recent discoveries on Engrish:

New Zealand maths tutor

2008-02-15T15:12:00.004+10:00

In honour of Andrew's new adventure coming up (I think he is becoming a crack smoking pirate) here is a New Zealand person teaching maths.

Andrew help

2008-02-15T15:12:00.001+10:00

Andrew can you check if this is correct.

Andrew found stuff in a can

2008-02-13T14:27:00.002+10:00

This is lifted from an email Andrew sent me.....

For starters.....
- thongs (as in underwear) in a can
- the economy (how does it fit?)
- romance (abstract concepts can be canned too!!!!)
- the cheeseburger thread on something awful (they do a taste test!!!!)
- pancakes (actually pancake mix, so not that weird, really)
- wine in a can

.... they don't really seem to get better..... but, hey, I tried.

Excitement for mac users

2008-02-11T17:03:00.000+10:00

Australian's can now make photo books using iPhoto. See this more details.

USB drive

2008-02-11T12:59:00.001+10:00

Looking for a new USB drive?

You can watch the humping dog usb drive again here.

A good prank.

2008-02-11T12:53:00.000+10:00

Over 200 people freeze in place for 5 minutes at Grand Central station in New York.

Thanks Damien for the link!

The 1996 internet

2008-01-30T14:04:00.000+10:00

Here is a funny article linking to the actual sites used in 1996...

fast food and soft drink corporations because they were some of the earliest adapters of the internet. They viewed the medium as a chance for inexpensive advertising and invested dozens upon dozens of dollars into it. The results are tremendously humiliating.

Cheeseburger in a can

2008-01-30T13:31:00.001+10:00

Hungry? Buy it! Here is the English translation of the page using BabelFish.

Johnny Lee strikes again.

2008-01-24T12:27:00.000+10:00

I thought I'd check out Johnny's research. It's even more interesting than the wii stuff.

Johnny Chung Lee, the coolest guy ever.

2008-01-24T12:21:00.000+10:00

Johnny has come up with some great stuff using the Wii.

Monkey Business

2008-01-17T16:12:00.000+10:00

Have you ever wanted to dress up a monkey and make them talk? Here is your chance - Monk-e-mail.

Considering a pet?

2008-01-14T14:35:00.000+10:00

I love all things nerdy, especially robotic nerdy. So this year get ready for "Pleo", a robotic dinosaur that has

"body language, exhibits evolving emotions, is aware of his surroundings and has recognizable behaviors that change over time."

However, I would still favour adopting a real pet from the RSPCA instead of forking out the $349 USD for the dinosaur pet. The RSPCA has a great site called Adopt-a-Pet where you can search for all types of pets (and see pictures) that are currently available at the RSPCA centres.

Exploding Dog

2008-01-13T22:35:00.000+10:00

Want to know how to make a living drawing stick figures? I'm not sure how to do that, I just know that a guy named Sam who runs Exploding Dog does. People send him emails containing a sentence and he draws a picture using that sentence as a title. I enjoy his take on the titles.

Here are some titles and pictures:

I need to be outside.

Are you going to eat that?

More titles - click to get the pictures:

Our little secret.

I thought it would be bigger.

I get nervous in cars.

Please drink responsibly.

Will I be able to do it?

It didn't have to end this way.

This blog is white hot

2008-01-13T16:30:00.000+10:00

Thanks to David Barry who left a comment on Andrew's blog. I can now see that this blog is hot with visitors. I don't know how the servers can keep up.

Check out the stats below taken by google analytics since I started it just after the new year.

13 visits and 6 unique vistors, average time spent on site = 2 minutes. I must have an intelligent readership since they speed read my blog posts in 2 minutes.

My blog must be in competition with Crossing the Ditch for the hottest website. Apparently the Crossing the Ditch website had 1 million hits in 30 minutes when the 2 Trans Tasman kayakers were about to make history when landing in New Plymouth.

Stormy Brisbane

2008-01-06T14:48:00.001+10:00

To avoid the current thunderstorms in Brisbane and northern NSW I thought I'd share a handy site. The Australian Bureau of Meteorology's Brisbane radar has saved my car from many hail storms and traffic jams in the last few years. You can find the closest radar to you here.

True office rage or viral videos

2007-12-21T12:44:00.001+10:00

I'm not sure what these videos are but they are still interesting.

Google street view car in Brisbane!

2007-11-21T11:49:00.000+10:00

I have some actual news. I've just seen the Google "street view" maps car in Brisbane taking pictures of the suburb of Wilston. I tried to follow it but lost it when I got stuck behind a moving van. So fellow Brisbanites, get out your signs and prepare your silly faces and take to the streets.

The google car is a small white car with a stand on the top and in small writing it has google written on the front doors. The car was a white Ford Fiesta, Toyota Corolla or similar model (not the newest models).

Sundays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays

2007-11-20T14:47:00.000+10:00

After my last post, you must now be an avid reader of the Dr McNinja webcomic and eagerly anticipate the updates on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Those other days must be filled with boring work and study.....but luckily I'm here to get you back to bludging.

Darths and Droids is a comic using stills from the Star Wars movies and dialog based on playing an RPG. The best part is that it is updated on Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays! ¹

What about Saturday's you ask? You'll have to read Andrew's blog or something.

¹Thanks for the link Andy!!

Web comics

2007-10-31T22:09:00.000+10:00

Everyone should embrace their inner nerd and read comics once in a while. Now you can do it for free with many quality web comics available. So what makes a good web comic?

Ninjas?

Pirates?

Colour?

Dinosaurs?

Zombies?

Gorilla medical secretaries?

Giants?

Spooky forests?

Mean parents?

Medicine?

One web comic has all of these in the one story (well except zombies that comes in another story, oh...I lied about being in colour, their in high quality black & white). Welcome to the world of The Adventures of Dr.McNinja, he is a doctor who is also a ninja. It's best to start with the first story.

Wikipedia tells me that Dr. McNinja won the 2007 Web Cartoonist's Choice Award for Outstanding Superhero / Action Comic.

Get your dose of Offbeat

2007-10-30T13:17:00.001+10:00

Many Australian office workers have a busy day so they chow down on lunch while at their desks. So lunch time entertainment usually comes in the form of surfing the net for safe for work websites.

I get my dose from the ABC news using their offbeat tag for news. These news items are entertaining and helpful in modern life:

UK hotels are already prepared for my visit.

I'll be prepared for Brisbane's traffic during planned major roadworks.

Explains how I could break into a shop using a cardboard box.

The best product ever

2007-10-23T21:31:00.000+10:00

Have you ever needed your shotgun while you were sleeping? Well, do I have the product for you, it's a bed mounted gun rack! "For access to your shotgun from the lying position!" You'll always be ready to shoot those things that startle you in your sleep, like annoying pets, or excited kids on their birthdays and Christmas!

Today's post comes from b3ta newsletter #299.

It's Hammer time.

2007-10-22T11:20:00.000+10:00

I cheated on today's blog entry, instead of searching the net for fascinating things, I'm just going to post something I got via email¹. By the way, I don't understand what he is saying so hopefully it's not offensive.

¹Thanks must go to Damien for the email.

Classic FM is full of surprises

2007-10-16T10:10:00.000+10:00

Today's blog posting comes from the ABC Media Watch is one of my favorite sites for a quick laugh. This comes from their Dog of the Week section¹. Have a listen to this from ABC Classic FM, and listen out for the name of the Jazz program².

¹Here is the media watch article.
²Just incase you didn't catch it, she calls the program "Jazz crap".

Advertising

2007-10-15T12:34:00.000+10:00

With the election being called on the weekend, the advertising campaigns are already in full swing. I thought I'd find any interesting advertising techniques to share.

Tunnel Advertising
In underground railway systems multiple posters are used to create a "flip book" type effect. I found these you youtube:

New York City subway

A subway somewhere in japan

Billboard/Poster Advertising
A came across a site bored.com with a huge array of creative billboard advertising. Here are some I enjoyed:

Wrong job
Lego
Batteries
Painted shadows
Violence
Lockers
Karate School
Roof of smoker's area

Sport Advertising
This is a reminder to players in a soccer team to think of their sponsors when they score a goal.

Shoplifting Seagull

2007-10-12T13:33:00.000+10:00

From Snopes, my favorite site for checking all those urban legends and tall tales I get in my email, comes this story of a seagull in Scotland that has learnt how to shoplift packets of chips from a shop and share the bounty with his mates. Long live Sam the seagull the true Robin Hood of the animal kingdom.

A town called Yass

2007-10-12T12:32:00.000+10:00

I think the McDonald's marketing department should have reconsidered their advertising for the town of Yass (just a short drive from Canberra) which reads (if you haven't spotted it already):

"MY ASS OPEN 6 AM"

Album covers

2007-10-12T11:31:00.000+10:00

I'll start this blog with something good then it will be all down hill from there. Here are some real album covers that I have discovered while trawling the net. Click on the album below to see a slideshow¹.

Worst Album Covers

¹I recommend pressing the pause button and stepping through the slideshow manually.