Saturday, April 3, 2010

Instant CSI

Click here for instant CSI..

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Waiting In Line


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Friday, April 2, 2010

Introducing: Google Mail Envelopes

By Rahul Mahtani & Yofred Moik



Designers Rahul Mahtani & Yofred Moik from the Industrial Design program at Syracuse University came up with this concept called Google Envelopes. Wouldn’t it be great to be able to map the course of mail and how it can tell a story? They came up with Google Envelopes, which can be sent through G-Mail itself. It’s only a concept, but totally viable and something people can immediately understand.



Yanko Design

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11 Ways I'd Fix (And Save) The Rock n Roll Hall Of Fame

...a SUPER review by the guys over at 11points dot com.

I first went to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum when I was in high school. They were throwing some banquet there for nerds from different area schools and I snagged the invite to this one.

That was 1996, one year after the Hall opened. I distinctly remember my thoughts back then: "Meh. It's like a really big Hard Rock Cafe."

This week, while visiting my parents back here in Cleveland, I returned to the Hall for the first time in 14 years. My thoughts now: "They've had a decade and a half to improve this place and it's still like a really big Hard Rock Cafe. Only less crowded."

I don't think this list topic is particularly commercial... nor do I think this list will even crack my top 200 most viewed. But it's something I need to write for three reasons. One: On the outside chance that someone from the Hall reads this, takes it to heart, and saves the place and helps the city. Two: I need a cathartic outlet after going to that place with optimism in my heart. And three: They charge a jaw-dropping $22 for admission. I need to make a list about it so I can write that insanity off.

Here are 11 steps that need to be taken to fix (and, quite possibly, save) Cleveland's beloved Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum. Because, quite frankly, it sucks worse than the Shitty Beatles. (Which isn't just a clever name.)

1. Allow people to take photos.
Normally, when I write a travel list -- like my 11 Points on the Jack Daniels distillery or Fenway or Wrigley -- every point is accompanied by a photo I took. That is not the case here. The Hall does not allow photos.

And they MEAN it. You have to check your camera at their coat check. There are signs every few feet reminding you. And I even passed a SNIPER as we went on the top floor... literally, an employee who stands there, from on high, radioing down to the guards below when he spots someone taking a photo.

They say this is because many of the artists (or their estates) agreed to donate their stuff under the condition that it not be photographed. That may be sporadically true, but seems suspect to me. My most cynical side says they don't want a ton of photos out there because, once people actually see the crapiness within for free, it will discourage anyone from actually coming to the Hall.

Fortunately, with the rest of my plan items below, the Hall would become so much more of a multimedia experience that a photo of John Lennon' Sgt. Pepper's jacket could hit the Internet and not push the Hall into the red for a quarter.

Let people take photos of their trip to the museum. They're paying $22 and seeing stuff they want to remember. And if the photos are of cool enough stuff, it might even... wait for it... make people want to actually travel to Cleveland to see the Hall.

2. Don't cluster everything on the ground floor.
So you enter the museum, head to the ground floor, and go into the main display area. You walk around for at least an hour, seeing memorabilia and such, and say to yourself, "Wow! This was just one floor! I can't wait to see the rest of the museum." Then you leave the ground floor and find... virtually nothing. A few random cases of more of the same memorabilia, a few exhibits that may or may not interest you... and that's about it.

For some reason, the Hall decided to put 99 percent of the museum in one huge room on the ground floor. It was like that in 1996, and it's like that today.

It's kind of like someone who decided to watch "The O.C." on DVD. You get about halfway through the first season and you think, "This show is amazing! There's a fight at a rich people's party every episode. Not to mention so many sexy results." Then, eventually, you find yourself halfway through the third season realizing the show used up everything it had in the first season and is now just presenting a meager shell of itself. That's a completely terrible metaphor for the basement of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Having everything on one floor creates all sorts of problems. One: Congestion. Everyone's in the main room. Two: It renders the rest of the museum useless. And three: It makes this giant building feel like an enormous waste of space.

So, here's what I propose: Split it up and use the full museum. Divide the main room into smaller rooms and take us on a tour through the history of rock and roll through those rooms.

You know how an art museum has an ancient Egyptian room, a Renaissance room, an Impressionism room and on and on until finally you're in a modern art room where the pièce de résistance is like a giant jar of fish heads with a Ziggy cartoon taped to it? Do that. Give us a Motown room, a '60s San Francisco room, a grunge room, a Beatles room, an Elvis room. Start with the roots of rock in the basement, then take us all the way up through today by the fifth floor. And when we get there, have it lead right into the Hall of Fame itself.

3. Break the displays up by performer.
Right now the displays are by era -- everyone from one era stuffed into one or two cases. It's OK, but it leaves them so incredibly jammed that you can't possibly examine everything. It really doesn't have the (I think) intended effect of making you see how these acts all contributed to these major musical epochs -- it just looks like a glass-encased thrift store.

Continue to the rest of this gem..

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Thursday, April 1, 2010

Product Of The Day



Dress up your houseplants with this playful dachshund trio. The larger dachshund stretches to the rim of your pot, and 2 smaller pups hang on the side of the pot and rest within its foilage. Crafted of polyresin. Large dog measures 12 3/4"L x 4 1/4"W.

Get it HERE..

LOL, Make Some Bacon, Then Call 911

...in that order!

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Now That's Mulitasking!

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Wednesday, March 31, 2010

It Was Metallica At Their Peak

~~Here's Your Language Warning~~



Just took a little trip down memory lane. I saw a post at Gorilla Mask dot com regarding the best "passover" rock song, and the article was about Creeping Death. You can read it here.

Anyway, it led me down a 30 minute road to try and find footage of my memories from the Wherever We May Roam Tour in support of their 1991 Black Album. The diamond-shaped stage. The lucky guys who were down there inside the diamond. "One" live! Hetfield with his foot on his monitor and hand slowly waving across the horizon, chanting:


"And my ties are severed clean
Less I have the more I gain
Off the beaten path I reign"




Great seats all around. Drum set rotating... omg! They were at their prime then. And it was one of the best concerts I've ever been to. And I've been to a ton!

No, I didn't go in Moscow with 1.5 million people, it was either Austin or San Antonio. It was a 3-hour set with no opening band, and left me blown away. One distinct memory from that night was the portion of Creeping Death during which 20,000 people - all in one building - are all yelling "DIE" - on beat - in unison.. At our show, James didn't tell us what to do, everyone knew what to do, and it was surreal.

Tuesday, March 30, 2010

Unless What?

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Talk About Being Kicked When You're Down

If it weren't for bad luck, this guy and his family would have no luck at all, geeez!

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So Much For That Idea


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Monday, March 29, 2010

The Most Polluted Places On Earth

Click to enlarge..

Even though the world's developed nations are notorious for being among the most polluting, they can afford the economic cost of reducing greenhouse gas emissions and environmental clean up efforts. On the other hand, developing economies that are also producing large amounts of carbon do not have the resources or experience to counter-balance their increasing emissions.

Therefore it is little wonder that the city of Linfen in China, in the middle of the nation's coal industry, and Sumgayt, Azerbaijan, have been named the most polluted places in the world. As one of Russia's satellite states that was left under-developed after the collapse of the Soviet Union, Azerbaijan has not been able to deal with its escalating carbon production as a result of its mass-manufacturing of industrial and agricultural chemicals and its heavy reliance on oil.

Linfen has the worst air quality in the whole of China due to choking clouds of coal dust that linger over the city. The high levels of pollution are also taking a serious toll on human health: clinics are recording growing cases of bronchitis, pneumonia and lung cancer.

An alarming number of the most polluted cities are in China, where concern for the environment comes second to fuelling the country's huge economic growth. They have the financial resources to deal with the pollution, but are instead choosing to put more money into meeting the insatiable energy of its ever-growing population.

According to a report by the Blacksmith Institute, communism's lack of environmental programs and the collapse of industrial controls lead to the former Soviet Union's waste products seeping into the environment.

The UN climate change summit in Copenhagen, that so famously flopped in December last year, was vital to putting as many nations as possible on the same path to curbing carbon emissions. As energy demands increase and populations continue to grow, it cannot be left up to the developed world alone to invest capital into controlling the emissions their industrial activity produces.

Europe has strong renewable energy policies in place and look likely to meet the target of producing 20 percent of energy from clean sources by 2020. The USA also has a promising renewable energy market and legislation could be on its way to further regulate emissions. Even China and other less-environmentally-savvy countries like South Africa and India are now starting to develop their own clean energy technology programmes.

Dangers to health

If not for the environment, then nations must invest to control pollution for the sake of people's health. In all of the cities mentioned on the list of the world's most polluted places, the health of millions of people is at risk.

Lower IQs, short attention spans, learning disabilities, hyperactivity, impaired physical growth, hearing and visual problems, stomach aches, irritation of the colon, kidney malfunction, anaemia and brain damage, can all stem from poor air quality and contaminated food and water supplies.

Governments all over the world must establish legislation that can encourage the development of high-level technologies to help control emissions, but also legislation that can control things such as illegal operations that also help to make places heavily polluted.

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Newton Would Be Proud



∞ Yeah it's infinitely amazing. The ∞ hand, or something.

And, well the ∞ ball too. Kinda hurts my knuckles!

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Kamikaze Matches Ready For Service!



























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What Did That Sign Sa.. OH SH..!!


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Sunday, March 28, 2010

10 Coolest Decoration Stickers



Anti-Theft Car/Bike Stickers






































How can we protect our bikes/cars from being stolen? Just try these stickers. They can make your beautiful bike/car look rusted and scratched. I believe that no thief would like wasting time on it.


Bathroom Stickers
































These funny vinyl stickers by Hua2 when applied to the smooth walls, windows, furniture, sanitary ware not only give your bathroom a unique touch but also amuse you each time you use it. Easily removable, these humorously cool vinyl stickers leave no mark or impression that one frets while applying.


Garage Door Stickers







































Even an ordinary garage will draw as much attention as a super star does if you decorate the garage door with these 3D stickers created by the German company StyleYourGarage. Finished in high-quality material, these garage billboards will not become deformed even they're exposed in the sun or rain.

Continue to the rest..

Banner image source

In Case Of Crab Battle

Click to enlarge..

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