January 1, 2012
Life can be a challenge, life can seem impossible, it's never easy when there is so much on the line.
Pokemon: Game Freak and Nintendo's series of cartoony monster-training RPGs that kicked off huge crazes among the kids of both Japan and the U.S. In these games, children take up the calling of "Pokemon trainers," capturing the titular animals and then keeping them as pets or fighting them against either wild pokemon or those of other trainers.
Nobunaga's Ambition: An even-longer-running classic series of historical strategy/simulation games produced by Koei. Noted for their realistic approach, their difficulty, and a high level of dryness. You grow rice, distribute it to your population to keep them happy, send out spies, guard against assassins, raise and train a military, and ultimately attempt to unite feudal-era Japan.
And now... Pokemon + Nobunaga's Ambition, a Real Thing that will Soon Exist.
Nobunaga's Ambition: An even-longer-running classic series of historical strategy/simulation games produced by Koei. Noted for their realistic approach, their difficulty, and a high level of dryness. You grow rice, distribute it to your population to keep them happy, send out spies, guard against assassins, raise and train a military, and ultimately attempt to unite feudal-era Japan.
And now... Pokemon + Nobunaga's Ambition, a Real Thing that will Soon Exist.
who'd a thunk it?
Welsh pop idol and blue-eyed soulman Tom Jones as lead vocalist for 60s hippie icons Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young? Seems spectacularly unlikely at first glance, but...it happened. [more inside]
Sort of like Pandora for YouTube
Tubalr is a music video playing service for YouTube. Type in a band name and click "only" or "similar" and it will play a stream of music videos only from that artist or from a selection of similar artists. Creating an account will allow for marking videos as favorites and enable saving of playlists. Also available are genre-based playlists rather than using artists as seeds. [more inside]
So, would your holiness care to change her password?
The holiday season isn't always relaxing for those in the computing security field.
2011's Chaos Communication Congress brought many gifts in the form of vulnerability disclosures, including: malicious documents that infect HP printers, remote control vulnerabilities in prison lock systems, and denial-of-service attacks against Web servers written in just about every scripting language.
A very confused Bob Hope
A top ten list of top ten lists of top ten lists.
Dragon Hunters
Dragon Hunters is a french made CGI animated movie that had a limited US release. Scott Mendelson says "It is a visually rich and emotionally satisfying adventure movie that deserves to get noticed."
Aaaalrighty then
Jim Carrey has a website. (Do not click on the Bio link)
(Disney) Princesses Gone Wild
Princesses Gone Wild is a tumblr blog of Disney princesses re-imagined with tattoos, piercings, dyed hair and band t-shirts. [more inside]
5 Scoops
The Peanut Butter Solution is a 1985 Canadian 'family' film about a boy who is scared bald trying to sneak into a burned house and cops a hairgrowth recipe from two ghosts. Then things get weird. See for yourself [google video, 90 min]
Clear lines
Princeless, Bayou Arcana, and more
"Princeless" is a new comic book in the self-rescuing princesses genre (more page previews here and here) - perhaps a younger-audience example of women kicking back against comic-book sexism? (previously on MeFi - wik, alsø wik, alsø alsø wik)
Aum Shinrikyo fugitive surrenders after 16 years
Makoto Hirata, a senior member of doomsday cult Aum Shinrikyo and one of three remaining fugitives from the group, has turned himself in to police after more than sixteen years on the run, leading to questions about the timing of his surrender now, after all these years.
While Aum is best known as the group responsible for the deadly sarin-gas attack on Tokyo's subway system that killed 13 people and injured more than 6000, Hirata is wanted on suspicion of taking part in a different crime, the kidnapping and murder of Kiyoshi Kariya, the brother of an ex-Aum member who had left the group.
Despite the fact that police stations and koban (police boxes) throughout Japan have prominently displayed wanted posters of the three Aum Shinrikyo fugitives for the past 16 years, Hirata had remained at large and hadn't had plastic surgery, leading to police speculation that he must have been helped by others while on the run.
The 8th Fire
The CBC debut: The 8th Fire draws from an Anishinaabe prophecy that declares now is the time for Aboriginal peoples and the settler community to come together and build the '8TH Fire' of justice and harmony. [more inside]
I'm just gonna go ahead and Godwin this in-title.
Yesterday, 1500 protesters denounced the Netanyahu government, carrying signs reading "Zionism is racism" and wearing yellow stars to emphasize comparison between the Israel and the Nazi state. “What’s happening is exactly like what happened in Germany,” said one man wearing a yellow star. “It started with incitement and continued to different types of oppression. Is it insulting that we wear these stars? Absolutely, and it hurts people to see this, but this is how we feel at the moment, we feel we are being prevented from observing the Torah in the manner in which we wish.”
Wait, what?
Yep -- the protesters aren't Arabs or latte-sipping Berkeley radicals, but ultra-Orthodox Jews in Jerusalem, angry about recent TV news coverage of incidents in which haredim threw rocks at handicapped Modern Orthodox children in Beit Shemesh who were using their wheelchairs on Shabbat. The angry crowd was also protesting the jailing of Shmuel Weisfish, a member of the "Modesty Squad" who recently started a 2-year prison sentence for beating and threatening employees of a computer store for selling MP4 players which might expose customers to inappropriate content. As always, Failed Messiah is your (admittedly one-sided) source for bad behavior among the frum. [more inside]
10 things that will happen in Canadian real estate in 2012
Garth Turner, former Member of Parliament and current entertaining, curmudgeonly, and well-informed Greater Fool blogger about Canadian real estate -- and the world economy generally -- gives his predictions for 2012. The main one, IMO, is the one that he talks about relentlessly in his postings: "Most people won't get it."
Oh Look It's The Hangover Ham!
Russian shellacing
Russian Records is an online archive of thousands of 78s issued in Russia, or with Russian themes. Just the labels are a visual feast but there's audio as well. Don't miss the whistlers with orchestral backing.
Stuck in the Trollmire
Tales of Maj'Eyal (ToME) is a graphical roguelike RPG. It started off in 1998 as an Angband variant (history), but has since been completely rewritten, ditching both the engine and the Tolkien setting. It recently became the first game to win the Roguelike of the Year award for two years in a row (and also the first game to win it more than once). [more inside]
Hi Richard!
You may know him as the funny response to Shit Girls Say , but Jeffery Self has good things to say and a fabulous organization to support
The newest Year
Alofa'aga mo se Tausaga Fou fiafia, manuia ma saogalemu. Ia manuia fuafuaga uma mo le tausaga fou 2012. American Samoa just changed time zones. But if you missed New Years, you still have, at the time of this writing, 50 minutes until New Years in Pago Pago.
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