yearbook yourself [thx for the reminder, sis]

not much to say about the first day. as usual it was a day of first impressions, a brief dip into what’s around this year. i went to a few openings - ecology of the techno mind at lentos, the featured artist group from slovenia, seems very intense, kinda dark, kinda cool; hybrid ego, the japanese students at campus impress with their haptic and playful approach -, not to the opening of CyberArts at Ok Center though. i missed that for the conference on interactiviy. to be honest, i am not too exited about much of the work shown this year at CyberArts, and with that i pretty much diss the prix ars winners, so sorry everyone. i will catch it later, but at least on paper none of the projects really have managed to grab my fancy, with the exception of bleu remix and moving mario, that i look forward to see. but i am open to surprises.

the conference on interactivity, titel : Interaction, Interactivity, Interactive Art - a buzzword of new media under scrutiny, sounded interesting, however it also kinda went past me. i must have been a little bit too tired (after just one hour sleep the previous nght) for the sometimes heady debates (or too engrossed in the interactive capabilities of my ipod touch interface ^^). this is what my notes looked like at the end: “ludwig boltzmann institute conference interacticvity”. not much, i agree.

i did however notice something, that i can’t really decide yet, how to feel about. i noticed that when i listen to british people give talks, i tend to get very impressed, even though often when i think about what they said a little bit further, it might turn out to be quite obvious, banal even. but they tend to deliver their arguments with such weighed words, that it gives the impression of being very thoughtful and deep. spinning this further, americans i tend to dismiss much too quickly, because they give their talks with such gung-ho over-enthusiasm, like yapping puppies, yet often what they do say is actually right on. now with germans, it’s the worst for me. they often say very profound things, but it may do it in such a snide way and in such elitist language, that i might miss it, because i either get stuck in my defenses against their arrogance or in my feelings of inadequacy because of their language. not good. i wish there was a bullshit-filter for such cliches that lets me hear just the essence of what people are saying, not influenced by how they deliever them.

ok, enough words. let the images do the talking:

flickr set: ars electronica 2008

gustav is fast approaching bern, switzerland.

but no worries, it’s the other gustav, eva jantschitsch, musician from vienna austria.

she will perform at frauenraum, reitschule this coming saturday 6. 9. 2008.

gustav’s latest album, verlass die stadt, can be streamed here.

gustav official website

(i can’t make it sadly, cause i am away at ars electronica in linz, austria, but hey, i ain’t complaining, just wishing gustav would play there once)

teh glorious interweb as it got stuck in my camino tabs this past week - the edited version.

banksy schmanksy

Fresh Stuff From Banksy On The Streets Of New Orleans - 3 years after katrina it’s banksy’s turn to hit new orleans.

More Banksy In New Orleans - and more photos.

Banksy New Orleans - and yet more.

banksy on advertising - Banksy: "The thing I hate the most about advertising is that it attracts all the bright, creative and ambitious young people, leaving us mainly with the slow and self-obsessed to become our artists. Modern art is a disaster area. Never in the field of human history has so much been used by so many to say so little."

apple schmapple

newtonica - this game for iphone/ipod touch looks fun, but costs 5.50. hmm, call me cheap but i'll stick to my free tris … while it lasts (see bellow).

how to make an iPhone last 36 hours - "Hang on, though - no 3G, no location, hourly data, limited calling? Sounds to me like he might as well have bought an iPod Touch… and a proper phone."

Steve Jobs's Obituary, As Run By Bloomberg - "The Bloomberg financial newswire decided to update its 17-page Steve Jobs obituary today — and inadvertently published it in the process. Some investors were undoubtedly rattled to see, as our tipster did late this afternoon, the Apple CEO's obit cross the wire and then suddenly disappear." what do you mean, he ain’t dead? and i sold all my stock, damn.

KILLER APP - "Here at infurious, we would love to work with Apple to ensure a content rating system can be put in place to allow material that is no more offensive than many of the R rated films available to download on iTunes." wait, apple censored a comicbook?

Apple bans comic book on iPhone - "It seems the Murderdrome comic book might offend someone, and that isn't allowed by Apple's SDK"

Two Finger Play: Over, for now - "Thus, it's with great sadness that I must announce that I'll be pulling Tris from the App Store on Wednesday, August 27th, to remain in Apple's systems but publicly unavailable until I work out a solution to this." tris is only the most amazing tetris implementation ever. get it while you still can.

online video killed the …

Bee-Boy dance crew drops dead - hopp yb!

Treadmill Race Across Azeroth - “We hook up treadmills to World of Warcraft and run a brutal race from Shadowglen to Darnassus. Turns out your character continuously runs 12mph, you know who can't do that?”

Heavy Metal Monk - "an italian monk who sings heavy metal- what more could you ask for? the bands name is 'Fratello Metallo'"

The CERN black hole - "Stolen from Misunderstood Universe. Because its HILARIOUS." and just a lil bit scary. ok, very. noooo, nothing’s gonna happen. or?

Leaving fear behind - "Leaving Fear Behind (in Tibetan, Jigdrel) is a heroic film shot by Tibetans from inside Tibet, who longed to bring Tibetan voices to the Beijing Olympic Games."

Leaving Fear Behind (complete film) - and there it is.

Soulja Boy Myspace Hacked - Soulja Boy on how his myspace got hacked.

The Daily Show's 8 Best '08 Olympic Moments - "I can only assume that I've got myself a nasty Olympics hangover. Luckily, I've got some hair of the dog here with the best of The Daily Show's coverage of the Beijing games." worked like a charm to get me out of my post-olympics blues.

Paid to Party - "Paid to Party is the funky fresh debut EP from Sean Ward."

jan the music nazi says: buy these!!!!11!!

roots manuva : slime & reason - can be pre-ordered now, release date 1. sept. 2008.

14 Tracks : Steve Barker's Dubwise assault - "Steve Barker is one of the UK's leading authorities on dub/reggae and has been hosting and curating the hugely influential 'On The Wire' radio show for BBC Radio Lancashire since 1984." wikid riddim inna rootsical cultjah.

schmooze & abuse

Furby Gurdy circuit bend - "The Furby Gurdy combines the "guts" of 4 Furby toys which can be made to produce music noise one after another by winding a handle, similar to a regular hurdy gurdy."

YouTube Comment Snob - "YouTube Comment Snob is a Firefox extension that filters out undesirable comments from YouTube comment threads." [via bb]

1 in 10 Native American deaths alcohol related - "Almost 12 percent of the deaths among Native Americans and Alaska Natives are alcohol-related — more than three times the percentage in the general population, a new federal report says."

Free Realms - "Sony's free to play MMO might look a bit lightweight for the hardcore, and you certainly won't find many level 70 raids happening, but it might just harbour a bit more depth than you were expecting." this game actually looks like fun. [via endgadgeted]

ey, i want my hand back - cute cartoony graphic.

As he turns 50, is this what Michael Jackson should really look like? - "But for Michael Jackson, it seems, the time for a comeback has passed. 'I'm tired,' he said last week. 'I've got nothing left to give. I just want to be left alone. Is that so bad?'" the image of how michael jackson would look like had he not … gotta love photoshop.

FriendFeed - "Discover what your friends are sharing" lets users create a meta feed of all their user uploads, eg. http://friendfeed.com/pieceoplastic. share the shareage.

Fake following - "One of the new features of FriendFeed (a Twitter-like thingie) is "fake following". That means you can friend someone but you don't see their updates. That way, it appears that you're paying attention to them when you're really not. Just like everyone does all the time in real life to maintain their sanity." why not flat out not-follow? *sigh* at socialsoftware “politics”.

things to say during sex - flowchart = "rehorical questions" ??? “oh, you enjoyed that, huh?”

SongBlitz Music Game Start - "SongBlitz is a game that puts your musical knowledge to the test. " i can report, i didn’t get addicted, but this shit has the potential.

Opentape - "Opentape's creation and design are proudly inspired by Muxtape's success and sleek interface. We were sad with it's untimely shutdown and wanted to let the web mixtape movement continue." take that RIAA et al.

i spent all day watching porn - porn font [midly NSFW] [via swissmiss]

burning man map on flickr - burning man black rock city geotagged.

Piadini Recipe - "Serve hot, with slices of cheese, and perhaps olives, radishes or a little tomato for a quick lunch."

beckham busted - but but but victoria, eyes have their own rules.

Record-Setting Thief Steals 2,396 Bikes - “So what does one do with thousands of bicycles? [...] he was saving them to melt them down during the next spike in scrap metal prices or was hording them for the eventual energy apocalypse.”

OMG - »Oh God, There Is No God«, 2002 by Marc Bijl. ofc there is no god, there can only be the ONE flying spghetti monster.

delicious.com/pieceoplastic or subscribe to this RSS feed - with all the typos.

ok ok, so i was a little bored last night:

jamaica: 20 medals for 2 804 332 inhabitants = 1 medal per 140 216 inhabitants
slovenia: 5 for 2 029 000 = 1 medal per 405 800 inhabitants
australia: 46 for 21 394 309 = 1 medal per 465 093 inhabitants
norway: 10 for 4 778 500 = 1 medal per 477 850 inhabitants
belarus: 19 for 9 689 800 = 1 medal per 509 989 inhabitants
bahrain: 1 for 760 168 = 1 medal per 760 168 inhabitants
switzerland: 6 for 7 591 400 = 1 medal per 1 265 233 inhabitants
france: 40 for 64 473 140 = 1 medal per 1 611 828 inhabitants
russia: 72 for 142 008 838 = 1 medal per 1 972 344 inhabitants
germany: 41 for 82 217 800 = 1 medal per 2 005 312 inhabitants
kenya: 14 for 34 707 817 = 1 medal per 2 479 129 inhabitants
romania: 8 for 21 438 000 = 1 medal per 2 679 750 inhabitants
usa: 110 for 304 943 000 = 1 medal per 2 772 209 inhabitants
china: 100 for 1 329 349 388 = 1 medal per 13 293 493 inhabitants
nigeria: 3 for 148 093 000 = 1 medal per 49 364 333 inhabitants
india: 3 for 1 137 087 600 = 1 medal per 379 029 200 inhabitants

these results put some things in perspective, innit? go go jamaica and aww india.

this list is in no way complete, i just did the calculation for the countries i was interested in or that struck me as special in one way or other.

the data is from overall medal standings and list of countries by population.

edit: someone made a graphic using the same numbers to visualize this: The real Olympic performers