It’s getting towards that time of year when the tuneless unlistenable sentimental charity singles that you aren’t allowed to criticise start to mass-singalonging their way out of the woodwork, so what better time to celebrate the most tuneless, unlistenable, sentimental and not-allowed-to-criticise-tastic (seriously – a previous long-forgotten blog post on this very subject drew some extremely stern rejoinders) of them all… Chicken Shed Theatre’s I Am In Love With The World.

Cast your mind back, if you will, to 1997, a year that brought us Blue Jam, Supergrass’ best album by far, and Phil Cool celebrating the eleventh anniversary of drinking some Citrus Spring. This was also the year, of course, of Princess Diana’s fateful flight from the paparazzi, yet weirdly, despite the unwelcome repercussions of the ridiculous outpourings of grief still being felt to this day, the effect of this defining historical moment on popular music was negligible to say the least. The weeks that immediately followed saw The Verve being stopped from being famous, Denim’s offensively upbeat Summer Smash being given a release date of ‘never’, Radio 1 briefly turning into wall-to-wall ’meaningful’ Oasis album tracks, and Elton John releasing poignant tribute Croco-Di Rock, though even that only topped the chart for about three minutes and then… what else?

Well, the answer would be ‘nothing’, if it wasn’t for a certain charitable organisation. Founded in the seventies, Chicken Shed Theatre is a long-running project with the laudable ambition of giving ‘mixed ability’ youngsters the opportunity to participate in the creative arts. This is all truly wonderful stuff, but even that cannot really excuse the woefulness of I Am In Love With The World, issued as a single in tribute to their former patron. This woefulness has nothing to do with the performance; oh no, you can only admire the gutsiness of the contributing youngsters, particularly that lead-singing girl who despite an endearing lack of technical ability has the guts to roar like an eighties ‘rawk’ power-balladeer without the slightest shred of self-awareness. It’s just the song itself, an utterly empty anthem-by-numbers with ridiculous phatic cliched lyrics. Worse still, or worse still for anyone who wasn’t particularly fond of hearing it, it was promoted as ‘Diana’s favourite song’ on account of the fact that she had heard it once, which in all fairness means that Georgie Fame could have re-released Wake Up Morph under a similar pretence. Still, as a cultural snapshot of that curious weekend in that curious late August, it’s right up there with the blase Fred Harris-remembering launch of TV Cream, and that local radio DJ who accidentally played Fall On Me by REM instead of Everybody Hurts when he was trying to be ‘reverential’. Though anyway, the version by The Curious Orange on This Morning With Richard Not Judy was better.

So, there, I’ve said it. Go on, kick off in the comments box. It’ll make a change from all the people shouting about Stewart Lee or Russell T Davies betraying the glorious legacy of Mission To Duh. And if you’d rather sing along at home, here’s those lyrics in full:

I am in love with the world, and its failure to commission a third series of The Tripods
I am in love with the world, and its blatant underuse of Maury Parkman and Adam Monroe on Heroes
I fell in love with the world, when it refused to release series 3 of KYTV on DVD
Let your heart fall in love with Tony Hart
And Morph
And The White One Too

Pauline Nordin é sueca (acho) e competidora de fitness, na categoria figure – onde as mulheres são mais musculosas, mas não chegam a ser fisiculturistas, e dona de um lindo sorriso. Achei duas fotos dela na Internet, uma normal (fazendo a pose de bíceps duplo) e outra, monstruosamente muscular. Bem, resolvi fazer um rápido morph entre elas, e deu nisso aí embaixo. Espero que gostem.

Para quem ficou curioso com as imagens, e gosta de uma animação, abaixo vão duas animações que fiz com a história do post anterior. Aproveitem!

Mas, se você tem menos de 18 anos, clique aqui e nem discuta.

Morph is a concept demonstrating some of the possibilities nanotechnologies might enable in future communication devices.

Achei alguns textos que eu mesmo traduzi para o BE Story Archive, que eu achava que estava desativado. Não, não está. Logo, estou revisando e atualizando as traduções, para então postar aqui. Mais novidades em breve.
Também tem alguns morphs que eu realizei, e que estão hospedados em contas no Dailymotion e no Metacafe. Novos virão, e eu colocarei lá e aqui também.

Printmaking is rad.

If I had a time machine, I still wouldn’t skip Etching’s labor intensive demands.The process can be Zen-like… this is where the radness comes in!

This particular image has taken quite a bit of elbow grease and time, probably over 36 hrs I would guess. The good news is that I’m really learning to manipulate the Intaglio on the zinc plate.

So, I thought it would be fun to see the progress steps together in a video. It shows the begining sketch, the Soft Ground LINE print, the AQUATINT and the BURNISHING steps. The final frame is a TWO COLOR PRINT done with a dark oil based ink and a glowy green transparent ink roll.

“Change Machine” |  9″x12″

MORE about the Printmaking Process.

Ever wanted to know what the future looks like? Then you’d better listen when a company like Nokia presents it’s vision of the future.

Pretty interesting stuff, although I must say that most technologies in the movie, like social networks, RSS, augmented reality and the likes already exist today and will just become smarter, get improved. The true innovation is in the intergration of all these platforms into one system.

One thing that is not in this video is the Morph concept. It was presented over a year ago but I felt I couldn’t keep from you. This concept based on nanotechnology is truly pushing boundaries. I could give you a full description of this device, but the movie below explains it all:

Rumor has it that this device could also go into production sometime around 2015. Pretty amazing, don’t you think? Now go create the future!

I think I will be purchasing these for a bit of retro banter, especially as The Contemporary Home send their products through DHL (happy days!) instead of Royal Mail (boooo!)

I have always been impressed with this company’s products so I am glad to see them selling retro stuff alongside both ‘out there’ and mainstream items.

Par Exemple:

Funky

Mainstream

Ooohh yea I fancy a bit of that chandelier!

คอร์นเสนค (corn snake)

คอร์นเสนคจัดเป็นงูที่ได้รับความนิยมของนักเลี้ยงสัตว์เลื้อยคลานเป็นอันดับต้นๆทั้งในและต่างประเทศ  เพราะสีสันที่สดใส ลวดลายสวยงาม  ไม่มีพิษ  และนิสัยไม่ดุร้าย  ทำให้ไม่ยากเลยที่คอร์นเสนคจะอยู่ในใจหลายๆคน  แม้แต่ผู้หญิงบางคนก็ตามที    สำหรับนักเลี้ยงสัตว์เลื้อยคลานมือใหม่  คอร์นเสนคเหมาะสมทีเดียวที่จะเป็นงูตัวแรก  เพราะเลี้ยงง่าย  และขนาดตัวไม่ใหญ่โตนัก

คอร์นเสนคมีช่วงตัวยาว  เคลื่อนไหวปราดเปรียว  คอสั้น  หัวเล็ก  ดวงตากลมโต  เกล็ดแข็งเรียบลื่น  มีขนาดตั้งแต่ 60-180 เซนติเมตร   นิสัยไม่ดุร้าย ไม่มีพิษ  ออกหากินในเวลากลางคืน  อาหารคือสัตว์เลี้ยงลูกด้วยนมขนาดเล็ก  ผู้เลี้ยงจึงต้องพร้อมที่จะป้อนหนูให้กับงูที่เลี้ยงประมาณ 4 วันต่อครั้งถึง 1 สัปดาห์ต่อครั้ง

พื้นเพเดิมคอร์นเสนคเป็นงูที่พบอยู่ที่บริเวณตะวันออกเฉียงใต้ของประเทศอเมริกา อาศัยอยู่ตามไร่ข้าวโพด ยุ้งฉางและตามบ้านเรือนคน  เพราะอาศัยอยู่ในไร่ข้าวโพดนั่นเองทำให้งูชนิดนี้ได้ชื่อว่า “คอร์นเสนค” นอกจากนี้บริเวณท้องของงูชนิดนี้ ยังมีลวดลายของเกล็ดคล้ายกับเมล็ดข้าวโพดอีกด้วย

Corn snake

คอร์นเสนคมียีนส์ที่ควบคุมเม็ดสีอยู่ 3 สีด้วยกัน  คือ  แดง  เหลือง  ดำ  คอร์นเสนคจึงมีสีสันและลวดลายอยู่บนพื้นฐานของสามสีนี้  ทั้งนี้ขึ้นอยู่กับการผสมกันทางพันธุกรรม  ยิ่งซับซ้อนมากก็ยิ่งราคาสูง  ลวดลายและสีสันบนตัวงูที่ขึ้นอยู่กับลักษณะทางพันธุกรรมนี้เรียกว่ามอร์พ (morph)  ซึ้งจะกล่าวถึงลำดับต่อไป

Como seria se nosso estimados celulares e  smartphones tivessem recursos de nanotecnologia?

A Nokia desenvolveu um video desse conceito. Vejam o que poderemos ter em nosso futuro, nem tão distante:

Uma pequena demonstração do conceito do Morph, desenvolvido pela Nokia — algumas possibilidades da nanotecnologia.

discovered morphthing.com last night. it could get addictive. 

thinking of getting my hair done short like audrey’s, so thought i’d do a morph of me + her..

i think it looks rather nice.

Hunh? Yeah, you read that correctly. Freemasons are lame. Should I have encoded that for you to decipher? Is that more your style?

*&@*#%(!)@#$*

Here is the cipher you need to figure out my code Mr. Freemason: You suck and I hate you. I don’t think you’ll need Robert Langdon’s help to decrypt that one.

“Aggressive Tuesday”! Actually, reading and seeing how poorly the impromptu “Aggressive Monday” went over it only makes me want every day be an “Aggressive” day. I did see the comments. I read the comments. And, bless each and every one of you who commented.

Although, it has seemed to work out that Thursday’s tend to be more aggressive in nature, I think every post has the potential to be aggressive. Thursday falls into aggressive territory because I just want the weekend to be here so badly. I am patiently writing and waiting and writing and waiting for the weekend and by the time Thursday’s post rolls around I am losing my grip on what sanity is left. Also, you all help with Friday’s post so that post is the easiest to write each week. Awwww… team work.

But today? Fuck the Freemasons.

Oooohhhh… don’t say that. Don’t even whisper that. They are a secret society entrusted with the secrets. They sit around whispering secrets into each other’s ears like a game of telephone. Oh for the love of God who cares? I don’t. I’m tired of the Freemasons. First, I don’t believe they have any more secrets than any other male fraternity. Well, that might not be true. Most all male groups at some point or another have you participate in some quasi-homosexual acts. And by “quasi”, I mean gayer than 6 dudes blowing 7 dudes. The Freemasons have been around since the 16^th century I think, which means they have a lot of “secrets” of “heterosexual” men “performing” “sacred” “rituals”. So, I may be wrong about them not having literally “more” stories.

Lets guestimate, they have approximately 400 years worth of secret stories that fall under the category of “Fred wrestled Jeff naked in front of all the other members and then later when no one was looking they wrestled again, this time with kissing.” So they might have a couple more stories than most groups. Unless newer groups wrestle more often.

Yeah, what’s up now Freemasons? You have a problem with me calling you a bunch of gays? Bunch of homophobes! That’s right. You’re all homophobes. What’s wrong with being gay? Maybe I meant it as a compliment. Maybe you’re just misinterpreting my sentiments because you are so homophobic. Maybe you can’t see past your own bigotry to realize I’m saying you are “gay” as in “happy”. The Freemasons are a big old gay boy’s club taking big gay group showers together. Everyone just big and gay and soapy and “who dropped the soap?” and secrets. Secrets like what happened after “who dropped the soap?”, am I right?

I am not a conspiracy theory guy. I don’t think there are any clandestine big brother organizations. I don’t think there is a vault at the center of the Earth where an unknown group of billionaires meet to decide the fate of the world. Minus the Jewish ones. Because that is all true. The Jews have so many vaults at the center of the Earth. Way too many. That is actually my big problem with the Jewish faith is that we spend so much of our collective money on building these secret vaults at the center of the Earth.

Could you even imagine the cost to build a secret vault at the center of the Earth? Contractors, carpenters, electricians, and plumbers are hard enough to deal with when you’re building a house let alone a secret vault at the center of the Earth. Jeez it is incredible how much money you have to pay them to keep that vault secret. And drillers!?! It costs so much money to drill to the center of the Earth.

Anyway, I don’t believe that the Freemasons hold any answers to humanity or God or whatever. But if they do… oh please Freemasons tell me! I swear I won’t tell anyone your secrets! I am so good at keeping secrets. Like there was that one time my friend Steve stole all this money …. Ehhh fuck ‘em. I don’t know what answers they supposedly know, but I’m not sure if that would help any. What if I was wrong? Just wrong in general about life or God. That would suck, right? Who wants that suckiness in their life?

I already have so much pressure weighing down on me trying to write this blog everyday and be funny and not be too aggressive on day’s outside of Thursday and some how mention Kristen Stewart in everything I write and at the same time the Steelers are only 2-2(!) and Troy Polamalu gets hurt in the first game of the season(!) and I still haven’t watched the new Curb or Bored to Death or Mad Men. What the fuck?

But what if I was right about life or God? I’ve been right about things before. It feels good to be right. But then the Steelers give up 21 points in the fourth quarter to the Chargers and honestly who cares about being right anymore? JUST SACK PHILLIP RIVERS ALREADY! So I’ll be happy for a minute that I’m right and then what? If I’m right about the nature of God, does that mean I don’t have to show up to work on Wednesday? I hate to sound cynical, but if there is a God I doubt he’ll cut you a $20 million check or grant you one X-Men super power of your choosing if you figured him out while you’re alive.

Morph. I’d choose Morph in a heart beat. Seriously, you’d have to be retarded not to choose Morph. Do you want to fly? As Morph you could “morph” into a superhero with wings that flies or into a giant ass bird. Do you want to run fast (also Morph can fly for some reason on his own which has never been explained)? As Morph you could “morph” into a superhero that runs fast or into a giant ass cheetah. You could have so much fun as Morph. You could commit a string of bank robberies as former-America’s sweetheart Reese Witherspoon. That may all come later, but I know exactly what you, the commenters, would do first with Morph’s powers:

You would stand in front of a full-length mirror, strip yourself naked and then individually morph from one member of the Twilight cast to the next. Sickos. Brilliant sickos.

I am a mind reader and I know exactly what two questions you are thinking. Why on Earth do I continue to read this blog? And, if as Morph I morphed into Kristen Stewart, would I want it as much as Kristen Stewart wants it? Nope. That’s easy. If Morph morphs into Superman, he isn’t Superman. He just looks like Superman. He doesn’t have Superman’s abilities. Same goes with Kristen Stewart.

If we lived in a world where you were a Freemason and you figured out God and God granted you an X-Men superpower and that superpower was Morph’s power and you morphed into Kristen Stewart and then you flew to LA and found Rob P….. I hate to break it to you, but he would know the difference. Even in the continuous drunken state I believe he must/should live his life in, he would be able to tell that you are not Kristen Stewart.

Like when Morph pretended to be Professor X and only Wolverine could tell that it was Morph because he had a different scent than Professor X (Morph actually has no scent), Rob would also be able to tell that you are not Kristen Stewart. As much as you may want Rob, there is no Earthly way you could ever feign Kristen Stewart’s all powerful world ending want even for a second. If the blind can see her want then drunken Rob could see the differences in the want. Rob probably has such a high tolerance for want because of being with Kristen Stewart as much as he is that your want levels would not even register. At this point, Rob is a “want-aholic”.

But I digress, Freemasons are lame. Kristen Stewart can’t be a Freemason. Or at least she originally couldn’t. There are probably some ultra-liberal chapters that let in women, but they’re no closer to being “real” Freemasons than I am a Freemason. I wouldn’t want to join an organization that didn’t allow in the almighty want of Kristen Stewart. They would make Kristen Stewart’s want join one of those Freemason women’s organizations. As if Kristen Stewart’s want would be some Freemason groupie. As if Kristen Stewart’s want would play second fiddle to a bunch of big gay secret keepers. As if Kristen Stewart’s want would play the fiddle in general. Kristen Stewart’s want is no second class citizen to no one!

Kristen Stewart and I should start our own organization free of the tyranny of the Freemasons. The Free-Freemasons. The Free-Kristen-Stewart-Masons. The Free-Kristen-Stewarts. The Free-Friends-With-Benefits-For-KSWI-Jordan. Who can join this new organization I thought up 7 seconds ago? Well, I’ll start off stealing the “general requirements” for the Freemasons. And this list is definitely the genuine artifact because it was on Wikipedia.

1. Be a Man – Definitely not. Actually, the less men the better I would imagine. We could work on a ratio system of 1 guy for every 100 girls seems reasonable. Or enough girls in between each guy that no eye contact ever could occur.

2. Believe in a Supreme Being – Kristen Stewart’s inexplicably infinite amount of want. Check.

3. Be at least the minimum age (18-25) – Well 17 is legal in… it’s ok 18 is fine. 18 works.

4. Be of good morals and good reputation – Yeah…….. I’m not sure about that one. There will definitely be a lot of redefining of what is “good morals” and “good reputation” in this new organization that has a ratio of 1 guy for every 100 girls.

5. Be free-born (ie not a slave) – I’m not sure if this problem will come up much anymore, unless we are talking about “mental slavery” or “political slavery”. Either way, the Freemasons are/were racist. I’m going to take the inverse and opposite position (?) on this and say we don’t want anyone in the group who currently has slaves. If you own slaves then you can’t join. I’m putting my foot down on that one. I hope that doesn’t cause a schism in the commenters’ section. But I am against slavery. I don’t even have to consult with Kristen because I know she is also against slavery. I am sorry if that makes everyone else uncomfortable, but Kristen Stewart and I are anti-slavery.

6. Be capable of furnishing character references, as well as one or two references from current members of the group – That’s a pretty good stipulation. People vouching for your devotion to Kristen Stewart’s want, people vouching for you being pretty cool and fun to hang out with and not a crazed serial killer. That’s not bad. Although, I feel like those character references could easily be pushed aside for Ashley Greene-esque lingerie photos. I’m just saying that may happen.

So…. Who wants to join?

In conclusion, KSWI Jordan is currently listening to The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown (don’t ask) on CD in his car during his commute to and from work and he is now insane. More insane. Why are they so stupid!?! Just stick the “capstone” on the “pyramid” and decipher the damn code already! What the fuck!?! What the hell are you waiting for? Why didn’t Katherine Solomon just run Molock (sp?) over with her car!?! Damn it! Why does Dan Brown mention “The Redskins” every 5 seconds!?!

At this point, I am actively rooting for all the characters to be killed by drunk drivers or a fast acting airborne cancer or crazed postal workers with machine guns or Kristen Stewart could go rogue and sear off all their flesh with the heat of her wanting it… something! Just kill Robert Langdon before Dan Brown mentions that he swims laps in Harvard’s pool to keep his 40 year old cryptologist body in-shape for the 1 millionth time.

Why Twitter will fail or why it must Morph

Have you started wondering if tweeting has any impact? Or more pointed – is tweeting a waste of time?  I have an opinion about why I think Twitter could die or it will at least morph into something different than we experience now… 

When I first opened my twitter account and a few folks started following me I was surprised… Why did they want to follow me anyway? I quickly learned there were others that had similar interests and notice that if I commented about their tweets they became a follower of me and vice versa… I downloaded Tweetdeck and started experimenting with the powerful search features and organizing ability to keep up with certain topics etc…

THE MORE THE MERRIER

I think many new tweeps follow this learning curve…  You also start noticing that ‘growing your followers’ is somehow an important strategy… You are told to follow back and participate in Follow Fridays.  You are told to keep growing your base with all types of techniques and strategies to keep adding these valuable followers.  Maybe because you realize that if you have something pertinent to say it will reach more people.. You seem to ‘connect’ with other tweeps where you exchange niceties and maybe ‘inside jokes’.  Like running into a friend at the coffee shop and hanging with them…but this tends to be only a few and generally the first ones I had conversations with… Now they are lost in a sea of incoming never stopping ‘20 new all-friends’ at a time.  So, some of these I have to set up a separate columns just to make sure I see what they are up to… sound familiar?

THE HONEYMOON IS OVER

Your following grows to 50 then 100 then 150 and about this time an interesting problem reveals itself… at least for me… I used to read every single post in my timeline as it came in each day… and I could do this up to around 100 to 150 followers… it almost became an obligation on my part to keep track… It took a couple of hours to ‘catch up’ to, respond to some, and tweet my own thoughts.  And the more people follow you the more you follow back…

Here’s the problem:  I can no longer stay ‘plugged in’ with my group of followers and I’m at 500+ followers – How the heck can someone that has 10,000+ following/followers have any meaningful experience with so  many followers..

Unless you are oblivious to what is happening around you maybe you start feeling like the honeymoon with Twitter is over… At this point you are really having a conversation with yourself… think about it, you post a message and maybe a few people RT it (retweet – reposting your tweet to their followers) but…

WHO’S LISTENING

I don’t think anyone is… with so many followers.  I find myself now just glancing at my timeline to see if I recognize anyone or a post that happens to stick out… I am on twitter less and less.  I wonder if that is what everyone is doing?  Or maybe even less… it seems like some tweeters are just holding a ‘megaphone’ up and blasting a self-serving message or marketing-based message etc.  I wonder if they wonder if anyone is listening to them.  Am I the only one who feels this way?  I doubt anyone’s post will go viral with only 140 characters to express this nagging feeling I have – that all of this tweeting effort is for not…

I think if you could ‘hear’ the tweets it would be like being in a sports stadium with thousands of others who are all talking at the same time, creating a loud roar that no one can understand…

TWITTER WILL FAIL

 I believe there will come a time very soon where people will start ignoring their own twitter account… I believe you will start to see a trend where de-following will become the norm as people whittle their following down to a manageable size… or maybe only follow specific groups, organizations and a few close friends or like minded individuals.. No one can really gain value with so many ‘friends’ 

With that in mind, Twitter could fall out of favor unless…

IT MORPHS

I guess my lens tends to be filtered by politics and current events… so I tend to be an ‘activist’ sending tweets to people who make policy maybe hoping to influence their position. Maybe just to admonish.   Getting into verbal wrestling matches with those who would and do oppose my values…  When my followers are so prolific tweeters that I could not pretend to keep up with the onrush of a building river bursting from it’s banks – I am just trying not to drown…

So, unless I can see positive feedback with my followers why spend time tweeting while they are tweeting and while they don’t have time to read all their tweets (which include mine) we are all just communicating on a one-way street…  “LISTEN TO ME!!” But, alas, I fear you are not… I know I am not and here we all are circulating in this big ‘ole pot of twitter stew…

I believe twitter will experience a ‘draw down’ where folks only communicate through Direct Messaging (DM) and the public timeline becomes such a nuisance that it will be totally ignored… kinda like telemarketers calling you during your family meal.  You shut them out and only let folks in that have your ‘unlisted number’ – those you choose to ‘stay in touch’ with…  Maybe it will happen by just people setting their account to private.

TWITTER – THE WEATHER CHANNEL OF SOCIAL MEDIA

Now when someone follows me I go to their profile and one of the first things I do is see how often they tweet… if I see they are ‘power tweeters’ I am loathe to follow them back… is this just me? How can I keep up with another 5-10+ tweets per hour?

I am not a twitter expert… I am just someone wondering if I should continue to participate as an individual.  I do not have a product to hawk or a blog to promote (well not yet – I created this blog mainly just to get this article published) or anything to offer really other than this idea about Twitter’s demise… Maybe I am such a neophyte that I don’t recognize why Twitter will continue to grow beyond it current ‘juggernaut’ status…

I can see big companies data mining and collecting a ‘stream of consciousness’ as it attempts to manage it’s public brand and use it as a sleuthing tools for it’s competitors… Twitter could be a tool for social or political activism.  Maybe it will morph more towards a ‘news feed’ for the masses where you only go to it when something big happens (think Iran protests) – kinda the way we watch The Weather Channel – only when an impending hurricane is bearing down on us…

Of course I will not ‘shut down’ my account… but like an old classic car that I spent lots of time getting it road worthy, now I only drive it occasionally – unless there is a sea-change that warrants a different way to utilize it.. let’s hope.

It’s been next to impossible to find good facial morphing software. Until now.

http://www.morphthing.com/morph

Morphs are now going monthly so here we are up to the end of August.

Morph Thumbnail - Click to view the magic!

]]> http://dparsonsmedia.wordpress.com/2009/09/11/interactivity-flourishes-with-concept-cell-phone-the-nokia-morph/ Fri, 11 Sep 2009 23:01:36 +0000 dparsonsmedia http://dparsonsmedia.wordpress.com/2009/09/11/interactivity-flourishes-with-concept-cell-phone-the-nokia-morph/

I was recently turned onto the following video regarding Nokia’s latest concept phone, the Nokia Morph. If you haven’t seen this yet, it is worth a look.

With all the converging technologies and the increasing demand for interactivity within the user interfaces we utilize on a daily basis, this concept phone is a prime example of a company redefining itself as a leader in the industry. Once made popular in early 2000 for their user-friendly, customizable cell phone design, we haven’t seen Nokia as a major player in the cell phone market for quite some time. Motorola, LG, Blackberry, Apple iPhone and Google Android seem to be the current frontrunner’s in this industry, but this may all change in the near future if Nokia has anything to say about it. If the aforementioned companies don’t have something in product development right now to compete with the concept behind Nokia’s Morph, they need to. And they need it fast.

The Morph combines a variety of interactive elements never before seen in the cell phone genre. First, we have the Morph’s physical flexibility, from thin foldout LED display to the phone’s ability to literally “morph” into the shape of a watch or bracelet. (Go, go Gadget phone?) This is something we’ve not seen before – unless you count the slap bracelets we all assaulted each other with in the late 80s. The beauty behind this product is that the nanotechnology that allows for the morphing feature of this phone has already been developed, it is just not yet affordable for the average tech-guru.

Another amazing aspect of this phone’s exterior is its self cleaning technology. The surface of Morph is superhydrophobic (Is that a phobia? Scared of liquids?) which makes it virtually dirt repellent. Also (and this feature may be marketed more towards female buyers, but is an amazing use of technology, nonetheless) the phone has the capability to change the color or pattern of its exterior.  Take a photo of your favorite wallpaper or curtain, and voila, your phone is instantly able to mimic the intricate colors and patterns it sees.

Of course, this is just a concept phone at the moment, but we are getting a first hand peek at what interactive cell phone technology could look like in just a few years. Nokia has done a great job in utilizing some key interactive aspects in designing this new model, and it will be interesting to see how the functionality is received by the public, if and when it hits the market.

Vi segnalo www.morphthing.com, sito che permette di selezionare due foto da un vasto archivio di volti di personaggi famosi (oppure di caricarne di proprie) e letteralmente fonderle insieme (tutto online in puro stile web 2.0). In particolare la funzione Morph a Baby ci mostra come saranno i nostri figli XD Davvero divertente e semplice da usare!

Não é novidade, foi lançado no ano passado, mas me interessei bastante pelo Nest 8.

O produto foi desenvolvido para a Joseph Joseph pelo Morph, escritório inglês de alguns clientes gigantes.

Não posso negar que, primeiramente, me interessei apenas pela beleza do Nest 8,. Mas ao procurar saber mais sobre ele, pude ver que ele satisfaz necessidades importantes. Fazem parte do conjunto 4 copos de medida, 1 tijela pequena, 1 peneira, 1 escorredor e uma tijela grande.

Essa organização das partes cairia muito bem na minha apertada república…

Only when drinking could otherwise professional, polite, stable adults squabble over table space and seating with strangers. Last night after consuming copious amounts of wine at a dinner party and then joining friends in Ballard for a beer, I found myself mean mugging and mocking total strangers within their earshot and view. Sharing, a lesson we all learn in pre-k, proved to be too much of a challenge for our inebriated adult minds.

When I walked into the bar last night, my friend whose shift there had just ended, and I grabbed a bigger, empty table for us to sip our brews while we waited for a few more people that we expected to show up. While the two of us sat there at our big table, a man looking to have climbed out of Belltown, set three waters next to me on our table and got back in line at the bar. A few minutes passed and then he and three mini dress, stiletto wearing girls showed up at our table and sat down in the seats that we were holding for our soon-to-be-arriving friends. This wasn’t a problem until our friends started to arrive. Their seats were now taken, which forced us all to squish and squeeze onto the booth. Still, this probably would have been alright, if the button down wearing, SUV driving male at the table didn’t insist on making comments about how my friend and I had “stolen” the table from them. Fuel meet fire. Within minutes, the claustrophobic feeling I was experience morphed into a feeling of annoyance. Annoyance that I proceeded to vocalize.

If this situation arose at a restaurant with all parties sober, I am sure that the passive, polite overtones of Seattle would have won out. I imagine the situation more along the lines of, “You take the seat.” “No, you take the seat.” “No, I insist you take the seat.” And so on. Instead it escalated into ridiculous immaturity.

This incident last night along with some other recent alcohol fueled, regrettable situations, has made me evaluate the appeal of drinking. Frankly, I was in a hurry to move away from Idaho, since I had fallen into a pattern of going out, drinking and really living my life for the weekend, which I find to be completely unfulfilling. Seattle was a needed change and I have successfully avoided falling into this habit again. At least, until the last month or so. With the increase of dates, which normally involves grabbing drinks, and other social events, I’ve been drinking more often that I normally would or would care to. So with that, I’ve decided to not drink at all for the month of September. I’m setting a time limit of a month not because I feel this will be more or less bearable, but I’ve chosen a month more as a way to monitor the difference a booze free existence will have on my wallet, diet and mental and emotional well being. Looking forward to the change.

By Jeff Parker (Writer), Salva Espin (Art), and Anthony Washington (Colors)

Some Thoughts Before The Review: First Exiles… Then Agents of Atlas… Not cool Marvel… Not cool at all…

The Story: The Exiles go back to finish their first mission. They also find out why Blink has been acting a bit strange…

What’s Good and What’s Not So Good: The latest, (and, sadly, last) issue of Exiles is just as satisfying as the others. Writer Jeff Parker finds a nice balance between fun, lighthearted dialogue and somewhat serious, weighty themes without ever allowing Exiles #6 to tip too far into one direction. In addition, Parker manages to give readers a sense of where the series (and character work) was headed, had it been allowed to continue while at the same time bring in an open-ended sort of closure that one comes to expect from a final issue (I believe longtime Exiles fans will find a lot to like). In short, Exiles #6 is pretty much a great example of an early cancellation handled right… Except for the one thing that can’t possibly be ignored.

I totally understand why Jeff Parker drops so much into the issue, especially considering that it’s clear he had a pretty big plan for the series. That said, the pages dedicated to laying out Parker’s vision are pretty dense and a bit boring. While the whole concept is fun to try to wrap your head around, the surprisingly dark, detailed explanation Parker reveals seems somewhat out of place as a whole. Spread out over what I’m sure would have been an arc or two, the whole thing would have probably been much easier to swallow.

Salva Espin’s clean, attractive artwork is, as I’ve said before, a perfect fit for the series. Thanks, in part, to Anthony Washington’s bright, vibrant color work, Espin’s style captures the funny, the sexy, the serious, and the action of Parker’s script incredibly well. While some expressions are a bit off and some of the work seems a bit simplified, Espin is an artist that I’m definitely going to be watching for quite some time. I can’t wait to see what series he lands on next.

Conclusion: Exiles, it’s been fun. You all will be missed.

Grade: C+

-Kyle Posluszny

Morph Thing is a fun site where you can combine two faces into one–not unlike those science museum contraptions where you and a friend sit on either side of a screen and adjust a knob to see what your children would look like.  You can upload your own photos or chose from a selection of celebrity photos.   Yeah so if Ms. Tiller and I ever decide to procreate we’ll all know what to expect.

-Steph