Nasty People

The World's 10 Worst Dictators 2005

This year's top 10 arseholes who shouldn't have power....dishonourable mentions also go to the leaders of Laos and Vietnam.

Flickr Buyout Rumours

Flickr: FlickrCentral discusses the rumours of an imminent buyout of the pioneering photo blogging/hosting/social networking thingy, by Yahoo!

Is this the end of lovable Ludicorp as it's swallowed up by the big boys intent on bending it tpo their evil will, or is the Flickr brand strong enough alone for it to be allowed to live relatively unchanged. Either way Stuart etc, desrve all the money they can get for it for a job well done in pioneering so many different directions of image storage and sharing.

Is this new logo a bit of a joke though? Check out the .gif image's name.

Star Wars Episode 3 Spoilers

STAR WARS Episode 3 Picture Spoilers

I'm not sure even I want to see this page but it's too much of a naughty one not to blog. This is a major plot and stills leak for the forthcoming finale to Star Wars Episode III. It's very picture heavy and very slow loading and will tell you far more than you want to know about the new movie...but consider this temptation.

Jon's Jail Journal

Jon's Jail Journal

An astonishing an compelling read, this blog is the prison journal of British prisoner in America Shaun Attwood, who has been given a 10 year sentence for the "heinous" crime of organising raves.

In it he lifts the lid on inhumane conditions which almost rival those found in Thai jails in terms of their brutality and horrendous conditions.

The blog is entitled Jon's Jail Journal, which was a pseudonym whilse he was being held in the jail awaiting sentence, though now there is a even a photo of him. This guy does not look a danger to society and seems to be yet another pointless victim in the war on drugs and raves.

Fear in the USA

Check out this 5.2 meg video of the language used to scare voters by the Republican party at their recent conference, chopped up it starkly brings home just how much these people rely on your fear, but constant repetitions like 'terrorist' '9/11' and 'Saddam Hussein'. Truly mesmerising stuff.

Save by right clicking here and save as....

Via Boingboing

Farewell Fish

Walking into the sunset

Ledgendary BBC weatherman Michael Fish makes his last broadcast today...his latterday fashions have far exceeded classics like the one pictured. He also stenuously denies that he ever told the nation that the UK was not in for a hurricane in 1987. He claims he was referring to Florida at the time...a Fishy tale if ever I heard one.

These days I can't firgure out whether the long outer garments BBC weather men wear is supposed to be a posh lab coat or a full length winter coat. Is it supposed to represent the scientific aspect of meteorology or sympathise with the people who have to trudge along in the freezing rain the UK gets so regularly (hahaha)

Police State USA

This personal account of the protesting of the Republican National Convention on August 31st 2004 has convinced me that I never want to go back to what is fast becoming a fascist state.

They arrested 1000 people for little more reason than exercising this so-called freedom of speech they are supposed to have and kept them for days at a time.

Disgusting!
Picture From The Memory Hole

Old Skool Pics

Janey Brainy SFB just sent me some piccies from her time in Songkhla....there's one or two really unflattering ones in there somwhere, like the one which depicts me 5 seconds after throwing up at Thaphoon 2 our second party.

Good album!! Old Skool indeed!

HM Department For Vague Paranoia

The Reg is reporting that the British Government isn't amused with a parody of it's terrorism emergency plans. The Cabinet Office is reported to have told the author to take it down and not to trivialise the site. Enjoy whilst it's still there.

Via MonkeyFilter

If I were a rich man....

Knight Rider car goes to auction

Not sure if it's just me or does UKP32k seem fairly cheap for a car with as much potential kudos as KITT from Knight Rider. Surely this is every 80's child's dream and for less than the cost of a decent Merc...I know which one I'd pick. I wonder if it comes with Turbo Boost...

However if you can't afford KITT why not just decorate your car with plastic fastfood toys like the car that this blogger spotted.

Revenge of the Sith

Third Star Wars film gets title

Star Wars Episode 3 will be called 'Revenge of the Sith' and will document Anakin's fall to the Darkside (this possibly having nothing to do with Sadao Road, Songkhla.) Let's hope it's better than the first two of the new trilogy. Despite my previous disappointed I am still as excited as a nine year old. Well, it's still Star Wars innit?
From the Beeb

Boy Scout Builds Nuclear Reactor In Garden Shed - Irradiates Neighbourhood

The Radioactive Boy Scout

He got his Atomic Energy badge for it too....

Xylophone Man RIP

In Friday's B3ta newsletter, usually home to the Interwebs funniest stuff, I received the tragic news of the death of Nottinghams funniest street entertainer, known to most as Xylophone man.

His real name was Frank Robinson who was born and bred in Cotgrave, Nottingham, where he lived until his death. Nearly every day from the late 80's onwards, Frank would sit near Marks and Spencers on a little crate and play a child's toy Xylophone. It was not the quality of his playing that made him a hit, he could barely muster 5 different tunes, but the childlike glee he would show from each repeated rendition, which in turn made thousands of shoppers smile. He even had a Christmas repotoire. Not a giant amongst men nor musicians, but there must be a gaping hole in Listergate, Nottingham where he once sat.

Personally speaking he was the only busker I ever regularly gave money to, and I am sadened by his death. It is like a small piece of Nottingham history died with him.

His death has made headlines in the Nottingham Evening Post, and there is a campaign being spear-headed by the Left Lion Nottingham E-zine to have one of Nottingham's new trams named after him. A worthy cause in deed. Here is another page with photos of Frank.

The BBC also has a tributes page to Frank, as well as an interview conducted by the aforementioned Left Lion in December 2003. There are also some vocal triutes.

Thanks for the music...all 5 tunes of it anyway. RIP Frank!

Tongue studs are so 1990's

Eyelid Piercing

Is there anything they WON'T pierce?

Kind of wincey viewing but most enlightening all the same.

Footy Faking

How to Survive Euro '04 For Dummies

What is most embarrassing about living in Thailand is the fact that most of my students labour under the impression that all Brits are all automatic football experts. Now whilst I am very dilligent in emphasising that American football is not REAL football, I frankly die on my feet in any kind of serious discussion of the game. I also find it depressing that most of my students know more than me. Whilst I openly hate football usually, I do try to make time for the big international tournaments, if England has qualified of course. On those rare occasisions that I feel anything but seething contempt for the game, it's nice to communicate as if you're normal.

The above link is a primer to bluff your way during these brief moments of national unity to be able to talk the talk.
From the Beeb
Via Mefi

Atlantis found....maybe.

Satellite images 'show Atlantis'

A scientist says he may have found remains of the lost city of Atlantis. Satellite photos of southern Spain reveal features on the ground appearing to match descriptions made by Greek scholar Plato of the fabled utopia.

I want my money back from Disney if this is true.
Damn, another perfectly good myth shattered.

James 'Muthafuckin' Bond

Kill Bill director aims for Bond

Old Quentin T. reckons he'd fancy a go at doing a Bond movie.

The Pulp Fiction director said he was interested in remaking the original story Casino Royale.

"I would like to do the original book 'Casino Royale' and do it more or less the way the Ian Fleming book is," Tarantino said.

'Would he do a good job though?' I ask myself. It's not like I'm that much of a conservative type, but would Tarantino try and fix something that ain't broke. I personally feel that a man with a reputation for breaking molds with every film he makes should stay the hell away from a franchise
which everyone loves just because they're so predictable and formulaic. Don't get me wrong, I don't dislike Tarantino, in fact I was just worshiping Kill Bill Vol. 1 again last night, but I'm sceptical to say the least about whether this will ever happen.

Prison Psychology

The Stanford Prison Experiment: A Simulation Study of the Psychology of Imprisonment

There has been much comparison between the disgusting behaviour of American and British solidiers in Iraqi jails, with psychologist Philip Zimbardo's 1971 experiment. The above link is an excellect 44 page slide show documenting 6 days that ordinary students were split into tyrants and oppressed captives at the flip of the coin and got frighteningly into their roles to the extent that the experiment had to be terminated not even halfway through it's 14 day course due to the fact that serious human rights abuses were taking place, with 'guards' relishing their roles forcing prisoners to perform degrading acts on each other in the name of control and order of the mock-up prison.

Even Zimbardo himself lost his sense of objectivity as he became absoarbed into his role as prison superintendant, more concerned with crushing prisoner spirits than controlling his own experiment.

Anyone familiar to this experiment should not then be surprised at the images of apparently normal nice-looking people happily taking part in what outsiders would consider horrific human rights abuses. Who knows what goes on in the murky realms of prisons worldwide, but this case has really lifted the lid on the terrible things that happen when good people are put into bad places.

I am sure that Lynddie England is not proud with her name being synonymous with human rights abuses. She doesn't look like a monster on outward appearences, and she's about to become a mother, but still her disgusting behaviour has earned her the world's contempt and rightly so.

I cannot help wondering, having read the Stanford Prison Experiment, how quickly the line blurred between being firm and keeping order to the revolting scenes she seemed so pleased to be a part of. I also wonder how much of a blind eye was turned, and how far up the food chain.

I also wonder in how many prisons worldwide, in the US, the UK, or anywhere these abuses take place daily, without digital cameras documenting them.

Here's some further background on 21 year old Lynddie.

England grew up in a trailer down a dirt road behind a saloon and a sheep farm in Fort Ashby, W.Va., a one-stoplight town about 13 miles south of Cumberland. .... This was not supposed to be the fate of a girl who grew up hunting turkey or killing time with her sister at the local Dairy Dip, making wisecracks about the cars whizzing past.

...and most tellingly in the light of the Stanford Prison Experiment

The unit was in a strange, almost unfathomable land. Like improperly supervised children, he says, members wanted to do their jobs but were uncertain exactly what was expected of them.

Heads must roll.

Not a game!

Newsgaming.com -- September 12th

This simulation is designed to illustrate what happenes when you use strong arm tactics on civillians in order to take out a small amount of so-called terrorists. As you send in missiles and you inevitably kill civillians, you see them mourn their dead and then morph into terrorists. Before very long you see the former minority of terrorists grow into the majority. Done a different way this could be seen as hate gaming but as the blurb says, there is no beginning and no end, you can shoot or not shoot, it's just to give an example of some aspects of the Israeli/Palestinian paradox. Thoughtprovoking at the very least.