November 2007
52 posts
Free OSX WM5/6 sync tool →
I would imagine I’ll stick with GooSync to keep calendars in line (feeding the Google calendar into iCal as needed), but the contact and other syncing functions that SyncMate offers (including a video converter) sound terrific.
Collaborative out-of-window video →
Add tagged clips shot through vehicle windows to YouTube and they appear in this stream of video (in either right-window or left-window versions).
WatchLiveLeak.com - Exoskeleton Turns Humans Into Terminators.
“The more you learn, the more you grow
The more you grow, the more you know
The...”
– Slogan rendered in plaster relief on the wall of Roppongi Hills’ 52nd-floor Mado Lounge
The root of Japan's malaise
One of the most recent surveys on the Nintendo Wii’s Everybody Votes Channel here asks for your opinion on whether “things that can be put off until tomorrow should be (a) knocked off today; (b) left until tomorrow.” Japan being, of course, an embodiment of the Protestant work ethic that would have made the Protestant elders come in their pants, and so on and so forth, I’d...
The Future of Reading (A Play in Six Acts) →
The Kindle, and its contradictions.
Top 100 Private Contractors in Iraq and... →
And the winner is “Unidentified Foreign Entities!” That’s $20 billion in “miscellaneous items.” — thedaytheytriedtokillme
Tokyo, the world's gourmet capital →
Michelin has just announced the first edition of its Tokyo guide, which gives the city’s restaurants more stars in total than any other world city — 150, including eight three-star restaurants, four of which are Japanese. Look forward to taking a gander at the guide in more detail.
Help Me Find Jimmy Hoffa →
A penultimate Friday gift: a tongue-in-cheek country song about the missing union leader.
A Wikipedia odyssey
Etymology of “cocktail” —> Cock throwing (English blood sport in which people threw special weighted sticks at an immobilised rooster until it died) —> Mixture of horror and hilarity from colleagues leads to mention of dwarf tossing —> Dwarf tossing
“Japanese lawmakers, who passed the law with little public debate, conveniently...”
– NEC helps Big Brother watch foreigners in Japan ::: Pink Tentacle
“For some weeks I’ve been scouring the news for an analogy- some incident...”
– Urban Dirt: Steamrollers, nuts and odd-shaped balls
Village Voice on the E-mu SP-1200 →
Wonderful homage to the E-mu SP-1200 drum box, the instrument behind some of rap’s greatest hits, with folks like Hank Shocklee geeking out over the machine and its sound.
Beer pong →
Further proof that certain sections of the human race have far too much free time: an exhaustive writeup of the rules and customs of beer pong.
GelaSkins →
iPod skins. Particularly like the steampunk one linked here, though the Hokusai print is also great.
1 tag
Saturday music wishlist
Posting this partly to bookmark a few things that aren’t available to buy in Japan yet. Bleep.com is, as ever, a treasure trove of great stuff I’ve never or only vaguely heard of. Listing up a few things that sounded interesting on a quick listen. Various - Cocoon Compilation D Tunng - Bullets Shit Robot - Chasm Prefuse 73 - Preparations & Interregnums Paul Hillier & Theatre...
100 Greatest Japanese Rock Albums →
Good post at Neojaponisme about Rolling Stone Japan’s decision to publish a list of the 100 top J-rock albums, apparently in an attempt to establish a foothold for proper mainstream critical music writing. (The Japanese press is notoriously uncritical in reviews because the publication is almost invariably dependent on advertising revenue from the content producers/distributors.) It’s...
New Plaid single →
Plaid, and before them Black Dog, are one outfit I keep on coming back to in the electronic realm. They habitually seem to expend about three songs’ worth of ideas on each track, with a minimal reliance on repetition. More head music than visceral oomph, but usually taut and edgy rather than wooly and ambient.
High-def footage of the Moon →
(Via Pink Tentacle)
Ichiro Ozawa's second childhood
The DPJ leader may be seen by some as a devious political intriguer, but his will-he-won’t-he act over the last few days smacks more of a kid throwing toys out of the crib. Latest news: he’s been persuaded to stay.
Name of the day: Peter Dengate Thrush →
Positively Pythonesque. Throatwobbler-Mangrove. This is, in fact, name of the day from two days ago, since when I have been busy. Today’s name is Guillermo Wang, from a spam I received earlier informing me that my cock is tragically small.
