BitTorrent is the go-to resource for downloading everything from music and movies to software and operating systems, but as its popularity continues to grow, so do the number of tools available for making the most of it. Here's the best tools to utilize torrents, brought to you by Lifehacker.com. Here's a brief summary of the article:
Read full article here
10. Use BitTorrent to Send Files
Of course BitTorrent is a great place to go looking for files, but you can actually take advantage of BitTorrent's distributed download protocol to share your own files. This guide details how to create your own torrent to distribute a file on your computer. The guide covers creating the torrent with the popular, Windows-only uTorrent, but the feature is available in almost any BitTorrent client
9. Start BitTorrent Downloads Over IM
Using IM applications like Pidgin or the Mac-only Adium, you can set up your IM client to automatically accept downloads from specific users (namely, you) and then save the file to a folder that your BitTorrent client watches for new torrent files (in Pidgin you'll need to go to Tools -> Plugins and enable the Autoaccept plugin). Most clients like uTorrent (Windows) and Transmission (*nix) support folder monitoring, so if your BitTorrent client is running it'll detect the . . .
8. Download BitTorrent in Your Browser
I'd always recommend using a dedicated BitTorrent client whenever you can, but sometimes installing or running another app just isn't an option. In those cases, web application BitLet is a perfect solution. It runs BitTorrent downloads through an applet directly in your web browser; all you have to do is . . .
7. Manage Your Video Downloads with Miro
Cross platform, open source application Miro is designed as a one-stop shop for handling video—whether that's video podcasts or BitTorrent. It doesn't have all the tools available to less specialized clients like uTorrent or Transmission, but it does work well to automatically download a season's worth of television while it's happening.
6. Speed Up Your Downloads and Outwit Your Traffic-Shaping ISP
Whether you're new to BitTorrent or you're just not getting the download speeds you were hoping for, you can take steps to speed up your downloads by capping your upload speeds, adjust your connection allowances, or switch the default port.
Read full article here
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Thursday, January 31, 2008
Top 10 BitTorrent Tools and Tricks
How-to make a Batch File to Kill Unwanted Programs
Lifehacker shows how to create an automated batch file that kills off a bunch of programs at once. The batch script is smart enough to skip any apps you don't have open, and makes it easy to strip down running programs to grab the most power from your system. The basic trick is to open the Windows Task Manager, find the executable names (like firefox.exe) of the apps you want to kill, then open a simple text editor and add a line for each app, like so:
taskkill /im program.exe
Replace program.exe with the ones you want to kill, save the text file with a .bat extension, and you've got a quick streamlining app.
Thanks Lifehacker
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Wednesday, January 30, 2008
Universcale
Link: Universcale
To let us know just how small we really are. Very impressive to see. Check the link.
Link: Universcale
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Tuesday, January 29, 2008
Interesting Site
- Social Wallpapering - "Welcome to Social Wallpapering, a community effort to classify, rank, and distribute high resolution images for use as computer wallpaper." A good place for free wallpapers.
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All in One Network Tool Site
Source: Yougetsignal.com
This place has some very useful tools. Here's a brief summary of what they have to offer:
Open Port Finder - The port forwarding tester is a utility used to identify your external IP address and detect open ports on your connection. This tool is useful for finding out if your port forwarding is setup correctly or if your server applications are being blocked by a firewall.
Network Location Tool - The network location tool is a utility that approximates and displays the geophysical location of your network address on a Google Map. Currently, geolocation information is available from two sources, MaxMind and Hostip.info. The location database provided by MaxMind is 98% accurate on a country level and 70% accurate on a city level for the US within a 25 mile radius. Accuracy information is not available for Hostip.info; however, the Hostip database is open for user input so it is continually becoming more precise.
Visual Trace Route Tool - The visual trace route tool displays the path Internet packets traverse to reach a specified destination. The tool works by identifying the IP addresses of each hop along the way to the destination network address. The estimated geophysical location of each hop is identified using MaxMind's GeoIP database. After all of the hops locations' are identified, the path to the destination is plotted on a Google Map.
Phone Number Geolocator - The phone number geolocator allows you to quickly find the geographical area that a phone number originates from. Locations are identified by matching the area code (NPA) and prefix (NXX) of a phone number to a latitude/longitude coordinate. This tool currently supports most phone numbers within the United States. The database is a little dated, so information such as whether the number is a landline or wireless may be inaccurate.
Reverse IP Domain Check - A reverse IP domain check takes the domain name or IP address of a web server and searches for other sites known to be hosted on that same web server.
Source: Yougetsignal.com
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Little Green Men on Mars?
Source: slippery brick
Is this proof that aliens exist? Does this photograph really prove that we are not alone in the universe? The internet has been buzzing about this photo beamed back from Mars. It may be just an odd shaped rock.
Can you spot the flaw to this photo? i wonder...
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Thursday, January 24, 2008
Heath Ledger found dead in apartment
Source: Wikipedia
Heathcliff Andrew Ledger (April 4, 1979–January 22, 2008) was an Academy Award-nominated Australian actor. After appearing in television roles during the 1990s, Ledger developed a Hollywood career. He starred in both critical and financial successes, including Ten Things I Hate about You, The Patriot, Monster's Ball, A Knight's Tale and Brokeback Mountain, and completed the role of the Joker in the forthcoming The Dark Knight.
On January 22, 2008, Ledger was found dead in his fourth-floor apartment at 421 Broome Street in the SoHo neighborhood of New York City. According to police, housekeeper Teresa Solomon had arrived at approximately 12:30 p.m. EST to do household chores, entered the bedroom at about 1 p.m. to change a light bulb in the adjacent bathroom, and found Ledger face down on the bed, with a sheet pulled to his shoulders, and snoring. Masseuse Diana Wolozin arrived at approximately 2:45 p.m. to give Ledger a massage, and when he did not emerge by 3 p.m., called his cell phone and received no answer. Wolozin entered the bedroom, began to set up the massage table, and tried to awaken the unresponsive Ledger. Wolozin called actress Mary-Kate Olsen, whose number was programmed in Ledger's cell phone. She replied she would have a member of her security firm go to the apartment. After again attempting to awaken Ledger, Wolozin called Olsen again, and at 3:26 p.m. called 9-1-1. Medical workers moved Ledger to the floor, used a defibrillator and CPR, and pronounced Ledger dead at 3:36 p.m.
Source: Wikipedia
And look what Best Buy did as a memorial. . .
Imageshack
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Tuesday, January 22, 2008
70 Horror, Blood and Gore Photoshop Effects and Brushes
Link: Photoshoproadmap.com
Photoshoproadmap: "Lately I’ve been noticing that many Photoshop artists are mastering the horror makeup techniques and believed that it was time to gather a nice (er, sort of…) list of Photoshop tutorials filled with gore, splatter and blood. Some previews have been blocked just because the final effect was too explicit. Have some fun with your photos, but don’t scare your kid brother too much, please."
Link: Photoshoproadmap.com
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Friday, January 18, 2008
The 5 Most Horrifying Bugs in the World
Read the full story: cracked.com
There are about 10,000,000,000,000,000,000 insects on earth at any given moment. Seriously, that's a real number. For every one of us, there are 1.5 billion bugs.
But some of them are so horrifying, just one is too many. Here are five you want to avoid at all costs.
- Japanese Giant Hornet (vespa mandarinia japonica)
From: Japan, obviously.
Why you must fear it:
It's the size of your thumb and it can spray flesh-melting poison. We really wish we were making that up for, you know, dramatic effect because goddamn, what a terrible thing a three-inch acid-shooting hornet would be, you know? Oh, hey, did we mention it shoots it into your eyes? Or that the poison also has a pheromone cocktail in it that'll call every hornet in the hive to come over and sting you until you are no longer alive?
Think you can outrun it? It can fly 50 miles in a day. It'd be nice to say something reassuring at this point, like "Don't worry, they only live on top of really tall mountains where nobody wants to live," but no, they live all over the goddamned place, including outside Tokyo.
Forty people die like that every year, each of them horribly.
-Bullet Ant (Paraponera clavata)
From: Rainforests from Nicaragua to Paraguay
Why you must fear it:
It's a full inch long, it lives in trees and thus can and will fall on you to scare you away from its hive--the one you didn't know was there, because it's in a fucking tree. Before it does this, it shrieks at you. This ant, you see, can shriek.
It's called a Bullet Ant because its 'unusually severe' sting feels like getting shot. On the Schmidt Sting Index, Bullet Ants rate as the number one most try-not-to-shit-out-your-spine painful in the entirety of the Kingdom Arthropoda.
Also--and we do feel the need to stress this--they fucking shriek at you before they attack.
-Africanized Honey Bee (Apis mellifera scutellata)
From: South and Central America, the American Southwest
Why you must fear it:
You know how you can spot one of these? You can't. There is no physical way to determine the difference between an Africanized bee and a common European bee. None whatsoever.
You can, however, easily tell the difference based on their behavior. Regular bees will give you about nine seconds of being too close to the hive before deciding you're a threat and then attacking you. So it's pretty easy to just walk past them without any screams. And if you do get them after you, they'll consider you to be 'chased off' after about 300 feet.
Africanized bees do not roll this way. They give you half a second of being too close before they decide it is time to completely fuck your shit up and empty the entire hive--tens, maybe hundreds of thousands of angry, angry bees. When you run, flailing and crying and soiling yourself while screaming "JESUS CHRIST I'M COVERED IN BEES," they will chase you for over half a mile.
-Army or Soldier Ant (Eciton burchellii)
From: The Amazon Basin. There's other subfamilies living in Asia and Africa, but these are the most notorious.
Why you must fear it:
By now, you will not be surprised to hear that these ants are, in fact, fucking huge, with the soldiers reaching a half inch in length. You will also not be surprised to learn that they have massive, powerful, machete-like jaws half the length of the soldiers themselves. They're notorious for dismantling any living thing in their path, regardless of size. They're also completely blind, which for some reason makes the whole thing worse.
-Bot Fly (family oestridae, genus and species varies)
From: Most species found in Central and South America, some species found all over the world
Why you must fear it:
Oh boy. Ohhhhh boy. Okay, Bot flies.
There are dozens of varieties of Bot Fly, they're each highly adapted to target a specific animal, they have delightfully descriptive names like Horse Stomach Bot Fly, Sheep Nose Bot Fly and, hey, guess what. One of them is called Human Bot Fly.
They each have a different and elaborate reproductive cycle, all of which end with a fat, half-inch maggot embedded in living flesh. Feeding.
Horse Stomach Bots, for example, lay their eggs in grass. Horses eat the grass. And the eggs. Which hatch in the heat of the horse's mouth. Upon which they chew through the horse's tongue and burrow, through the horse, into its belly. Where they meet up and dig honeycombs into the horse's stomach. And get fat. When they're ready to be flies, they just let go and get pooped out of the system.
The Human Bot Fly lays its eggs on a horsefly or a mosquito, something that will attempt to land on a human. This carrier finds a human and lands on him or her. The eggs rub off onto the human, whose body heat hatches the eggs. The larvae drop onto the skin and burrow right the fuck in. Where they live. Under your skin. Eating.
Read the full story: cracked.com
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10+ Unusual Ways To Make Easy Money On The Internet If You Love Writing.
1. Make easy money online naming domains. The original idea comes from Dane Carson’s blog. While you can earn money as a contributor for services such as PickyDomains.Com, here is a better idea. Go to Google or any other search engine, find sucky domain names and contact their owners directly, offering them your services. The key to success is to make it 100% risk free. Inform your prospective clients that you’ll accept money only if they like your domain name. If you come up with one approved domain name a day and charge what PickyDomain charges, you can make $1500 a month. Another twist – come up with cool domain names, like SiteToRemember.Com or ItsMe.Com, register them yourself and sell them on the aftermarket.
2. eBay arbitrage. A lot of people like buying stuff on eBay, because it’s cheap. And some people never buy on eBay, because they are afraid of being ripped off. Here is your solution to making easy money on eBay. Go to Craigslist.Com and see what items people buy and sell most often. Look at prices. Then go to eBay and see, if you can get it cheaper. Once you find your niche, you can buy things on eBay (or better yet, act as a representative for an eBay powerseller) and sell them for a profit using local classifieds and Craigslist. You can do this online as well. Set up a proxy store, and when you get an order, simply buy the same item on eBay for less, substituting shipping address from your own to that of your buyer.
3. eBay copywriting. If you are good at copywriting, go to eBay and look for highticket items, like boats. Find auctions with totally sucky descriptions. Contact an owner and inform him or her that good description of his or her item is likely to increase the chances of that item being sold. Then offer your services for a 1% of the selling price. You can use free eBay software
4. Get Paid Writing Reviews. This idea comes from a blog called Business Ideas That Work. A site called SoftwareJudge.Com pays up to 50 dollars per good review. However, if you are good at reviewing software, you can do this on your own. Go to CNET or any other site that lists software. Find sites that don’t have any reviews or testimonials. Contact developers directly, offering them your review services. Good reviews and testimonials increases sales, so you shouldn’t have any difficulties convincing developers that they need your services. And you get free software and games too! Oh, and you don't have to limit yourself to software alone.
5. Social Bookmark Whoring (oops, I meant to say PR). This is really easy money online. RedDit and Digg can bring a crapload of traffic. And traffic means money. If you have experience creating linkbate titles and getting to the top, why not offer your services? Say, you charge 10 dollars for submitting news to RedDit, Digg, StumbleUpon, Furl, NewsVine, Fark and all the other social bookmarting sites. The key is to work only with interesting stories, so you don’t become a spammer. 10 news a day and you are 100 dollars richer. You can probably work out a deal with online PR agencies, because they are totally clueless about this.
6. Writing Google AdWords Ads. Every time I see “Cake Icing. Used And New. eBay.Com” type ads or “Four best sites on killing your wife”, it makes me wonder. Aren’t there any GOOD AdWords ads copywriters? Look’s like a great job to me. The ads are only three lines long and if you charge 10 bucks per ad, you can make a lot of money. And the customers are easy to find, too. Just look at all these terrible ads that Google displays on their search engine and contextual network.
7. Wacky blogs. Steve Pavlina gets over 300 dollars a day from AdSense alone, writing on wacky topics, like polyphasic sleep, astral projection and psychic development. Or take David Icke, who claims that president Bush in an alien and a reptilian. Your blog doesn’t have to be true, it just has to be interesting.
8. Blog whoring. There are a number of services, like PayPerPost.Com, that pay for promotional blogposts. Once again, you can do the same thing, cutting the middleman out.
9. Unique Personal Ads. Write memorable personal ads for online daters. Most personal ads suck. “Hi, my name is Bambie, I’m a Vergo, I’m 19 and I love dogs.” Here is my favorite personal ad. If people pay for resume writing, they might pay for a great personal ad.
10. Poet For Hire. This is nothing new. Still, if you love writing poetry, why not make some money with your rhymes.
Read more...
10 Things You Did Not Know You Could Buy On Amazon.Com
1. The George W. Bush Voodoo Kit: Stick It to Him Like Hes Been Sticking It to You!
2. The Celebrity Black Book: Over 55,000 Accurate Celebrity Addresses
3 Tickle His Pickle: Your Hands-On Guide to Penis Pleasing
4. Man to Man : Gay Attraction Body Mist 2 Oz
5. SILK Micro G-String Thong Rings Panty 4 COLORS Red Cobalt Purple or Black
6. JL421 Badonkadonk Land Cruiser/Tank
7. Stink Bombs Box of 36 Glass Viles
9. Uranium Ore
10. Liquid Ass Fart
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160 Megapixel Camera from Seitz
This odd-looking camera that looks like a cross between a vintage and modern version captures odd-sized pictures at an incredible 160 Megapixels.
Don’t look for this one at your local Best Buy. It’s for specialty photography and the prices for a kit can go as high as $40,000. Notice how the grip ergonomics have been worked out to help keep a firm hold on this expensive beast. It’s MUCH bigger than your average point and shoot, at 6 x 17 inches. One full resolution image taken with this camera at 48-bit colour depth will take up 900 MB of storage space!
Source: Slippery Brick
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Thursday, January 17, 2008
Microsoft’s high-tech grocery cart with video ads
Microsoft wants to deliver more ads to consumers, so they have found a unique way to do it more effectively. Working with a company called MediaCart, they are building computers that would be mounted on grocery carts. It would allow consumers to navigate the store and then automatically check them out when they’re finished. What would convenience be without revenue? That’s why Microsoft will have video ads mixed with the experience.
The cart-mounted computers will be tested at some ShopRite markets in the second half of 2008. Shoppers can pick up items, scan them with the system and leave them in their carts. The console will provide a running price tally and even check items off the shopping list. The system is also equipped with RFID, so it can track shoppers while they’re moving around in the store, deciding whether they want Captain Crunch or Cocoa Puffs. Shoppers will also be able to bring their list to the store with just a swipe of their loyalty card.(Everybody has a loyalty card, and yet it doesn’t seem to make any of us loyal.)
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The Top Telephone Tricks
In no particular order, here are some cool tricks I found about a telephone. Most were gathered from Lifehacker.
1) Avoid the cost of calling 411 with GOOG 411.
Instead of calling regular 411 to get information (and an extra charge on your phone bill), Google by voice by calling 1-800-GOOG-411 to get a street address or phone number. Here's a video from Youtube on how it works:
2) Avoid annoying calls with a custom silent ringtone.
If your cell phone supports per-caller ringtones, silence the low-priority incoming calls with a dead air ringtone. This idea makes very good sense; the phone will ring regardless, so just make their ringtone something silent like dead air. Here's a link on how to make a ringtone.
3) Ring all your phones from one number with GrandCentral.
Sick of missing calls to the office while you're home or vice versa? Set up a free GrandCentral number that can ring all your phones at once from one number, or selective phones based on the caller—like your cell phone, office phone, and home phone.
4) Name that tune.
Dying to know what song that is playing on the car radio? Call 866-411-SONG and hold your phone up to the speakers. Just 15 seconds (and a small fee), and 411 SONG will send you a text message with the song name and artist. (This only works on cell phones with SMS capabilities.)
5) Swear like a sailor to skip directly to a human operator.
Some IVR's are programmed to listen for naughty words and speed you along to human help when they hear them. Drop the F bomb a couple of times and you'll be zoomed right along to a human operator.
6) Trick automated phone bots into never calling you again.
Automated phone bots keep interrupting your dinner with their pre-recorded marketing messages? Play the U.S. Special Information Tone signal for "vacant circuit" when you pick up the phone. Of course, adding this to your answering machine greeting may confuse genuine human callers as well, but that may be worth scaring off the bots. Grab the tone as a WAV file from the Art of Hacking site.
Get .WAV file here: U.S. SIT (Special Information Tones) signal: Vacant Circuit (out of service or nonexistent phone number)
7) Get a free disposable phone number for short period of time
Numbr provides free, anonymous, disposable phone numbers. Numbr is Craigsnumber re-branded with a lot of cool new features. Numbr supports 23 US cities, can forward calls to up to 2 phones, blocks telemarketers, and offers a Do Not Disturb option from 9PM to 8AM. Additionally, the app can also take voicemails and email you your disposable number's call history. If you ever feel wary about handing out your real number for a short term contact, Numbr is the perfect place to go.
Website: Numbr
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Wednesday, January 16, 2008
8 websites that sold out
I read this article on Holy Taco....it's great. Here's a brief summary:
Check it: Holy Taco
8. AINTITCOOLNEWS.COM
It started out as a cool website where you could find unbiased reviews and information on upcoming movies and television. Now it’s owner and operator, Harry Knowles, (who looks like what would happen if an Orange Julius and a pile of tires had a baby) is so bought and sold by the studios that when he reviewed the movie Daredevil, he said this...
7. PEREZHILTON.COM
I know, I know, how does a site that scribbles little droplets of semen coming from Britney Spears’ mouth, jump the shark? By doing stuff other than that–that’s how. Suddenly, Perez Hilton thinks people give a flying fuck about things he has to say other than celeb gossip, and he’s started commenting on politics and music. Right. The only thing we want him to comment on is why he won’t shut the hell up. Here’s a rule...
6. JUMPTHESHARK.COM
JTS used to be a nice, straightforward website. Users would vote on when a classic TV show turned the corner and started to suck. It was a harsh, brutal, and clear-cut commentary on the TV world. Then it got bought by some big corporation and became my 12 year old sister’s diary...
5. ALL PAY PORN SITES
Can you remember the last time you paid money on the internet to masturbate? I can’t, and let me tell you–I masturbate a lot. With youporn, porntube, redtube.com, and the like, there’s enough free porn out there to satisfy all of China, if it was only inhabited by thirteen-year-old boys with portable lotion dispensers. Why should I pay $9.99 to get on a pay site...
4. CNN.COM
Remember when cnn.com used to be about news? Now half the headlines are either about some dude who found out he was banging his long lost sister, or a story about a cat in Des Moines, Iowa that made a 911 call that saved Christmas...
3. EBAUMSWORLD.COM
This used to be THE site for funny videos and pictures. In fact, there was a rumor that Eric Bauman was offered 100 million dollars for it and said no. That prompts me to start a new rumor: Eric Bauman is mentally retarded. If you’ve made your entire fortune from stealing other people’s videos, how do you not forsee that maybe other companies might take your business model and kick the absolute crap out of it?...
2. MYSPACE.COM
...every day I get the following friend request from some chick in a bikini named something like “Nadia”. “Hey, I noticed you were on the site, just wanted to say hi! Myspace won’t let me show my naked pics here, so come to my website!” If If I wanted porn, I’d go to a website or look in between my dad’s mattress. And who could forget how awesome it is to go to someone’s site, wait 15 minutes for it load...
1. AOL.COM
AOL used to own the internet. They were like the smoking hot chick in high school that everyone wanted to bang. Now you go back to your ten-year reunion and they’re the overweight hag, who’s carrying a child and asking you if she can “bum a smoke” as she attempts to lick some dried mayonnaise off her face. AOL’s been so bought out by large corporations and networks that their news coverage and search engines are total shit. Look at this screen shot from today of their “hot searches.”...
Check it: Holy Taco
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Tuesday, January 15, 2008
Commercials from the 80s
- The Lego Maniac
Did you know that the word "LEGO" came from the Danish words "leg-godt", meaning "Play well."
- ABC Promos for Moonlighting and Thirty Something
I've never heard of the shows, but check out Bruce Willis...man that's old-school.
- Definitely Dinosaurs
Definitely Dinosaurs were a series of "dinosaur" toys first produced by Playskool in the 1980s. Each dinosaur had a distinctive Apatosaurus stamp on its underbelly or leg to indicate authenticity. They also included cavemen and cavewomen, with different faces and racial features. However, no other mammals were produced. Smaller versions were included in the Wendy's kid's meal and on blister cards.
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Microsoft Customer Service Calls Back a Decade Later
Microsoft Y2K bug circa 1998? [BIC's Bickerings]
On 1/8/08, 10 years after he placed a call to Microsoft tech support, they called Brian back to see if his problem had been resolved. Are they just that backed up? Latent Y2K error? Phishing attempt? The truth is much more banal, and potentially, more frightening. See if you can figure out the solution before continuing on to the answer...
Here's what happened. The original call was placed on January 7th, 1998. The rep meant to put in a note to have someone call Brian back the next day, but instead of typing "1/8/98" they probably typed "1/8/08." Most likely because 9 and 0 are right next to each other on the computer keyboard and their finger slipped. The result? A followup call a decade late!
Imagine all sorts of the fun mistakes customer service reps can make just by mess up one digit....
Microsoft Y2K bug circa 1998? [BIC's Bickerings]
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Monday, January 14, 2008
Useless facts that you always wanted to know
Granted most of these are old news, I still found them interesting to read. It's everything you never wanted to know about everything. I'm not going to list them all, so check out the link for the whole list. (There are lots of them)
Full list here
-Cost of raising a medium-size dog to the age of eleven: $6,400
-Average number of people airborne over the US any given hour: 61,000.
-Percentage of Americans who have visited Disneyland/Disney World: 70%
-Average life span of a major league baseball: 7 pitches.
-Only President to win a Pulitzer: John F. Kennedy for Profiles in Courage
-Intelligent people have more zinc and copper in their hair.
-The world's youngest parents were 8 and 9 and lived in China in 1910.
-The youngest pope was 11 years old.
-Iceland consumes more Coca-Cola per capita than any other nation.
-First novel ever written on a typewriter: Tom Sawyer.
-A duck's quack doesn't echo, and no one knows why.
-In the 1940s, the FCC assigned television's Channel 1 to mobile services (two-way radios in taxicabs, for instance) but did not renumber the other channel assignments. That is why your TV set has channels 2 and up, but no channel 1.
-The San Francisco Cable cars are the only mobile National Monuments
-The only 15 letter word that can be spelled without repeating a letter is uncopyrightable.
-"Hang On Sloopy" is the official rock song of Ohio.
-There are coffee flavored PEZ.
-The reason firehouses have circular stairways is from the days of yore when the engines were pulled by horses. The horses were stabled on the ground floor and figured out how to walk up straight staircases.
-The airplane Buddy Holly died in was the "American Pie." (Thus the name of the Don McLean song.)
-When opossums are playing 'possum, they are not "playing." They actually pass out from sheer terror.
-The Main Library at Indiana University sinks over an inch every year because when it was built, engineers failed to take into account the weight of all the books that would occupy the building.
-Each king in a deck of playing cards represents a great king from history. Spades - King David, Clubs - Alexander the Great, Hearts - Charlemagne, and Diamonds - Julius Caesar.
-111,111,111 x 111,111,111 = 12,345,678,987,654,321
-If a statue in the park of a person on a horse has both front legs in the air, the person died in battle; if the horse has one front leg in the air, the person died as a result of wounds received in battle; if the horse has all four legs on the ground, the person died of natural causes.
-Clans of long ago that wanted to get rid of their unwanted people without killing them would burn their houses down; hence the expression "to get fired."
-Only two people signed the Declaration of Independence on July 4th, John Hancock and Charles Thomson. Most of the rest signed on August 2, but the last signature wasn't added until 5 years later.
-"I am." is the shortest complete sentence in the English language.
-The term "the whole 9 yards" came from W.W.II fighter pilots in the South Pacific.
-When arming their airplanes on the ground, the .50 caliber machine gun ammo belts measured exactly 27 feet, before being loaded into the fuselage. If the pilots fired all their ammo at a target, it got "the whole 9 yards."
-Hershey's Kisses are called that because the machine that makes them looks like it's kissing the conveyor belt.
-The phrase "rule of thumb" is derived from an old English law which stated that you couldn't beat your wife with anything wider than your thumb.
-An ostrich's eye is bigger that it's brain.
-The longest recorded flight of a chicken is thirteen seconds.
Full list here
Read more...
Interesting Sites
http://thinkorthwim.com - "A collection of things worth considering." Here's some of the entries you might find here: paper or plastic, economics, pictures, 5 Dangerous Things You Should Let Your Kids Do, A Comparison of the US-Mexico Border in 1898 and 2008, The News vs The Truth, etc... Definately worth checking it out.
http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/archivepix.html - Astronomy Picture of the Day Archive. Nasa has taken some cool pictures of space. These pictures date from 1995 to the present. There's TONS of pictures.
http://funny-picturez.blogspot.com/ - Deennn's funny picture blog. "Collect all funny things and amazing pictures all over the world! Wish you love them." This site seems brand new, but it has a good start. Stay updated on this one, and see where it goes.
Read more...
Can you see the Comet?
Source: apod.nasa.gov
Explanation: Sometimes the sky itself is the best show in town. On January 26, people from Perth, Australia gathered on a local beach to watch a sky light up with delights near and far. Nearby, fireworks exploded as part of Australia Day celebrations. On the far right, lightning from a thunderstorm flashed in the distance. Near the image center, though, seen through clouds, was the most unusual sight of all: Comet McNaught. The photogenic comet was so bright that it even remained visible though the din of Earthly flashes. Comet McNaught continues to move out from the Sun and dim, but should remain visible in southern skies with binoculars through the end of this month. The above image is actually a three photograph panorama digitally processed to reduce red reflections from the exploding firework.
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Website Secret Information
I found this very interesting, with all kinds of tid-bits and things I didn't know about various sites. It also contains odd, interesting, or funny things in other websites’ code. Follow the link for the whole story. Thanx Robert Accettura.
Robert Accettura's Fun with Wordage
Microsoft
Microsoft’s offering against Linux and Apache is IIS on Windows. Which one would expect they themselves use. What they don’t tell you is that they also have used Akamai (with over 25,000 servers), which uses Linux. They have used Akamai for many things like DNS, and caching files. Rather than “Powered By Windows Server” maybe they should append “hiding behind Linux”.
Myspace.com
Myspace.com was previously Adobe/Macromedia’s model customer because it was written in ColdFusion, and said to be the biggest ColdFusion site on the net (and one of the biggest sites on the net). Many think it still is, but it’s not. While many URL’s suggest it might be because they end in .cfm it’s actually running ASP.net and has been since aprox, 2006. You can confirm this by viewing the headers on some of their pages. You’ll see:
X-AspNet-Version: 2.0.50727
MTV.com
MTV.com’s site has search powered by a Google Search Appliance. MTV is also owned by Viacom who sued Google, the parent company of YouTube. The folks at MTV awesomely admitted the irony during relaunch on their blog.
Google
For some reason, most of Google’s services are insecure by default. By simply going to https, you can use SSL for added security.
Gmail: https://mail.google.com
Google Calendar: https://www.google.com/calendar
Google Reader: https://www.google.com/reader
Robert Accettura's Fun with Wordage
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Friday, January 11, 2008
The story behind 10 famous entertainment websites
Read full story
Thanx to 2spare.com, you can see how it all began for these sites. Excellent reading material. Here's a little summary of the article:
1) Fark - Originally, the web server on Drew Curtis' fark.com domain contained no content, except for an image of a squirrel with large testicles. Later, in 1999, the site introduced what would evolve into its current format, as a way....
2)Something Awful - Something Awful is the brainchild of Richard "Lowtax" Kyanka, who remains in control of the site, despite the proliferation of writers and administrators who have assisted him over the years. The earliest comedic features of the website appeared originally on Kyanka's personal site ARCCentral, but were popularized on...
3)College Humor - The site was originally created in 1999 by Josh Abramson and Ricky Van Veen, two high school friends from Baltimore, Maryland as a means to stay in touch when they attended college. It has since...
4)eBaum's World - eBaum's World features entertainment media such as videos, Flash cartoons and web games. In 1998, founder Eric Bauman launched a bulletin board service, where people could dial in for free text jokes. That same year...
5)General Mayhem - General [M]ayhem, nicknamed by its users Genmay or the "[M]", is an Internet forum containing general discussion forums; its title aptly describing the character of these discussions. General Mayhem has very...
6)Digg - Digg started out as an experiment in November 2004 by Kevin Rose, Owen Byrne, Ron Gorodetzky, and Jay Adelson (who serves as CEO), all of whom currently play an active role in the management of the site.
7)The Best Page in the Universe - The Best Page in the Universe is a personal satirical humor website created by self-proclaimed pirate George Ouzounian, better known as Maddox, from Salt Lake City, Utah, USA. The site originated from a text document he wrote listing 50 things that "pissed him off." He gave the list to several people on EFnet's #coders. The response was positive, so in 1997 he created the web site.
8)Rotten - Rotten.com is web site with a slogan of "An archive of disturbing illustration" operated by Soylent Communications. It is devoted to morbid curiosities, primarily pictures of gruesome fatalities, deformities, autopsy or forensic photographs depictions of perverse sex acts, and historical curios that are disturbing or misanthropic in nature. The site was founded in 1996, and its format has changed very little since that time...
9)YTMND - YTMND, an initialism for "You're The Man Now Dog", is an online community centered around the creation of hosted web pages (known within the community as YTMNDs) featuring a juxtaposition of a single image or a simple slideshow, which may be animated and/or tiled, along with optional large zooming text, and a looping sound file. Images used in YTMNDs are usually either created or edited by users. Most YTMNDs are meant to expose or reflect the more inane facets of pop culture, and some can be considered inside jokes...
10)B3ta - B3ta is a humorous British website, described as a "puerile digital arts community" by The Guardian. It was founded by Rob Manuel, Denise Wilton and Cal Henderson. To inspire creative works, B3ta poses a weekly image challenge, such as "if cats ruled the world" and a "question of the week", for example asking "what's your most embarrassing injury?"...
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Interesting Links
-thecoolhunter.net - I guess it's all in the name. This place hunts cool items, whether it be music, gadgets, architecture, books, fashion, etc... I enjoyed the architecture section. It has some really crazy looking houses.
-http://www.iambetterthanu.com/ - Computer pranks galore. Find silly pranks to play on your friends or enemies. They also have office pranks, but I like the Windows pranks the best.
-http://www.stupiddomainsnetwork.com/ - Stupid Domains Network. Stupid websites such as ihateyourbaby.com or ihatekitties.com
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Tuesday, January 8, 2008
Monday, January 7, 2008
18 People Stuck On Roller Coaster
Image: China.org
This has got to be the worst place to get stuck on a roller coaster. Have any of you ever been stuck like this?
Summary of the story:
Eighteen people who rode a roller coaster in Anhui, China, got more than they bargained for: they got stuck upside down for half an hour when strong winds caused the roller coaster to stop on its track!
Read the rest of the story.
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Interesting Sites
-http://www.thebudgetgraph.com - A visual guide to where your tax dollars GO (incredible graph!)
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Block Uwanted ads / parasites with a Hosts file
Here's a way to block annoying ads, banners, blah, blah, blah, etc. Or you can use this for troubleshooting access issues with websites. It's all in the HOSTS file.
The Hosts file contains the mappings of IP addresses to host names. You can use a HOSTS file to block ads, banners, 3rd party Cookies, 3rd party page counters, web bugs, and even most hijackers. This is accomplished by blocking the connection(s) that supplies these little gems. And what do you know, i found a massive list of possible unwanted sites here. The list contains thousands upon thousands of annoying sites to block, including trackers, ads, banners, etc. Here's a video on the process:
Links and download instructions:
Heres the very detailed explanation
To view the HOSTS file in plain text form. (640 kb) (opens in IE)
Note: The text version also makes a terrific reference for determining possible unwanted sites
Download: hosts.zip [right-click - Select: Save Target As] [Updated 01-03-08]
This download includes a simple batch file (mvps.bat) that will rename the existing HOSTS file to HOSTS.MVP then copy the included updated HOSTS file to the proper location. For more information please see the readme.txt included in the download.
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Friday, January 4, 2008
Access the Internet when Web Browsers are Disabled
I thought this would come in handy for those times when, well, you don't have a browser or it has been disabled. Thanks lifehacker. This method uses the browser built into the XP default help app.
1) Open up an ordinary application, like Calculator.
2) Hit F1 or go to Help -> Help Topics.
3) Right-click the title bar and select "Jump to URL..."
4) Then it's simply a matter of entering the URL you want to visit.
It may not work in extreme cases of restriction or lockdown.
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Thursday, January 3, 2008
Install Wikipedia on Your iPod
I found this thanks to makeuseof.com. A special thanks to ipodlinux too. Well, here's your instructions. Good luck. The Wikipedia file is updated approximately once every 6 months so you won’t have the most up-to-date version but it’s free and most facts never change.
1. First connect your iPod to your computer and fire up iTunes. Then make sure the box “enabling disk use” is ticked. This is extremely important otherwise you won’t be able to move any files on there. Then close down iTunes.
2. Download the program installation wizard and install. Make sure your iPod is still plugged into your computer as the program installation wizard will automatically detect your iPod presence and install everything directly there.
3. One important thing to remember during installation is that you will be asked if you want to make the Wikipedia your “default system” on your iPod. This means that when you switch on your iPod each time, do you want to see your music menu or the Wikipedia menu? I recommend you say no to making Wikipedia the default view.
4. When the installation is complete, eject your iPod from your computer.
5. Now is the time to see if the installation worked. You need to reboot your iPod which you achieve by holding down the play button and the menu button together at the same time for 5 seconds. You will then see the Apple logo which is the iPod re-booting. When you see the Apple logo, press down the re-wind button for 5 seconds and this kicks in the new Wikipedia section of your iPod.
6. If everything looks OK, you now need to download the huge 1.7 GB Wikipedia file. When it is downloaded, go to your iPod folder on your PC, specifically to “data\encyclopodia\library\” and place the file in there.
7. Again, eject and re-boot the iPod, use the rewind button to go to your Wikipedia section and see if the Wikipedia file works properly.
To make a search, just use the scroll wheel to choose letters to spell your search term (just like you would choose the keys on a mobile phone to type a SMS message). Then press the “play” button to start searching.
READ-ME:
*When accessing the Wikipedia file on your iPod, you have to go into “settings” first and alter the screen contrast and the wheel sensitivity. It will be totally off-whack the first time you access it.
*The older your iPod, the slower it will be to retrieve information from the Wikipedia file. Your iPod might even crash, prompting you to re-boot. So this works best with the newer iPod models.
*Every 6 months or so, download the Wikipedia file again so you get the latest version. However, saying that, the current file is dated February 2007 so maybe once a year is more accurate!
*When you are in the Wikipedia section, pressing the menu button turns the back light on. The back light will stay on until you switch it off again so you can read the text easily. Be aware though that having the light continually on is a real battery drainer.
*To get back to your music section, you need to reboot the iPod again by holding down the menu button and the play button.
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Transform Windows to another OS
For the new year everyone should download and install these free transformation packs, and transform XP to look like any other OS.
Ubuntu Transformation Pack [Download]
Fedora Transformation Pack [Download]
FlyakiteOSX [Download]
Mac OS Transformation Pack [Download]
Vista Transformation Pack [Download]
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Wednesday, January 2, 2008
Interesting Sites
- http://www.makeuseof.com - Cool websites, software, and internet tips
- http://lifehacker.com/ - Tips and Downloads for getting things done
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100 things we didn't know last year
Follow the link to see the whole list, but here are a few:
Link: BBC News
1. Coach travel is the safest form of road transport in the country.
2. Saddam Hussein's codename while in US custody in 2004/5 was "Victor".
3. Adding milk to tea negates the health-giving effects of a hot brew.
4. The word "jaywalking" came from the US slang "jay", a term popular in the early 20th Century meaning a rustic newcomer unfamiliar with city ways.
5. Cloudy apple juice is healthier than clear, containing almost double the antioxidants which protect against heart disease and cancer.
6. Dishcloths are purged of 99% of their bacteria during two minutes in a microwave.
7. A haddock's mating call starts as a slow knocking sound, before turning into a quicker hum similar to a small motorcycle revving its engine.
8. Newcastle is the noisiest place in England.
9. The people who built Stonehenge lived at an ancient village in Durrington Walls.
10. Brazil nuts are seeds encased in an outer shell that weighs more than 1kg.
11. Astronauts wear nappies during launch and re-entry because they can't stop what they're doing should they need to urinate.
12. Georgic is a punishment dished out to Eton pupils which involves the copying out of hundreds of lines of Latin.
13. Tony Blair does not keep a personal diary.
14. Antony and Cleopatra were ugly.
15. 10% of university work from across the UK is plagiarised.
16. Chimpanzees make their own spears for hunting.
17. Two cups of spearmint tea a day is thought to control excessive hair growth for women.
18. Burglar alarms, traffic wardens and crowded buses are good news for home owners, signalling an area is on the up.
19. Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez hosts a daily radio phone-in show.
20. More than half (52%) of smokers haven't told their parents about their habit.
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