flickering pictures

* = may not actually happen If someone told you that IBM and the U.S. government were building the world’s most powerful supercomputer — one that could perform a staggering 20 quadrillion calculations per second — what would you think its purpose was? If you guessed curing cancer, studying climate change or running Vista smoothly [...]

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This is apparently an authentic ad for Microsoft’s Songsmith song-writing program, which I guess is supposed to compete with Apple’s less seizure-inducing GarageBand. If there’s a commercial out there that makes you want to incoherently spew obscenities more than this one, I haven’t seen it. Microsoft says: Songsmith generates musical accompaniment to match a singer’s [...]

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The quote of the day comes from Republican National Committee chairman Mike Duncan, who’s leading the GOP’s charge into social media: “We have to do it in the Facebook, with the Twittering, the different technology that young people are using today.” Is it just me, or does the phrase “do it in the Facebook” sound [...]

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Germany’s world-renowned Max Planck Institutes, whose science and technology researchers are among the world’s finest, accidentally printed an ad for a Chinese brothel on the cover of its latest journal. The Independent reports: There were red faces on the editorial board of one of Germany’s top scientific institutions, the Max Planck Institute, after it ran [...]

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Cracked.com features eight of the most pathetic exercises in futility in Guinness history. Featured record attempts include a mass fire-walking event, a fellow who attempted to break the sound barrier by free-falling from 34 kilometres up, and something called “smurfing.” Story via Mental Floss. Image via the Science Creative Quarterly at the University of British [...]

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The BBC reports: On Thursday, [Zimbabwe president Robert] Mugabe said a deadly cholera outbreak had been stopped, as aid workers warned it was worsening. He said Western powers were plotting to use cholera as an excuse to invade and overthrow him. The World Health Organization says the outbreak has not been contained and the death [...]

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Because they’re idiots, that’s why.

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From the indefatigable Cool Things in Random Places: The sport of shin kicking has been around since the 17th century [and was] reborn in 1951 at Chipping Camden, England. Although the games are not quite as brutal as the earlier versions, I’m sure players are secretly rejoicing that they now prohibit iron-capped boots. Players used [...]

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After more than a year, a Nebraska state senator’s lawsuit against God has finally worked its way through the courts and been dismissed — not because it’s silly, but because the legal paperwork omitted the defendant’s home address, in violation of state law. From CNN: State Sen. Ernie Chambers of Omaha sued God [last year], [...]

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What? Why was a moose in a helicopter? Why did he fall out? And what the heck does “DNR” mean? The CBC reports: An endangered moose died as a result of a fall from a helicopter sling, the Nova Scotia Department of Natural Resources says. Department spokesman Dan Davis said veterinarians have confirmed the moose [...]

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