Nathan Campbell – Page 229

Tangible Twitter

I’m using Twitter again (feel free to follow me). I stopped for a while because I didn’t have the time or patience to bother with it. But now I’ve set up little automated things that import anything I bookmark and everything I post here. And I can post what I’m listening to on iTunes as well. Exciting stuff. I like that I’m contributing to the noise to signal ratio on Twitter (on the noise side of the equation).

But that’s not the reason I’m posting this. The reason I’m posting this is to draw your attention to this infographic that considers the voluminous amount of information currently residing on Twitter’s servers. And imagining what would happen if you turned it into paper. This was put together by GOOD.is. They make good infographics.

January 23, 2010

When you prank you begin with “do Remi”

If you took the Annoying Devil character from Balls of Steel and combined him with the Chaser, and then made that combination French you’d end up with someone a lot like Remi Galliard. I’ve posted some of his stuff before. I think he’s funny. Especially when he gets on the field with sporting teams.

He has been doing his thing for ten years. Here are some highlights.

January 21, 2010

Pet sounds

There’s a character in Douglas Adam’s Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency who made his mark in computer world by writing a program that turned financial spreadsheets into music.

This guy wrote a program that turns pictures into music – taking the RGB values of every pixel and converting them into a three note harmonic.

It sounds clever – clever enough to be worth patenting. Only somebody else has already done that. So he’s closed down the program that used to be online. One day though people. One day I will hear the sound of turtles… they don’t actually make noise.

January 21, 2010

Bowl the zombies over

If zombies are taking over your neighbourhood and you want to welcome them with a piece of good old fashion hospitality you might want to serve up your delectables in a dish that looks like this…

From Etsy…

January 21, 2010

Know where you stand when you fall

Just in case you were wondering about the post death pecking order – chances are you’ll (until judgment day at least) be at the bottom.

When I use the word “chances” I don’t mean to suggest that there is any probability of zombies, ghosts, or vampires coming after you. But if you’re writing fiction and want to produce better characters then this will at least help you put things in perspective.

From here.

January 21, 2010

Crayola’s Law

Where do they get the colours from? Who knows. But since the history of crayons Crayola’s colour range has doubled every 28 years.

Image via weathersealed.com

From here, via here.

January 21, 2010

The bread of life

An artist who was perhaps tired of unverifiable claims of Jesus appearing in believer’s daily bread has recreated the crucifixion using slices of toast.

From here.

“British artist Adam Sheldon recreated Jesus’ crucifixion using some pieces of burned toast and a scraping knife. His work of art is now on display at the Anglican Church of St Peter, in Lincs.

33-year-old Adam Sheldon took on the project at the request of his mother, who worships at St. Peter’s Church. Before starting work on his 1.8 ,meters long, 1.1 meters wide masterpiece, Adam scraped the Last Supper on three pieces of toast, to perfect his technique.

He used a regular toaster to burn the pieces of bread, then dried and flattened them so they would fit in a giant frame. Using a scraping knife he managed to create the lighter parts of the artwork, and darkened the background with a blowtorch.”

January 21, 2010

I like traffic lights… except when they are red

Why has this idea not been put into practice yet?

Traffic lights with a progress bar. Brilliant.

From here.

January 21, 2010

Character checklist

If you’re like me you know all about narrative, have grand plans, but fall at the most basic hurdle. Naming and developing characters. I am terrible at coming up with names that I like. But even worse at developing a character past that point. It’s why I steer clear of writing fiction.

Wikihow has a handy guide.

And a video. Which is boring. Don’t watch it.

January 20, 2010

Status Memes: Compare, contrast, and do neither

Two different statuses quoting the same statistics…

asked Jesus,”How much do you love me?” Jesus replied “This much”, and stretched his arms on the cross and died. If you believe in God put this in your status. 97% of you won’t put this in your status. When Jesus died on the cross he was thinking of you. 3% of you will stand up for him and put this in your status!!!

97% of teens would cry if they saw Robert Pattison (Edward Cullen from Twilight) standing on top of a sky scraper, about to jump. If you’re one of the 3% who would sit there eating pop corn screaming “DO A FLIP YOU SPARKLY F$#%^T!” then copy and paste this as your status haha this is funny!

There’s something fishy going on here.

So I wrote this one. I kind of hope it starts a Facebook revolution:

97% of status updates are from the 3% of people who copy and paste or follow the crowd. Come up with original and interesting stuff about yourself or stop thinking your status is making a difference. Facebook is for self promotion and posting of embarrassing pictures. Not for sharing your knowledge of the radio alphabet and stupid statistics. If you’re sick of the degeneration of Facebook statuses don’t copy this.

January 20, 2010

Tiny Teddy Art

My clever little sister (number 2) made these Tiny Teddy Pictures for your enjoyment and edification.

January 20, 2010

Sharing is caring

Because I like experimenting with just about every feature you can add to a website (this may well come in handy one day when someone asks “how can I get people to be able to share my stuff on Facebook without copying and pasting a link”) I’ve added a little “share on Facebook” button to the top right of each post. This is pretty cool. It lets you post stuff you like straight to your profile so that all your friends can also read it. And it keeps track of how many times something has been shared. If there is no little speech bubble above the button with a number in it it’s because nobody has shared the link.

Here are four reasons you should click the “share on Facebook” button.

It will make me feel better about myself.
It will make the number change.
It will get more people coming to this page who will then click the button to make me feel good.
Those people will think you’re brilliant and capable of finding all sorts of funny things on the Internet. You can vicariously benefit from my dedicated procrastination.

I don’t know how long I’ll keep it. But I haven’t culled any of the other plugins or things I’ve installed to get more people here – even if I’m the only person who clicks and shares my stuff. It’ll be depressing if things only ever get shared once (especially if that once is by me) so at that point I might remove it. But seriously, without trying to clamour desperately for your attention, how hard is it to click on a star (you don’t even have to like the post to do this), and click on a button once in a while?

If you are reading this, and you have a Facebook profile (which you need to be able to share the post on Facebook), and you’re not a fan of St. Eutychus yet – then do ~~yourself~~ me yourself a favour and get on board the juggernaut.

January 20, 2010

The Bible that doesn’t need a double adapter

Am I the only one who thought that the lyrics to “500 Miles” by the Proclaimers included “Double adapter, double adapter”… Perhaps.

Irrelevant though this tangent may be – it begs the question as to what this post is actually about. I will keep you in suspense no longer. If the camouflage Bible sounds good to you, except that you’re illiterate, then I have a solution.

A solar powered audio Bible. Bringing hope to the nations. It’s called the “Proclaimer”. And it looks like your grandpa’s wireless.

Here are some FAQs from the website… actually, I can’t imagine that anybody’s first question when confronted with this device is “how many times will it play before it dies?” My question is “why did you make a solar powered audio Bible in the first place?”

How does the Proclaimer work?

An installed microchip contains Scriptures in the heart language; the chip will not erase or wear out from frequent playing.
The battery will play for 15 hours and can be recharged enough times to play the entire New Testament more than 1,000 times.
The Proclaimer has a built-in generator and solar panel to charge the battery.
The solar panel, in addition to charging the battery, will run the Proclaimer even without battery power as long as there is sunlight.
The sound is digital quality and loud enough to be heard clearly by groups as large as 300.

January 20, 2010

A journalistic gem

This, friends, is a fine piece of journalism. A reporter has tracked down and interviewed members of an internatiaonal cabal of diamond thieves to produce a stunning picture of the life of Yugoslavian professional criminals.

It does seem eerily similar to a bunch of Mafia “confessionals” that I read when I wanted to write a Mafia novel. The accounts from the gangsters perhaps suffer a little from their slightly myopic and glorified storytelling. But it’s well worth a read.

The heist alone is worthy of detailed retelling (and will no doubt be the plot line of Oceans 14) – from the story:

Each member of the gang did his or her job perfectly. The attractive young woman seduced the son of the jewelry store owner in Rome to find out where the safe was in the owner’s house. She also discovered that the owner needed builders for repairs. Some of the others secured the renovation contract and cased the house. The get-away driver spent weeks learning every one-way road and stop sign in downtown Rome. And eventually the safe-cracker, the smallest in the group, hid himself inside a false-bottomed chest that the others left on the balcony of a bedroom where the safe was located.

As luck would have it, he didn’t even have to break into the safe, which was hidden behind a painting. The jeweller’s other son left it open for 15 minutes, plenty of time for the diminutive safe-cracker to remove the diamonds and make his escape to the street, where the driver was waiting for him. Back in their rented apartment in Ostia, near the Fiumicino airport outside Rome, the gang met up and celebrated.

The heist was the work of a subgroup of a network of criminals dubbed the Pink Panthers. In the last ten years these guys stole $340 million worth of jewelry in 160 robberies in 26 countries.

Some of the quotes from the criminals are just priceless…

“Any good robbery should take up to 20 seconds.”

Another said that having a nickname and reputation in the media will be the death of the gang:

“When they give you a name you’re in big trouble,” he said, as he finished up a dinner of fresh sea bass at the seaside restaurant and lit a cigarette. “Because every single small policeman is trying to catch you. We lost a lot of guys because of that name. Some of our co-workers got drunk in casinos and were bragging about it, thinking they are something. It’s better to be nothing. The best criminals are those who stay out of prison.”

January 20, 2010

The definitive and authoritative guide to the six basic plot lines

I made a comment in my Avatar post that accusations of plot plagiarism are hollow when there are only a limited number of plots to choose from. I set that limit at six. I was called out on that limit and asked to define them. So. Here goes.

Star crossed lovers – an unlikely pair meet from different tribes, nations, species etc but their love is not meant to be and ultimately leads to some sort of sacrifice. Think Romeo and Juliette, Avatar, Samson and Delilah, or any Rom-Com where a loser somehow scores his dream girl from the other side of the social tracks.
Buddy movie – two friends go on a merry adventure – think Milo and Otis, any Jackie Chan comedy, Lethal Weapon 1, 2, 3…
The unlikely hero thrust into an equally unlikely situation or sporting event – think The Lord of the Rings, any sporting movie, any movie about superhero (genetic mutations, spider bites etc). Basically the hero has to come to grips with their powers and then choose to say the day. This has been popular since Jesus.
The “betrayal twist” – take the unlikely hero, or the buddy adventure and have the hero be betrayed, or the buddy be betrayed by a buddy – think the Matrix, Mighty Ducks, any story about Julius Caesar, Jesus and Judas etc.
The tragedy – simple recipe – develop characters, get people to like the characters and then unjustly kill the character people like the most with a disease or act of unwarranted evil. Think just about any chick flick that is not a Rom Com. Think The Boy in the Striped Pajamas, just about any war movie (unless it’s a buddy movie), or anything written by Shakespeare that wasn’t a comedy. There’s a slight variation where you think there’s going to be a tragedy but the protagonist escapes through a lucky turn of events – like Apollo 13.
The “alien” invasion – where the alien can be any kind of foreign species or a freak act of nature but is often an alien. Chances are an unlikely hero will need to emerge to fight off the aliens. But add something big and ground shaking to the mix and watch everybody deal with the consequences. Think Men in Black, Transformers, Alien, Predator, Alien v Predator, Independence Day, The Perfect Storm, etc…

Just about all of these can be applied to the story of Jesus. Jesus is an alien who comes to earth to be tragically killed following a betrayal by one of his buddies. His ministry involves him using his awesome powers while walking around with his band of merry disciples. He does this all because he loves the world and wants to save it – which is ultimately his downfall. Only it’s actually an untragedy because he comes back to life.

Can you think of any stories not covered by these options? I can’t. Not any that I’d want to watch anyway.

For a different set of “plot types” check out this article that features a few different ways of breaking plots down.

January 20, 2010