I’m going to agree with the commentators on the video on this one. He’s not being snubbed, he’s introducing the guy he’s with. People are pushing this as if he’s offering ot shake hands and no one is taking. He’s gesturing in introduction.

In an address to the Chinese about their firewall issues, one person asks what Obama things about Twitter.

Turns out he’s never used it.

Which I find hilarious. I don’t know that he ever said he did use it but his account during the election was relatively active and had a huge following.

There’s always been some speculation as to if these celebrity accounts are actually real. While Ashton Kutcher’s account likely is, Barack Obama’s is certainly not.

That’s not to say that branded link based Twitters are a bad thing. I subscribe to several and find them useful. Some even have additional “real Tweets” that aren’t links. However, I do find Twitter accounts that have the pretense of authenticity to be rather deceitful.

Or, from another angle, if you consider Obama to be a brand name, you’ve got more ammunition for your arsenal.

Well, maybe….

chances are that yeah, no one reads you and you’ll never actually “make a difference”. I still say that if you enjoy doing it, keep doing it. Lord knows I still do even though I’ve long since lost th numbers I had 2 years+ ago. On the other hand, I don’t really care about “numbers”.

On to the story.

Blog Sparks Mass Council Walkout!

The story basically goes that a single UK Blogger has cause the resignation of a large majority of some city council to resign.

The story does not go into much detail into how this Blogger caused this, one can suspect some sort of regular criticism. It may be that it actually has nothing to do with the guy’s blog at all, possible he simply regularly attended the meetings and managed to out some sort of scandal while also happening to be a blogger. It also suggest sthat the council members simply needed some sort of scapegoat.

There also seems to be some level of sensationalism going on as the blogger himself suggests that the story isn’t accurate nor that it’s his responsibility at all.

The point though is that if you run a blog, especially a more localized blog, you might be able to make more of a difference than you’d think. Also this sort of “eye opening of the public” is part of what I’ve been saying has been going on with this whole “connected social internet” phenomenon.

This comic (Linked by this clip) demonstrates the most obvious reason for Obama winning the Nobel Prize. Kudos to the creator.

This is a rather hilarious concept that I’d never really knew of until now. It’s something called the Streisand Effect. There is even a Wikipedia Page! Basically, it’s what happens when a company or celebrity tries to take down to cover up news only to have it backfire and spread like wildfire, usually across the Internet.

Today’s Streisand Effect involves Ralph Lauren and two sites Photoshop Disaster, and Boing Boing.
http://www.boingboing.net/2009/10/06/the-criticism-that-r.html

Sadly, Google, who runs blogspot, has a policy of complying with DMCA take downs by default, so Photoshop Disaster’s original post is gone. The thing is, there wasn’t any real copyright infringement since the original post was criticism of the work, it falls under “Fair Use”. Essentially, the idea is, Ralph Lauren didn’t like the criticism of it’s advertisement.

I’ve heard two relatively prolific conspiracy theories since the death of Pop Legend Michael Jackson. First is that his death was staged in order to create an enormous comeback. Or possibly just so he could simply go away and leave all of the stressful obsessive coverage.

Second, and if either were true more likely, is that he was killed to release the rights to his library of songs. Please note, not the rights to HIS songs, the rights he owned to BEATLES songs.

That’s right, Michael Jackson owned the publishing rights to a lot of Beatles music. Have you noticed the massive influx of Beatles themes lately inc commercials? Then there was Beatles Rock Band.

Eh eh?

Anyway, I’ve seen a video a while ago that was supposedly Michael Jackson casually strolling out of an ambulance after his “death” but it was grainy as hell and frankly, it could have been anyone. Hell the video could have been Obama wandering out of the ambulance. all we know is Someone, or something, got out and walked into a door in an underground garage.

This one takes the cake though for supporting conspiracy theories.

Here’s a photo of Michael Jackson’s “last rehersal”.

Take a minute to look it over. To the casual person it seems ok right? If you’re familiar with Photoshop take a closer look at Michael himself. Still not seeing it? Pretend you’re into “guys junk” and look again. See it yet? Notice that there is no neon sign between his legs? Of course you didn’t see it you were too busy looking at Michael Jackson’s crotch you PERVERT.

Anyway, the guy in charge apparently screwed up a job any regular Something Awful poster could manage (Photoshop Phriday anyone?).

Original Story on HolyMoly.com , via This Looks Shopped…

Apparently September 12th, there was a very large march in Washington DC.

More photos can be found here.

There was surprisingly little coverage on this. The agenda here seems to have been a bit random though mostly focusing on Healthcare and general disgust with the government.

This is pretty stupid. Who the hell figures this crap out.

PS, the words are pretty weak and who knows if there is some other manipulation going on. Also you can watch about 60 seconds of this and get the gist.

There’s something else to this. The power of suggestion can be extremely powerful on audio understanding.

Here’s an example. Close your eyes, try not to read any suggesting text, and watch this (or at least part of it.)

What’s he saying? Mostly gibberish right?

Now if I tell you “At the beginning he’s saying “Faggot” over and over”. Then you watch it again, what do you hear? Yep, now he sounds like he’s saying “faggot faggot”.

For what it’s worth I found a REAL secret message once on a Pink Floyd album. If you play “Empty Spaces” backwards you get a message along the lines of “Congratulations, you’ve found the secret message, please send your message to old Pink, care of, the funny farm”.

Maybe later I’ll dig up the audio file and post it.

“Because they end up on Youtube in a compromising position.”

Also he says something about “You’re not going to tell me how to run my congressional.”

I thought these guys were technically “employees of the people.” Basically, this guy won’t be getting reelected.

Here’s an interesting video regarding your Freedoms in the United States.

A few comments though. they never show the guy’s sign, which seems suspicious. For all we know this sign has some naked woman on it and has no relevance to whatever he’s protesting. The whole thing seems a little fishy and set up.