Evil Twin Valentine Day Wish List
#1: For All Life's Artificial Moments, an Artificial You!
Perfect for: Cocktail Parties, Family Gatherings, Performance Reviews, Admiring Possessions, Praising Incompetency, Submitting to Undeserved Authority, Listening Attentively to Mind-Numbing Air Bags, Finding Newborns adorable, Making Small Talk, and more!
The Akutoroido DER (DER stands for "Dramatic Entertainment Robot") is a robot with a 'realistic' female appearance, facial expressions, and movements (ie her eyes blink and she uses hand gestures to accentuate the points she’s making) whose makers claim can understand simplistic conversation topics ("Are you married?") and make reply ("No, but I am looking.")
In January 2010, the Japanese department store Sogo & Seibu began accepting pre-orders for Actroid life-sized, animatronic female robots. Quantities are extremely limited: only two will be sold, at a price of $225,000 each and will be manufactured in the likeness of the purchaser.
Why such robots appear to be universally limited to the female shape is a matter for cultural psychoanalysis and will not be explored here.
Current models (as seen in the video) have 'already infiltrated low skilled jobs where looking pretty and having the ability to answer three or four questions is highly valued.'
This about covers all the skills necessary to meet the expectations of your typical Obligatory Event. Certainly, my needs in regards to an Artificial Me when I'm not up to being my Artificial Self are few indeed.
 “You say you were sick so you just sent your 2010 Akutoroido DER? Why, we didn't even notice!" |
 "What a wonderful, friendly 2010 Akutoroido DER you have! We talked and talked!” |
For my obligatory events in St. Louis, for example, I would merely require the addition of:
- "So what high school did you go to?"
- "Have you tried the fried ravioli? It's delicious!"
- "I'm not originally from around here."
To watch a movie that gives you some idea how the use of robots for Obligatory Events might fit into your future, see the movie The Surrogates in #5. Or blow off your second cousin's baby shower and watch a Creepy Android Commercial:
Mehmet Efe’s TEKERRÜR
Mehmet Efe and Hakan Albayrak Nov 2009 Hotel lobby in Fatih district of Istanbul
utanmayı bilenlerdi bu kavgayı verenler
ganimeti kaltabanlar topladı
aç açık bağrı yanık delikanlı çocuklar
copların kan kusturduğu iffet karanfilleri
Tekbir kitap eylem tırnak aldılar sokakları
zaferi açgözlüler kutladı
Çanakkale ilk değildi her şubat yirmisekiz
Karabekir tutuklanır sarışınlar sarhoş olur
Denizler ipe gider Zülfü yare dokunmaz
Serdengeçti Nurettin'e devreder hücresini
bayrakları müsveddeler katladı
altın kapris ipek şarap besmeleyle kan içer
kafa tutar gibi yapar kahpelerle saf tutar
yemyeşil tepelere çullanır ihaleler
şarlatır maaş verir amin diyen herkese
Musa verdi kavgayı Samiri çağ atladı
'karanfil sitil olur yoksula fitil olur'
şairleri dondurur deprem görüntüleri
kavganın varisleri tırmanır otellere
ellerinde Akdeniz'in yüzakı dokuz bayrak
düzeltmeye doğrulur tok gözlü eğri kılıç
dindara kul olmanın köleliği çarpılır
ücretsiz elçilerin özgürlük bilincine
Rüstem'in halısına mızrağı kim sapladı
Rüstem'in halısına mızrağı kim sapladı
Mehmet Efe, 29 Ocak 2012
JAZZ GOT THEM
Police blame rap culture for silence after shootings Authorities in Alton say they have struggled to get witnesses to talk about 8 shootings since May 13.
Author: Carolyn Tuft ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
ALTON - A new form of peer pressure, possibly glamorized by rap music, has police here struggling to find answers in several recent shootings.
Since May 13, the Alton Police Department has investigated eight shootings. And in each case, police have struggled to persuade witnesses to talk.
Lt. David Hayes, chief of detectives for the department, blames the problem, in part, on a new trend caused by rap stars who "glamorize the stop-snitching policy."
What Does China Censor Online?
source: informationisbeautiful.net
Go To:
NOTE: only the Chinese terms are blocked, while the English terms are freely searchable.
Third Worlding It: Evidence of a De-Evolving U.S.?
Angry nationalism shouts down prudence. Disproportionate military spending threatens economic wellbeing. Industry has its hand so deep in the government's purse that private enterprise is becoming public property. The currency falters, the infrastructure crumbles and a supine media, once a watchdog of the powerful, happily licks the strongman's hand.
If the picture looks familiar, that's because we've seen it many times before, from Argentina to Chile to Russia. The U.S. is third worlding.
Going South:
From macho militarism to official corruption, America increasingly resembles a Third World nation.
by Ximena Ortiz
January 2010 The American Conservative
In this articulate, insightful, yet highly accessible and blunt analysis, Ximena Ortiz makes a compelling case for the argument the United States is becoming it's own worst enemy: a militaristic, corrupt, Third World State.
OLD MICHAEL JACKSON STORY RESURRECTED!! THRILLER REPEAT!!!
News of the World lip syncs
a Michael Jackson News Exclusive!!!
'News Corpse' Re-Animated by Bloggers
Suffering from 'Acute Hyperbol Intoxication'!!
According to the January 10, 2010 edition of the 'News of the World', a British tabloid, it has a 'world exclusive" on publication of death certificates that show Michael Jackson was 'murdered':
MICHAEL Jackson's death certificate rules he WAS murdered, the News of the World can reveal.
We obtained a copy of the document and an amendment to it - that have never been published.
Uhm, not true. Unless you want to be a stickler about things like "our copy has never been published" or "never published with this clerk's signature' or 'never been published with this bit blacked out." Or fill in the <bullshit> here.
The real crime being committed, however, is by all the journalists and bloggers who are at this very moment spreading old news and false credit like some sort of 'I can't believe it's not butter!' plague in articles, blogs, and tweets—including content providers who are selling it, for perhaps the second time, to their paying clients.
The Top 25 Profoundly Ignored News Stories of 2009
The Best of the Worst Press Releases 2009
A modeling agency landed assignments for Rudi the cat and Enrique the dog, a dentist went to Hawaii on Boondoggle, and the head of R&D at the Hookah-Hookah Company proclaimed: “When you’re dealing with the task of emulating the taste of America’s number one snack food, there’s no fooling anybody."
Breitbart’s Sticky Situation
Andrew Breitbart has gotten himself into quite a sticky situation over a name on a list, and what he's read into it. So is it mere coincidence that, among the 132 words one can ferret out of Breitbart's name, we find the following?
Brer, Rabbit, Tar, Babe.
To quote Breitbart: what are the odds?
More ‘Wave a Dead Chicken’ Media Mumble Jumbo
More from the 'wave a dead chicken over it' school of strategic thinking:
Shoe bomber? Take off your shoes! Underwear bomber? Show us your underwear! And tomorrow, when we hear about the "Tampon Bomber" and the corresponding uptick in placement services specializing in freelance gynecologists, remember: you heard it here first.
The Superficial Hypocrite: I Know You Are But What Is Tiger Woods?
Wang has kept the +$2.7M sale of The Superficial.com to Buzz Media a secret from fans
On December 18, 2009, The Superficial.com tried serious journalism and the result was so embarrassing for them one can only hope they'll never try it again. The writer watched a 2007 video of Tiger Woods where, according to the writer, Tiger makes critical remarks about Michael Vick that proves Tiger is a hypocrite. (ESPN actually replaced originally lead in commentator with a new one prior to 're-releasing' the 2007 interview, and have since replaced the link with an ad. Sorry).
There are so many things wrong with the writer's logic in making his arguments that a separate post is required to deconstruct it. Suffice to say it went something like this:
Bulldog fell in a well.
In trying to get out, Bulldog just made the well deeper.
Tiger told Bulldog how to get out of the well without making it deeper.
One time, a weasel threatened to push Tiger in the well, but Tiger gave it a bone so it didn't.
Therefore, Tiger is a hypocrite.