Quotes and Questions 34 - 16 Dec 08

For the answers to the questions, visit my SLCN blog

Quotes:

Some people think luxury is the opposite of poverty. It is not. It is the opposite of vulgarity.
Coco Chanel

You give but little when you give of your possessions. It is when you give of yourself that you truly give.
Kahlil Gibran


Questions

1) In 1956 this was invented and began popping up in schools and stores everywhere. In 1965 a patent was granted to Noah and Joseph McVicker for a "plastic modeling composition", which was originally intended to be wallpaper cleaner. Over 2 billion cans sold since its invention in 1956. Noah McVicker shipped a box of his cleaning composition to a nearby school and it was a huge hit with both the teachers and the kids. He offered to supply all of the schools in the Cincinnati area with this new material, and after great reactions from those schools as well, his product was showcased at a national education convention. What is this substance that now comes in a huge variety of colors?

2) What is a milihelen ?

3) It is a is a broad theory that covers diverse fields from evolutionary biology to webpage design. It postulates that animals, people, even well designed machines will naturally choose the path of least resistance, and known as known as a "deterministic description of human behavior." It applies not only in the library context, but also to any information seeking activity. For example, one might consult a generalist co-worker down the hall rather than a specialist in another building, so long as the generalist's answers were within the threshold of acceptability, what is this principle called?

4) His name comes from the Old Norse meaning "All Wise" Throughout his life he maintained he could communicate with his dead twin. His only commercial was for Southern made doughnuts in 1954, and he had a pet chimp named Scatter which developed a taste for Bourbon. He collected badges from police departments including a federal narcotics badge given to him By President Nixon. His motto was TCB, and his last words were "ok, I won't" According to a 1989 news survey 7% of the American population think he is still alive- who was he?

5) Invented in 1903, and named after its, um, inventor, It usually offers abnormally high short-term returns in order to entice new investors. The perpetuation of the high returns that this advertises (and pays) requires an ever-increasing flow of money from investors in order to keep it going. The system is destined to collapse because there are little or no underlying earnings from the money received by the promoters as more investors become involved, the likelihood of the scheme coming to the attention of authorities increases. Benjamin Madoff was just convicted of defrauding people of $50 Billion dollars using it. What is it called?

6) Widely considered the Father of Haute Couture, he was an English-born fashion designer of the 19th century. He dressed the Empress Eugenie of France and actresses such as Sarah Bernhardt. Much of his work is associated with the movement to redefine the female fashionable shape, removing excessive ruffles and frills and using rich fabrics in simple but flattering outlines. He is credited as the first designer to put labels onto the clothing he manufactured and completely revolutionized the business of dressmaking. He was the first of the couturiers, dressmakers considered artists rather than mere artisans. Who was he?

7) This is nothing less than the Google News Alert service. The Google Alerts were first beta'd in August of 2003. Just a quarter of a century after this famous writer published the idea in 1978 in his book Fountains of paradise. It is a A set of topics about which you would like to hear the latest news; and Arthur C. Clarke set this up for an engineer who wanted to make sure that his computer searched for what he needed in the flood of global news items. What did Clarke call it?

8)It is the brightest star in the constellation Piscis Austrinus and one of the brightest stars in the sky. Its name means "mouth of the whale" in Arabic, and holds a special significance. It is surrounded by a debris disk of dust and in November of this year astronomers announced the discovery of an extra solar planet orbiting just inside the debris ring. This was the first extra solar planet to be seen with visible light, captured by the Hubble Space Telescope. What is this star called?

9) During the World War II Battle of Berlin in 1945, a dozen of the many superheroes and masked crimefighters of that era are ambushed by Nazis in the basement of an SS building, where the heroes are gassed and placed into cryogenic suspension for later experimentation, but the building is air bombed soon after and anyone aware of their situation is killed. In the present day, construction workers find this bunker, and the they are revived. Put into the care of the U.S. military, they are housed together in a mansion where they receive counseling and support, are gradually made to understand that decades have passed, and are offered a role as heroes in the 21st century, Singularly they were The Blue Blade, The Black Widow , Captain Wonder, Dynamic Man, Electro, The Fiery Mask, The Laughing Mask, Master Mind Excello, Mister E, The Phantom Reporter, Rockman, and The Witness. What were they known collectively as? Not the US house of Representatives.

10) He is a Polish writer known for his satiric, philosophical and science fictional works. His studies of medicine were interrupted by WWII; he worked as a car mechanic and welder, and was a member of the resistance against the Nazis. Highly critical of American pulp sci-fi literature, he considers his own work to be more mainstream literature. His books have sold over 27 million copies and have been translated into 40 languages, making him one of the most widely read sf authors. In his book Return Form the Stars he had a Sky Ceiling - long before Hogwarts, and spray on clothing, as well as Parastatics Means of completely eliminating injury in vehicles during crashes. Who was he?

11) These pictures are called "of the floating world", is a genre of Japanese woodblock prints paintings produced between the 17th and the 20th centuries, featuring motifs of landscapes, tales from history, the theatre and pleasure quarters. It is the main artistic genre of woodblock printing in Japan, flourishing in the old Edo capital. The "floating world" refers to the impetuous urban culture that bloomed and was a world unto itself. Although the traditional classes of Japanese society were bound by numerous strictures and prohibitions, the rising merchant class was relatively unregulated, therefore "floating." Hokusai, Utamaru and Hiroshige are among the more famous of these artists. What is it known as in Japanese?

12) The word has also been applied in Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, as a form of motion picture that provides the sensation of touch in addition to sight and sound. A device that adds the tactile element to entertainment. We still don't have them here, but might some day. What was this super sensation kind of movie called?

13) The Maccabees successfully rebelled against their oppressors. According to the Talmud, at the re-dedication following the victory of the Maccabees over the Seleucid Empire, there was only enough consecrated olive oil to fuel the eternal flame in the Temple for one day. Miraculously, the oil burned for eight days, which was the length of time it took to press, prepare and consecrate fresh olive oil. A miracle, Hanukah is the festival of lights called. What is the one song associated with this Holiday?

14)It is the ability of some materials (notably crystals and certain ceramics, including bone) to generate an electric response by applied mechanical stress. This may take the form of a separation of electric charge across the crystal lattice. If the material is not short-circuited, the applied charge induces a voltage across the material. The word is derived from the Greek which means to squeeze or press.. The effect finds useful applications such as the production and detection of sound, generation of high voltages, electronic frequency generation, and is also the basis of a number of scientific instrumental techniques with atomic resolution, , and everyday uses such as acting as the ignition source for cigarette lighters and push-start propane barbecues. What is this called?

15) This was a mystery religion which became popular among the military in the Roman Empire, from the 1st to 4th centuries From Rome to Britain to the Danube, he had worshippers, The religion was passed from initiate to initiate, not based on a body of scripture, and hence hasvery little written evidence which survives. Religious practice was centered on an adapted or artificial cave or cavern. And the tauroctony, an artistic depiction of the mythic hero and shows him engaged in the ritual slaying of a bull most likely a symbolic representation of the constellations, and the precession of the equinoxes, The identification of some constellations in his portrayal is clear enough: the bull is Taurus, the serpent Hydra, the dog Canis Major or Minor, the crow or raven Corvus, the goblet Crater, and the lion Leo, His bronze image emerging from an egg-shaped zodiac ring was found along Hadrian's Wall (now at the University of Newcastle). An inscription from the city of Rome suggests that he may have been seen as the Orphic creator-god Phanes who emerged from the world egg at the beginning of time, bringing the universe into existence. He was said to have been born on December 25, even Isaac Newton argued that the date of Christmas was selected to correspond with the winter solstice. Who was this god.?

Quotes and Questions 33 - 9 Dec 08

For the answers to the questions, visit my SLCN blog

Quotes

Give me the liberty to know, to think, to believe, and to utter freely according to conscience, above all other liberties.
Milton

Oftentimes the test of courage becomes rather to live than to die.
Alfieri


Questions

1) In Silence of the lambs Hannibal Lecter spoke of eating fava beans with a nice Chianti. The philosopher Pythagoras, would not let his followers eat fava beans because he believed they contained what?

2) Besides writing novel such as Lolita, Vladimar Nabakov was a lepidopterist, and discovered several new species of this, including one named Nabakovs pug. What did he discover?

3) It starts out life as a male and changes back and forth between the 2 sexes as its life progresses. In 1868, Maryland instituted a police force to enforce laws pertaining to them. One species in Jamaica grows on trees, and Boyd Bolut in set a new world record in 2003 by eating 18 dozen in ten minutes in one of the majors in the International federation of competitive eating circuits. A baby one is called a spat. What is it?

4) The first book published by this famous author was "the Duties of Clerks of Petty Sessions in Ireland", not his most famous book. When the ministry of tourism of Romania wanted to build a theme park of with the name of this famous book, they were told the rights to the name was held by Universal Studios. When President Ceausescu was in charge of continental Romania all mention of this name was banned. What name is it?

5)He was a French Enlightenment writer, essayist, and philosopher known for his wit, and defense of civil liberties, including freedom of religion and free trade. A prolific writer, and produced works in almost every literary form, authoring plays, poetry, novels, essays, historical and scientific works, over 20,000 letters and over two thousand books and pamphlets. He is credited with saying "I detest what you write, but I would give my life to make it possible for you to continue to write. & "If God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent him", and of course- "this is the best of all possible worlds, "a phrase he gave a famous character of his Dr. Pangloss. Supposed Allegedly 5' 3 "and drinker of 50 cups of coffee a day.. Who was he?

6) A French stage actress, and has been referred to as "the most famous actress in the history of the world" Although primarily a stage actress, she made several cylinders and discs of famous dialogues from various productions. One of the earliest was a reading from Phèdre by Jean Racine, at Thomas Edison's home on a visit to New York City in the 1880s. She slept in a coffin, was a courtesan and supposedly a notorious liar. And she was one of the pioneer silent movie actresses, debuting as Hamlet in the two minute long film Le Duel d'Hamlet in 1900. (Technically, this was not a silent film, as it had an accompanying Edison cylinder with sound effects. In 1905, while performing in Rio de Janeiro, she injured her right knee when she was required to leap from a high wall. The leg never healed properly. By 1915, gangrene had set in and her entire right leg was amputated, She performed in a wheelchair until her death. Who was she?

7) In 1835 he began as a showman with his purchase and exhibition of a blind and almost completely paralyzed slave woman, Joice Heth, claimed b to have been the nurse of George Washington, and to be over 160, she wasn't even 80. By the 1840s, he was operating an entertainment complex in lower Manhattan.. The roof was transformed to a strolling garden with a view of the city, where hot-air balloon rides were launched daily. To the static exhibits of stuffed animals were added a changing series of live acts and "curiosities", including albinos, giants, midgets, "fat boys", jugglers, magicians, "exotic women", detailed models of cities and famous battles, and eventually a menagerie of animals. He introduced his first major hoax, the "Fejee" mermaid, it was a tail of a fish and the head of a monkey. He justified his hoaxes or "humbugs" as "advertisements to draw attention...to the Museum. I don't believe in duping the public, but I believe in first attracting and then pleasing them.". He also reportedly offered to pay Bernhard 10,000 to show off her amputated leg. She refused. Who was he?

8) It was invented in 1834 in England by William Horner. He called it the 'Daedalum' ('the wheel of the devil). It didn't become popular until the 1860s, when it was patented by makers in both England and America. The American developer, William F. Lincoln, named his toy this, which means 'wheel of life'. It is s a device that produces an illusion of action from a rapid succession of static pictures. It consists of a cylinder with slits cut vertically in the sides. Beneath the slits on the inner surface of the cylinder is a band which has either individual frames from a video/film or images from a set of sequenced drawings or photographs. what is it?

9) The brothers stated that "the cinema is an invention without any future" and declined to sell their camera to other filmmakers. They turned their attention to photography, where many of their inventions of the 20th century are under the name Ilford, with whom they merged. However- They patented a number of significant processes leading up to their film camera - most notably film perforations as a means of advancing the film through the camera and projector. Their first public screening of films at which admission was charged was held in, 1895, at Paris's Salon Indien du Grand Café. This history-making presentation featured ten short films, including their first film, They are credited with making some of the first movies ever shown, who were they?

10) Its pre-history began in 1975, when Warner Cable launched the first two-way interactive cable TV system, Qube, in Columbus, Ohio.The Qube system offered many specialized channels, including a children's channel called Pinwheel which would later become Nickelodeon. One of these specialized channels was Sight On Sound, a music channel that featured concert footage and music oriented TV programs; with the interactive Qube service, viewers could vote for their favorite songs and artists. It launched On August 1, 1981, at 12:01 a.m., with the words "Ladies and gentlemen, rock and roll," spoken by John Lack. Yes, it is MTV. What was the first video ever played on the channel?

11) Products of the Yoshida Kogyo Kabushibibaisha or YKK group are used by probably every member of the outworld audience and those of you in real life too. YKK claims to be the first company of its kind to promote environmental protection measures. And has developed a line of environmentally friendly products, following the company's philosophy "The Cycle of Goodness" which means that one prospers when the person renders benefit to others. Where do you see the initials YKK everyday?

12) On this Saturnian moon, jets of powdery snow and water vapor, laden with organic compounds, vent from the "tiger stripes," warm gashes in the surface. How can a body just over 500 kilometers across sustain such vigorous activity? The answer may be the presence of underground fluids, perhaps a sea, which would increase the efficiency of heating by tidal effects. Support for this idea has come from recent flybys. If has liquid water, it joins Mars and Jupiter's moon Europa as one of the prime places in the solar system to look for extraterrestrial life. What is the name of this moon.

13) This is an almond-shaped and size portion of the brain which helps us decide whether to fight, take flight or simply be afraid. Scientists also believe it helps form long-term memories, especially those tied to strong emotions. What part of the brain is often referred to as the "fear center?"

14) ) His prototype was created from a green ladies' coat that his creators mother had thrown into a waste bin, and he had two ping pong balls for eyes.and 11 ponts on his collar. He has made numerous guest appearances on popular television shows, including co-hosting individual episodes of a number of long-running talk shows: On April 2, 1979, he guest-hosted The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson, and as an April Fool's joke, he hosted CNN's Larry King Live in 1994 and interviewed Hulk Hogan. According to his autobiography, at the age of 12, he was the first of his siblings to leave the swamp, and one of the first frogs to talk to humans. Who is he?

15) This Chinese emperor, responsible for the first grand unification of china, is responsible for such famous projects as the terra cotta army, and the first phase of the great wall. He is suspected to have died well before his time, due to his alchemists and apothecaries prescribing balms and potions for his health whose main ingredient was quicksilver, later renamed mercury, which was, at the time, seen as a cure-all wonder drug of the ultra-elite.

Quotes and Questions 32 - 2 Dec 08

For the answers to the questions, visit my SLCN blog here

Quotes

Men can only be happy when they do not assume that the object of life is happiness.
George Orwell

I pick my favourite quotations and store them in my mind as ready armour, offensive or defensive, amid the struggle of this turbulent existence.
Robert Burns

Questions

1) In 1922, this inventor approached Lenin with a strange looking box featuring two protruding antennas. By moving his hands near the antennas, this man could create sounds of varying pitch and volume. The "aetherphone", appeared in a number of widely publicized and critically acclaimed concerts throughout Europe and the United States in the 1920s and 1930s, and is immortalized in the songs of the Rolling Stones and Led Zeppelin, the movies The Day The Earth Stood Still and The Thing, and the opening theme from The Outer Limits. Name the inventor or the more widely used name of the aetehrphone.

2) Gold leafing vehicles isn't new - the Egyptians mastered the technique more than 3000 years ago and Tutankhamen's chariot was decorated with gold leaves. Gold plating your car is however, new and a sure-fire way to differentiate your ride. London-based Alchemist created a unique 24-carat gold and platinum-leafed what for the recent MPH Prestige and Performance Motor Show at London's Earls Court? The car, also features seven diamonds in its bodywork.

3) The show- "Batboy the musical" was inspired by a story from what publication?

4) Van Gogh sliced off part of his ear, his left one, after an argument with this man. Thinking he would find him at a brothel, he went there to present it to him. Not finding him there, he gave it a prostitute named Rachel. The man with whom van Gogh had the argument, was once a stockbroker, and later on became a leading post-impressionist painter. His style paved the way to primitivism as well. He spent nine weeks painting in Arles, Vincent Van Gogh, in 1888. He died at age 54. Who was he?

5) When he graduated from high school in 1917, he chose journalism instead of college and spent seven months as a newspaper reporter. While driving a Red Cross ambulance in Italy in 1918 he was severely wounded by shrapnel. Who was he?

6) In an interview with H.G. Wells, Stalin said "Education is a weapon whose effects depend on who holds it in his hands and at whom it is aimed." To keep scientists firmly in his grasp, and research constantly focused on harming his enemies, Stalin created a type of labor camp where the great minds of the USSR were indefinitely detained to work on scientific projects for the state. Inmate Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn gave the camp a t title, based on Dante's description of hell: the "First Circle". Due to the practice of attributing research there to well-known Russian scientists, many of the masterminds behind Russia's cold war scientific breakthroughs will remain lost to history. What was the labor camp called?

7) Inspired by an unflattering baby photo of himself, what cartoon character did Bob Clampett create in 1942? Originally, started out as an aggressive, mean-spirited, pink-feathered bird named Orson who tormented two cats based on the popular comedy team Abbot and Costello. He went on to become the first Warner Brothers cartoon to win an Oscar.

8) Members of Pasadena's Valley Hunt Club first staged the parade of roses in 1890. Since then the Parade has been held in Pasadena every New Year's Day, except when January 1 falls on a Sunday. This exception was instituted in 1893. this "Never on Sunday" policy was instituted why?

9) When two bodies that hold electrical charge are in proximity, they create an electric field – a phenomenon Theremin used in the 1920s to create the Radio Watchman, a device that was able to identify the approach of the human body using a sensor. Theremin invented and patented the motion detector at the request of Lenin, and dedicated the early part of his career to exploring applications of the amount of electrical charge able to be held by a body. What is this phenomena called?

10) What civil rights leader did Dorothy Parker leave the bulk of her estate to?

11) Elvis was in 33 films, and his favorite "King Creole," which was filmed just before he entered the Army in 1958. He also won 3 Grammy's in what category?

12) Who said: "I'm the President of the United States and I'm not going to eat any more broccolis"?

13) Although it first appeared in comic form in 1996, it really became a huge hit with the release of a 27-episode television series and a collectible card game where they could duel like their favorite characters. Some duelists have paid thousands of dollars for a single card on auction web sites such as eBay. What is this called?

14) This London club's sole requirement for membership is "a hirsute appendage of the upper lip and with graspable extremities"; beards are absolutely forbidden. The club engages in activism to assuage discrimination as well as competitive facial hair tourneys, and has inspired the foundation of transatlantic and Scandinavian counterparts. The club declares itself to be at war with a society that demands people choose "the bland, the boring and the generic";[ a club chant includes the proposition that being kissed by a smooth face is akin to "meat without the salt" What is the club called?

15) The worlds first were gas powered contraptions were erected in 1868 to make it easier for ministers of parliament to reach the house of commons. They were controlled by a lever operated by a police constable. One month later they exploded causing injury to several policemen. It took half a century before Britain put trust in them again. What are they?

Quotes - 25 Nov 08

“The optimist thinks this is the best of all possible worlds. The pessimist fears it is true.”
J. Robert Oppenheimer

“Beauty is no quality in things themselves. It exists merely in the mind which contemplates them.”
David Hume

Quotes - 18 Nov 08

“Only a mediocre person is always at his best.”
W. Somerset Maugham

“You must have been warned against letting the golden hours slip by; but some of them are golden only because we let them slip by. “
James M. Barrie

The Slews - 7/15

Lights dim and music swells….From the top of what rises in the east to the bottom of what falls in the west, covering the metaplace, the marketplace and wherever else inquiring minds are…..This…Is…The>…Slews!

P: Good evening Second Nation & here now The Slews

P: Astronomers say that Saturn’s rings will disappear from view on Earth on September 4, 2009. That is officially before the 2009 SecondLife Convention, think we know where they are heading?

H: No Pooky, The gases, ice, and rocky material that make up the rings will remain in place, but be invisible from the vantage point of Earth, as they do about every fifteen years. The rings are so thin that stargazers will be unable to see them through small telescopes.

P: I always wondered, What are Saturn’s rings made of? Light? Gases? Water and ice? Rock and debris?

H: Rocks to boulder size objects, even up to small minivan size objects, all in orbit around Saturn, & at how many gallons per mile, that takes some Lindens to get there.

P: Until now, astronomers have failed to identify where asteroids come from, because of what happens after the meteorites are ejected from their asteroidal parent body.
Most of the meteorites that we collect on Earth come from the main belt between Mars and Jupiter

H: . Why do we want to know this? Meteorites are a major tool for knowing the history of the solar system because their composition is a record of past geology that occurred while they were still incorporated in the parent asteroid.. Like when I used to live at home.

P: Undersea volcanic rocks offer vast repository for greenhouse gas, says study A group of scientists has used deep ocean-floor drilling and experiments to show that volcanic rocks off the West Coast and elsewhere might be used to securely imprison huge amounts of globe-warming carbon dioxide captured from power plants or other sources.

H: In particular, they say that natural chemical reactions under 30,000 square miles of ocean floor off California, Oregon, Washington and British Columbia could lock in as much as 150 years of US CO2 production.

P: Research scientists have now presented a new generation of household robots, the “Care-O-bot® 3”. Stereo-vision color cameras, laser scanners and a 3-D range camera enable Care-O-bot® 3 to register its surroundings in three dimensions in real time. Just like in SecondLife, but I will smack anyone who calls me their robot!

H: If a person moves into the radius of its arm, it stops moving. Another feature of the small, flexible helper is that it can move in any direction. It can also learn to recognize new objects. The user simply places the unfamiliar object in the robot’s hand so that it can gain a three-dimensional impression of the item.

P: However, the new robot does not look like a human being. humanoid service robots were deliberately moved away from, when we designing Care-O-bot® 3,” But can they hold a human hand? Never mind a human heart?

H: A U.S. watch list of terrorism suspects has passed 1 million records, corresponding to about 400,000 people, and a leading civil rights group said on Monday the number was far too high to be effective.

P: President George W. Bush ordered in the current list in September 2003 as a way to wrap several growing terrorism watchlists into a single government database compiled and overseen by the FBI, through a Terrorist Screening Center. Now is we could only get them all into a social network that would be an instant 1 million registered users.

H: Telescopes looking back in time to more than 12 billion years ago have spotted a star factory — a galaxy producing so many new stars that they have nicknamed it the “baby boom” galaxy.

P:The remote galaxy is — or was — pumping out stars at a rate of up to 4,000 per year. In comparison, our own Milky Way galaxy gives birth to an average of just 10 stars per year.This galaxy is undergoing a major baby boom, producing most of its stars all at once,

H: If our human population was produced in a similar boom, then almost all of the people alive today would be the same age.

P: Speaking of babies - A baby’s smile does more than warm a mother’s heart — it also lights up the reward centers of her brain, according to the results of a brain imaging study. The investigators found that when the mothers saw their own infants’ faces, key areas of the brain associated with reward lit up during the scans, suggesting increased blood flow to that area.

H: These are areas that have been activated in other experiments associated with drug addiction, or SecondLife addiction.

P: Cymbals don’t clash of their own accord – in our world, anyway and diaper spelt backwards is repaid. But the quantum world is bizarrely different. Two metal plates, placed almost infinitesimally close together, spontaneously attract each other.

H: What seems like magic is known as the Casimir force, and it has been well-documented in experiments. The cause goes to the heart of quantum physics: Seemingly empty space is not actually empty but contains virtual particles associated with fluctuating electromagnetic fields.

P: However, only virtual particles of shorter wavelengths — in the quantum world, particles exist simultaneously as waves — can fit into the space between the plates, so that the outward pressure is slightly smaller than the inward pressure. The result is the plates are forced together. What about virtual plates?

H: Now, tiny “microelectromechanical” systems — so-called MEMS devices that are already used in a wide array of consumer products — become so small they are affected by quantum forces. More specifically, the finding could one day help reduce what MEMS engineers call “stiction” — when two very small, very close objects tend to stick together.

P: how small do you have to get to be Stuck on you? A new report is the first to describe the principles behind the stability and electronic properties of tiny nanoclusters of metallic gold. The study, which confirms the “divide and protect” bonding structure, resulted from the work of researchers at four universities on two continents.

H: In the Heart of Gold effect – this Study reveals principles behind stability and electronic properties of gold nanoclusters that confirms ‘divide and protect’ bonding structure.

P: BabyCenter.com has launched a social network for what it calls “the largest parenting community online.” many blogs and matching with people who share common interests or childrens’ ages, and tag photos and profiles.

H: I am bit suspicious of anyone who shares that much common interest with a child. But the moms just keep on coming! New moms and pregnant women have over 109 word-of-mouth conversations per week about products, services, and brands, most of them positive and considered highly credible by other moms,

P: Nielsen is expected to announce its long-awaited new service that will deliver standardized metrics for out-of-home video networks. It will deliver free reports to agency clients,

H: Speaking of which, The world’s largest digital sign - commissioned by Walgreens - is nearly completed in Times Square. The sign, which is comprised of 23 synchronized digital screens to create a solid animation, wraps three sides of a 25-story T the building from which the New Year’s Eve ball is dropped.

P: Weighing in at 250,000 pounds, it spans 43,720 square feet making it significantly larger than the old champion from NASDAQ, which covers just 11,000 square feet.

H: More Out of Home marketing! A futuristic, inflatable, transformer-style giant graced New York’s Times Square yesterday. The 60-foot gift monster is heading to Phoenix today, to take its place outside of the University of Phoenix stadium where the Super Bowl will be played in two weeks.

P: In response to the complaints of a pastor of a church in Times Square, a New York state Supreme Court Justice has ordered a temporary restraining order against a company that proposed to put up ads that would have shown naked bottoms with smiley faces.

H: The advertisements for the Washlet - a bidet-toilet seat that uses warm water and air - were to go up July 1 for 30 days on the two sides of the building that houses the nondenominational church.

P: Storage vendors are scrambling to keep up with the demand from Hollywood special-effects houses and surveillance companies. Digital video storage is the single fastest-growing sector in the storage industry and it is being driven by the demand from filmmakers and security companies, both producing thousands of hours of video that needs to be held indefinitely;

H: The first iPhones won praise for their sleek design and elegant touchscreen, but Apple’s latest will be celebrated for the software applications it enables. & sold a million over the weekend.

P: Last weekend there was, an ultra technorati blowout generously sponsored by the folks at O’Reilly Media at their spacious campus in Sebastapol Among them were folk from Get Satisfaction, a site that fosters dialog between companies and their customers. You post questions there, offer advice to others, and when it’s something company employees can address, they respond.

H: Linden Lab also has a Get Satisfaction company listing, with five Lindens interacting. A bit like JIRA, the Lindens’ feature tracking software, but way more user-friendly– and perhaps just as important, publicly viewable.

P: It’s a family Affair! Night Morrisey has a fascinating and keenly observed profile of a Second Life family, seven adult-age Residents who roleplay as a caring nuclear household, with a mother and father, and five kids. I bet there is a lot of smiling going on.

H: The details of their virtual domestic life are intriguing, especially as they relate to their real world identities. MOM & DAD have accumulated I mean adopted, the children, and even extendplay into their real lives with telephone calls- I am sorry Pooky but I think I’m just going to call that a real relationship

P: The mom remembers when her smallest was “three days old, and looked it. So I took him shopping, then home - I wouldn’t take him home with noob hair!”
but he didn’t intentionally become a kid, “I started playing with the slider settings and without realizing it I was making my av smaller and smaller, and it felt more natural to me. He bumped into other kids on a playground my first day as a boy and the other kids there were picked up by their mother, and I immediately knew I had to have that same thing.”

H: I got mine from slexchange, she’s a beauty. And cleans up better than a robot. Will virtual diapers be that far in the future?

P: diaper spelt backwards is..

H: Okay Pooky, we know…..Today was the Tour of the IBM Virtual Green Data Center
& IBM has announced it has accomplished virtual teleportation. That’s correct. The company known as the world leader in supercomputing teamed up with Second Life to make sure that users of virtual worlds can “teleport” their avatars between them.

P: “Teleporting an avatar between platforms has the potential to have a significant impact on the future of virtual worlds. An open standard for interoperability would allow users to cross freely from one world to another in a seamless transfer, just as they can go from one Web site to another on the Internet today.”

H: while Developing this protocol is a key milestone and has the potential to push virtual worlds into the next stage of their evolution.so is getting the teleportation device that transports a real human into Second Life as an avatar, that just might be very worthwhile.

P: I thought that was called logging in? The “Partner” option in Second Life enables you to list another Resident as such in your avatar profile (if that person accepts your proposal, that is), and doing so is a bargain deal, literally costing pennies: listing cost is $L10 (around 3.7 US cents), and L$25, if the couple decides to get divorced. but who gets the kids?

H: The designation means different things to different Residents. Sometimes it’s just romantic roleplay. For others, it’s a connection that’s real in some meaningful way. (The Linden Partner page acknowledges as much, offering it as an option for partnerships that certain real world governments forbid: “Can’t be married in real life? Try Second Life!”)

P: What about polygamy? Is that legal here? Recently CeNedra Rivera ran a survey on her blog, asking “What does ‘Partner’ mean to you in SL?”, 27% said nothing I will never get partnered here, and you dont have to be married to get virtually pregnant either.

H: In other virtual headlines – yes Lively reminds me of something like IMVU, an instant messaging program that enables 3D avatar chat, in that it provides off-the-shelf avatars with teen appeal for socializing.

P: However, imagine if Google Earth became a portal to other virtual spaces. If you were in business mode, you could fly in via Google Earth to check the name of that company whose building you keep driving past, find its real-world buildings, use them to launch its webpage, and then enter its Lively virtual space to interact with some real employees.

H: As a tourist, you could fly into New York, check out the hotels in the area near where your friends live, and then fly your avatar into the hotel’s Lively space to talk to someone about getting a deal on a weekend break.

P: It’s this integration of 2D and 3D which is so powerful, and Google, which dominates the world’s text-based information and has hell of a leg up in 3D via Google Earth, seems to me well placed to create the ultimate mash-up of real and virtual world content. It will be interesting to see how Lively develops, but for now, we don’t need another stand alone virtual space: the real magic will happen when these worlds start to collide.

H: And The perception of most business people (if they’ve even heard of virtual worlds) is that virtual worlds are games. It’s hard for many business people to imagine using them for work.

P: . But with large companies like Diageo, Unilever, BP, IBM and others using virtual worlds the case studies will start to come out and perception will gradually change.”

H: A Gartner report shows that 90% of corporate attempts to use virtual worlds fail within the first 18 months. Despite this finding, Gartner says that virtual worlds could still play a vital role in the future with 70% of organizations developing a private internal virtual world by 2012.

P: The projects so often fail either because they are launched for the wrong reasons

H: for the cool factor or to keep up with competitors, or because they replaced the bright sociable go-getter with the IT guy who has the personality of a mushroom.

P: or because marketers don’t understand at a fundamental level how virtual worlds are different from the rest of the Web (the pages that compose the “2-D Internet”).

H: “Realistic graphics and physical behavior count for little unless the presence is valued by and engaging to a large audience. and unless they smile Pooky, at least somewhere deep inside.

P: yeah & certainly if you don’t have to clean up your room. And that…it…the …slews!

The Slews - July 8th - Pooky & Hydra

Lights dim music swells..from the top of my head to the tip of my tongue,,covering this
Once in a lifetime..beat that will go on in ways too persistent to remember…this….is….The….Slews
P: And good evening Second Nation, Here now The Slews!

H:A boa noite, e é aqui os pântanos

P: Scientists use the Big Byrd Green Bank Telescope to go fishing in a rich molecular cloud in our Milky Way. Seeking to discover new, complex molecules in interstellar space that may be precursors to life. Always that search for life, why don’t they try Google?

H: As molecules rotate and vibrate, they emit radio waves at specific frequencies. Each molecule has a unique pattern of such frequencies, called spectral lines, that constitutes a “fingerprint” . We tune in, and gotcha!

P: For centuries, sailors in the Indian Ocean have told stories of seas glowing with a dim, white light at night. Satellite images now confirm the appearance of what seem to be bioluminescent bacteria, right where a ship’s crew reported seeing the “milky seas” 11 years ago.

H: Scientists say this rare phenomenon could be a way for the bacteria to attract the attention of fish so they can enter their guts and live there. I don’t know about you Pooky, but I don’t eat anything that glows in the dark.

P: Plotting the ship’s course, and then, there it was on the satellite image… “It was one of those chill-down-the-spine moments that you hope to get once or twice in your career,” Scientests said.

H: Yeah like when you eat something that glows in the dark How many bacteria would it take to light up the seas?

P: Four billion trillion.

H: Lets just say a Google. Letting your imagination run away with you may actually influence how you see the world. New research from Vanderbilt University has found that mental imagery—what we see with the “mind’s eye”—directly impacts our visual perception.

P: Imagery leads to a short-term memory trace can bias future perception, definitively showing that imagining something changes vision both while you are imagining it and later on.” Top-down expectations or recollections of previous experiences might shape perception itself.”

H: As long as you didn’t say topless Pooky. And this just in… “Animals wings, unlike propellers, have to keep stopping and starting in order produce lift”" (animals have forgotten to invent propellers, just as they forgot wheels), New research is centering on the compromise winged creatures face between meeting aerodynamic requirements and overcoming inertia in order to generate lift.

P: In the name of science researchers in England are loading wings of racing pigeons with lead fishing weights. This, Dr. Underwood believes should act as a reminder to be cautious in copying nature. There is lots of interest in making micro/unmanned air vehicles that flap, hoping they present all sorts of advantages in terms of maneuverability, speed and so on.

H: He also goes on to say there is a tendency to presume that biology is efficient, and I would say that, even at very small sizes, if you want to hover efficiently, be a helicopter not a flapper…” I would like to see someone put lead weights in his underwear and see how far he gets.

P: In Einstein’s relativistic universe, matter curves space and slows down time, and the speed of light remains the only constant. But those are the big effects. The theory of relativity also includes some more esoteric details, one of which is called spin precession.

H: The idea goes like this: Two massive bodies orbiting near each other will warp space enough to disturb the central axis around which both are moving, causing them to begin wobbling just like spinning tops. Strong gravity creates this so-called precession, and the more massive the objects, the easier the precession is to observe.

P: It’s not an easy theory to test. The lack of candidates and telescopic power had frustrated astronomers for years, until the discovery in 2003 of a particular pair of pulsars. Most important in this case, one pulsar eclipses the other briefly every couple of hours. That’s key to detecting precession, because during each eclipse astronomers can determine the precise angle of the radio signal and therefore the pulsar’s wobble over time.

H: Calculations based on Einstein’s theory predicted it should advance by 5.07 degrees per year, well within the margin of error. “It’s bang-on,” says astrophysicist and Nobel laureate Joseph Taylor of Princeton University. “Einstein’s theory passed the test this time,” agrees astrophysicist Fotis Gavriil of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, who praises the study’s “amazing high-precision measurement.” So is Einstein’s reputation secure? Says Gavriil, “Only with experiments like this will we know for sure.”

P: Put some lead weights on him…and see if he flys…Martian soil data collected by five robotic missions indicates that rain fell on the Red Planet billions of years ago. The findings provide no new insight into the possibility of Martian life,(again) but they do suggest that further clues to Mars’s past could be found right here on Earth.

H: There’s little doubt now that Mars once was wet. Yes but did it glow in the dark? less than 2 weeks ago, the Phoenix Mars Lander struck water ice while digging at the north polar region. What remains to be determined is where this wetness came from and how long it lasted.

P: Preliminary investigations by Mars mission scientists, as well as high-resolution images taken by orbiters, have suggested that water on Mars surged up from deep below the surface, sometimes carving extensive channels and gullies, However ther are also indications of rain by studying our own planet’s geochemistry.

H: Analyzing soil samples show a distinctive pattern of chloride and sulfate deposits. In all of the samples, the data show that the sulfates tend to stay nearer to the surface, whereas chloride concentrations increase with depth. That’s the same pattern found in extremely arid places on Earth such as Antarctica’s dry-valley regions and Chile’s Atacama Desert.

P: More than a year after taking a hallucinogenic drug in a carefully controlled experiment, most people rate the experience among the most personally meaningful and spiritually significant of their lives, researchers reported in the Journal of Psychopharmacology. Such findings are helping to renew interest in research with hallucinogens, a field whose reputation long suffered from the psychedelic excesses of the 1960s. When people glowed in the dark with alarming frequency.

H: The researchers monitored the mostly middle-aged subjects while they took a strong dose of psilocybin, the active ingredient in hallucinogenic mushrooms. All of the volunteers had indicated at least some participation in religious or spiritual activities–such as meditating or going to church–and the researchers instructed them to direct their attention inward while under the drug’s sway.

P:None had previous experience with hallucinogens. Over a year later, people continued to rate their 8-hour experience in the lab as similar in significance to life events such as the birth of a first child.

H: A giant rubber snake could be the future of renewable energy. The rippling “Anaconda” produces electricity as it is squeezed by passing waves. Its developers say it would produce more energy than existing wave-energy devices and be cheaper to maintain.

P: I think it might have been part of that Pslocybin experiment. Retired physicist Francis Farley and Rod Rainey dreamed up a flexible tube filled with seawater and sealed at both ends like a giant sausage. The structure streams out in the waves like a windsock pushed by the wind.

H: The passage of each wave squeezes the rubber and produces a bulging pressure wave that travels down its length. When the bulge reaches the end it sets turbines spinning to generate electricity. That reminds me of something but I am not going to say what.

P: IF YOU were unfortunate enough to experience one of the universe’s most powerful explosions up close, you would certainly be doomed. But would the blast obliterate you with jets like something from a flamethrower or with cannonball-like projectiles of plasma? We thought we knew the answer, but now the picture is not so clear.

H: Gamma-ray bursts the most violent explosions in the cosmos, are intense flashes of high-energy radiation. The shorter bursts probably happen when a neutron star collides with another neutron star or a black hole. More protracted bursts release so much energy that only one type of event is thought capable of producing them - the collapse of a massive star’s core to form a black hole or neutron star
.
P: Or the collapse of the news as we knew it. The value of 11 newspaper groups that have traded publicly since 2005 plummeted a combined $23.7 billion in the first half of this year. The value fell nearly as much in six months as it had in the three previous years put together,

H: But there is hope in the newspaper galaxy because, In developing countries, newspapers are booming, with circulation increasing in some cases in the double digits, despite the fact that the medium faces near-constant predictions of doom in the U.S. and Europe.

P: Rising literacy rates and an increase in disposable income are helping boost newspaper readership. Anyone who can read or write is still looked at with a bit of awe [in many markets in India.] When people first learn how to read, they want to let people know, and the first thing you want to do is be seen to be reading a newspaper.

H: WSJ.com’s traffic soared an impressive 94 percent in June compared to the same month last year, according to the company’s internal traffic numbers.Rupert Murdoch plans to make access to the Wall Street Journal’s website free. The move will be able to bring in more advertising, as instead of having 1 million subscribers, it will have “at least 10 million to 15 million, in every corner of the earth,” he said.

P: At a meeting with about a dozen senior members of AOL’s staff very recently, Jeff Bewkes, CEO left at least one member of management with the impression that the company is for sale, a source close to the company says.

H: If Twitter had a P2P payments system in place today, it would become the most used mobile payments system overnight. Having the ability to send a message like “p innonate $5″ for that beer I just bought you”, would integrate seamlessly with the way Twitter’s users already interact with their system.

P: Layering on a payments system would not only make the feature instantly used, it would position Twitter to revolutionize how money is collected and exchanged on the Internet. (Think of what Twitter’s done for flashmobs and how it could effect fundraising.)

H: The Senate Commerce Committee’s has rescheduled its online behavioral targeting hearing for July 9. On the eve of the hearing, Public Knowledge, Free Press and the Center for Democracy and Technology will hold a debate contesting the safety of behavioral targeting, It might be putting the Cart before the horse though.

P: One-third of marketers say there are no written goals of any kind guiding marketing strategy. But as marketers begin developing metrics that help plan for future marketing, they are focusing on a variety of measures: brand and customer equity models, predictive models for direct response, working to understand the offline impact of online advertising, and working to understand the impact of experiential marketing.

H: Stop the presses! Word-of-mouth (WOM) happens during actual conversations! Those taking place in person and over the phone are overwhelmingly more prevalent than those online Specifically, content from a spouse, relative or best friend is rated more believable when it is shared offline, either by phone or face to face, than online - via email, text messaging or blogs.

P: Apparently, the value of eye contact, voice and perhaps even nonverbal communication provides a boost to credibility and to the likelihood that we’ll do something about what we’ve learned,” I wonder how the metetrics track for WOM on SL?

H: Especially now that our lips move? Google scored a legal victory in keeping its search source code secret from Viacom, but YouTube users were not so fortunate with their privacy. Well if you put it on youTube, how private is it?

P: A federal judge ruled on Wednesday that the search giant doesn’t have to turn over the code to Viacom, which filed a $1 billion copyright infringement lawsuit against Google in 2007. In granting Google’s motion for a protective order, U.S. District Judge Louis L. Stanton in Manhattan agreed with Google’s characterization of the source code as a trade secret that can’t be disclosed without risking the loss of business.

H: New research from Nielsen tracks the top ten sites in the UK in average monthly minutes. There aren’t any virtual worlds on the list–MSN Search, eBay, and Facebook take the top slots–but Club Penguin and Second Life make the up-and-coming list.

P: Tracking their usage minutes from May 2007 to May 2008, Nielsen reports that Club Penguin grew 82% from 23 million minutes to 42 million while Second Life grew a whopping 137% from 125 million minutes to 296 million. My Club Penguin account is UberWaddle.

H: We’ve previously heard about A-SpaceX, a virtual world for intelligence agency collaboration and analysis that lets agents look at data from around the world and across different time frames, but it looks like the project is picking up steam.

P: The Office of the Director for National Intelligence, IARPA, and the Air Force Research Laboratory recently announced an Industry Day for A-SpaceX, that happened today with a simulcast in Second Life & it was all too hush hush to mention.

H: “A-SpaceX is seeking to create an analytic environment where the workspace becomes an enabler for the analytic process – fostering creativity between two key emerging technologies: Virtual worlds, and Workflow management.” a press release stated.

P:In this case, A-SpaceX is planned to include multiple virtual worlds, each targeted at specific kinds of decision making, though the goal is to make them interoperable to allow analysts to jump from one hoop through another.

H: Habbo Hotel announced a partnership with the Matthew Shepard Foundation to bring the “Erase Hate” project to the Habbo.com InfoBus. Foundation staff will lead two discussions each week in the virtual bus on bullying, discrimination and hate–both on- and offline.

P:I remember Sulka Haro explaining that the company had problems opening up its Hotels to international audiences, though, since “only 44% of teenagers had positive attitudes toward foreigners.” Regardless, it sounds like an interesting project and a nice indication of nonprofits reaching out to the youth audience through their increasing involvement in virtual worlds.

H: On24 focus is on events with corporate webinars, but announced yesterday that it had expanded to include virtual worlds for trade shows, conferences, and events with ON24 Virtual Show. Virtual Show targets users looking to avoid travel costs and time as well as extending physical events’ reach with networking, virtual booths, webcasts, and a customizable interface.

P: And San Jose State University, in the heart of Silicon Valley, has built a campus at Second Life, . “I can send a student in to have an experience in an unstructured environment, and then come out and have a conversation about it.” professor Kemp said.

H: Thirty students signed up for Kemp’s 15-week virtual-world class, which includes learning about the application driving the Second Life program.

P: On the 4th Americans celebrate Independence Day, but five years ago, July became a significant month for everyone in Second Life. That’s when outrage against the Linden’s tax policy, which penalized excessive building by deducting L$ from the creator’s account, began festering toward open revolt,

H: Buildings were razed, giant tea crates were deployed, declarations were written (by Fleabite Beach, and within the year, the Lindens had canceled the policy, replacing monthly subscriptions with what we have now: land use fees where building is no longer taxed. Sounds effective-

HP This week Master of Puppets Meets Hands Free: Dorkbot Presents Top Avatar Control Innovators Avatar Puppeteering introduces a completely physics-based means of naturalistically animating the avatar,

H: in which every joint can be pushed, pulled, or rotated in real time for maximum expressivity and responsiveness.

P: Demonstrated this Sunday in a fantastic open comment no=holds barred environment It was a great debut for a possibley soon to be seen flexibility. Every joint has a position and a rotation in 3D space.

H: In the early 1980s, NSF put together NSFNet as a network connecting regional computer networks around the country. The Department of Defense had already created the Arpanet network, which gave birth to many of the tools and techniques used on the modern Internet, but Arpanet traffic was limited to Defense-sponsored research. NSFNet was designed to be open to all users. Happy Birthday Modern Internet

P: & Happy birthday Hydra too! That was Hydras big event this past weekend. CIGNA, , is announcing the development of a virtual health care community. situated on a Second Life® island, where seminars, interactive displays, educational games and virtual health consultations help foster real and sustainable behavior change that improves health.

H: Developed by Method, a brand experience agency, will help us develop nutrition knowledge, learn how to make healthier food choices, manage our weight and understand portion sizes and food labels - Stress, physical activity and sleep zones within the community will be developed following an evaluation of people’s experience with the nutrition zone.

P: Sleep zones ???? Don’t be foolish! – everyone knows that Sl stands for Sleep Less!

The Slews……7/1 Pooky & Hydra at the helm

Lights dim..music swells

From the top of the crown on the Head Lindens Head to the bottom left hand corner of the search for the new and exciting …and going beyond the virtual world for relevant facts and fiction 24/7….in ways to crazy to completely understand…This …is…the….Slews

P: Good Evening Second Nation and here now the Slews.

H: Gutenabend und hier ist jetzt die Durchläufe

P: Although the preliminary findings from Phoenix do not answer whether life ever existed on Mars (or might still exist somewhere underground), an experiment showed the dirt on the planet’s northern arctic plains similar to surface soils found in Antarctica, full of the mineral nutrients that a plant would need.

H: Mars today is frigid and dry, and the surface is bombarded by ultraviolet radiation, making life unlikely, but conditions in more ancient epochs may have not been so harsh.

P: NASA reported“We basically have found what appears to be the requirements, the nutrients, to support life whether past, present or future,” “The sort of soil you have there is the type of soil you’d probably have in your backyard.”for Phoenix scientists that was “like winning the lottery

H: Trying out the new & unusual could be programmed into our hot wiring - Using brain scans to measure blood flow, British researchers discovered that a brain region known as the ventral striatum was more active when subjects chose unusual objects in controlled tests.

P:The ventral striatum is involved in processing rewards in the brain through the release of neurotransmitters like dopamine.

H: Scientists believe the existence of this age-old reward mechanism indicates there is an evolutionary advantage in sampling the unknown.

P: programming into our brains? In the future we could have computers implanted Scientists at the University of Florida aren’t just creating a neural implant that can translate human brain signals, but one that can act independently to increase its efficiency and synergy with the brain as it learns new things.

H: Tests with new evolving brain-machine interfaces using rats have tiny electrodes that capture thought signals.

P:: Three rats were taught how to move a robotic arm toward a target using just their thoughts. Each time they succeeded, the rats were rewarded. Is that like food for thought?

H: You can run but you can not hide -! A new whitepaper reveals how advertising that spans multiple-media platforms drives conversion well beyond the effects of increased frequency, and targeting. With or without brain implants

P: I know if I could shop just by thought it might prove fatal.

H: So if I just thought of you naked would that mean…..never mind….
Driven by market capitalization growth in emerging economies, the wealth of the world’s high net worth individuals increased 9. percent to $40.7 trillion in 2007,

P: The global economy grew at a slower pace but upward wealth will grow to $59 trillion by 2012, advancing at a rate of 7.7 percent per year.

H: ICANN, which regulates aspects of internet use, voted unanimously to relax restrictions on trusted domains like .com and .net, as well as country suffixes like .uk, .it and .fr

P: The decision enables companies to create brand-specific web addresses, and individuals to purchase self-named domains — provided they have a “business plan and technical capacity.” omg.com is still free as of this writing

H: Google on Monday unveiled a new Web-based tool, Map Maker, that lets people add roads, lakes, businesses, and other features to unmapped regions of Google Maps. Just what Google needs, more free stuff

P: What if I build my own island on google map that doesn’t exist yet- will google create it for me? They might not have the money - A technology startup that developed software for migrating data from Microsoft) Outlook to Google Web mail has filed a lawsuit , claiming Google owes the smaller company more than $1 billion for stealing its trade secrets.

H: LimitNone agreed to share its technology with the understanding that it would be kept confidential. “When a mega-company like Google that professes ‘Don’t be evil’ tells you they love your product and says they are not going to make a competing product, you believe them.”
“Don’t be evil”! it should be don’t be a weasel!

P: Stuck in a traffic jam and really hoping you could update your Facebook page? You soon may be able to in a Chrysler. Which will announce a wireless Internet-access option for all 2009 models called UConnect Web —& you can check you that real-time stock quotes now made available on CNBC.com , So you can see how your social profile improves as your stock goes down

H: or vice versa. Yearly online video ad revenue will increase at a compound annual growth rate of 168 percent.

P: A recent report by IDC predicts that Internet video advertising will increase over sevenfold during the next four years, from $500 million in 2007 to $3.8 billion in 2012. Obviously, this is huge and great news for the industry. Get me my agent

H: Wyndstorm Corporation launched Socialframes, which enables users to interact with a social network or virtual world without leaving the website they are visiting. Or their car.

P: be on the look out for virtual salesgirls with a perky names and a handy discounts

H: The virtual associates are built with artificial intelligence software from Justdevelopit, a new company. When the software senses a transaction delay, it launches a chat and offers the customer a privileged discount,

P:but since the salesgirls are so hot they are also inciting emotional relationships- never let a chatbot break your heart Hydra

H: TechCrunch is reporting that Vint Cerf, the so-called “father of the Internet,” says maybe we should think of the Internet as being like the highway system — a public good that should be nationalized. trying to spark a debate about whether the Internet should be treated more like the public resource that it is.

P: I Paramount with Makena, are making thousands of movie clips available on There.com, Visitors who purchase the clips can use them to communicate with others by having their avatar “speak” lines from movies while the actual clip plays in a small window.

H: Cliches made fresh Daily.

P: Slim Jim has launched its own virtual world, Spicy Town, which actually now is the main, official website for the snack food. It’s a pretty basic, Flash-based environment: users can walk around, chat, pick fights, collect Slim Jims, and wreak havoc on the environment. All While they exude the aroma of SlimJims!

H: Not in my car! One of the only steps to the registration process, which is minimal and full of ‘tude, is to upload a photo of yourself, which is then mapped on to the edgier version of you. I don’t think I could stand a spicier version of myself? Could you Pooky?

P: Don’t blame me I was just drawn this way. I am more interested in SeaPals,. I am already beginning to populate my virtual aquarium. I am still looking for a penguin as of this writing. But the chat is only in preset messages with other fish.

H: Instead of going to a site to play a MMOG, RocketON has actually placed a virtual world on top of the Internet. Your avatar can roam the Web with you, inviting friends to join, discuss and interact on any site.

P:, RocketON is super-imposed in the bottom corner of your screen.Then you can chat, play games, and, if the site is a partner, download virtual goods from the site for your ava like GAP outfits, NIKe shoes or virtual coke-

H: I just don’t want one in my car.

P: for HabboHotel The recent milestone of 100 million users is nothing to snuff at. In true Habbo style, they threw a big bash and gave the 100 millionth user a boatload of prizes as a thank you for helping them reach this major goal.

H: Found! Beach ball made by Philip Linden in April 2002 before SL was even launched. In Smoky there is Philip’s handiwork, made in the days before the world was even Beta.

P: Lost! The Garden for the Missing which contains over 170 posters of missing persons from the US. All of the missing persons posters are clickable so that you can read more about their disappearances; In Remora.

H: Profound: Sl5b is SL’s big birthday bash with over 600 exhibits and plenty to look at, anything and everything you might have imagined can and was built. And there were many panel discussions on how here can affect *points behind*

P: Monsters attacking Toxian City’s Exhibit
Toxia is a dark urban live action role playing game. The city’s setting is what’s left of an old port town after major disaster hit. How that helps us I don’t know

H: The ABA’s Conference “Why Virtual Worlds Matter for Lawyers” was held at the Justice Center in (SL). Discussion of virtual reality law issues and the future of law in worlds. As long as they dont sell SecondLife Insurance.

P: Troy Mcluhan’s new exhibition called Lord Rosse’s Monster Telescopes opened on Sunday, on the sim named Space Island,

H: The greatest avatar the world has ever known might indeed be that of Philip Linden. His statue is in the VIP known as the Linden installation where you can actually see the statue . The man has a sense of humor, and we searched the SL5B for evidence of where he might have gotten those flashy pixels which cover his privates.

P: Yes we finally discovered this picture after days of searching –The Hansel & Gretal house & yes it is skittles which are covering his vitals and that is the Slews…

The Slews - 6/24 Pooky & Hydra from the The Desk

Lights dim….music swells
From the Top of the flying carpet which flew itself into my tiny heart to the bottom of the koi pond where I saw the future reflected in blue eyes, covering the mental Inline skating we make happen on & off the ice 24/7…in ways Bobby ORR couldn’t even imagine…This …IS…The…. Slews……

P: Good evening Second Nation and here now The Slews!

H: Hyvä ilta , ja tähän kas noin

P: Dice-size crumbs of bright material have vanished from inside a trench where they were photographed by NASA’s Phoenix Mars Lander, convincing scientists that the material was frozen water that vaporized after digging exposed it.

H: “It must be ice,”These little clumps completely disappearing over the course of a few days, that is perfect evidence that it’s ice. There had been some question whether the bright material was salt. Salt can’t do that.” Neither can dandruff.

P: For the second time since April, ESA’s Jules Verne ATV was used to raise the orbit of the International Space Station.

H: A record boost from the 20 minute burn of the Automated Transfer Vehicle’s main engines successfully lifted the altitude of the 300-tonne Station by around 7 km . Talk about a relaunch!

P: Advanced ground penetration radar, originally developed to investigate the soil structure on the Moon and other planets is now used in Canadian mines to spot hidden cracks and weaknesses in mine roofs.

H: Lavas from Hawaiian volcano contain fingerprint of planetary formation Now, a precision analysis of lava samples taken from the crater is giving scientists a new tool for reconstructing planetary origins. A closer examination of iron isotopes tells us more.

P: Higher than expected levels of sodium found in a 4.6 billion-year-old meteorite suggest that the dust clouds from which the building blocks of the Earth and neighboring planets formed were much denser than previously supposed

H: Has anyone been Sodium and Iron on the panel?

P: Single person submersibles have been called in to help scientists retrieve samples from a lake in northern British Columbia that may hold vital clues to the history of life on Earth and on other planets.

H: Underwater exploration at heart of outer space. How we explore this Lake will lay the groundwork for how we will explore Mars.”

P: At an international conference, a team of European astronomers announced a remarkable breakthrough in the field of extra-solar planets.

H: Using the HARPS instrument at the ESO La Silla Observatory, they have found a triple system of super-Earths around the star HD 40307.

P:.. Add to it the Jupiter-like planets already known, and you may well arrive at the conclusion that planets are ubiquitous,” as in everywhere.

H: Scientists have confirmed for the first time that an important component of early genetic material which has been found in meteorite fragments is extraterrestrial in origin,

P: The finding suggests that parts of the raw materials to make the first molecules of DNA and RNA may have come from the stars. The analysis shows that the nucleobases contain a heavier form of carbon which could only have been formed in space.

H: Electronic Arts has released the so-called Spore Creature Creator, which allows players to generate infinitely varied 3D critters and interact with them. :It’s a tantalizing, preview of the company’s upcoming God-game Spore.

P: Almost all of the bloggers on the site where this was announced are still waiting for the download - There is A god then there is an EA- Phone home.

H: Japan’s biggest astronomical observatories are teaming up with international community for an unprecedented quest to find out whether there is life in outer space.

P: New computing technologies and the evolution of a “virtual man” to predict the effects of new drugs before they enter clinical trials could transform the fortunes of pharmaceutical research,

H: In May 2008, the average time spent among all social networking websites increased 71 percent compared with May of last year.

P: Although Overall monetization in the online ad industry dropped last month social networking and gaming site pricing began to improve.

H: Cost per thousand increased 66 percent and 51 percent, while sports sites remained level and entertainment, news and tech sites dropped.

P: Almost 100% of the content in IMVU is user-generated. They have collectively created the world’s largest catalog of virtual items. The games industry should understand user generated content before it’s too late.

H: iOpener Media,, got a nice feature from the BBC today about its plans to create a mixed-reality racing game, pitting average users against professional Formula One drivers.

P: iOpener will track real-time differential GPS data from the races and send it to PCs and consoles.

H: “It’s clear that the next trend in gaming is going to be bringing real objects into the virtual world; playing not against other gamers but people doing the real thing, “You can compete against the best of the best.”

P:TV ASAHI, one of Japan’s major broadcasters, is airing a pilot this Saturday night for a”one hour interactive mobile participation TV show, Artificial Life, letting audience members at home chime in with their own 3D avatars, competing against 100,000 others and answering quiz questions for TV ASAHI-sponsored prizes. Viewer log in!

H; The application that’s getting attention is Loopt. Working with Microsoft Virtual Earth for the display, Loopt lets people use their iPhone as a “social compass.”
A free service using the iPhone’s location services to display your location and your friends’ as pinpoints on a map. But does it know where your secret crush is Pooky?

P: As long as he can find me on the world map, I’m good….This week 50 Golden Brands, which is a send-up of the brands that influenced each of the past 50 years . 1959 was ruled the year of Barbie. ‘85 went to Microsoft, ‘88 to Nike, ‘01 to the iPod, and ‘07 to O2. 2008’s brand has not yet been named. I vote for the 2nd QuestioN!

H : A new survey by consumer research firm Experian has found that PlayStation 3 owners skew the oldest of all three consoles - with appeal at its highest levels to those 44 and older,

P:also tracking low gamer activity in… needlework and antiques shopping?

H: The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation had purchased 20 SimWelder units and with channel partner VRSim. California Prisons Using Virtual Reality to Train Inmates in Welding Skills. Working on a Virtual chain gang!

P: If you want to create your perfect mate have a look at new World Notes & CyFishy Traveler– you can create your perfect match right here on SL. If you don’t mind dating yourself.

H: Pooky you never do that!

P:The fourth Virtual Worlds Business Panel was hosted at the Nokia sim last friday, and drew quite a choice crowd, exploring many varied experts’ opinions on how to really make it in virtual world business.

H: Linden Lab has announced that it will celebrate Second Life’s 5th Birthday by holding a two-week long Virtual World Fair,

P: The Virtual World Fair, which will take place in several Second Life regions from June 23 to July 7, showcasing our creativity, kicked off with founder and former CEO Philip Rosedale and current CEO Mark Kindom each delivering an opening address.

H: Lotus Development Corporation founder and Linden Lab board member Mitch Kapor will offer closing remarks.

cP: Check out The Garden of NPIRL Delights, a sprawling continent of interactive art installations that could only exist in a metaverse like ours

H: Recent note -ArcelorMittal is hosting a global, mixed-reality shareholder event in Second Life.. Charity Contact a Family is using Second Life to help parents of disabled children stay in touch.

P: French executive recruiting company GBO has opened up a space in Second Life. Blockdot has opened a gaming center in Second Life with Asahi and Fivestar Interactive to reach the Asian market.

H: The 2008 Second Life Surfing Association Season One Champion Awards Party officially marked the end of the year’s first Second Life surfing season with Second Life resident Pova Rustamova being declared the season champion,

P: With ten qualifying SLSA surfing competitions in the year, plus twenty-odd others, surfing is one of the most popular and fastest growing sports in Second Life.

H: Cory Ondrejka left his post of CTO at Linden Lab, many wondered where he’d wind up next. It’s not to a hot, new virtual world,
though. Two weeks ago Ondrejka became Senior Vice President, Digital Strategy, for EMI Music. Yes but do they have surfing?

P: I think he took the Second Award for best executed Job Surf- You Hydra who hosted the now Famous Nokia business panel- beat him by a few curls and that is The Slews!

The Slews - June 12th - Pooky & Hydra report!

From the top of the airship hovering above us to the bottom of the cube rotating on its arc… covering internet madness and scientific gladness in ways to eclectic to set bongo music to….This …is ….the …slews!

P: Good evening Second Nation and here now The Slews!

H: Irass hai mass se kon ban wa oy shee

P: Older than Stonehenge but 3 times as powerful! the Greater Stonehenge Cursus 500 years older than the circle itself.
Has been uncovered! A university of Manchester team has found it. Go Man United!

H: They don’t know what it was used for – but we do know it encloses a pathway which has been made inaccessible.
And that suggests it was either a sanctified area or for some reason cursed.”

P: It is believed that the Cursus was part of complex of monuments, of which Stonehenge was later constructed. And dated some of the cremated human remains from Stonehenge..I’m sorry Hydra, but wouldn’t dating live human remains have made for more fun evening?

H: Researchers in Sweden and Japan report development of a new type of paper that resists breaking when pulled almost as well as cast iron. The new material, called “cellulose nanopaper,” is made of sub-microscopic particles of cellulose and may open the way for expanded use of paper as a construction material.

P: All quiet on the setting sun: Sunspot activity at a standstill - scientists said periods of inactivity are normal for the sun, but this period has gone on longer than usual. “It continues to be dead,” That’s a small concern, a very small concern.” Especially if you are the sunspot program manager.

H: Shuttle Discovery astronauts said goodbye to the International Space Station crew on Tuesday, ending a nine-day mission to deliver a Japanese-made orbital research laboratory.

P: The new Japanese laboratory on the International Space Station has one drawback: It’s so spacious that astronauts floating in the middle of the room can get stranded

H: NASA has nine more flights to complete assembly and resupply of the station by 2010, when the shuttle fleet is due to be retired. The agency also plans a final servicing call to the Hubble Space Telescope in October.

P: Hewlett-Packard, the world’s biggest computer maker, launched a new generation of PCs on Tuesday that respond to users tapping or stroking the screen, potentially bringing user-friendly computing to the masses.

H: :Apple Inc on Monday unveiled a next-generation iPhone with faster Internet access.

P: It will run on advanced wireless networks and sell for as low as $199 — half the current entry-level price.

H: Curious timing! Of all days, Samsung chose the same day launch its flagship device for 2008, a Windows Mobile-based über-phone. the Omnia

P: Google is not making a Gphone, and top Google execs have gone on record, multiple times in the media in the last week, all saying the same thing. Google is engineering an open source multi-platform.

H: In the same way that Microsoft doesn’t make your PC, Google will not be making your new cell phone. Android is a complete mobile phone software stack . Android will be made available as open source via the Apache v2 license..”

P:Kansas public schools are preparing to teach students and their parents about wind as an energy source through a national initiative from the DOE & Renewable Energy Laboratory. It is pairing wind turbines with schools in six states that are just beginning to harness wind energy..

H: Twenty years from now the United States may be getting 20 percent of its electricity from wind power a report this week stated. While Wind energy only accounts for 1 percent of the USA’s electricity, that is a 45 percent leap from last year. The goal is to lead more students toward careers in engineering with a focus on tackling the looming energy crisis.

P:Tuesday night Rep. Dennis Kucinich presented 35 articles of impeachment against President George W. Bush to the U.S. House of Representatives.

H Kucinich’ will move his impeachment resolution forward to the House Judiciary Committee. The thirty-five articles of impeachment were read painstakingly for several hours and will enter the record

P: While oil and gas will someday run out companies still generate a seemingly inexhaustible supply of data:
.
H: : In an effort to test the results of advertising in its print and online products, Philadelphia Media Holdings created and ran ads on Friday for a fictitious airline The full and partial page ads for Derrie-Air appeared everyehere multiple time in local media outlets

P: early results showed a “clickthrough” rate for the online ads of 1.25 percent, compared with a national clickthrough average of 0.05 percent.”

H: In addition to research, the ads were designed to stimulate conversation about environmental issues and “to put a smile on people’s faces.” But not a happy Meal face on their plates.

P: New York Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo this week was expected to announced an unprecedented nationwide agreement with Verizon, Sprint and Time Warner Cable that would prohibit subscribers from accessing online bulletin boards and Web sites that distribute child pornography. Other ISPs may join this effort

H: However, The FCC’s Kevin Martin, who permitted bandwidth bidding by companies who could make a “no porn” promise, hit a speed bump. Some say it interferes with free speech and is infeasible

P: Amazon.com, the largest e-commerce site in the country, went down for 90 minutes on Friday afternoon. The site blames the outage on its complex systems.. Ad Age estimates Amazon lost about $1.8 million an hour

H: The outage reportedly sparked outcry and speculation on social chat sites like Twitter. Always the first to know!

P: Steve Ballmer of Microsoft asserted this as a key aspect of Microsoft’s vision: “there will be no media consumption left in 10 years that is not delivered over an IP network. There will be no newspapers, no magazines that are delivered in paper form. Everything gets delivered i electronically “

H: And in other race for inner space news- Google’s CEO predicts that his company will hold up well in a U.S. downturn and claims to believe that Microsoft’s proposed Yahoo buyout is bad for the internet

P: People over age 40 participate heavily in word-of-mouth and value personal recommendations and expert opinions, but they have not embraced social networking or blogs despite being heavy users of other online services

H: For a look at the top 10 networking sites – See, linkedIn growth was above Club Penguin

P: FedEx is proving it can deliver in social networks with a hot new Facebook application. Released less than two weeks ago, the “Launch a Package” application lets users send virtual goods to friends, from little digital trinkets to photos and links.

H: The items arrive in a FedEx box that the recipient opens to reveal the gifts inside. It has 258,000 total installations and more than 15,000 active users.

P: this summer, Disney Family.com plans to roll out a new parent-oriented social network so the whole family can make avatars. The new community will be different from emphasizing individual profiles. “This is about when your family becomes your identity over your self,”

H: Waves to MOM , oh I don’t know Pooky, but this will be designed to help parents meet other families in similar lifestages
Disney is also attributing recent growth to its virtual worlds like Pixie Hollow, which, with almost 6 million unique avatars, all looking like the same 6 fairies

P: Teen-skewed social networking site Bebo, recently acquired by AOL, has commissioned another online drama –. “The Secret World of Sam King,” , aiming to blend fact and fiction in the setting of Universal’s London HQ

H: In common with previous Bebo dramas “KateModern” and “Sofia’s Dairy,” the show is financed by product placement arrangements with teen-centered brands.

P: its online dramas are a big draw for its core audience of teenage girls and have helped differentiate the site from MySpace and Facebook I am writing Days of our Second Life- call my agent!

H: AOL’s Open AIM developer platform might be an “often over-looked ” but with 80 million users and plans to integrate the AOL Instant Messenger platform into bebo, it might not be oer-looked for long

P: in fact, it now has 295,000 developers signed up. AOL has been pushing their chat platform hard this year, last month giving out $100,000 for the best AIM-powered applications, and announced the availability of AIM Money, a new revenue sharing program.

H: Millions of Us announced today the launch of a new company, Virtual Greats, aimed at the virtual goods market with, an eye toward celebrity and pop culture. Virtual Greats announced that it had secured the rights for virtual goods based on Justin Timberlake, Elvis Presley, and the upcoming Incredible Hulk film.

P: The goods will include likenesses, and more based on celebrities and entertainment IP. The goods will be available in 60 virtual worlds and social media platforms. Gaia Online is onboard & but already earns over $1 million/month in its own virtual goods sales.

H: If Millions Of Us had to negotiate with the talent to get the IP, including likenesses, how does a site like Stardoll have “virtual dolls” of hundreds of celebrities

P: Successful MMOGs can see $1-2 in monthly Average Revenue Per User however Second Life is monetizing at 5x higher which is $9.30 per user per month

H: their blog posts are prolific too James Au on New World Notes cites over 250 Sl blogs with more added each second

P: Orange Island and Koinup are proud to announce the ‘Orange Island Photo Week’ Contest. From june 9 – 23 The theme of the contest is “One second of reality”.

H: The aim of the contest is to capture an instant of reality, and have viewers believe the photo was taken in RL.

P: The challenge here is to share with the community what for a second seemed real to you. They hope we will go beyond still-life shots and try to show us emotions are real, no matter where they happen. *sighs*There were emotions at the satruday night space club

H: Also in Sl this week Rocket Sellars hosted a discussion on Asteroids which included the very important – how to avoid getting hit by one. At the odds of 1 to 9,000 only 3 times less than the odds of being killedi n a car accident. This could be important.

P: This week the best Of SL was an award show focusing on the reality of what we see feel & hear here. Named Avtar of the Year waas The great Beyers Sellars tireless Lord of the Metanomics who has brought incredible focus, credibility and professionalism to what the monetizing aspects are of this great adventure and platform.

H: Accepting the award for him was the beautiful Bevan Whitfield who was able to set the perfect note with her gracious warmth and whose help has been indispensable throughout.

P: Khriss Lehman’ Botanical Sim was named best overall Sim, and other awards of note .best scripter was given to francis Chung
and best animation to Easy Babcock.

H: In other award news the Worst Of Sl will soon be opening nominations in categories such as Most Unlikely To Succeed, Avatar Most Likely to be voted off the island and Least important Inworld Launch. What Award would you like to win Pooky

P: I just want to hand them out Hydra, not get one, and that is the Slews!