Sky News on our (absurdly hopeful) 2° Future

Just in time for the talks in Paris* and as the last hopes of our keeping temperature-increase under 2 degrees Celsius evaporate, here's a nice video from Sky News illustrating what, at this point, our most optimistic future might look like due to our greedy shortsighted stupidity.

This video, released in the last 24 hours or so, on our 2° future was accompanied by scarier videos illustrating 3° & 4° respectively.  For some reason, Sky has since chosen to set the accompanying videos to 'Private' status on YouTube.

To be generous to Sky, maybe these videos were just released prematurely by accident, and will be re-released shortly.  Maybe.**

The remaining video is instructive.****  But we're missing the progression that the video-makers clearly intended with just the one.  Also, each video ended with an encouragement to share said content via social media.  Kinda hard to do that Sky when you disappear the videos with no warning, and no explanation.



* Which due to our ever currently convenient obsession with 'The War on Terror'*** are to occur under a 'State of Emergency' with protests conveniently banned.

** That, or representatives of Murdoch's buddies in the fossil-fuel-industries got wind of what one of his media-outlets was putting out, and convinced Sky of the benefits of a little self-censorship ?

*** Many of the roots of which can be directly tied back to our dependence upon fossil-fuels, and support of the backwards regimes who control much of the supply thereof.

**** Myself, I think there's an argument that some of the millennials and younger may have an excuse (living under Western corporate media & the likes of GOP-compromised educational systems) for not understanding just how dire the threat is.  But, really, if you're over thirty or so and need any further convincing, then at this point I can't put it down to any better than, at most generous, wilful ignorance.


Update: This vid. on 5° change may be a replacement for the other two videos I mentioned.

Interesting Times

Anyone else feel like we are sleepwalking off a precipice ?  And that our governments are utterly unprepared for the next shoe to drop, having exhausted all the tools in their toolbox during the last crisis ?*


Meanwhile, apparently this is a thing:

People's poorly remembered experiences with an unusually titled series of childrens' books**, from their childhood, at a time when they were just barely learning to read, as evidence of alternate dimensions/parallel universes, rewritten history, interference by aliens, time-travel, or the like...

As a lifelong fan of escapism (hey, I still watch Doctor Who, though I'm not sure Moffat appreciates the escapist element fully), I can't blame people for wanting to escape from reality.  Certainly not in times like these.  The present sucks, and the future looks bleak indeed.  But meanwhile our overlords in government and in the business-classes are continuing to pursue policies that are destroying our planet, and planning for the future when then need to pull up the ladders behind them, as they batten the hatches, and leave us to drown, safely ensconced (they hope) in their fortified private compounds.***  And ninety-plus percent of us aren't paying any attention whatsoever.

Aw, what the hell ?  No-one cares.  Interview with a/the Vampire, Fruit/Froot Loops, Nelson Mandela dying in prison, Sex in/and the City, 52 states in the US, New Zealand changing location, Henry VIII with a turkey-leg in his hand****, Magic mirror on the wall...have at it.

We're all gonna die !  Possibly imminently if the conflict with Russia goes nuclear.  But...isn't this just the cutest likkle doggie you ever did see ?!!

* Mixing metaphors all over the place.  And no, I don't fully understand the significance in the drop-off of the PRC and others purchasing US debt.  Nor am I sure I want to...

** Always thought the spelling was weird; Never imagined it would be inspiring conspiracy-theories in multiple generations of adults.

*** Mixing metaphors with abandon now.  Whee !

**** Wouldn't chicken be more likely ?

Irish Women on 'Ginger' Jokes

And then most of the news-stories seem too obvious, too old, too boring, too depressing, too Trump-centric even in the case of one country's politics, for anything other than a link-dump. Wait, women-only train-carriages ?  Is Corbyn advocating Sharia ?! Scandal ! Scandal !  Scandal !

Always cartoons, and Bell's latest is a beaut., if only for what he did to Harman, but I just ran Bell, and I have to have some kind of standards.  And for some of the other dailies...

But I do feel I should post something more than a half-century-old song, so*...

I do feel like the specific sport of Ginger-baiting is more a phenomenon of the British Isles than elsewhere, but no doubt some degree of discrimination is present in any country where redheads are a minority (ie, er...well, practically everywhere).  I'll never understand it.


* If only out of laziness in continuing to avoid a couple of other subjects on which I meant to write.

Ted Cruz Still a Pathetic Clown. A Reminder

One would think that with the billionaire-backers showering money on these assholes, that they could hire some writers with a modicum of wit, up the production-value, and produce YouTube-ready videos, that while still showing their utter lack of gravitas and desperation for attention, would be at least...a little funny.  Instead:

Hey, we need to make a 'viral' video for Ted so it'll get played by the mainstream news and remind Americans that he still exists.  I know: everyone likes bacon, right ?*, and Americans love them some guns.  So why don't we combine the three ?  Genius !

If he were running for class-president in a school in Katy, Texas, I'd be impressed with little fifteen-year-old Rafael's efforts in the Audio/Visual Club.  But he's not.

* Bacon is over-rated as fuck in my opinion.

Another Desperate Candidate for the GOP: Dr. Ben Carson !

Um, okay...Doctor.  And ?...


H/T Digby

Van Halen: Hear About It Later

Joy.  Direct embedding of videos from YT is evidently broken again...

Jim Jefferies on America's Gun Culture

There is one argument, and one argument alone for having a gun, and this is the argument: 'Fuck off !  I like guns.'  It's not the best argument, but it's all you've got.  And there's nothing wrong with it.  There's nothing wrong with saying 'I like something, don't take it away from me', but don't give me this other bullshit.  The main one is 'I need it for protection.  I need to protect me, I need to protect my family.'  Really ?  Is that why they're called assault-rifles ?  Is it ?

Best takedown I've ever seen of America's gun-culture, by a non-American, natch., but then again I haven't really sought out such things.  Wonder if Carlin had anything to say on the subject...

Who knew Wayne LaPierre was around that far back ?


Update: Replaced the YouTube link.  Not sure if the new video is the same length as the old one.  Replacing it 'cos according to the YT, the old video was 'removed as a violation of YouTube's policy against spam, scams, and commercially deceptive content.'  No idea, what the hell that means or why...

So Punchable

Aw, this guy...!

You want to punch that face, don't you ?  Even if you don't know why yet.

Is this would-be Bieber also known for his YouTube videos ?  Well, yes...

RICH kid Grisha Mamurin has provoked a storm of protest by paying girls to flash their boobs in public and then to kiss him.

The controversial 16-year-old, grandson of Russian billionaire Igor Nekludov, is making a series of videos about people’s humiliation and what they would be prepared to do for money.

In his latest video, he gets smashed to the ground when he tries to bribe someone to drink a jar of his urine.

The intended victim was so angry he punched the cocky teenager so hard he knocked him off his feet.

Earlier in the video a man takes him up on his offer and Mamurin can be seen peeing into a glass before handing it over.

Towards the end of the video he picks on safer targets, luring young women to kiss him and expose their breasts.

His videos have been watched more than 850,000 times with mixed reactions.
At the beginning of his new video he says: “Today, we will check what crazy things girls can do to earn some money.”

Then he goes and annoys girls who are walking alone asking them: “Can you show me your breasts for cash?

And then he moves on to a bunch of homeless guys, and further hilarity ensues...

Thanks news.com.au !  I'd remained blissfuly ignorant of the existence of this asshole until now, despite his having apparently made the news elsewhere back in May.

His video sparked a wave of online criticism, but Grigory defended his decision saying the video showed what society 'is ready to do for the sake of money'.

Speaking through a personal press officer, he said:  'I don't understand why people are so negative about me. We have seen similar shows on MTV, various practical jokes.

'I can say that every fourth person agreed to do something crazy like this. The video is genuine. I should have been at least Spielberg to stage something like this.

...Grigory said he did not tell his parents about the project as he was not spending their money.

He said: 'Of course, originally this is their money but this is also my savings. I got the money from my parents for my birthdays and saved quite a lot.

'It is also a joint project, the money of my friends is here too. It is not like "Granddad, give me 100,000 roubles and I will make people drink urine".

He promised a follow-up in which 'a girl who agreed to lick the bottom of his boot from one end to the other for 10,000 roubles'.

He added: 'I do not criticize these people. I think each of them has problems which makes them do this.

'We don't know what we would have done if we had had the same problems. If to talk about me - I don't think I was ever in a situation when I would drink urine.' 

Unearned wealth (and most vast accumulations of wealth tend IMO to be largely if not mostly unearned, relying more on the exploitation of others and corruption than personal effort or ability) does tend to breed sociopathy, whether in Russia, America, or anywhere in the world.

Still, this particular embarrassment belongs to Russia, and Putin's Russia at that, son of an oligarch may he be.  And as long as he has wealth and avoids criticising the government, he can probably ride this particular game of exploiting the desperate for fleeting fame on YouTube a good while yet.

And after all, he's doing a public service, right ?  Exposing the cruel realities of modern capitalistic existence for...journalism...for...art...for..for.  No, he's just an asshole.

Persepolis

Couple clips from the film-version of Marjane Satrapi's brilliant graphic novels about her life growing up in Iran through the revolution and the war with Iraq.  Strange how ones willingness to just bomb a people consistently portrayed as two-dimensional cartoon villains can change when one gets a sense of the actual flesh-and-blood humans behind the propaganda.

Apparently, the film is available to watch for a fee on YouTube, if one wanted.  I don't know what the form-factor or quality would be like, or whether one would have a choice in English-speaking regions between the subtitled French soundtrack (watch that one unless you really really hate subtitles) or the 'celebrity' American soundtrack.  I'm assuming it's still available to buy on DVD or Blu-ray, and the original graphic novels are cool as well.

The Arrow

Speaking of the CBC, and the fiction that Canada can these days defend itself without being entirely dependent upon the protection of its pimpthe United States, got me thinking of this maybe not totally authentically historical but still awesome piece about the Avro Arrow...and what could have been.  And yay, it's on YouTube.

Stan Freberg: The Old Payola Roll Blues

There's another version out there on the YT with cleaner audio, but a key chunk of dialogue missing.  So...choices.  RIP.

Killing Joke: Eighties

Reading the comments on YouTube for this are depressing, with most commentators focused on a debate along maybe a 70/30 split whether Nirvana ripped off this song with Come As You Are, or...no joke...that Killing Joke somehow ripped off Nirvana.  Fer fuck's sake...

2015 UK Elections Rap Parody

I just love everything about this:

Even more than this masterpiece:

OT, it seems that Blogger just got that one little bit shittier in terms of locating and posting videos from YouTube.  Used to be, if it couldn't locate the video (which happens a lot), you could hack off the identifier, pick something random, and edit the HTML with the right ID.  Now, that option's gone.  Why ?  WTF is wrong with you Google ?

Nirvana: Rape Me

Wanted to post a video by a cool Welsh band, but nope, YouTube never heard of them.  And just as I'm hearing that sadwrn is closing down.

So, fuck it, only posted two other Nirvana tracks thus far.

BTW, what the fuck is up with the go-go sci-fi lighting wenches ?  Is that a normal thing in Seattle ?

Amazon MP3

Tried downloading some new music from Amazon for the first time in a while; Oh G-d, what a mistake.  Experience as painful and complicated as I've ever experienced it, prices way up, the new resource-intensive downloader rife with examples of everything that is wrong with that trendy evil of  'flat design', and then, this crap with the Prime Library, wherein Amazon will gracefully give subscribers access to oh so many tracks, so long as they now and till the end of eternity maintain their payments to Amazon in order to access what they quaintly may have once seen as 'their library.'  Da fuck ?

Like people can't use Pandora and their ilk ?  Like most music isn't available for free on YouTube these days ?  What's this shit about having to install & run special apps. to play Prime tracks ?  Free is worth what you pay for it and all that, but the idea that people should pay you a premium to create a library, that is held in thrall to the temporal products of a company that could just as well choose to close up shop (or individual service -- like that's never happened in recent memory) tomorrow ?  When they could get the same for free elsewhere ?  Or buy and own* from other services ?

After iTunes held back the market for years on .mp3 sales with their over-priced DRM'd garbage, the introduction of relatively cheap DRM-free .mp3 tracks on Amazon, was the reason I finally took to seriously buying music by the track for the first time, having previously relied largely on CD's and on DRM-free subscription services like eMusic.  Seems likes we're moonwalking backwards here.  Fuck the cloud, fuck flat design, and fuck Amazon.

*(Oh hell, not going to get into the legalistics here of how the corporations will simply determine that they own content from now until the end of eternity, and that you are simply renting it from them.  Cough.  Microsoft.  Cough.)

Buzzcocks: I Believe

Da fuck ?  I put in the video URL, of the service that Google owns, and duh-huh, can't find it...  I edit the HTML manually, and it takes the audio, but for some reason throws up an error on the image.  Another video URL, again from the service that Google owns, and duh, somehow, can't find it.  Edit the HTML manually again.  Fucking tossers !

Don't believe boys & girls in shiny tech. companies that promise the earth whilst drooling over thine own data.  Fuck 'em all.

Kentucky AFC: Be Nesa

Wanted to post the Kentucky AFC cover of Gorkys' awesome Iechyd Da, but apparently it's not on YouTube (have to learn to post there myself).  But this ear-cleanser'll do for now.

Paid downloads from the LP available at http://www.amazon.com/Kentucky-AFC-Afc/dp/B000T37KWE, though you'll have to look elsewhere for possibly their best English-language track, Outlaw.  Gonna gun the sucker down...  Wait, Not Available, WTF ?  The expense of re-printing CD's I get, but this is digital downloads of tracks from an album released in the last decade.  Fuck.

I won't tell you to download shit illegally, but does this industry ever suck ?  If you can support the band-members in any more recent projects please do, and there is always http://www.sadwrn.com/eng/ for new Welsh music.  Highly recommended.