Best News in Ages – Top Gear is BACK.

That’s right, I just found out that Top Gear is back on our screens this week; well it is if you live in England. For those of us that live outside the homeland we have to find other ways to keep up-to-date. But that is beside the point. The point is that we will have the gang back, Jeremy will no doubt be power sliding flash cars shouting “power”, the Hamster will be polishing his teeth and James May will be going slow.

Top gear is undoubtedly the best show on TV, it is funny, dangerous, intelligent, stupid and outrageous all at once. Even members of the fairer sex like the show (probably has something to do with Richard Hammond), my wife finds it funny. The 1st episode of season 11 is on BBC2 on June 22 and will feature a Ferrari F430 Scuderia.

On related news Jalopnik just announced that BBC America have cast the presenters of the US version of Top Gear which will be produced by NBC. They are Adam Carolla who is know for been on the Manshow with Jimmy Kimmel, Tanner Frost who apparently is a well known rally driver and drift racer, and a chap called Eric Stromer who is a TV construction type guy. I have to say that I am cynical about this as half the reason that the British version works is because they are all former journalists or radio personalities that have an unbridled passion for the motorcar but mostly because they are all seriously good mates. I don’t know, maybe it will take a while for the US team to gel and become popular. It will be interesting to see who the guests in the reasonably priced car will be, what with being in the US where most of the famous people in the world hang out.
Jay Leno pulled out of the project saying "it would be impossible to re-create or live up to the standards of the British show."
No word yet as to when the US version will air, only to say that the pilot is currently being filmed.
Top Gear Season 11 trailers (click the link and then select from the options)
Trailer 1
Trailer 2
Bloopers and Uncut.

RIP Stan Winston. 1946-2008

This is sad news. Stan Winston has passed away at the age of 62 after a 7 year battle with multiple myeloma, a type of cancer. Winston had a prolific career in the special effects arena and created many icons of modern cinema. He regularly worked with the likes of James Cameron, Steven Spielberg and Tim Burton and was directly responsible for the practical effects in films such as the Terminator, Aliens and Jurassic Park.

Winston won four Oscars in a career that spanned over 40 years. The Visual effects Oscar went to Winston and his team for Aliens, Terminator 2, Jurassic Park and he also won one for makeup for Batman Returns.
It was Stan Winston that gave the Predator the classic facial mandibles and enabled James Cameron to recognise the monster puppet that was used to bring the Alien Queen to life.
Close friend Arnold Schwarzenegger had this to say:

"The entertainment industry has lost a genius, and I lost one of my best friends with the death Sunday night of Stan Winston. Stan's work and four Oscars speak for themselves and will live on forever. What will live forever in my heart is the way that Stan loved everyone and treated each of his friends like they were family."

The film industry has truly lost a great person with a great imagination. Few people have influenced the design of films like Stan and he will be sorely missed.

RIP Stan Winston. 1946-2008

The Happening, and why it sucks balls

M. Night Shyamalan's latest flick has hit the screens and apparently nearly everyone thinks its crap. Check out the reviews its getting at Rotten Tomatoes where they think "People drop dead; remain more animated than Wahlberg". Not surprising really - all his movies except the 6th Sense have sucked in my opinion. The latest claim is that his new flick The Happening is a bare faced proponent of Intelligent Design, that lovely religious movement trying to cram the Bible into everyone's science class. But is it?

I'll go on record as saying I've never seen this movie, and I never will. M. Night Shyamalan's ability at writing good screenplays has degraded to such an extent that the endings are no longer unpredictable and subtle, but are more likened to the end to a torturous session on the toilet after 3 solid days of eating bran. His last three films Signs, The Village and Lady in the Water have all been differing degrees of awful - so much so that I ignored Lady in the Water completely after reading a synopsis.

His latest foray in movie crappiness, the Happening, is according to some people a thinly veiled attempt at endorsing ID. But is this all that surprising? It a well know fact that MNS is down with the g.o.d. and a quick look over his past films shows the themes and motivations behind all his screenplays and what they all have in common.


Praying with Anger (1992) - young man returns to home country, finds god and stops riot by preaching.

Wide Awake (1998) - 10 year old boy seeks God, has crisis of faith, finds god again.

The Sixth Sense (1999) - boy sees ghosts, Bruce Willis tries to help him sort out his life. Surprising lack of god.

Unbreakable (2000) - Bruce Willis and Sam Jackson talk a lot, and find out they are super heroes. god had nothing to do with it.

Signs (2002) - In a return to form, MNS has fellow god botherer Mel Gibson as a priest in a crisis of faith save his farm from invading aliens by believing in god.

The Village (2004) - people in olde village terrorised by boogie man (just a man in a suit, much like christianity) find out they are living in big olde theme park because of all the godlessness in the world.

Lady in the Water (2006) - MNS takes peyote, loses his freaking mind and makes a weird film about story monsters coming alive. god does not appear in this film, all though was originally on the billing, and replaced at later stage by nargles from Harry Potter. Kills film critic in movie in vain hope that life imitates art.

The Happening (2008) - MNS hires fellow god botherer Marky Mark to be a science teacher who spouts crap like "evolution is just a theory", and "spontaneous evolution". Turns out everyone is dying in the film because god is mad at us, so he makes the plants turn bad.


Oh well, lets hope he "see's the light" so to speak and makes a better movie next time. I'm not holding my breath.

Quack Health Part 2 : Vaccinations and why famous people should be ignored

Jim Carrey - Ace Ventura, bizarre bodily contortionist style comedian, and an actor who has made several highly entertaining movies.

Charlie Sheen - Hot Shots star, Hot Shots 2 star and Wall Street star. All round prolific actor who has made more movies than I've had hot dinners.

Jenny McCarthy. Um....who? Oh that’s right – the playboy chick.

What do these three have in common? Are they aliens? Are they Anti-Vaccine proponents? Are they out of their freaking minds? Yes. Yes they are. Well, except the bit about the aliens.

I never understood why we put people such as this on a pedestal outside of their given field. Sure they have great acting talent, and they make us laugh, but how exactly does that translate into intelligence or knowledge? We idolise these people for evoking emotion on the silver screen, and I don’t have an issue with that. I admire and envy people for their acting talent just like I admire the All Blacks for their rugby skill. You watch them and think “Wouldn’t it be amazing to be able to do that?” But that’s where it ends and that’s where it should end. Just because someone is talented in one field, does not automatically infer talent in another.

More and more often now we see movie stars and musicians making bat shit crazy pronouncements (I'm looking at you Tom) and it seems to be expected of everyone to say "Well he was in that movie with the dolphin, so he must be right!" Media saturation of these so called A-list celebs has lead many people to jump on just about any bandwagon, regardless of the cause. “I mean, look at the winning smile - surely someone who smiles so well couldn't possibly be wrong?”
Fame is not a substitute for intelligence, or critical thinking. If there is no evidence to support a claim, made by anyone, then it can be relegated to the waste heap of bullshit, cast out by the trowel of fact finding, and buried under the mounds of wooly thinking.

I don't have a beef with people believing weird things - no no, really I don't. If you believe that theres a omnipotent beardy weirdy in the sky, wtching your every molve, judging you against some shifting code of morals, and listening to your thoughts – go for gold. I will add the rider that if people state these beliefs, and try and coerce others to sing along, I reserve the right to ridicule them if there's no evidence to back them up. And that's where the three aforementioned actors come in.

Charlie Sheen has recently told his ex-wife Denise Richards that he will sue the doctor if she asks him to vaccinate their children. Yes, he is more concerned with his kooky ideas that vaccines have a link to Autism, than the benefits of vaccination. Rather than investigating the information at hand, and having even a remote grasp of reality, he is forcing his beliefs on his children who now will have no protection against measles, mumps or rubella. Has he ever seen a child with mumps? Wouldn’t he want to do anything in his power to avoid having his children go through that? I for one hope Denise tells him to shove it, and gets it done anyway.

Jenny McCarthy had a baby boy in 2002, and she stated on Oprah in 2007 that he had been diagnosed with autism. This, in no uncertain terms, sucks. I have no idea who Jenny McCarthy is, what she's like as a person, or how she performs as a mother, but I don't wish Autism on my worst enemy. It’s hard on the parents, and must be hell for the poor kids. And when you are in that unenviable position, you must be desperate to find someone to blame, someone to take the rap, and something you can point the finger of blame squarely at and say "that's the root cause of all my problems". That's a pretty common response - whenever something goes wrong, everyone wants to find that one root cause that started it all and squash it. Bush invaded Iraq because of the WMD's. Petrol prices keep rising because the US invaded Iraq. Autism cases are on the rise because more children get vaccines now than ever before.

But life is never that simple. When was the last time something that was subject to so many variables ever had a single root cause? A good analogy I think is the Coke and Mentos experiments. When people started firing Mentos into Diet Coke causing fountains of froth, people began to wonder why so much bang for such a little sweet? It was assumed to begin with that the substance in the sweet (gum arabic) and the carbonation of the Diet Coke was the root cause of the violent chemical reaction. This sounds plausible, until you actually do a bit of science and test it. If you throw a Mentos into soda water, the reaction is not that great, which means it ain't just carbonation or gum arabic. So individual testing of each Diet Coke ingredient plus the Mentos sweet showed that not one, but ALL of the ingredients played a role in the fountain effect. But there was something else - when one of the flavoured versions of Mentos was used, virtually no reaction was seen at all. This meant there must have been a difference between the flavoured and mint Mentos. And there was - the physical properties of the Mentos was found to be pitted, as opposed to the flavoured one which was smooth. This meant that the sweet had millions of nucleation sites, causing a sudden and violent out gassing of the CO2 in the Diet Coke. The point that I make here is that although we automatically assume one or two root causes for things, its often never that simple. In fact, when some outcome has several possible variables acting on it, you can guarantee the answer will most likely not be just one of the aforementioned variables. Something that only repeated and reliable testing can prove.

Jenny McCarthy however, decided not to take a scientific approach to discovering the cause of her sons Autism. She has linked his autism with his MMRI (Measles, Mumps and Rubella Inoculation) vaccination at the age of 15 months. I cannot say where she got this idea from, but its fair to say there's plenty of kook's out there peddling their stupidity, waiting for anyone to buy into it. And when you feel aggrieved like Jenny probably did, its a safe bet to say it was an attractive idea to blame the vaccine.

She, and her partner Jim Carey, have organised a group to protest against vaccinations called "Green our Vaccines" who's mantra is "pro-safe vaccines", but is pretty obviously leaning towards the anti-vaccine crowd. They are not alone in this idea that vaccines cause autism. Plenty of kooks and weirdos have come out of the woodwork over the last few years stating that they "know" there is a link, and big Pharma or the Government are conspiring to cover it all up. So what the hell are they on about? Here's a quick run down of their arguments

Too Many Vaccines at once
A popular argument is that there are too many vaccines given to children under the age of two. This began when a study of 12 children was done in England by Andrew Wakefield, who suggested a link between the MMR vaccine and autism. Subsequent peer reviews failed to support the hypothesis, and the CDC, along with the UK NHS have both concluded there is no link between Autism and the MMR vaccine.
Another variant of this is that anti-vacciner's say that too many at once will deplete the immune system, allowing other diseases to take hold where they may not have. The biggest problem with this hypothesis is that there is no correlation between the admittances to hospital or doctor visits, and vaccinations.

Thiomersal
An organomercury preservative used in vaccines since the 1930's, it is claimed there is a direct link between the mercury content of the vaccine and Autism. To date, there has been no reputable study that has concluded a link between Thiomersal and Autism.

Aluminium
Compounds containing Aluminium are used as immunologic adjuvants in vaccines, and there have been several recent studies into adverse effects of these compounds. All have come back with results showing no adverse effects.

We don't need no stinking vaccine
Some critics of the vaccines say that we don't really need to be vaccinated in the western world, and that all the major diseases always only break out in areas of high poverty, overcrowding and poor sanitation. This, however, is utter crap. We have outbreaks of disease such as measles every year in every developed country, and if immunisation rates weren't as high as they were, we would be in a lot more shit than we are now. heres a excerpt from an open letter to the US Government from a heap of US health and science groups :

A decision not to vaccinate is not just an individual decision. Because these diseases are spread from person to person, the decision to leave a child unvaccinated not only leaves that child susceptible to vaccine-preventable diseases, but permits the spread of those diseases to the surrounding community, including infants too young to be immunized and those suffering from immunodeficiency conditions. The ongoing measles outbreaks across the nation are a clear, current example. In each instance, the outbreak was started by an unimmunized individual who spread the infection to others, including children whose parents had opted not to have them immunized and infants less than one year of age who were too young to have received measles vaccine.

Its all bollocks. The fact (and I emphasise the word fact) is that there have been no scientific links between autism and inoculation programmes. None. Nada. Zip. There have been several studies done into a possible link and every single one has come up negative. There is no evidence. Not a single shred has ever been produced that can prove a link between Autism and vaccinations.

But that doesn't stop the anti-vaccine crowd, oh no. All these bastards do is drum up fears in already nervous parents, who then make ill-informed decisions about their children putting not only them at risk, but everyone else in the community as well. Parents are supposed to make decisions based on the best welfare for their children, and they cant do that if whack jobs like Jenny McCarthy and Jim Carrey are all over the TV saying crap like "don't immunise your child or they might become autistic!". Its annoying, its dishonest and its dumb. Like Orac said, I didn't know Dumb and Dumber was a documentary.

The only thing I can take heart from all of this, is that the number of people who believe there is an Autism-Vaccine link is still very small. A majority of people still understand the principles behind vaccination, and agree that the risk of complications during immunization are far lower than the risk of catching one of the diseases if you are not immunised, and that there is a large risk of even small percentages of the community not being immunised. As long as we take care not to listen to idiots like Jenny and Jim, and think a bit more skeptically about this sort of stuff, we'll all come through ok.

For more information check out these sites :

Science Blogs - Oracs Insolence
Autism News Beat
Science Based Medicine
AutismDiva - Autism : Its not like you think
Evidence Based Medicine

Blow Up Doll Gets Quick Ride To Work - No Pun Intended

Here in New Zealand just like most other countries there are issues with traffic congestion, especially Auckland which is the largest city. Some drivers have been coming up with some novel ways to beat the transit lane rules that have been put in place to reward those who carpool. Those who have three or more people in a car are allowed to drive in the same lanes as buses, taxis and motorbikes therefore making their journey shorter by up to fifteen minutes. Some enterprising commuters have started taking their blow-up dolls to work in an effort to make it look like they carrying the allotted amount of passengers.

Blow up dolls, mannequins and medium sized dogs dressed in children’s clothes have all been employed by drivers trying to get to work quicker. I commend them for thinking of ways to beat the rules but they should really just get more real people in the car. Drivers that get caught are fined NZ$150 and are usually caught by officers standing on the side of the road noting down registration plate numbers. They first noticed something was wrong when cars were stopping at lights had passengers that were not moving.

At least if it is a quiet day at work then there is something to do to break the monotony.

"There were some odd people that tried these antics," said North Shore city council officer Andre Dannhauser

Check out the video from one of our local news broadcasters who reported this after Reuters broke the story.

News Video

The Emperor : Or how I learned to stop worrying and love the bomb

Some people have ordinary workstations, 1 monitor, crappy post-it notes all over everything, and more crap than you can shake a stick at. Well screw that. From now on, we should ALL be issued with new workstations from Novelquest, designed by Patrick Laflamme Duval. Modelled after a scorpion, the tail section rises up to let the user be seated, and then descends again with "the three monitors at the perfect height and angle for perfect viewing comfort". Nice. Click on the image left to embiggen.



NovelQuest via Gizmodo

Guns are bad m'kay

Ah yes, guns are useful for only one thing. Putting successively larger holes in things to make sure they go away. But its looks like we've found another use - comedy! Yes for every able gun toting marksman out there, we also have the dimwits and idiots who forget the principle rules of firearms - don't point it at anything you don't want to die, and don't forget the safety. Check out the vid after the jump for a Benny Hill inspired look at all those people who should NOT have a gun. Darwin would be proud.

Those wacky Creationists!

Ever wondered what's inside the temple of stupidity that is the Creationist Museum in Kentucky? Ever felt like having a peek but aren't willing to shell out the dolleros to fund the fundies? Well wonder no more, and don't bother going - demonbaby has done a fairly huge write up on his site, covering all the bases and checking out the gift shop too. I heartily recommend you take a visit to his blog and read what he has to say. Clear, humorous and chock full of fruits/nuts.

Exploring The Creation Museum - America's New Mecca of Fanatical Ignorance
[Currently Going To: Hell]

Two Eyed Brown Snake vs One Eyed Trouser Snake

In a clash of the titans match up reminiscent of Ali vs Foreman in the Rumble in the Jungle, a man was bitten on the wanger by a snake in Laura, 300km north of Cairns in north Queensland, Australia. It happened a few weeks ago, and because its the outback, these things take time to come to the attention of anyone else. Mr Zutt said he had crouched down by the side of the road to take a dump when the attack took place.

"I squatted down – I reckon I must've nearly sat on his head," he said.
"As soon as I felt it, I yelled. As would anyone I reckon - any guesses what he was yelling?

Arrrrrrgh fuuuuuuuck!

Fair suck of the sav, a snakes bit me willy!

Strewth, look at the size of that snake. Oh no hang on, its me old fella.

Mr Zutt was also quoted as saying "It really hurt." One would imagine so. He said he tried to remain calm as he inspected the damage. "He got me about halfway down," he said. "I saw fang marks and a bit of blood come out."

Ok - that's about all we need to hear really. Apparently he was taken to hospital where tests confirmed he had not been poisoned. On the way he had called his mum to say goodbye, preparing her for the worst. Not the nicest phone call to receive I imagine.

Oh hello Basil, hows the hunting trip going?
Well Mum, a snake just bit my John Thomas and I might be on my way out. Don't put it on my gravestone please.

His mates have been none too sympathetic either. "They've been saying things like `It was a trouser snake fight' and `He (the snake) saw the competition and got scared'," he said.

He said he would still venture to the outback but there would be no more "running through the bush barefoot and pig-hunting".

Bugger eh?

UPDATE : When the cubicle becomes just too much

I posted the other day about some cubicle freak going ballistic, and I mentioned that it looked quite real. Well, in another example of "don't believe everything you see on the internet" I've been told by the Internet that its a fake. Yes, irony is everywhere these days. Apparently its a viral marketing campaign for a new movie called Wanted with James MacAvoy and Angelina Jolie. Not quite sure exactly what the fuck the link between the two was supposed to be, but there you go. Obscure video links to obscure film. Who'da thought it eh.

Photo of Earth from Mars - Well done HiRISE

Oh my God the aliens are coming, run for the hills.... Aarrgghh!!!
Here is the best photo ever of the planet Earth taken from the orbit of Mars. This falls into the same realms as the photo that was taken recently of the Mars Phoenix lander descending to the Martian surface. Funnily enough both images were taken by the HiRISE camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and goes to show just how good that technology is.
So this is what we look like to an approaching invasion force, or to an alien race as it leaves our solar system after having its ass whipped by Will Smith.... Bigger picture after the jump.

This picture was taken on October 3, 2007, when Earth was 142 million kilometers away, that is amazing. It is similar to an image that was taken back in 2003 by the Mars Global Surveyor but this new image is a much better resolution.

Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona

Quack Health Part 1 : Insidious Advertising and Magnet Quackery

I normally try and ignore most advertising on the television. A majority of it holds no interest (toothpaste - it ain't that interesting), does not apply (do I really need another pair of high heels?), or is total bollocks (thanks whoever wrote the ad's for Dunedin). But tonight whilst watching the news and having a spot of dinner, I noticed an ad that has been on for quite some time and although I had noticed it in the past, I hadn't really paid much attention. But when I tuned in I realised it was an ad for good old, gen-eew-ine higgery pokery. Yes it was quack medicine from the 1800's, on prime time television.

Magnesleep, a product distributed by Body Magnetix for the duped masses all over New Zealand. Its their advertising we see most often, and certainly the one I notice the most, although I have seen others. I looked them up to see what they sold and what they claimed. Their website is decidedly unprofessional, and if I was purchasing something on this fact alone I wouldn't send them a cent. Their front page is full of good sales language - lots of descriptive words and emotion evoking, but little content or description of their actual product and its benefits. Here's a sample :

Imagine waking each day feeling better - refreshed, energized and ready to get into life. Imagine your aches and pains gone, your illnesses and injuries being eased away quickly and painlessly.

Sure - that's nice, but although they imply that's what their product does, they don't say it. Imagine this, imagine that - nice try but no substance.

It's not a dream! It's the reality you can enjoy, thanks to the amazingly effective magnetic therapy created by Magne-Sleep. We are magnetic therapy specialists, using only better quality magnets and manufacturing procedures. No short cut's - just better pain relief, better quality in every way.

Although they use the right words, they are still not really claiming to do anything other than what would be given by having a sleep in a warm bed (which is the wool part). "Magnetic Therapy specialists" = specialist in nothing. In fact, replace the word "magnetic" for "nothing" and its about right.

The next two paragraphs are much the same - no substance to the claims other than "Magnetic therapy has helped millions of people worldwide" and "Discover how magnetic therapy can make your life better, ease your aches, pains, illnesses and injuries and help you get the very best out of life". But how? Well, if you scroll past all the intro, past the prices for the products, past the guarantee (more disclaimer and refund policy) you get to a list of ailments this product is supposed to affect. here's the list :

ARTHRITIS, LOWER BACK PAIN, ASTHMA & ALLERGIES, ADHD, SKIN CONDITIONS, FIBROMYALGIA, DIABETES, SCIATICA, GOUT, MUSCLE SPASMS, LEG CRAMPS, BONE FRACTURES, INSOMNIA, STRESS & NERVOUS DISORDERS, SPORTS INJURIES, SPRAINS & STRAINS,CHRONIC FATIGUE SYNDROME, CARPAL TUNNEL SYNDROME, HEADACHE & MIGRAINE, DEPRESSION LUPUS

Shit - is there anything it can't do? New Super bed blanket thing! Cures all ailments, feeds the hungry, makes you a cup of tea and leaps tall buildings in a single bound. Depression Lupus - I'm sad because I'm a werewolf? Ok - I couldn't help it. Lupus is apparently a very real condition with a lot of symptoms. I cant say I know a lot about it, so look it up on disease and medical sites if you are interested.

And what does the magic hoo-doo cost? Shitloads - from $190 for a single budget COTTON (not wool) version, and from $290 (single) to $429 (super king) woollen version. Compare that to a standard woollen underlay from a standard NZ supplier of $190 (single) to $350 (super king). And that's not the cheapest price I could find, merely the one I knew off the top of my head. So you pay an extra $70 to $100 for what? Some magnets.

If you look at any of these websites like Body Magnetix, Biomag, Biomagnetic, you will notice the same formula. There are plenty of vague claims about supposed health benefits, several key phrases like "ease your aches, pains, illnesses and injuries", "all without pills and potions" or "as viewed by leading Western medical practitioners and researchers". They use word play and advertising jargon to convince the unwary and people in pain that their product will cure their problems. They point to specific studies that back up their claims of magnetic therapy. They claim magnets increase circulation because blood has iron in it. They say things like "the magnetic force stimulates nerve-endings to improve blood flow to injured or swollen joints, causing the blood vessels to dilate". Hmm - really?

Pills and Potions
This is a standard advertising technique used by fringe medicine. If you used the word potions along with pills, it evokes negative connotations by drawing on peoples mental picture of alchemists and pre-1800 style quacks selling tonics at sideshows. Ironically, this is exactly their area of trade and they apply it to science based medicine to give it a negative spin.

"Studies have shown"
Really? Which ones? These website make major claims and don't back them up with any evidence whatsoever. I will steal a few paragraphs from the Silly Beliefs site...

The following is typical of proponents of magnetic therapy:

The positive effects of magnetic treatment have been confirmed by clinical tests and are recognized by modern medical science around the world.

Do you believe these claims, and if you do, why? What clinical tests support magnetic therapy and since when has modern medical science proscribed a treatment of magnets? Since they provide no real evidence whatsoever that their claims are in fact true, this statement is worthless, just as worthless as the following claims that I might make:

'The positive effects of treatment using Eskimo magic has been confirmed by clinical tests and is recognized by modern medical science around the world'.

Or how about this one:

'Many scientists believe the Moon is made out of green cheese, and suppressed government files support this belief'.

These examples clearly demonstrate that saying something is true does not make it so. Magnetic therapy proponents can make bogus claim after bogus claim on their websites and in their promotional brochures, but this doesn't mean there is any truth to them. They can claim that science and research supports their claims, just like I can claim Eskimo magic works and that the moon is made of green cheese, but you shouldn't believe either of us until we provide supporting evidence.

A double-blind test study - apparently.
Some sites actually refer to a study conducted at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston on which people who had suffered Polio as a child and had pain related to that illness were treated with magnetic therapy. Although the results of that one pilot study of 50 people showed a statistically significant result in favour of magnet therapy, there were several major problems with the study, and the results have never been accepted as proof of the efficacy of magnets, except by the Magnet Salesmen. The key phrase here is "pilot study" - it was never a full blown test. The authors themselves acknowledge that the study was a "pilot study." Pilot studies are done to determine whether it makes sense to invest in a larger more definitive study. They never provide a legitimate basis for marketing any product as effective against any symptom or health problem.
Every other scientific study conducted within double blind testing, and large groups has shown there is no effect from magnets of the size marketed by the woo merchants like Biomag, Magnesleep and other such conmen.

So in conclusion what more do I need to say? Its pretty clear that there's no evidence to support any of this mumbo jumbo, but it continues to be pushed onto the unsuspecting public here in NZ. I think the Government should make these guys put up or shut up - scientifically prove that what you are selling has an effect on the diseases you claim to cure, or fuck off. They fleece the unsuspecting public for millions every year, and should be subject to the same kind of rigorous testing all other medicines go through.

See these websites for an even more in depth dissection of Magnet Therapy and its false claims.

Silly Beliefs - Magnetic Therapy - Healing or Scam?
Magnetic Therapy: A Skeptical View

Clint Eastwood V's Spike Lee (I know who my money's on)

One of the greatest actors of all time and the one man that should be ruler of the universe has told Spike Lee to ‘Shut his face’. Clint Eastwood made the comment in regards to what Lee said about there being no African Americans in the veteran filmmakers war films Letters to Iwo Jima and Flags of Our Fathers. If I was Spike Lee I’d be shitting myself about now as Clint is probably not someone I would want knocking on my front door with a .44 Magnum in hand.

The Dirty Harry star, turned director said that the film Flags of Our Fathers was about the chaps that raised the flag in the iconic photo taken at Iwo Jima by Joe Rosenthal, and it just so happened that there was no African Americans in the story he was telling. He went on to say about the black troops that were actually there:

“they didn't raise the flag. The story is 'Flags of Our
Fathers,' the famous flag-raising picture, and they didn't do that. If I go
ahead and put an African-American actor in there, people'd go, 'This guy's lost
his mind.' I mean, it's not accurate."

Mr Harry responded to Lee’s jibe with the simple line “A guy like him should shut his face."

A lot of films are made about historical events and most of them take a lot of liberties with the actual facts and the fact that there are few depictions of African Americans is a testament to Eastwood’s film making and Spike Lee’s lack of knowledge about the subject. The moral to this story really is don’t piss off the man with no name or he’ll eat you for breakfast.

Go Pale Rider.

Classic prank - as long as you ain't the prankee

Mentos and Diet Coke - has there been a better find in chemical and prank history after compressed air and the whoopee cushion? We've seen all manner of interesting things done from Mythbusters testing exactly what it is in the two substances that makes the violent reaction, to the guys on Youtube with their Coke\Mentos synchronised musical fountains. Lets not forget all the idiots eating mentos and drinking coke to "see what happens". Darwin would be proud. But its always interesting to see new and inventive ways to use old tricks. See after the jump for a neat, and messy way to entertain yourself and perhaps make a new enemy.












How To Build A Mentos And Diet Coke Booby Trap

College Humor Prank Wars parts 1-6

This is great stuff. This is developing into something of an internet phenomenon. It is two guys (Streeter and Amir) that work at www.collegehumor.com that spent most of 2007 pranking each other and there are some crackers in here. There are 6 videos to view and each one gets more and more risky/fun, it pays to start at the beginning. Check out after the jump for the films.

Number 1


Number 2


Number 3


Number 4


Number 5


Number 6

Superfast RC Helicopter - killbots next

Billed as the fastest RC helicopter in the world, the Rave 450 Electric helicopter has to be seen to be believed. Looks and sounds pretty angry, and I can see itbeing used as either a high class hedgetrimmer, or crowd control decapitation machine. Check out the vid after the jump.








More vids here at the CYB site. Check it out.

Or for buying models in NZ check these guys out

When the cubicle becomes just too much

Most videos of people going postal in the office are usually set ups, viral adverts or just some guys having a laugh. But sometimes you watch them and wonder "What if someone lost it completely one day? How far would they go?"
Enter some eastern european man who obviously can't take the pressure any more of people bumping his desk, spilling his coffee and some fat bloke knocking papers onto the floor. Check out the two vids after the jump and make your own mind up as to its authenticity.






Craaaazy.



and heres some footage from a cellphone by a co-worker of the same scene.

Little Green Men, Call the Plumber Please.

What a week it’s been for NASA and space. We have the $325 million Phoenix Lander successfully making touchdown on the red planet and the Space Shuttle Discovery made it to orbit without any major issues. That means the hunt for little green men is now on and the Space Station will get its new crapper.



The Phoenix landed just as expected and in a nice flat area with very few rocks and boulders. During its rocket assisted descent the plumes of exhaust have blown away the dust to reveal flat, bright areas that we will hopefully find to be ice of some kind. After performing all the post landing tests it was confirmed that the lander was in good shape and ready to start science. Just yesterday the bucket scoop grabbed a sample of the regolith and took images of the rusty coloured material. I have to say that it looks a lot like mud and surprisingly there is a small patch of what looks like a white/silvery substance which NASA think could be ICE or some kind of salts.
NASA hopes to do some tests on this soil sometime over the next week and confirm what the makeup of it is. We may yet see traces of hydrogen which may mean water.

And coupled with that the Space Shuttle Discovery launched almost flawlessly on its way to the International Space Station to deliver the rest of the Japanese science module Kibo and repair the toilet that is not working. The toilet has 2 parts, one for poo and one for wee, it’s the wee part that is broken, so at least they are not up shit creek yet. In saying that the manual function of the toilet is working and the crew has been using the toilet in the Soyuz capsule which is docked for emergencies so it’s not all doom and gloom. If the toilet can not be fixed they may have to evacuate the station or use Apollo era crapper bags which could be messy.

The launch which was almost flawless did no apparent damage the orbiter but it sunbstantially wrecked part of the launch facility. Mortar and bricks were blown out from the blast chamber which channels the exhaust plumes during takeoff and scattered them over the road behind the pad. NASA have said that this should be repaired in time for the next scheduled launch at pad 39A on Oct 8th.

All in all a pretty good week for NASA as they try to complete the space station and prove that little green men do in fact live on Mars and War of the Worlds is a documentary.

Opt out you bastard, I said OPT OUT!

Premium SMS messaging services, credit cards, phone services, cable TV, gherkin in your McDonald's - you name the service, they will only remove it if you ask them too, even if you didnt ask for it in the first place. In this day and age, the dirty tactics marketing type or the sneaky bastard behind opt-out services, seems to be the calibre of person being hired by companies small and large to run their service administration. They will drum up cash by pushing their services onto unsuspecting people on mailing\phone lists or dimwitted individuals silly enough to sign up to services without reading the fine print.

How does it work? Simple - lets take scenario A. Jane is an average chick. She likes walks on the beach, romantic dinners and strangling ferrets. She purchases something online from a reputable online sales company called Nice Guys Inc. Working for Nice Guys Inc. is Jim Bastard. Jim trawls through the Nice Guys Inc. database collecting personal information of its customers and sells it on the side to a rep from Up Yours Inc. called Sneaky Bugger. Mr S. Bugger then uses the cell phone info to sign Jane up to a costly but innocuous Mobile Phone Quiz service that texts you questions and offers prizes for correct answers (prizes that don't exist, but that's another scam). Jane receives text messages, not understanding who they are from, and deletes them thinking she's being spammed. Jane receives her next cell phone bill, sees she is in the hock to the tune of $hitloads and promptly has a coronary. You see, what Jane didn't realise is that every time she received a text she was being billed for it. To cancel this, she would have to opt out, even though she never opted in personally in the first place.

Sound far fetched? Sound like I've run out of spam fodder for my blog and am making this shit up? Unfortunately no - this happens all the time and is on the rise around the world. Sneaky bastards are using our personal information and in some cases our gullibility against us yet again, and this include some major companies. In New Zealand we have Telecom, our largest telco provider, doing this very thing just recently with some of its services on mobile phones. Credit Card companies, for a long time, raise your credit limit without asking, and refuse to let you cancel your cards. American Express is a great example of this. A personal friend of mine has tried on multiple occasions to cancel his Amex and he gets transferred, put off, hung up on and abused to prevent him doing so. And they charge him a yearly service fee for having the card! WTF is up with that! An opt-out service you can't opt-out of!

And of course, there are always things advertised late at night on the telly for "sign-your-life-away-services" where you can have all manner of date\quiz\joke spam pour into your cell handset 24-7 if you are so inclined. These services, which cost the aforementioned $hitload, are aimed at the dimwitted and lonely individual who may just want to have someone text him\her once in a while. And while I feel sorry for them, they do write their own credit obituary by signing up.

"But" I hear you cry, "surely if this kind of thing was policed it wouldn't happen?". "Wouldn't the fuzz be cracking skulls if there was a law against it?" Sadly, no - there already IS laws against it, but unless you can prove who did it (in Janes case) or prove the company sent you the texts without your consent, theres not a lot anyone can do. The ombudsman in NZ already hears plenty of these cases every year and the number of cases is on the rise.

So what can we do? Well its like the other spam rants I've been on recently.

Awareness - be aware of scams doing the rounds, but dont believe everything you read. Check up on it if you are unsure if its spam alert about a scam or it came with an advert about Viagra. Check Snopes.com - they have a good encyclopaedia of spam emails and hoaxes. But also Googling will find most things

Protection - turn on junk filters, don't give out information to people you don't trust and don't do phone surveys - they are often people trawling for personal information so they can rip you off. If you recieve a text you don't understand, check with the phone company to make sure you are not getting billed for it.

Think-before-you-click - links in emails, pop-ups on websites, things asking you to "sign up". Don't do it unless its absolutely necessary, and don't give them any information you don't think is useful to complete whatever transaction you are trying to complete. Why do they want your phone number/address/bank account? If it wont let you through, lie - change a couple of numbers and if its ever a problem, say you mistyped.

Be careful out there!

Their day in the sun - Tribute 08

New Zealand had a modest involvement in the Vietnam war, which was in contrast to the major wars in the previous 40 years. We sent 3900 personnel between June 1964 and December 1972, and 37 of those young men did not come home. This Queens Birthday weekend was spent remembering those young men, and honouring the men who served in a war that many saw as wrong and has had massive repercussions on both the Vietnamese and Western forces for generations.

You may ask why we spent the last 5 days marching, speaking and remembering when this was all so long ago, and ANZAC day is our national day of remembrance for all our past armed servicemen and women. To answer that, go back to that time as the troops returned from fighting in a foreign country for what the government at the time deemed an important enough cause to lay down Kiwi lives. See here for an overview of the political and historical overview.
In 1972, if you were a returning serviceman there were no parades. There were no effusive speeches from the elected officials. There were no welcoming communities ready to buy you a pint at the pub as a small thank you for your part in a confusing and controversial conflict. There were plenty of protesters, plenty of officials who refused to recognise your involvement in serving for your country, and for many Vietnam War veterans all this contributed to serious mental health problems associated with fighting in an unpopular war. Add to this the physical and genetic effects of Agent Orange, widely thought to have been used in hand sprayers and dropped from aircraft to negate the cover of bush to the Vietnamese.
I was honoured this weekend to have been asked to take part in the Honour March through Wellington and be present for Whakanoa & Parliamentary Welcome. I walked with my Father in law who served two tours in Vietnam in Victor 5, and elsewhere in the crowd was my great Uncle who served in the SAS. It was a different atmosphere to how it must have been for the returning servicemen back in the 70's. There were people applauding, the officials spoke and apologised for previous wrongs, and promises were made.
So what did it all mean in the big scheme of things? To the millions of Vietnamese dead and the Kiwi's who died also, probably not a lot. But to the men and women who returned, it meant that there was acceptance that even though many did not agree with why they went, we applaud their efforts and they have our respect and pride for the job they did. Not just 12 month tour.

See here for more info on the NZ involvement in the Vietnam war.

And Here.

And here