DogsOfWar

542 posts
Dogs of War was born in a crossfire hurricane. He wrestles alligators in the pouring rain.

Canadians Can Now Be Told by the Internet How they Feel about Politics

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The CBC has released a new online tool that allows Canadians (or anyone) to answer some multiple choice questions and be told what party they should belong to. The Vote Compass tool asks how the user feels or how they would change 30 hot button issues.  The answers are tabulated and the tool assigns the user to a likely political party and shows their leanings on a graph of social and economic conservatism or liberalism.

As you can see the questions are not exactly nuanced in all cases and lean toward the blunt since they need to suss out a person’s political views in short order.  The tool is written in Adobe Flash so don’t bother using your elitist iPad to try to access it.

Once you’ve filled out all the questions in your choice of English or Français you’re told which party you need to start politely telling your friends about.

You can then tell the world where you stand with one click of the Facebook share button.

Update:

Thanks to Deadlist Sin (an actual Canadian, unlike me) we now learn that the liberal bias in the media is a real thing.  Even people who consider themselves conservative are being labeled as liberals by the CBC.

Source: El Reg.

Fake Girlfriends for Social Networks Are Now a Reality

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Do you wish you had a girlfriend to impress all your “friends” on those social networking sites, but all those online dating horror stories have driven you from finding a real girlfriend?  Well, now you can have the online girlfriend experience without all the trouble of dating and interacting with humans.  CloudGirlfriend.com will pretend to be your significant other on social networking sites for a small, but as yet undetermined fee.

The people behind the site claim your fake girlfriend will not be an automated love-bot but will be a real person.  Who knows, it might even be a girl.  She will write on your Facebook wall, tweet you sweet nothings and proclaim her love for you from the highest Tumblr.

I know what you’re thinking, wouldn’t your friends in real life wonder who this mystery woman is?  Yes, and you’ll have to lie to them.  But girls you barely know in your online social circle will think you have a girlfriend and then they’ll want to be your girlfriend too.  The science behind this is solid and you shouldn’t question it.

Source and image CNet.

LA’s Skyline Doesn’t Need Butterflies or Ads

I’ve seen the LA skyline from just about every possible angle and elevation.  The city core has freeways that run on all sides of it and when driving by at the wrong time of day motorists are often going slow enough to be able to appreciate it for a time.  When landing by plane LAX is far enough from downtown that you can see it as you approach and get a good perspective on it.  It’s not that LA is best known for it’s city skyline, but it’s not known for having an unattractive one.

If a group fronted by Hanjin owned Korean Air gets its way the Los Angeles skyline will begin to resemble Las Vegas with all its glitz and tackiness.  The plan is to build a 45 story hotel and adjacent 65 story office building and festoon each with an array of computer controlled LED lights that could form moving images of stars, butterflies and anything else the building management can think up.  The project is budgeted at $1B.

The bottom 10 floors would show advertisements while the floors above 10 would show images.  To make things worse the top 10% of each building would use the lights to display the major tenants and building owners’ names.  It’s not uncommon for a major tenant to negotiate signage rights but the familiar names on buildings do not often scroll by in a stock ticker fashion.

The new buildings would be built where the Wilshire Grand Hotel now sits.  The ground level advertisements would look like this:

The whole thing will just end up looking like a 13 year old’s MySpace profile if this is the direction things go.

Images: AC Martin and Christopher A. Joseph & Associates

Source LA Times.

Bigger Isn’t Always Better – Trends in Cosmetic Surgery

The American Society of Plastic Surgeons released a comprehensive report of cosmetic surgery trends through 2010.  With all the Real Housewives shows being so successful it’s not surprising that boob jobs are up 40% since 2000.  But the really amazing increase is in a procedure called a “lower body lift“, up an astounding 4,550% since 2000.  A lower body lift will cost you an average of $7,247. This is likely because the procedures that make up a lower body lift were all sold separately before but have now been conveniently bundled in recent years.  Those procedures are a tummy tuck, thigh lift and butt lift.

One of the big losers is the hair transplant down 57% since 2000.  Hair styles for men of diminished follicle fortitude has been the close cut or shaved head freeing them from having really terrible plugs that don’t look natural no matter what those late night TV commercials say.  Collagen is also down (73%) now that people have seen the light on fish lips, or new materials come on the market.  While boob jobs are almost universally popular they’re actually down 30% among women 55 and over.

Data is here.  Source NYT.

NJ Man Sues Over 4Loko Induced Heart Problems

Some wimp in Knowlton Township, NJ is suing the makers of Four Loko because he claims to now have heart arrhythmia after drinking a mere 2.5 cans of the magical elixir.  It is a well known fact that Four Loko can induce visions of Leprechauns, but only a nincompoop would drink 2.5 cans without getting a complete physical first.  Light weight.  Try to explain to the boys down at the tire shop why you’re suing instead of manning up and having another one.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

From SF Gate.

Firefox 4 Now Available

The most popular browser on Crasstalk is Firefox 3.  Today brings good news for those who have been suffering along with a browser that first came out in 2008.  Firefox 4 is now available and is one day ahead of schedule.  It’s not quite up on the Mozilla website but their FTP servers are offering up the latest bits.  You can download them here.  Just select your operating system and grab the language of your choice. Below are easier links for popular combinations:

If you’ve been running a Firefox 4 beta then you can get the new version by going to Help then About.  The download will start and install automatically.

Firefox 4 brings better speed, stability, a few new usability features, hardware acceleration and a redesigned user interface.  So, what are you waiting for, go download.

Minimum requirements are Windows 2000 or Mac OS 10.5.  If you are on 10.4 Apple wants you to know that they haven’t published any security updates since April 2009 and that you should upgrade to 10.5 or preferably 10.6.

iOS App Looks to “Convert” Homosexuals

The latest anti-gay iOS app is receiving broad criticism for its stated purpose of providing people “freedom from homosexuality.”  The app is published by Exodus International, an organization well known for its “conversion therapy” and hate speech.

On its website Exodus International proudly states that the app received a 4+ rating so it’s not objectionable to anyone.

Exodus International has released its new smartphone application now available through iTunes!  Receiving a 4+ rating from Apple (applications in this category contain no objectionable material), this application is designed to be a useful resource for men, women, parents, students, and ministry leaders.

Are you a man, woman, parent student or ministry leader?  Have you been “impacted by homosexuality?” Then this app is clearly for you and your burning desire to rid the world of those damn gays help gay people stop being gay.

If you would like to add your voice to those opposed to this electronic hate mongering then visit change.org.

Source El Reg.

Your Obsessive Web Browsing

Have you ever wondered how many times you’ve visited a website?  If you’re using Firefox and haven’t cleared your browsing history (they have a private mode for that you know) then your web browser will tell you.

  • Right click on the page background
  • Select “View Page Info”
  • Click on the Security tab at the top, it’s the one with the lock
  • Now read the line that says,  “Have I visited this web site prior to today?”

Shout out with your ridiculously high numbers for your favorite websites.  This number isn’t an exact science and only goes as far back as the last time you cleared history, but it’s fun to get an idea of how many times you’ve obsessively refreshed a particular site.

It’s Time to Update Your Twitter Settings

Twitter finally gives you the option to use full time HTTPS.  This will encrypt all of your traffic between your computer and Twitter’s servers making it more difficult for people to intercept or hijack your session with Firesheep or other tools.

To enable this feature:

  • Login to Twitter
  • On the upper right you should see your avatar and username.  Click this.
  • Select Settings
  • Click the check box next to “
  • Click Save
  • Enter your password to verify

That’s it, now you use HTTPS all the time.  Keep Tweeting those Crasstalk stories.

Source and screenshot Engadget.