10 geeky movies to show your kids

By Mark O’Neill
Contributing Writer, [GAS]

If you’re a geek, you’ll want your kids to grow up and be a geek too.   To that end, Wired has a list of ten geeky movies you should make your kids watch and of course it goes without saying that Star Wars IV: A New Hope is in first place.

I am also glad that Back To The Future made the cut.  But Harry Potter? Can Harry Potter seriously be considered a geek movie?   That little kid with a zigzag scar and a wand?   Can he honestly be put in the same league as Luke Skywalker?

What geek movies would you show / have you shown your kids?



Japan’s hi-tech toilet obsession

By Mark O’Neill
Contributing Writer, [GAS]

It seems that Japan is the one nation on earth with an obsession for making the best toilets.  While we are content with only making sure that they are able to flush properly and no more, the Japanese are installing handy little extras such as devices to wash and dry your bottom and “front parts” (hooo! kinky!), check your blood pressure, play you music, a heated seat and it will even put the lid down for you (which is called “the marriage-saver”!)

So this all provokes the thought – why do we have such a problem with the toilet?   Why are we so reluctant to upgrade our own toilets?   This is the 21st century for God’s sake!   Is it too much to ask to get a heated toilet seat to keep my bottom warm while I’m reading the Sunday newspaper?   I think not!   Come on toilet designers!   Let’s see some original thinking here!

A little bit of music and a bottom washer wouldn’t go amiss either.

Japan’s hi-tech toilets – Daily Telegraph

Dog Tongue Science

Most people think that when a dog drinks, he creates a kind of spoon with the top of his tongue and brings liquid back to his mouth. When looking at a dog lapping at a bowl of water in real time, it certainly seems this way. But if you slow down a film of the process at around 300 frames by second, things are not really as they appear. Video after the jump.

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Code Monkey like you

By Lyle Bateman
Contributing Writer, [GAS]

Geeks love music, and proof is in the incredible sales of games like Guitar Hero. But even then, it’s rare that a song comes along that is both eminently geeky and eminently musical, and I can’t think of a better way to describe “Code Monkey” by Jonathan Coulton. Anyone who has spent any time doing professional computer work will find something to relate to in this song, and more than just being a song with catchy lyrics, the whole thing really is a technical masterpiece. From the animation, through the music, the video for Code Monkey is incredibly well done. The use of the anime background, and the wonderfully precise cuts and rhythm are as impressive as the music that lays on top. In the classic world of copyright, a video like this is VERY hard to make, and its quality and relevance is a testament to the whole notion of an intellectual marketplace of ideas.

However, Coulton licenses all his music through Creative Commons to encourage sharing and derivative work – like the animation to this video. I dare you to listen to Code Monkey and NOT hum it to yourself later on in the day. I am writing this because, after a friend turned me on to this song the other day, I can’t get the darn thing out of my head, so I am hoping to share the misery. I only have one other thing to say to all the rest of you out there … “Code Monkey likes Fritos …”

Coming Soon – Facebook: The Movie

By Shéa Bennett
Contributing Writer, [GAS]

Yeah, I can’t wait either. Penned by Aaron Sorkin, who created The West Wing and wrote the Tom Hank’s vehicle Charlie Wilson’s War, the as of yet untitled Facebook movie will focus on Mark Zuckerberg, Dustin Moskovitz and Chris Hughes, the founders of the popular social networking site.

Sorkin’s leaving no stone unturned in his preparation, and has even gone as far as – gasp – opening an account on Facebook himself. “I figured a good first step in my preparation would be finding out what Facebook is, so I’ve started this page,” he says, adding, “I understand there are a few other people using Facebook pages under my name – which I find more flattering than creepy – but this is me. I don’t know how I can prove that but feel free to test me.”

The thing is, even that isn’t all it seems, as Sorkin then reveals that he didn’t even set up the page himself. “It was started by my researcher, Ian Reichbach, because my grandmother has more Internet savvy than I do and she’s been dead for 33 years. I honestly don’t know how this works, which is why I’m here.

I have a fairly specific idea of what the first 15 pages of the screenplay will be and no idea what will happen on pages 16 thru 130.”

I don’t know about you guys, but I can’t think of anyone better to write the script about a movie that I don’t care anything about.

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Nose Shower Gel Dispenser

We all know that when it comes to dating, today’s men and women prefer geeks. As a reader of this site, you should be aware of this fact by now. So for all you single geeks out there waiting to go on a date, here’s a little accessory that will bring a smile to your face while ensuring that you stay sparkling clean for your future significant other.

Ok, I’m pretty sure most girls wouldn’t put this in their shower, but single male geeks will probably get a kick out of it. Made out of rubber and priced at $17.95, the nose shower gel dispenser will probably gross out most people, but not you, right?. To get a bit of gel, just squeeze the nose and watch as the viscous liquid oozes out of the right nostril. Yummy!

Oh and if you decide to bring your new conquest home after a few dates, be sure to remove this thing from your shower. You wouldn’t want to scare her / him the first time they set their feet into your den, eh?

[Product Page | Via Branchez-vous]

British bank changes “pants” password

By Mark O’Neill
Contributing Writer, [GAS]

Here’s some food for thought if you think your online banking password is securely hidden from curious eyes at the bank.

A British banking customer, Steve Jetley, phoned up his bank (Lloyds TSB Bank) and discovered that his password “Lloyds is pants” had been changed to “no it’s not” by a bank employee.   He had made this password after having an argument with the bank over insurance.

He was then told he was banned from changing it back to “Lloyds is pants” or to another password such as “Barclays is better” (Barclays is a rival bank).   He even tried the word “censorship” but the bank employee refused that one too on the grounds it was too long.

Lloyds claims the employee has now been fired and Mr Jetley has received a full apology.   But this incident makes you wonder how many bank employees actually have full unrestricted access to your online banking password.

BBC News via Schneier on Security

Star Wars Landspeeder replica looks just like the real thing

This Star Wars Landspeeder replica was designed by a very talented dude named Daniel Deutsch. The near-perfect masterpiece was built from scratch using molded fiberglass and mounted on a custom aluminum chassis. The vehicle is powered by an electric drive system, which can take its passenger near light speed (or 25 mph). Additional pictures after the jump.

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Comcast Planning to Dump Bandwidth Hogs

By PatB
Contributing Writer, [GAS]

After a stinging rebuke from the FCC over Comcast’s efforts in bandwidth shaping to preserve bandwidth for all their customers, Comcast is planning to retreat behind a stingy Acceptable Usage Policy. Instead of shaping bandwidth, they are just going to give the finger and pull the plug on P2P users.

From Bloomberg here:

Comcast Corp., the largest U.S. cable operator, said subscribers whose use of the Internet exceeds 250 gigabytes of data a month may get a warning call and could lose their service.

Customers who breach the threshold — enough to send 50 million e-mails or 125 standard-definition movies — may be asked to reduce their use, the Philadelphia-based company said today in a Web posting. Those whose “excessive use” continues may be cut off for a year.

The limit officially becomes part of Comcast’s acceptable use policy Oct. 1. The company reported 14.3 million high-speed Internet customers at the end of the second quarter.

Cable operators are wrestling with how to keep high-speed Internet services operating smoothly as demand soars for features such as streaming video that place heavy demands on networks.

I sympathize with Comcast users, mostly over the company’s horrible track record with customer service. Heck, any company that will cause a grandmother to take a hammer and smash up the customer service center over bad service is a bad company. But the brouhaha over the net neutrality debate has forced Comcast to exert their rights as an ISP. Comcast’s suggestion to bandwidth hogging P2P users: Let’s see how well bit torrent works over dialup.

XP’s Nagware to Get an Upgrade [Oxymoron?]

By Jimmy Rogers
Contributing Writer, [GAS]

Mary-Jo Foley has posted an interesting bit of news about Microsoft’s most popular OS.  Nope, not Vista, silly, Windows XP.  It seems that Microsoft is planning a roll-out of a new version of Windows Genuine Advantage for XP.  If the update thinks you’ve got a pirated version of XP, The background will become all black with a transparent “non-genuine” warning over it (similar to the one below).

According to Microsoft, this update will allow them to track stolen software keys more easily but will not include any “counter-measures” like the unpopular “kill switch” that initially shipped with Windows Vista (and was later replaced in SP1).  Also, this update will only affect XP Professional, as it is the most popular version for pirates.  I assume this is because most people savvy enough to pirate Windows would rather jump off a cliff than use XP Home Edition.

While Microsoft claims that Windows XP users actually want this new nagware added to their OS, I find it a little hard to believe. The wording of their user survey must indeed be very misleading for users to accept installing this on their machine.  I’ll bet it asks if users would value “being notified if [they] are a victim of software piracy.”  In reality, people who pirate Windows are unlikely to install Windows Genuine Advantage on their computer in the first place.

[Image via ZDNet]