The video begin: “A short time ago in a garage near, near by…” from the guy who brought you the steam powered centipede comes another crabfu masterpiece – R2D2 from Star Wars, he’s back and he’s steaming!
Cheers
Jerry
Picture yourself behind the tiller of a record breaking racing car – 123 years old and still capable of 60 kilometres per hour. This deDion-Bouton et Trepardoux recently went up for auction and sold for US$3,520,000. It’s quite a catch and it runs quietly on steam. The car was built in 1884
(photos from Gooding & Co)
You can see a video of the car in action here.
The downdraft chimney is not unlike the 1889 Serpollet-Peugeot which suggests that the earlier car influenced the later Serpollet design.
(photo – Everard 2006)
Cheers
Jerry
Perhaps you are one of the lucky ones who has not yet received a dozen invites from trusted friends about joining the latest social networking site – Quechup. It seems that as part of the signup process Quechup scans your gmail in-box and emails everyone in it. This is not an opt-in option. Fortunately I read the list of ‘benefits’ and found virtually no difference from Facebook – which isn’t (quite) so aggressive – so I didn’t sign up and add to the global spam content.
This is certainly not the way viral marketing is supposed to work – ie it’s not actually meant to be like a virus that self-replicates around the internet – rather it should be about a good meme that others think is a really good idea and feels they want to share it with others – a soort of positive people power.
Instead, the involuntary sharing of Quechup invites seems about a attractive as turning up at a party with the flu and ‘sharing’ it with everyone!
My advice for what it’s worth is to avoid Quechup like the proverbial. I’ll stick to Facebook where I have more control over the process.
And don’t take my word for it – check out the technorati tag cloud on this topic.
Wherever there’s a positive creative space, there’s always someone who wants to spoil it for others – and virtual world SecondLife is no exception. Maybe it’s a power trip thing, maybe it’s someone’s idea of a joke, but it can be disconcerting – even upsetting to be the butt of a griefer’s fun.
I attended a really useful class run in-world by Ayla Curry at the GQ teaching site on dealing with griefers.
Griefing can take many forms – the one common feature is it’s a form of bullying. Some shoot guns that push your avatar around, some surround you in particles until everything slows down under the processing weight, and some try to get control of your avatar and make it do things you don’t want it to. Some are just abusive, incite vilification, or belittle a newbie’s attempts to come to grips with their new surroundings.
Most people respond with anger – and that’s exactly what the griefer wants – a sign that they have had an impact. So it’s important to stay calm – there are several things you can do.
If you are surrounded by fog or particles you can go to the View menu and click on BEACONS – you can edit out particles and then you can see again.
If an avatar is pointing a gun then sit down. That’s it – just find something to sit on – the ground will do – and sit down. This immobilises your avatar and renders it immune to pushing by others.
If they attach something that follows you around – like a big spider or a sound that hurls abuse – try teleporting out – anything that is attached can’t follow through a teleport.
And if all else fails log out and log in again later.
If you can get a screenshot of the griefer or capture chat history of any abuse then you have the identity of the griefer and proof of abuse – report it to Linden Labs and it is likely that person will be banned from the world.
Above all, stay calm and breath deeply. It’s only a game after all! And remember: WHEN IN DOUBT – LOGOUT!
For more information, consult the Secondlife knowledge base (login required).
Many thanks to Ayla Curry for her time and generosity 🙂
So
It was the first total lunar eclipse since 2000, and the Australian news reported it this way. There were spectacular photos (one of these days I really should get a digital SLR with a good zoom) from around the world – you can see some of them here
Cheers
Jerry
