Real-World News

As a followup to my blog on why Christian rock sucks, it appears that God agrees:

More than 40 people were taken to hospital — three with serious injuries — after the floor caved in at a packed concert in an Abbotsford, B.C, church late Friday night.
...
The sold-out event featured contemporary Christian rock band Starfield. A couple of warm-up bands were playing their music when the accident happened, Thiessen said.

Glad to know the big guy shares my opinions. Sucks people had to get injured in the process. If only they had read my blog, this whole thing could have been averted.

Okay, so I joke. Realistically, God didn't do it because even if he exists, he certainly wouldn't give a shit about some crap music and some silly teenagers— regardless of their faith. I suppose, though, that it's really more the end result of putting too little faith in science. Oh well. Perhaps this serves as a warning against future mindlessness.

... or not. After all, chances are they'll simply say it was "God testing them" or something, but the next time a gay soldier dies, they'll say it's because God hates him. Funny how they get to have it both ways. Funny— but mainly just plain pathetic.

Cheers.

Yep, that's right, Wikimedia has hit its 10 millionth article across all 250 languages. Apparently, it was an article about Nicholas Hilliard, an Elizabethan era portrait painter, on the Hungarian language Wikipedia. Pretty cool, eh?

Not only do we have articles about various historical people— we also have them in lots of languages. From alexa's rankings, the various Wikipedias are in the top 10 visited sites for 14 countries, and in the top 20 for 9 more on top of that. And, only around 15% of our users come from the United States. To give even more perspective, our daily reach exceeds MySpace, Facebook, and blows Britannica out of the water. That means that on a daily basis, more people will make their way to Wikipedia than any of the other sites listed. Eat that, Britannica. Of course, google is still kicking our ass, but their time will come... muahahahah.

Wanna jump on the bandwagon? Go make an account on the English Wikipedia... or don't. It's totally up to you. After all, we don't require you to create an account to edit, but if you want credit for your work, it's easier to keep track of it by making one.

Some little-known niches of Wikipedia:

• The reference desk — have a question in need of someone who knows a certain topic well? Ask there and you'll likely have a response within a couple of hours or less.


• Commons — Need pictures or other media but don't wanna pay for it? Look no further. Commons hosts royal-free, free-to-use-and-modify content, so instead of paying ridiculous sums for stock photos, look on commons first. Simply looking for a new wallpaper? Check out the quality images category and you won't be disappointed. I never am. :P


• How we pwn Britannica — We maintain a running list of things that Encyclopedia Britannica screwed up and we've since corrected. Unlike other encyclopedias, we actually respond to our readers' complaints, and, if we don't, we invite them to fix it themselves :P

Anyway. yay us. I'll be the one celebrating, dancing naked on our admin chat channel on IRC if anyone needs me. ;)

Cheers. :P

I heard this movie was going to be some sort of sci-fi film, so I went in with low expectations of nerd humor, average directing, average writing, and some silly twist. At worst, I'd be Villaged. Alas, even my low expectations for movies could not prepare me for this crapfest. Mind you, this is coming from someone who can always find something fun, silly, or stupid about a movie and still walk away and go, "meh, it wasn't that bad." The Golden Compass, however, has redefined the world as I know it.

I think this is how it went down in the writing room:

Larry: silence... typing on the keyboard
Curly: silence... writing
Mo: silence... brainstorming

All silence. Why? Because if they would have talked, they would have realized that I, as well as my friend, heard the phrase "ball sac" at least a dozen times. I honestly don't know to what they were referring, but I think it was a city of some sort. I was laughing too frequently at its occurrence to figure it out.

On top of that, there was another memorable zinger uttered by some polar bear: "you want to— ride me?" By that point, I had already been primed by the thought of traveling to a city of "ball sacs" that I lost it when I heard one about "riding me." Clearly, these writers were retards.

It gets better.

So as of today, Australia has now ratified the Kyoto Protocol— the thing that tells countries to progressively limit their carbon emissions. You know... so we don't all boil.

Anyway, that now makes 91% percent of the world. A few countries haven't even said anything about it, but one has vehemently denied even considering it: The United States of America. Yep, the US is the only country in the world that has overtly said, "fuck off" to the United Nations.

Of those who haven't taken a stance yet, well, I'll give you some of the highlights:

I've liked Bill Richardson since he announced his candidacy, and he's one of the only candidates up there that makes me still believe that someone can be in a position of power and maintain his integrity— he truly represents the people. Lemme give you some recent highlights:

"I am the only one who has dealt with immigration directly"


"It is not about what Halliburton wants in Iraq"


"One American death is too many"


I'd take him over Obama and certainly over Hillary any day. We need someone who's straightforward for a change.

Cheers.