NEWSLETTER: "TWO DAYS UNTIL THE NHS CLOSING CEREMONY"
This Week:
* ANIM - Printer Jam, final Trapped In Tech song
* CYRIAK - Makes stuff for Adam Buxton
* GIFS - And this time they are spooky
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________ ____ __ ___
____/ _)|_ // /_/ _ | "We're glad the Olympics
___/ _ |/_ </ __/ __ | is nearly over but will
__/____/____/\__/_/ |_| miss the empty streets"
B3ta email 541 - 10th Aug 2012
Bleep this issue on your pager:
http://b3ta.com/newsletter/issue541
Kisses : [email protected]
Pisses : [email protected]
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>> Sponsor B3ta <<
Want this space? Then talk to us.
http://b3ta.com/mailus/
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: WHAT B3TA PEOPLE HAVE BEEN MAKING THIS WEEK #1
Lots of stuff! Yay!
>> Printer Jam <<
"The final part of our 5 part song series about
technology!" exclaims ginger umlaut Rob Manuel.
"Thanks to @superpowerless for doing a great
job with the music, @peepshowcircus for the
animation and Mondo for asking us to do it.
Hope you enjoyed it. Bye-bye Trapped in
Technology, bye-bye, we'll miss all the crazy
YouTube comments from teenage Americans who had
literally no idea where we were coming from."
http://www.youtube.com/watch
>> The counting song <<
"Here's something I knocked up for Adam
Buxton's Bug TV show," explains Cyriak. "A
sure-fire antidote to depression." Ah, the
simple joys of early childhood.
http://b3ta.com/links/The_counting_song
>> Rejigged Galaxy ad <<
"That's Galaxy as in chocolate, not gadget,"
sort-of-clarifies kfk, adding more
extracurricular activities for the peculiarly
furtive, chocolate-eating girl.
http://bit.ly/MGOIgN
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: AMAZON TAT
Jesus Plasters
Leon007 writes, "Just read the latest
newsletter, very impressed by the 'Woman
rejecting a plate of food' page, but never mind
that, I've discovered 'Jesus - first aid in a
tin'"
Best review? "I had previously suffered a
shotgun blast to the head and the doctors said
there was nothing they could do. Eventually I
discovered these and within seconds of applying
the small plaster to the huge hole in my head I
was cured. Praise the Lord and his mighty ways."
http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/B0014DNPU...
BTW: Have you bought some tat on Amazon and
added "amusing" comments? Tell us.
http://b3ta.com/mailus/
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: SITES IN BRIEF
Stuff we like that wasn't made by our mates
* SPOOKY GIFS - Graphic artist Kevin Weir takes
old black and white photos and animates them.
This is what the B3ta board might have looked
like in Victorian times.
http://fluxmachine.tumblr.com/
* RICH KIDS OF INSTAGRAM - in a series of
photos that can only provoke class war, the
foolish kids of the rich show off their bling.
Their parents presumably would be horrified:
the way to stay rich is to be unobtrusive.
http://richkidsofinstagram.tumblr.com/
* SEX QUESTIONS FORM SEVENTH GRADERS - always
fascinating to hear kids trying to understand
the world.
http://sexquestionsfromseventhgraders.tumblr.com
* WHAT'S STEVE JOBS TYPICAL DAY LIKE? - check
the last answer (says '1 Answer Collapsed').
Ho ho ho.
http://b.qr.ae/MGOOoJ
* SOMETIMES INTERESTING THINGS - a website for
"weird, forgotten and sometimes interesting
things." We particularly enjoyed reading about
Giethoorn; a town with no roads - sounds like
a paradise.
http://sometimes-interesting.com/
* GUERRILLA ART ON THE TUNE - great stickers on
London public transport. You'll probably get
shot for doing this these days mind you.
http://bit.ly/MGP07t
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: STEVIERAR WRITES A BOOK
A real one, not that Kindle/Lulu bollocks
You've seen Stevierar's punning venn diagram
images - we've front-paged loads of them. He
writes, "I have written a book, called 'Falafel
the Cat', I've been working on it for about for
four years now. I've finally got it printed
(properly, I was brave and went straight to a
printer)."
http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/095732460...
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: QUESTION OF THE WEEK
Screwed over by the man
We asked for your stories of being stiffed by
employers, stepped on by authorities or
anything else that left you miffed:
http://b3ta.com/questions/screwedover/
* BANNED - "I used to be in a jazz band called
'The Banned' We were playing a jazz medley of
Christmas carols in fancy dress. Our drummer
had gotten rather excited and was wearing a
full size padded Frosty the Snowman costume,
complete with giant head. The heating was on
full blast, and all the stage lights were on
and halfway through the medley the drummer got
dizzy with the heat and stopped playing,
resting his head in his hands. The kids in the
audience watched as Frosty decided to get off
stage. He wobbled his way out of the kit, wove
through the rest of the band, and then lost his
direction and staggered stage front. "Oh
dammmnnnn..." he said slowly, the sound muffled
through the thick costume. We kept playing.
Perhaps we could write this one off as an
interpretative dance. Frosty staggered stage
left, and then reeled back from the curtain
and, finally, fainted. Two hundred kiddies
screamed as the snowman collapsed and his head
fell off, rolling... slowly... slowly... into
the middle of the stage, where its cold dead
coal eyes stared at them accusingly. It was a
great gig. I don't see why they refused to pay
us." (Sivvus)
* ZAPPED - "There is no creature so foul as a
London letting agent. After we'd been in our
three-storey house for a couple of months, the
top floor bathroom started leaking. They sent
some cowboy builders round, after which the
leak got considerably worse. They refused to
revisit a problem "that was fixed already."
Over time, the leak made its way to the 1st
floor, where the ceiling gently dripped and
various interesting mould and fungi grew. Then,
during a particularly heavy storm, it poured
trhrough through the light fitting in the
living room. Our contract was ending, but
rather than fix the place up, they immediately
tried to let it to hapless students. Various
teenagers trooped in and out, one with her
mother. We had a big sign next to the light
switch reminding us not to use it. "DO NOT USE
THIS LIGHT OR YOU WILL ELECTROCUTE YOURSELF AND
BURN THE HOUSE DOWN, KTHXBAI" The mother asked
what this was about. "There's nothing wrong
with it, it's lies, the current tenants want to
stay, they just put that sign there to put you
off," said the agent. "In that case, you won't
mind switching on the light." Caught between
admitting he'd lied and zapping himself, he
proved enough of a stupid fuckwit to switch it
on, predictably causing massive blue flashes to
light up the house like some sort of
potentially lethal Christmas tree.
(grandmasterfluffles)
* BUSTED - "I got screwed over by these three
guys claiming they caught a real nasty "Class 5
Free Roaming Vapour" in my hotel ballroom. Had
to fork out $5000 or they were going to put it
back in there. Mrs. Van Hoffman wasn't happy
about her party being ruined either." (Claude
Speed )
>> This Week - Home Science <<
Have you split the atom in your kitchen? Made
your own fireworks? Fired a bacon rocket
through your window? We love home science
experiments - tell us about your best here:
http://b3ta.com/questions/homescience/
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: FUNNY NAME CORNER
Anal Sheikh
In the week where the guy in the line for the
US Presidency doesn't know the difference
between Sikh and Sheikh (or worse, he does
know, but wants to insult people) let us
introduce you to our new favourite solicitor
who hopefully won't use the power of law to
shut us down after we mention him.
https://www.google.co.uk/search
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: VIDEO SCHMIDEO
Imagine if VHS flew magically through the air
* INTERESTING TOXIC WASTELAND - Ed Blackadder
writes, "In the early 1900s, an attempt was
made to turn to turn a Californian desert into
an artificial sea. This 5 minute film tells the
story of how it all went wrong."
http://www.youtube.com/watch
>> Funny short made with Source Filmmaker <<
Source Filmmaker is a 3D animation tool that
lets you create movie sequences inside the
Team Fortress game - the Windows version is
free to download and people are doing amazing
things with it - including this clip that
features motion capture via Xbox Kinect
controllers. The tools to create the next Toy
Story are now available for your local PC.
Amazing times.
http://bit.ly/MGP2Mz
>> Cockneys Vs Zombies <<
Twitter legend and occasional Dr Who writer
James Moran has written a new movie that looks
like it could be rather entertaining and
apparently set in a campy parallel world where
the London's cockneys actually live in the
East End, rather than moving out to Essex
a generation or two back.
http://www.b3ta.com/links/Cockneys_Vs_Zombies
>> Tom Waits - Hell Broke Luce <<
New Tom Waits video apparently about Jeff
Lucey, a marine who committed suicide after
returning from Iraq. We suspect the solution to
military suicide is in many ways simple: stop
asking soldiers to execute horrific wars. If
the job was, say, stroking bunnies all day, a
lot less suicide.
http://www.b3ta.com/links/Tom_Waits_Hell_Broke_Luc...
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: FOLLOW FRIDAY
Harry, my cat died...
Takartha80 recommends, "Twitter account
@Harrymycatdied, which retweets when One
Direction fans tell Harry Styles that they've
got a dead cat." Epic, epic trolling.
http://twitter.com/HarryMyCatDied
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: B3TA IMAGE CHALLENGE
Results from the Wild West Web Challenge
Last week we wanted you to picture the cowboy
internet.
Your favourites included:
* JOKE: splendid early example of charming,
race-based web humour (greg_evigan)
http://www.b3ta.com/board/10819557
* 419: those pesky scammers, seeking to con the
bushwackers and biscuit shooters of the West
(drbroon)
http://www.b3ta.com/board/10819592
* DUEL: he might be the man with no name, but
you can bet he has an Apple ID (Q4nobody.co.uk)
http://www.b3ta.com/board/10819428
All these images, and the highest as voted by
you can be found here:
http://www.b3ta.com/challenge/wildwestweb/
>> New challenge: Zebras! <<
It's National Zebra Week. And, if it isn't, it
ought to be. To mark the occasion, we'd like
you to photoshop this magnificent beast,
perhaps the stripiest of all the horse-creatures.
http://www.b3ta.com/challenge/zebras/
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: FEAR OF MURDOCH CORNER
Don't upset the grand wizard
A reader wrote wrote us an email this week
slagging off Fox News. Nothing out of the
ordinary but we enjoyed the follow-up email
sent two minutes later:
"EEK, IMPORTANT, HELP! If you use it in the
newsletter please use my *name redacted* and
not my email name, as I am sort of affiliated
with Fox and would rather not be murdered by
Murdoch's ninjas, thanks very muchly..."
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: WHAT HAPPENED NEXT?
Follow-ups on previous stories.
* HOW NOW BROWN TEETH - Jamtarts writes,
"You're asking about how to stop those brown
stains on teeth, one of the symptoms of dental
fluorosis is brown, mottled teeth. Use non
fluoride toothpaste. Results will not be
instant, but at least you'll stop adding to the
problem." Hmm googling this stuff takes us down
a rabbit hole of tin-foil-hattery about
fluoride being a mind control drug used to
lower our IQ and close our psychic third eye so
we can't unlock the programming created by the
media. And we just thought our teeth we brown
because we drink too much tea!
* DICK FUN - Simon 049 writes, "The Dick
Cockhead item is real. I worked with him (in
the ambulance service, after he left the
police) although he had changed his name by
deed poll by the time I met him. Colleagues
told me that was his old name and I didn't
immediately believe them either. He's retired
now, but I expect a few of his old colleagues
will see this as B3ta is something we read (on
night shifts, when there aren't any managers
around)."
* MICROWAVE WOE - The Togaboy writes, "I just
saw the top tip at the bottom of this weeks
newsletter. I don't know if anyone's told you
yet, but putting water in a microwave is a
really dangerous thing to do. Quite a lot of
people have been hurt this way." Hmm, probably
dangerous but we used to like microwaving water
then dropping instant coffee in it to see it
foam up. Simple pleasures of the 1980s.
http://www.animations.physics.unsw.edu.au/jw/super...
* ANGRY COMPLAINTS - Tina writes, "Your
disgusting language attacking Deila Smith is
pathetic. In wanting to know more about
poaching I would follow Delia than pathetic pin
heads like you who prefer foul language to
civilised behaviour. People like you make the
world a worse place." Tina is of course
referring to our ancient cooking advice that
featured the extremely upsetting passage, "A
poached egg shouldn't look like a mucus covered
fried-egg. Delia knows jack-shit about poaching
eggs." We're very, very sorry.
http://www.b3ta.com/features/howtopoachanegg/
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: WHAT B3TA PEOPLE HAVE BEEN MAKING THIS WEEK #2
Even more stuff! More Yays! More Lympics!
>> Lucky London couple catch all GB medals <<
Unbelievable as it may sound, "one lucky couple
from London has an amazing knack of picking
events where GB will win medals." Jurassicpaul
has the inside info on this statistical anomaly.
http://b3ta.com/links/Lucky_London_Couple_Catch_al...
>> Games Fever <<
"You can't escape it," intones Bewley. And,
indeed, even London's bacteria seem to have got
in on the act.
http://b3ta.com/links/Games_Fever
>> The starter man's authority <<
"Iamthemonkey and I thought the starter man at
the 100 metres should really take full
advantage of his position of authority,"
expounds superdonal. Athletes need to learn to
respect the man with the gun...
http://www.youtube.com/watch
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: STAR IN NEXT WEEK'S ISSUE
Make something cool and tell us about it. If
you are in it then people will see your stuff.
Things we'd really like to see include
* YOUR SHIT COMEDY TATTOOS - ginger love muscle
suggests, "Entertain people by tattooing the
words 'Where's Wally?' onto your chest, and a
small caricature of wally around your anus."
* AUTO TRANSLATE VIDEO FOR LOLS - you know
those websites that translate a phrase
backwards and forwards to create amusing
phrasing? Code one that takes the subtitles
from a movie and does the whole thing in
real time? Preferably to be watched with
non-English audio.
* SNOOZE BUTTON FOR ITUNES/SPOTIFY - we often
put it on pause to watch a YouTube video
etc and then forget to put it back on.
Something that just made it quiet for 3 mins
might help.
Send contributions via the mail form.
http://www.b3ta.com/mailus/
BTW: If you've sent something in that hasn't
been featured then don't be put off - we look
at everything you send us.
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This newsletter was written listening to Mike
Oldfield - the lack of lyrics makes him easy to
work to. Reading up on his music via Wikipedia
we learn that his Amarok album contains a
hidden message. Oldfield offered £1k prize to
person who found it. Message was - in morse -
Fuck Off RB (Richard Branson).
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Cool(ish) cats: [email protected]
Foolish twats: [email protected]
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THANKS:
This issue was written by Rob Manuel with David
Stevenson. Stuff sent in by SickRik Valentin
stuartalldred rob.elli Jimbotfu SleeplessAndy
Lord of Teh 9 King Ralph Alzo francis.li Image
challenge by Fraser Lewry. Mike Trinder is QOTW
bloke. Subjlols via Drunken Miss Photoshop Bitch.
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TOP TIP:
For a window into the deepest pits of human
despair, search Twitter for TravelodgeUK.
Saturdays and Sundays are particularly good
when the punters realise that they are not at a
Premier Inn. (Scaryduck)
