Waxy.org
Waxy.org is the sandbox of Andy Baio, a journalist/programmer living in Portland, Oregon. I'm the CTO of Kickstarter, created Upcoming.org, and some other stuff too.

Contact Me: log@waxy.org or waxpancake on AIM

ZombieURL

Posted Apr 18, 2008 (Updated Aug 10, 2009)

For the last few weeks, I've been spending every Friday with a small group of brilliant geeks — Rael Dornfest, Asha Dornfest, Chris Anderson, Greg Borenstein, and Adam Greene — for a weekly one-day hackathon. We call it Bottlecap Labs, a place to bounce around ideas, support each other's work, and occasionally whip up a project.

The first is ZombieURL, a TinyURL-clone with a twist.

Put in a URL, send it to a friend, and enjoy. Keep a camera nearby to capture the fun. (Here's a Zombie-fied version of Waxy, for example.)

(Warning: We're not responsible for emotional scarring, concussions, or heart failure as a result of using ZombieURL.)

17 Comments (Add Yours)

Apr 18, 2008
9:40 PM  
Lilly wrote:

Not as bad as a Rickroll by farrrrr. :)


Apr 19, 2008
3:16 AM  
Infested! wrote:

omg, my heart..

this is evil ^^


Apr 19, 2008
7:05 AM  
Hank wrote:

Ha, nice!

This is kinda like this service - http://tinyurl.com/5rnkto


Apr 19, 2008
11:28 AM  
Anonymous wrote:

Ah, sadly not iPhone compatible. Still, this really brings up a lot of ideas for non-prankish tinyurl value-additions, for lack of a better term.


Apr 19, 2008
5:42 PM  
Philipp Lenssen wrote:

I prefer this to TinyURL actually.

Are you overlaying something on a page wide iframe? What else could be done with this technique?


Apr 19, 2008
6:46 PM  
Andy Baio wrote:

Yep, that's pretty much it. JQuery for the effects, SoundManager for the audio. The source tells it all.

Not sure what else you could do with it... Create a soundtrack for a website that doesn't have one? Mash together two sites? GoatseURL?


Apr 19, 2008
6:51 PM  
Yaanu wrote:

Fucking brilliant.


Apr 19, 2008
7:32 PM  
range wrote:

Pretty cool. I was surprised. I expected the page to have another layout, some graphics and such.


Apr 20, 2008
12:38 AM  
Superdotman wrote:

I'm running Safari 3.1 (5525.13) on OS X 10.5.2, and the sound didn't play the first time I tried the link. All subsequent sounds played, but sometimes a moment after the image appears.
Awesome idea and execution, though!

A word of advice to pranksters: Try to URL-shrink text-only pages, rather than pages with sound (or sound and video).


Apr 20, 2008
5:00 PM  
Matt wrote:

hey, that was pretty awesome. My 4 month old daughter sleeping nearby thought differently, but she'll learn...


Apr 20, 2008
5:40 PM  
Rex Hammock wrote:

This is definitely 'fundable' -- and in your SXSW session. Thanks for the laugh.


Apr 22, 2008
9:13 AM  
Fubiz wrote:

Excellent link!


Apr 22, 2008
1:16 PM  
Jish wrote:

Baaaassssttttaaaarrrrddddd!!!!!!!


Apr 24, 2008
7:14 AM  
Charles Alves wrote:

Pretty cool!


Apr 24, 2008
1:38 PM  
Mr. Grass wrote:

LOL - this is awesome.

I've had a live webcam of my (uhhh) front yard for a couple of years - a surprising number of people surf on by to see the (uhhh) excitement.

Since I'm doing the first lawn mowing of the season this Saturday ... I just added a link to the Zombie'fied version on the main page for those coming by for live coverage of this (uhhh) entertaining activity.

P.S. Tidy says a couple of warnings with your web code/frame wrapper - maybe move the CSS code into the head section (?)


May 3, 2008
7:20 AM  
alesh wrote:

Wow cool.

However, something about the NYTimes defeats it. Try putting in this link.


May 3, 2008
9:45 AM  
Andy Baio wrote:

Yeah, we noticed that early on. The New York Times uses Javascript to break out of any frame. We figured if they were that concerned about people framing their content, we shouldn't try to find a workaround.


 

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Waxy Links
Ads via The Deck
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Joel Johnson, "Raiding Eternity" — more tech writing like this, please
xkcd's Google phrase frequency charts — "I got $x problems"
Newspaper Club designs, prints, distributes overnight newspaper at SXSW — I was lucky enough to grab one of the hand-numbered issues
March 17, 2010
Crowdsourced demographic study of Chatroulette — the info was gathered by Hacker News users
March 16, 2010
Progress Wars — countless hours of fun
March 15, 2010
Piano Improvisation on Chat Roulette — amazing how much creativity the site's inspiring (via)
March 12, 2010
8-Bit Austin — I think I'll use this map to get to Datapop 2010
Spritely, jQuery plugin for sprite and background animation — see also: gameQuery
March 11, 2010
Trololololololo Shreds — some context (via)
Preview of Sword & Sworcery EP for the iPhone — looks unlike anything I've ever seen
Sitby.us — essential iPhone-optimized site for SXSWi session planning
Danc on the release of Ribbon Hero — turning Microsoft Office into a game, with competition against your friends (via)
March 10, 2010
"Play" by David Kaplan and Eric Zimmerman — avatars as Russian nested dolls (via)
Chatroulette Map — I think I'd rather not know, thanks (via)
Steamshovel Harry — not sure how I missed this one last year, metagaming with music by Brad Sucks
El Fin Del Mundo by Alberto González Vázquez — there's so much I love about this, I can't quantify it all (via)
March 9, 2010
Wired Reread, blogging the best ads from '90s-era Wired — also, the complete SPIN archives are on Google Books
Academy Award Winning Movie Trailer — related: McSweeney's categories for the meta-awards (via)
Chris Parnell and Andy Samberg perform Lazy Sunday live — for the first time, backed by The Roots
Adam Savage's pursuit of the perfect Blade Runner gun replica — related: his quest for the perfect replica Maltese Falcon and dodo skeleton
The Panic Status Board — the instant feedback made work more game-like
March 8, 2010
Valve ports game library and Steam service to Mac — Portal 2 will be released for Mac simultaneously with PC, along with "all of our future games"
Maciej Ceglowski on the discovery, loss, and rediscovery of the cure for scurvy — fascinating story of bad science and the unintended effects of new information
March 7, 2010
8-Bit NYC, Brett Camper's videogame map of New York — he's using Kickstarter to expand to 15 other cities worldwide
Sleep Is Death, Jason Rohrer's new conversational two-player game — watch the slideshow for details; I just wish it was on the web instead
Obama appoints Edward Tufte to advise on stimulus transparency — "Maybe I'll learn something."
PS22 Chorus sings Phoenix's Lisztomania — I love how expressive they are
Echo Nest and SCHED's guide to SXSW Music — very nicely done, uses Echo Nest's recommendation engine
GameInformer's Portal 2 exclusive cover story — scans, since it's not on GameInformer's site yet; Valve hired the TAG: The Power of Paint team right out of Digipen

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