January 21, 2004

Vonnegut's "Harrison Bergeron," dystopian sci-fi about mandated equality — via Matt Jones #

January 20, 2004

Anna Maltz's One Size Fits All — hand-knit mohair naked bodysuits for the whole family #

The first Howard Dean remix comes in — using the sample suspiciously offered by Drudge #

Patch available to circumvent Photoshop's currency detection — Bugtraq found currency detection in more software #

The Fractal Blogosphere — I try to write like a 10,000, but I'm more like a 100 #

RSS: Scraped feed for Suprnova Bittorrents — thanks, rayg #

Blank face dolls — creepy, but inspires more creativity than Barbie #

Sad story of Meat Puppets' Cris Kirkwood — methadone addicted musician shot outside Phoenix post office #

A look at secret new Apple computer — flashback to January 1984 #

Photorealistic Chinese Photoshop work in 38 steps — may be faked, via Ask Mefi #

Gangrule, vintage gang photos — historical look at organized crime since 1890 #

Nice photos of fake ATM scam — from Snopes, which has an RSS feed now #

New Technorati beta — much faster, nicer results pages #

1993 Lincoln Mark VII for sale — may require light interior cleaning #

Bizarre attacks on Stephen Hawking — sounds like some sort of blackmail is involved #

SimCity Classic, free online play — registration required #

January 19, 2004

Michael Jackson Innocence Song — "where's the objectivity, not greedy insanity" #

Vogue's take on Alice in Wonderland — photos by Annie Leibovitz, with the designers as characters #

Anil on Windows Services for Unix — sounds like a decent Cygwin replacement, download here #

Detailed description of FBI house raid — looks like the guy is suspected of stealing the Half-Life 2 source code #

Guterman revives the dead Industry Standard — with a weblog, naturally #

Google developing ad service for e-mail — may offer free e-mail #

January 16, 2004

Design new levels for the Atari 2600 Combat remake — some sample playfields to inspire you #

Scans of Half-Life 2 bootleg CDs from Russia — $5.35, cheap! #

Prototype Marvin costume for Hitchhiker's Guide film — to be worn by my favorite little person, Warwick Davis #

Website Mixmaster, remix one site's layout with another's content — there's Kottke in my Haughey! #

Matt Haughey goes Under the Iron — great interview #

Indie rock stars design t-shirts for fake bands — it's for charity, so buy some (via Phil) #

President Bush's speech announcing manned missions to Mars and Moon, in 1989 — everything old is new again #

Disney sells off Celebration, FL — are there any bloggers living there? #

Independent UK on The Sims Online's banned newspaper — also: NYT article; does the First Amendment apply in virtual worlds? #

MoveOn, PETA Superbowl ads rejected by CBS #

A Modest Browser Proposal — Microsoft should switch to Mozilla #

January 15, 2004

Deep-fried cow brain burger — if you think that's appetizing, you're probably already infected #

Hollywood Reporter article on Academy screener leaks — heh, my first media mention of 2004 #

Japanese trailer for Donkey Konga for the Gamecube — rhythm game with bongo controllers #

Goatse.cx suspended by registrar — link goes to whois information #

The Color of the Web is #9C9C9C — overlaying 3000 URLs, view all 35 steps #

Amazing article about Wal-Mart's monopoly power #

Screen Spam, fighting intrusive full-screen ads #

Movable Type v2.66 released to defeat comment flooding #

Weblog for tenants of an L.A. apartment building — interesting alternative to message boards for micro communities #

Champagne Chair contest finalists — via Kottke #

U.S. military using XBox Live to connect soldiers with their families — speak with your wife and kids, and then blow them up #

Easy Favicon.ico generator — upload an image, they turn it into an icon #

January 14, 2004

eBay drop-off stores getting popular — drop off your junk, they list it, sell it, and take a commission #

Nintendo plans NES revivals for GBA — great idea, but $18 per game is way too high #

Researching the 2004 Oscar Screeners

Posted January 14, 2004 by Andy Baio

The Academy announced today that a second screener video was leaked to the Internet, after yesterday’s announcement of the “Something’s Gotta Give” appearance. I commented yesterday about how screener leaks are far more common than the Academy realizes (or acknowledges), but I decided to do some research to back it up.

I compiled a list of every likely Oscar nominee, using these popular 2004 Oscar predictions as a guide. Then, I tried to find downloadable screener copies of every film on the list.

The results might surprise the Academy. Out of 22 films, screeners for all but one were widely released on the Internet. Of those, 10 were leaked over a month ago, and five were leaked over two months ago.

Below you can find a list of the 22 films, with the date they were leaked and links to the NFO files added by the release group for each:

21 Grams (December 11, 2003)

A Mighty Wind (August 5, 2003)

American Splendor (November 3, 2003)

Big Fish (December 24, 2003)

Cold Mountain (January 3, 2004)

Finding Nemo (August 7, 2003)

Girl with a Pearl Earring (November 28, 2003)

House of Sand and Fog (December 16, 2003)

In America (December 15, 2003)

Kill Bill Volume 1 (November 24, 2003)

The Last Samurai (December 24, 2003)

Lost in Translation (December 11, 2003)

Love Actually (January 6, 2004)

Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (only available as camcorder videos)

Master and Commander (December 23, 2003)

Mona Lisa Smile (December 20, 2003)

Monster (December 24, 2003)

Mystic River (December 24, 2003)

Pirates of the Caribbean (September 15, 2003)

Seabiscuit (October 6, 2003)

Something’s Gotta Give (December 25, 2003)

Thirteen (December 2, 2003)

The big question: how did the Return of the King screener avoid getting leaked? New Line carefully released screeners to voting members, but specific details about their methods are scarce. Anyone have any information about it?

I'll Have You Know I Have Several Black Friendsters #

Bob, the Door-to-Door Spammer #