Let’s Play: Borderlands [Semi-Blind] German – Part 1 Claptrap der Feigling Awesome borderlands Macbook pro 13” play borderlands Amazon's Deal of the Day: Borderlands : Game of the Year Ed … For anyone that hasn’t yet been able to experience the greatness that is Borderlands , or for those hoping to nab the 4 available DLC game packs at some point in the near future, today is a good day to remedy the situation on both … Review: Borderlands « Backstage Stories » Foxs News – Where … Directed by Jerry Rapier, Plan-B Theatre Company’s world premiere of BORDERLANDS boldly tackles the issue of stepping forward into unexpected honesty in a culture that can often, much to its detriment, subdue questions and doubts. … Make a run for the Borderlands with Steam sale JoystiqMy Daily … With its addictive action, frantic first person shooter combat, massive arsenal of weaponry, RPG elements and four-player co-op, Borderlands is the breakthrough experience that challenges all the conventions of modern shooters. … Nerd City » Blog Archive » “ Borderlands : Game of the Year Edition … Admittedly, I am a bit late to the party, but I just picked up Borderlands : Game of the Year Edition (now only $19.99 new @ GameStop), and I seriously can’t get enough of it. Featuring all of the game’s DLC, and of course a stellar … Borderlands Choppy Gameplay – Overclock.net – Overclocking.net I just downloaded Borderlands from Steam… and it plays like crap. I am literally getting 2FPS. I tried it with both my GTX 570 and GTX 460 Both OC’d. jandaya86 says: just bought # Borderlands GOTY Edition on #steam . Its hard not to pass that game up at that price!
Continue reading …New York City marks April 16th as Foursquare Day, Mayor feeling good about his chances
April 14, 2011 No Comment
16 is the product of squaring four, so naturally the date of April 16th is the most logical one to be called Foursquare Day. Just why such a celebration should exist is less obvious. As it turns out, a grassroots movement of Foursquare users built up steam around the idea of dedicating a day to the online check-in service, that concept then filtered through to Foursquare’s founders who decided to go “100% in on this,” and now, somewhat surprisingly, so has New York City Mayor (the elected one) Mike Bloomberg. As Mike sees it, Foursquare represents a fine example of NYC’s startup-friendly environment, which is why he’s giving it and its heretofore informal Foursquare Day celebration the official NYC seal of approval. He even went so far as to deliver a Mayoral Proclamation to the Foursquare offices, which you can see for yourself after the break. Continue reading New York City marks April 16th as Foursquare Day, Mayor feeling good about his chances New York City marks April 16th as Foursquare Day, Mayor feeling good about his chances originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 14 Apr 2011 14:48:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
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Mountains in Gloucestershire, London buses driving on the right – and that’s before you get to the dialogue There are movies so bad that they transcend awfulness. Ed Wood’s Plan 9 from Outer Space and Glen or Glenda? perhaps, or Troll 2 . And then there is William and Kate: The Movie. Coming to a DVD outlet near you shortly. So bad it’s awful, toe-curlingly, teeth-furringly, pillow-bitingly ghastly. You begin to wonder what the happy young couple have done to deserve this. It will probably be a smash. Perhaps the PR handout gives it away: “Shot entirely in Los Angeles and inspired by true events.” That might account for the mountains in the backdrop to a pheasant shoot in Gloucestershire, buses driving on the right in London, the Middletons’ modern house transformed into a Californian Tudor mansion and the famous dragon boat race training that Kate Middleton once undertook on the Thames at Chiswick being transposed to the High Sierra. The film has sparked a worldwide media frenzy, according to its promoters. This is the Wedding of the Year as imagined in Wichita or Wyoming, with dialogue so authentic it follows you round the room. As in all the best plays, they tell each other things they must already know. “I say, Wills,” says Prince Harry. “I am not the heir. I am just the spare.” “You do realise this is the 21st century?” Kate expostulates to her etiquette coach. “In your world, perhaps, but not in his,” said coach replies portentously, and a million heads will nod knowingly, from Houston to Hawaii. Monarchists abroad may be shocked when William informs his intended that half the country loves his family and the other half thinks they are irrelevant throwbacks – a little bit of social comment there – but they will soon be back on track when he adds reassuringly: “My mother was one of the people. She tried to change the monarchy.” Kate replies: “We’ll still be us. Nothing will come between us.” At which point some in the audience at the film’s preview unaccountably began to titter. Prince William – aka “the Royal Beau” – is played by young New Zealander Nico Evers-Swindell, whose acting varies from plain wooden to teak-like, which may not be so far from the original, but is somehow less engaging. Who could blame him, saddled with lines such as: “I am sorry … I just need some space.” And air, by the looks of it.Middleton – whom everyone in the movie, including Prince Charles, calls Kate, unlike in real life where she’s known to friends and family as Catherine –is played by Camilla Luddington, an actor whose last part was as a teenage drink-driver in CSI. Luddington was apparently brought up in Berkshire, like her alter-ego, but, if so, she’s clearly spent too long in the US because her accent is more Berkeley than Bucklebury. Ben Cross, who once strode across Chariots of Fire, gives us his Prince Charles and he has certainly got the cufflink-fiddling off to a T. It is the little things that jar. Like the German spy in the old war movie who gives himself away when he doesn’t know who won the Cup final in 1938, or the ex-boyfriend who announces he’s going to “the college of law at Oxford”, or the reference to the happy couple’s alma mater as St Andrew’s College: apparently it’s a school, too. Perhaps the Scottish university had an inkling of what the film would be like and sensibly did not let the cast and crew anywhere near: there are only aerial shots of the town, interspersed curiously with an overhead view of Oxford. At ground level the university looks suspiciously more like an Ivy League campus. The tabloids and paparazzi get it in the neck for hounding Middleton, which is odd coming from a film which makes a virtue of its intrusiveness. Fortunately the Queen does not appear – perhaps Helen Mirren was too expensive for the £3m budget – probably saving her from telling her granddaughter-in-law-elect to: “Get with the programme, sister.” As the happy couple’s love entwines against a sunset as livid orange as any in Gone with the Wind, there will not be a dry eye in the house. But possibly not for the reasons the makers suppose. William and Kate: The Movie is released on DVD on 25 April Royal wedding Monarchy Weddings Kate Middleton Prince William United States Stephen Bates guardian.co.uk
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Way back when Peter Jackson started shooting The Fellowship of the Ring, he released a video clip showing off some of the film’s sets, costumes and effects. In the pre-YouTube days, that was a big deal, and it was very cool to be given a look inside the beginning of the massive project. Now things are a lot different — video blogs from film sets are hardly unusual — and Peter Jackson is back with… Broadcasting platform : YouTube Source : /Film Discovery Date : 14/04/2011 16:47 Number of articles : 5
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Opponents say leaked document proves sister company of pro-AV backer ERS could profit financially from yes vote The two camps on either side of the referendum on the alternative vote are trading blows over whether the group funding the yes campaign stands to gain financially from a switch to AV. Campaigners for a no vote obtained a leaked document which they said proved one of the yes campaign’s major backers was reliant on a company that could profit financially from a yes vote on 5 May. Allegations by the no campaign that their opponents have a conflict of interest have dogged the debate all week, galvanised by an intervention by George Osborne on Monday when he suggested the yes campaign’s funding model was “dodgy”. He was reprimanded by lawyers acting for the yes campaign who said this was “wholly untrue”. Ed Howker, a journalist, obtained what appears to be an internal risk assessment by the Electoral Reform Society – the principal donor to the Yes to AV campaign – in which the ERS acknowledges that the targeting of its funding relationship was a “medium” likelihood with a “high impact”. In a section detailing the “issue” the body notes that it is reliant on cash advances from its sister company Electoral Reform Services Limited (ERSL) about which it writes: “It is possible that ERSL will profit as a result of a YES vote (increased business opportunities).” Under a heading marked “risk” it writes: “Damage to reputation; could make us look unsavoury even if unfounded. Negative effect on donations levels if story becomes ‘we are rich’? ERSL fear that negative publicity might affect union clients, Conservative party or other ‘no’ supporters which in turn, might affect future dividends.” The no campaign says the ERS has given £1.1m to the pro-AV campaign and claimed that the society and its subsidiaries had received more than £15m in contracts from the public purse over the past three years. The no campaign also charges that the ERSL would provide new telling machines for processing AV ballots if there is a switch to the new system. The lawyers Lewis Silkin said on Monday: “This is wholly untrue. Electoral Reform Services Limited (the business arm of ERS) earns revenue in the public election administration area from three types of contract. Printing of ballot papers and the producing of voting packs for postal voters; printing and mailing of the annual canvas return forms and processing telephone and internet responses. “Provision of election management software through its subsidiary Xpress software solutions. The form of voting system upon which parliamentary elections are based is entirely irrelevant to the provision of any of these services. A change in the voting system would, therefore, have absolutely no impact on any of the revenue earned by the ERSL.” George Eustice, the Tory MP co-ordinating the no campaign, said: “Yesterday, lawyers for the Electoral Reform Society issued a threatening letter in a bid to discourage the media from reporting their conflict of interest in this referendum. Now it turns out their own internal documents highlight that just such a conflict of interest exists and that they have wilfully misled British voters and the media. “This appears to be a disgraceful attempt to influence the result of the referendum just as postal votes land on people’s doormats. This is not how we do politics in this country.” Responding to the publication of the leaked document, the Electoral Reform Society said: “This was a scenario planning document anticipating lines of attack we’ve come under from the no campaign. ERSL is an independent company and have made perfectly clear they won’t make a penny from a yes vote.” Alternative vote Electoral reform Allegra Stratton guardian.co.uk
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Mother of Zainab al-Khawaja – a 27-year-old protesting against treatment of father – says she is struggling to stand up Britain and the European Union have heaped diplomatic pressure on Bahrain over the alleged killing of pro-democracy activists in custody, while the health of a hunger striker protesting at the beating and arrest of her dissident father has deteriorated markedly. In a meeting with Interior Minister Shaikh Rashid bin Abdulla Al Khalifa, the British ambassador to Bahrain, Jamie Bowden, raised concerns over the deaths of four dissident prisoners in the last week. Catherine Ashton, the EU’s high representative for foreign affairs, speaking through a spokesman also called on the Bahrain regime to immediately release all those who have been detained for peacefully expressing themselves. Ashton announced she is to visit Bahrain next week and her spokesman called on the authorities to “investigate all recent events which have resulted in loss of life and injuries”. The high-level interventions follow what pro-democracy activists in Bahrain complain has been a period of minimal censure from Europe and the US of the renewed crackdown. They came as Zainab al-Khawaja, a 27-year-old mother on hunger strike following the beating and arrest of her father, Abdulhadi al-Khawaja – a prominent human rights activist – along with her husband and brother-in-law, saw her health slump. She had been speaking out against the government’s treatment of her family through the media and her Twitter blog but she struggled to stand up, vomited and could no longer breastfeed her 18-month-old daughter, according to her mother. “I asked if I could put some sugar in her water because I can see her suffering and her daughter is crying for milk because she can’t breastfeed her. She said no,” said Khadija al-Khawaja, 52. “She is just sleeping. I go and wake her up, she opens her eyes and speaks to me and says she is OK. I told her you have a little girl whose father is not here and if anything happens to you … but she feels she needs to do something. She is very angry and very upset about what is happening.” The family has received no information about the fate of Abdulhadi, Zainab’s husband Wafu Almajed or her brother-in-law Hussein Ahmed. But there was hope for her uncle who was arrested three weeks earlier, when his wife was called to bring clothes for him to the military court building, though she was not allowed to see him. Abdulhadi was beaten and arrested after he denounced the King of Bahrain and called for him to be put on trial. It is thought the two other men were arrested because they were with him at the time, but were not the targets. The Bahraini government has widened its crackdown on dissent by preparing a case to dissolve Al Wefaq, a registered political society that previously held 18 of the 40 seats in the chamber of deputies before it withdrew in protest at the government’s handling of demonstrations in February. It is also trying to shut down the Islamic Action Society, another registered society. A spokesman for the British foreign office denounced the move as “a backward step for reform” and said “the best way out of the situation is through inclusive dialogue”. Kareem Fakhwiri, a member of Al Wefaq, was buried on Wednesday after he died in police custody and suffered extensive bruising. “We are deeply concerned by the many reports of human rights abuses in Bahrain,” said a foreign office spokesman. “We are particularly worried by the deaths of four prisoners in the past week. Our ambassador raised these deaths with the minister of interior on 14 April. We call on the government to investigate them fully and transparently and we continue to urge the Bahraini authorities to act in accordance with the law and to meet international standards for the treatment of detainees.” Khadija al-Khawaja said she was increasingly afraid the authorities would call to announce her husband’s death, after she visited Kobra Fakhwiri, the widow of Kareem Fakhwiri. Bahrain Arab and Middle East unrest Protest Human rights Middle East Robert Booth guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Black Children Mock-Auctioned In Virginia Elementary School "History Lesson"
April 14, 2011 No Comment
enlarge What is the matter with Virginia teachers? What possessed this one to decide re-enacting a slave auction would be a good idea? I kid you not. First fetus dolls in their elementary schools, now this . AngryBlackLady has a few things to say , mostly in response to a fairly clueless and tepid defense of dear Ms. Boyle over at Mediaite: The obvious problem is separating the kids — obvious problem is obvious. But there’s another problem — the Charleston Problem , and that is, the narrative regarding the reasons this country fought itself in the Civil War have been coopted by idiots who like to put on their fanciest Confederate gear and pretend shoot one another . They see it as a celebration of history. I see it as a yearning for a Simpler Time, when it was all mint juleps, and seersucker, and field negroes. It makes me exceedingly uncomfortable. I think AngryBlackLady is putting that mildly. In the ABC interview with the kids , you can almost see them defending their teacher, which is somewhat heartbreaking to me — that they would be in a position first to be humiliated in that fashion, and then feel as though they needed to gentle-down what was done in that school that day. And more to the point, it’s beyond clueless. It indicates an attitude that doesn’t think one is the same flesh and blood as “those people.” This isn’t political correctness. This is taking a painful episode in history and asking children to re-enact it as a ‘learning experience’, with skin color determining what place in the re-enactment they will assume. Someone who thinks like that is also separating “those children” from the others in her own mind as a matter of course. It isn’t as though elementary schools in Virginia haven’t had similar incidents over the years. There is a pattern here that continues to go unaddressed : Last year, a Jacox Elementary teacher who anointed students with “holy oil” in the classroom resigned after a parent complained about the teacher’s religious actions. The division determined the teacher violated the school system’s instructional curriculum as well as policies and laws related to the separation of church and state. Also last year, two teachers at Norcom High School were placed on leave for using materials in the classroom that were endorsed by an anarchist group and an organization that backs legalized marijuana . Both received letters of reprimand for not receiving permission to use the materials in class and returned to their jobs. An elementary guidance counselor who distributed 80 to 100 human fetus figurines to students last year at Oakwood Elementary resigned after being put on leave. The school’s principal was removed from her post and reassigned elsewhere as an assistant principal. This didn’t just happen in Virginia last week, either. In Ohio last month another teacher decided a “re-enactment” was in order: Nikko Burton, a 10-year-old student at Chapelfield Elementary in Ohio, says he was humiliated by his teacher when she tried to demonstrate what it was like to be a slave on an auction block. Burton, one of two black students in his class, was chosen to be a slave. Students who were the “masters” inspected the “slaves” to see if they would be able workers. Meanwhile, confederate themes continue to grow and proliferate more than ever. 150 years later, the Civil War rages on, to all of our detriment. Perhaps it would help these teachers in Virginia and Ohio to remember better if they were forced to wear a big scarlet “B” (for bigot) instead of just apologizing.
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Laurel Lockamy was upset that a dolphin had been lying dead in the sand near Pass Christian, MS, for more than five days. It had been painted orange after being counted by the Institute for Marine Mammal
Continue reading …Tax Me Please, Says NY Times Columnist Kristof, While Calling for Defense Cuts as Libya Hawk
April 14, 2011 No CommentNew York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof joined the “tax me, please,” brigade in his Thursday column that is sure to win him new fans the day before tax day: “ Raise America’s Taxes .” President Obama in his speech on Wednesday confronted a topic that is harder to address seriously in public than sex or flatulence: America needs higher taxes. That ugly truth looms over today’s budget battles, but politicians have mostly preferred to run from reality. Mr. Obama’s speech was excellent not only for its content but also because he didn’t insult our intelligence. There is no single reason for today’s budget mess, but it’s worth remembering that the last time our budget was in the black was in the Clinton administration. That’s a broad hint that one sensible way to overcome our difficulties would be to revert to tax rates more or less as they were under President Clinton. That single step would solve three-quarters of the deficit for the next five years or so. So would cutting spending levels to the Clinton era, for that matter. Kudos to Mr. Obama for boldly stating that truth in his speech — even if he did focus only on taxes for the very wealthiest. I also thought he was right to say that we need spending cuts — including in our defense budget . Mr. Obama didn’t say so, but the United States accounts for almost as much military spending as the entire rest of the world put together. (A side note: Kristof wants cuts in defense spending while also being a hawk for bombing Libya, a country the U.S. has been at war with for 26 days. The late Times columnist R.W. Apple famously declared Afghanistan a quagmire on October 31, 2001, day 24 of our intervention there. On Monday, reporter David Sanger more mildly referred to the conflict in Libya as a “stalemate.”) Kristof concluded: Ever since Walter Mondale publicly committed hara-kiri in 1984 by telling voters that he would raise their taxes, politicians have run from fiscal reality. As baby boomers age and require Social Security and Medicare, escapism will no longer suffice. We need to have a frank national discussion of painful steps ahead, and since I’m not a politician, let me be perfectly clear: raise my taxes!
Continue reading …Donald Trump is pretty heavily into this whole birther thing at this point, so Jon Stewart wonders: Could anyone else in the GOP match his level of crazy? Not surprisingly, “Alaska Palin is with Trump,” Stewart noted last night . But “Minnesota Palin” (aka Michele Bachmann) takes the president “at his…
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