Did you check the price on the RealDoll? Add that on top of the price tag for the Robonaut and it would be an astronomical sum!
Astronomical funds for you and I, lad. Considering how much the gov't is willing to spend on toilet seats and screwdrivers and bolts, and how much it costs to keep my Congressman in supply with prostitutes and cocaine, the total may well be a justifiable expense on the manned missions to Mars!
Okay, okay. So some of Spielberg's work is odious. As is Lucas' revisionist history. And maybe Spielberg DID give us A.I. and Gremlins.
But then again,Spielberg did also give us Amistad and Schindler's List!(!!!) Tho, I'm afraid that a Speilberg helmed SW would be far more like the former two.
But at least the guy does have some noteworthy accomplishments. What the heck have you ever done but hurl insults like "1 1z 1337, y0u 1z ph@Gg0+!!!~~~!!! ph3&|2 m3" in UT chat?
The thought of GNU licensing may gave Microsoft a bad case of the hives, but interestingly enough at one point they had their own Redmond-grown version of UNIX known as Xenix. It even ran on 386s back in the day.
But I believe that it was out at about the same time that Linux was just getting off the ground and of course MS wanted money for their wares...so Xenix, as I understand it, died a very quiet death...
Not so much into the whole anime thing, myself. But right next to Other Music on 4th Street in the Village is a place called Anime Crash. I haven't been down there in a while, so I'm not sure if they're still there. But they were the last time I was in the neighborhood. Both stores are right across the street from Tower Records (blech!).
Both stores being right next to one another is very convenient. Because, if you're geeky enough to like Anime, you're likely very geeky about the music you listen to as well. And OM is staffed by obsessed music geeks who may consider "Nurse With Wound" a little too mainstream. Think of the music store from High Fidelity, on steroids!
Okay, so that was a little offtopic, but still usefull knowlege IMHO if you're heading down that way.
Anyway, Anime Crash is to obsessive Anime geeks what OM is to music nerds. Check them out.
Also, in NYC you'll find Jim Hanley's Universe useful, which is mostly a comic store but also has a nice supply of Anime. Same thing with Village Comics.
Also, a really good resource (and I'm surprised I didn't think of this first, because I am not entirely convinced that Anime Crash is still open) is Toy Tokyo which is also in the Village but has a location up on 73rd St as well. They are definitely still in the biz, I was just there last Tuesday. They have lots of nice Asian and obscure American toys, as well as a comprehensive collection of Anime. And of course, don't forget your old stand-by in the City, Forbidden Planet.
And that's just what I can think of off the top of my head. I think this list'll be pretty useful to you in Central Jersey, I'm from there myself. Now I'm living in Union City and commuting into New York. If you're determined to be mall-bound in suburban NJ, SunCoast Video actually has a very surprisingly good selection to choose from in terms of video releases.
New York, however, has EVERYTHING you could possibly wish for, for good or ill. You can get crack cocaine, you can get heroine, you can get prostitutes, Anime, Hentai...everything your little ole heart desires! Except, of course, egg and cheese on a bagel after 10:30 in the morning!;)
This was a real jolt, this realization. He was one of the main reasons I started playing bass at the tender age of 13 and spent many a year playing in punk, jazz and ambient musical projects. At the age of 33 Bass playing is still one of my most satisfying forms of catharses and I still love the who.
I will also never forget the time I brought the guy a cup of tea when he made an appearance at a radio station I was working in while I was in college. We had a nice chat, and I told him of the importance of his music to me and of my passion for playing inspired in no small part by him. He was a true, almost stereotypical 'English Gentleman' and I will always hold that experience very dear to my heart. I am genuinely saddened by this news.
This well thought out and articulated article vividly reminded me of an old Dave Thomas and Rick Moranis skit on SCTV in the '80s. It was called "Three C-P One".
"Yes Yuri, nice shoes"
"Thanks Boris, now on to the news. Forcast for 1985 -GOOD CROP YEAR! And forcast for 1986 - GOOD CROP YEAR! Forecast for 1987 - BEST INDUSTRIAL YEAR EVER!..."
You get the idea. So it seems incredibly coincidental that this story comes at a time when WalMart is shipping PCs with Mandrake Linux and Lindows OS. No surprise at all that this piece of utter tripe surfaces on Microsoft's very own propaganda wing.
True that Linux , 'till now, didn't have much penetration in the home user market. I would attribute that to Microsoft's "agreements" with major seller's of PCs that they ship no PCs with any operating system than Windows.
This article is the clearest sign I have seen yet that Microsoft is starting to get a little nervous at the (very correct) perception amongst users that there is an alternative out there.
Personally, I love running linux on everything from Macs to X86 boxes to my old NeXT cube and slab to my SGI Indy.
As far as the mac goes, here are some very nice distros:
I don't know if this is what you would call a trend. But it certainly seems like a great way to get people of common interests together. Make friends, and possibly network for professional reasons (I can't believe how hard this economy has hit what I previously thought was the "unsinkable" geek community).There is only one other site that I have heard of doing such a thing, The Straight Dope. A good friend of mine attends their regular pub-crawls through Greenwhich Village and says he has a blast every time. StraightDopers are apt to discuss everything from world events, to censorship to the the various methodologies of wiping your ass.
"then odds are that you could be handed a Macintrash, be told that it runs windows, and you wouldn't know the difference."
Except that current macs are shipping with OS X. A BSD / mach kernel based (yeah, I know. overhead, blah, blah. but i still think it rocks) that is centuries ahead of anything out of Redmond and decades ahead of "Lindows" (cool as I still think the Lindows project is).
"Dude, just about everybody on this site is 'unwashed'"
*snif*whew! You mean it isn't me throwing up that funk! whew! Actually, I could kinda use a breathmint...
"On second thought, maybe you should feel bad."
I do! I have one mutherfuckin' bad case of halitosis and NO breathmints!
"You can't imagine how amusing it is to see you use both terms without a trace of sarcasm."
Oh! You are absolutely right. Gosh was I being SUCH a silly ass !!! I should be lashed for being the mongoloid that I am! I should've known how efective posting messages on a site is at conveying sarcasm...It has absolutely nothing to do with the subtlties of inflection or tone of voice or facial expression or clever use of html.
Some people are into computers because they have a pure thirst for knowledge. These people learn things that are useful, and things that are useless...its all part of the same continuum for these people. To those that do, computers are toys. They may be apt to learn php or AmigaDOS. This doesn't mean they often will forego something useLESS at the expense of learning something useFULL. But time permitting, its fun to tinker...
It used to be that the computer field was filled with enthusiasts who knew their shit. But ever since the unwashed masses learned there was a paycheck attached to this knowlege, the industry was inundated with carpetbaggers who don't know what the fuck they are doing.
But these carpetbaggers get jobs anyway, because they have MCSEs or A(asshole)+ certs...
So are you just collecting a paycheck, bub? I would assume not, or I doubt you would be on this site. Which is why I am a little puzzled, I suppose...
Re:Buethundr's guide to Collecting Okudagrams
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"All the information about in-jokes you just gave is also in the ST:TNG tech manual. I'm really curious to see if you've got pictures with closeups of these things -- I never quite belevied the manual!"
Very interesting! I do have the TNG Manual, however, I've apparently not skimmed it enough to have gleaned this info from it. The stuff I reference in the above rant was the resulting knowledge of my collecting. I do have some snaps of the panels, but none close-up enough to see the things written on the buttons (some of the in-joke stuff is really quite small).
But I think I may get off my lazy ass one day soon and photo-document my server room enough to build a page about it. Maybe I'll see if I can get myself slashdotted again! Drawing much ridicule I'm sure, but that's half the fun of getting slashdotted!
Anyway, if you want to see the pics I have, drop me a line and I will send them to you.
-T
Re:I OWNED the ST captains chair for a year! Reall
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· Score: 1
>You have no idea how detailed the replica was. >i used to spend hours trying to spot a defect,
If you do, indeed suspect that the chair up for bid is on eBay is the one you used to own in Michigan. AND if you studied it as closely as you claim. AND if you did not notice a single thing diferent about the chair...
HOW DID YOU MISS THE RIGHT ARM???
Silly rabbit! The original chair (which I believe the eBay chair to be) was on public display and had the right arm damaged.
Before it was repaired the arm had lights and switches. That was how it appeared on TV.
But when they fixed the arm, they didn't bother duplicating its appearance before the damage. NOw it simply has push buttons, no switched and no lights.
So if the chair that your friend made was exact in every detail...then it should've had lights on the arm.
"Another trekkie showed up for OJ trial jury duty in her Starfleet uniform."
Actually it was the Whitewater trial, Jackass!
"waaaay too seriously to wrap the mantle of Political Correctness around themselves." ...Then again. The origin of the term "Politically Correct" is Chairman Mao's Great Leap Forward.
Face it "political correctness" is no sort of mantel that any intellectually competent person who respects the free interchange of ideas and information would ever have an ounce of respect for. How on Earth can you derride enthusiam for a myth system as brainwashing while at the same endorsing that purile form of mind control you malodorous offal!
"Mark Baard had an exclusive break on this story with WIRED back on May 22:"...props to him. Personally, I'm bored with Wired (for the most part). Which is probably why I missed it there.
But my question is, has anyone posted this story on Slashdot?
I ask because I am actually quite curious how this may have escaped mention on/.
Good link, tho!
"It's time for a new show in a new world with new characters and story lines."
There is. It's called Farscape..
-T
Re:An Ex-Trek Fan Speaks About The Club Scene
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Trek Prop Collecting
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· Score: 1
Bullshit. Lost in space may have predated it, but how can you even begin to compare that Irwin Allen assembly line TV to what Gene Roddenberry created. And I'm fairly sure it provided no inspiration. However, I'd bet a box of donuts that Ed Wood provided a lot of the inspiration that Irwin Allen used to make Lost In Space.
Lots of people like to say "Freud is an irrelevant madman". But how many other scientists of his genertion are people still bringing up in the 21st century?
Just the fact that Trek endures lends it at least SOME credence. All we got from LIS was that crappy movie a couple of years ago with "Joey" from friends...
Me too, eh. I started watching Trek when I was 5 years old. I was so brainwashed by Trek, that when Star Wars eventually came out I thought just because it was science fiction it was a cheap knockoff of Trek. But, hey, I was 7. I saw the difference to appreciate both in about a week, I think.
Holy SHIT dude! I AM a hick! *sob*
"This is pretty cool, although I can think of a number of other things I would prefer to use the minimum $80,000 bid on."
Indeed, sir. As would I. As much as I would think this is a neat thing, I am not even close to draining my 401k.:|
I hear you.No one's forcing YOU to collect them. So step off, yo. Lots of people like football. I am not one of those people. I don't, however, think they are *wrong* for liking it.
And, while wer're at it...it *MUST* be an old trick. What they did on TNG to achieve this effect is pretty much a slight variant on what they used to do on the 60's trek. Duh!
That being said, one can never be absolutely certain that what you buy is authentic. But there are several things to consider which I believe will help point you in the right direction. Again, its not fool-proof, but often I'll
1) Consider the seller. If you've been watching this category on eBay you get an idea of who can MAKE these things. Once you know who makes them, (and a few of them are out there) you get a sense of who is good at it and who is not.
There is one guy (flagboy20@aol.com) whom I believe to make truly first rate stuff that would look good in any collection. However, I believe him to be disingenuous in his claims of authenticity. I have personally witnessed him selling the "Ops" and "Tactical" and "Transporter" stations from the Enterprise D. (for but a couple of examples) many times over. I believe he tries to create the impression that these were parts of the Hollywood set through what I believe to be intentionally nebulous and misleading language in his eBay ads. He sells parts of the Enterprise as if he were a one man Okuda Factory! Some of the other people on eBay who make these things are just lousy at it. And there is a range in-beween. You get a sense of who is who.
The person whom I'll genuinely believe to be honest will have only one or at the most 3 to sell. They tend not to put a lot of effort into the ad. I will speak to them (if possible) and e-mail them to get a sense of whom I'm dealing with. And you get a feel for the process.
Some of them have bought them at auctions (the non-internet, for charity kind at which mostly non-trek stuff was sold) and others that I've dealt with have webpages about themselves with pictures of themselves behind a camera and actually *on* the trek sets, as well as t.v. commercial and sit-com sets. This could be faked of course, but why bother? To sell one or two panels with an ad on eBay that they didn't even put any effort into making?
2) BWARE of ANYONE who is selling these panels in "PERFECT" condition. Perfect is actually BAD, because the only way these actually come into a private person's posession is through the "Striking" of a set. At that point, cast members and crew get first dibs on the panels they want.
But, one thing you'll notice when you watch an ep of TNG is how damn plentiful they are! So obviously even after cast and crew claim their booty there is PLENTY left over. So they all get tossed in the trash.
As I understand it, there are many folk on the Paramount lot who love Trek, but don't work on the show. These people then go "dumpster diving" to find the ones they like. These are the type that most frequently turn up on eBay.
Also, just in the day to day use on the show, these panels get damaged. When they are removed through the strike process, especially no stage hand is ever going to give it the TLC a Trek geekoid would.
So you actually WANT panels to be a little scratched and scuffed and little chunks missing out of them.
3) Look for the number 4027x on the panels.
4027 was Paramount's production number for the show. So, 40273 would indicate a 3rd season episode, 40274 would be a 4th, 40725 is 5th, yadda yadda, I'm sure you already got it with the first example.
Even if you are just watching the show you will notice this numbering scheme over and over again.
Most knock-off artists aren't perspicacious enough to know this and you will see some pretty weird number cominations that come CLOSE (like I'm pretty sure I saw something like 42071 on one of flagboy's panels. I let him know this was wrong and "coincidentally" all of his panels had the right number from then on...) but NO cigar.
Also the number "47" turns up rather frequently. This has something to do with (I think) Pomona University in Califrnia which many of the Trek writers attended. Its some kind of school in-joke,apparently.
4) JOKES. This is a point that the counterfitters often screw up on. People who make the panels themselves rarely throw "in-jokes" into their work. The buttons on the panels are often the names of cast and crew. One panel I got (which I belive to be "real" and was from a person who was a camera person) has buttons that read PA STE (Patrick Stewart, no doubt) LE BUR (LeVar Burton) GE ROD (Gene Roddenberry), etc. You almost NEVER see this on a knockoff! One guy had a BIG graphic of the Enterprise D. In it the depiction had hidden amongst the decks Smiley Faces, Mickey Mouse heads and a VW Beatle.One of my panels has a sticker on it that reads "500,000 km per second. It's not just a good idea. It's the law!"
Again, these are just general guidlines. And generally, you can never be TOTALLY sure. But I admit I get a little charge out of something that I strongly suspect is a piece of hollywood in my home. And even if they are not authentic, they still look nice. Even if it weren't sci-fi hollywood prop related I would pay what I've paid (between $150 up to $600 for some really quite large pieces) to have a piece of authentic art that I wouldn't be skilled enough or have enough time on my hands to produce.
In my prowlings on eBay (I've been doing this for about 2 years now) I will go to the main page and type in "trek panel -shorts" (to weed out the "Trek Cycling Shorts" that inevitably turn up in these searches. Totally different thing!) Satisfied? I don't tell YOU how to suck the chrome off a trailer hitch, do I?;P
By the way fuckface,/. has been my homepage (in various guises) since 1998. Put that in your anonymous loser pipe and smoke it, just like you smoke the tube steak to keep your uncles happy.
like the Black Flag once said...SMALL MAN, BIG MOUTH!
http://www.suburbias.com/punk/bf/
...ROTFLOL!!! Isn't it hilarious how shallow so many computer geeks egos are? I must've hit a nerve considering the intensity of that response.
I also would suppose, considering the bile flowing from your fingertips at the slightest provocation that in your rage you have failed to consider that I might have multiple logins. I happen to like this name.
I invite you to find out what my other ones are, you über hacker, you!:)
Why is the ego of so many a geek so goshdarn fragile? By the way, thanks for conceding my point by failing to address it and attacking me on so completely (read:lower) level.
Incidentally, exactly where in any of my posts do I "pretend" to use Linux?
My recommendation? Get a therapist! Or better yet, a girlfriend since you've obviously never gotten laid to be so fragile, you maloderous offal !
Slashdot Mirror
Did you check the price on the RealDoll? Add that on top of the price tag for the Robonaut and it would be an astronomical sum!
Astronomical funds for you and I, lad. Considering how much the gov't is willing to spend on toilet seats and screwdrivers and bolts, and how much it costs to keep my Congressman in supply with prostitutes and cocaine, the total may well be a justifiable expense on the manned missions to Mars!
Okay, okay. So some of Spielberg's work is odious. As is Lucas' revisionist history. And maybe Spielberg DID give us A.I. and Gremlins.
But then again, Spielberg did also give us Amistad and Schindler's List!(!!!) Tho, I'm afraid that a Speilberg helmed SW would be far more like the former two.
But at least the guy does have some noteworthy accomplishments. What the heck have you ever done but hurl insults like "1 1z 1337, y0u 1z ph@Gg0+!!!~~~!!! ph3&|2 m3" in UT chat?
Doh!!!~!! Here's the Xenix link I tried to include in the last post. Not sure how that broke. Hopefully, this one wont...
The thought of GNU licensing may gave Microsoft a bad case of the hives, but interestingly enough at one point they had their own Redmond-grown version of UNIX known as Xenix . It even ran on 386s back in the day.
But I believe that it was out at about the same time that Linux was just getting off the ground and of course MS wanted money for their wares...so Xenix, as I understand it, died a very quiet death...
d00d,
.
.
;)
Not so much into the whole anime thing, myself. But right next to Other Music on 4th Street in the Village is a place called Anime Crash . I haven't been down there in a while, so I'm not sure if they're still there. But they were the last time I was in the neighborhood. Both stores are right across the street from Tower Records (blech!).
Both stores being right next to one another is very convenient. Because, if you're geeky enough to like Anime, you're likely very geeky about the music you listen to as well. And OM is staffed by obsessed music geeks who may consider "Nurse With Wound" a little too mainstream. Think of the music store from High Fidelity, on steroids!
Okay, so that was a little offtopic, but still usefull knowlege IMHO if you're heading down that way.
Anyway, Anime Crash is to obsessive Anime geeks what OM is to music nerds. Check them out.
Also, in NYC you'll find Jim Hanley's Universe useful, which is mostly a comic store but also has a nice supply of Anime. Same thing with Village Comics
Also, a really good resource (and I'm surprised I didn't think of this first, because I am not entirely convinced that Anime Crash is still open) is Toy Tokyo which is also in the Village but has a location up on 73rd St as well. They are definitely still in the biz, I was just there last Tuesday. They have lots of nice Asian and obscure American toys, as well as a comprehensive collection of Anime. And of course, don't forget your old stand-by in the City, Forbidden Planet
And that's just what I can think of off the top of my head. I think this list'll be pretty useful to you in Central Jersey, I'm from there myself. Now I'm living in Union City and commuting into New York. If you're determined to be mall-bound in suburban NJ, SunCoast Video actually has a very surprisingly good selection to choose from in terms of video releases.
New York, however, has EVERYTHING you could possibly wish for, for good or ill. You can get crack cocaine, you can get heroine, you can get prostitutes, Anime, Hentai...everything your little ole heart desires! Except, of course, egg and cheese on a bagel after 10:30 in the morning!
This was a real jolt, this realization. He was one of the main reasons I started playing bass at the tender age of 13 and spent many a year playing in punk, jazz and ambient musical projects. At the age of 33 Bass playing is still one of my most satisfying forms of catharses and I still love the who.
I will also never forget the time I brought the guy a cup of tea when he made an appearance at a radio station I was working in while I was in college. We had a nice chat, and I told him of the importance of his music to me and of my passion for playing inspired in no small part by him. He was a true, almost stereotypical 'English Gentleman' and I will always hold that experience very dear to my heart.
I am genuinely saddened by this news.
This well thought out and articulated article vividly reminded me of an old Dave Thomas and Rick Moranis skit on SCTV in the '80s. It was called "Three C-P One".
"Yes Yuri, nice shoes"
"Thanks Boris, now on to the news. Forcast for 1985 -GOOD CROP YEAR!
And forcast for 1986 - GOOD CROP YEAR!
Forecast for 1987 - BEST INDUSTRIAL YEAR EVER!..."
You get the idea. So it seems incredibly coincidental that this story comes at a time when WalMart is shipping PCs with Mandrake Linux and Lindows OS. No surprise at all that this piece of utter tripe surfaces on Microsoft's very own propaganda wing.
True that Linux , 'till now, didn't have much penetration in the home user market. I would attribute that to Microsoft's "agreements" with major seller's of PCs that they ship no PCs with any operating system than Windows.
This article is the clearest sign I have seen yet that Microsoft is starting to get a little nervous at the (very correct) perception amongst users that there is an alternative out there.
Good night Yuri!
- Yellow Dog
- Linux PPC
- Mac On Linux
- 68k Linux
- MkLinux -the original Mac distro
An here's a nice article about running Linux on the iBook.I don't know if this is what you would call a trend. But it certainly seems like a great way to get people of common interests together. Make friends, and possibly network for professional reasons (I can't believe how hard this economy has hit what I previously thought was the "unsinkable" geek community).There is only one other site that I have heard of doing such a thing, The Straight Dope . A good friend of mine attends their regular pub-crawls through Greenwhich Village and says he has a blast every time. StraightDopers are apt to discuss everything from world events, to censorship to the the various methodologies of wiping your ass.
big words, littleman.
"then odds are that you could be handed a Macintrash, be told that it runs windows, and you wouldn't know the difference." Except that current macs are shipping with OS X. A BSD / mach kernel based (yeah, I know. overhead, blah, blah. but i still think it rocks) that is centuries ahead of anything out of Redmond and decades ahead of "Lindows" (cool as I still think the Lindows project is).
"Dude, just about everybody on this site is 'unwashed'" *snif*whew! You mean it isn't me throwing up that funk! whew! Actually, I could kinda use a breathmint... "On second thought, maybe you should feel bad." I do! I have one mutherfuckin' bad case of halitosis and NO breathmints!
"You can't imagine how amusing it is to see you use both terms without a trace of sarcasm." Oh! You are absolutely right. Gosh was I being SUCH a silly ass !!! I should be lashed for being the mongoloid that I am! I should've known how efective posting messages on a site is at conveying sarcasm...It has absolutely nothing to do with the subtlties of inflection or tone of voice or facial expression or clever use of html.
Some people are into computers because they have a pure thirst for knowledge. These people learn things that are useful, and things that are useless...its all part of the same continuum for these people. To those that do, computers are toys. They may be apt to learn php or AmigaDOS. This doesn't mean they often will forego something useLESS at the expense of learning something useFULL. But time permitting, its fun to tinker... It used to be that the computer field was filled with enthusiasts who knew their shit. But ever since the unwashed masses learned there was a paycheck attached to this knowlege, the industry was inundated with carpetbaggers who don't know what the fuck they are doing. But these carpetbaggers get jobs anyway, because they have MCSEs or A(asshole)+ certs... So are you just collecting a paycheck, bub? I would assume not, or I doubt you would be on this site. Which is why I am a little puzzled, I suppose...
"All the information about in-jokes you just gave is also in the ST:TNG tech manual. I'm really curious to see if you've got pictures with closeups of these things -- I never quite belevied the manual!" Very interesting! I do have the TNG Manual, however, I've apparently not skimmed it enough to have gleaned this info from it. The stuff I reference in the above rant was the resulting knowledge of my collecting. I do have some snaps of the panels, but none close-up enough to see the things written on the buttons (some of the in-joke stuff is really quite small). But I think I may get off my lazy ass one day soon and photo-document my server room enough to build a page about it. Maybe I'll see if I can get myself slashdotted again! Drawing much ridicule I'm sure, but that's half the fun of getting slashdotted! Anyway, if you want to see the pics I have, drop me a line and I will send them to you. -T
>You have no idea how detailed the replica was. >i used to spend hours trying to spot a defect, If you do, indeed suspect that the chair up for bid is on eBay is the one you used to own in Michigan. AND if you studied it as closely as you claim. AND if you did not notice a single thing diferent about the chair... HOW DID YOU MISS THE RIGHT ARM??? Silly rabbit! The original chair (which I believe the eBay chair to be) was on public display and had the right arm damaged. Before it was repaired the arm had lights and switches. That was how it appeared on TV. But when they fixed the arm, they didn't bother duplicating its appearance before the damage. NOw it simply has push buttons, no switched and no lights. So if the chair that your friend made was exact in every detail...then it should've had lights on the arm.
"Another trekkie showed up for OJ trial jury duty in her Starfleet uniform." Actually it was the Whitewater trial, Jackass! "waaaay too seriously to wrap the mantle of Political Correctness around themselves." ...Then again. The origin of the term "Politically Correct" is Chairman Mao's Great Leap Forward.
Face it "political correctness" is no sort of mantel that any intellectually competent person who respects the free interchange of ideas and information would ever have an ounce of respect for. How on Earth can you derride enthusiam for a myth system as brainwashing while at the same endorsing that purile form of mind control you malodorous offal!
"Mark Baard had an exclusive break on this story with WIRED back on May 22:" ...props to him. Personally, I'm bored with Wired (for the most part). Which is probably why I missed it there.
But my question is, has anyone posted this story on Slashdot?
I ask because I am actually quite curious how this may have escaped mention on /.
Good link, tho!
"It's time for a new show in a new world with new characters and story lines." There is. It's called Farscape. .
-T
Bullshit. Lost in space may have predated it, but how can you even begin to compare that Irwin Allen assembly line TV to what Gene Roddenberry created. And I'm fairly sure it provided no inspiration. However, I'd bet a box of donuts that Ed Wood provided a lot of the inspiration that Irwin Allen used to make Lost In Space. Lots of people like to say "Freud is an irrelevant madman". But how many other scientists of his genertion are people still bringing up in the 21st century? Just the fact that Trek endures lends it at least SOME credence. All we got from LIS was that crappy movie a couple of years ago with "Joey" from friends...
Me too, eh. I started watching Trek when I was 5 years old. I was so brainwashed by Trek, that when Star Wars eventually came out I thought just because it was science fiction it was a cheap knockoff of Trek. But, hey, I was 7. I saw the difference to appreciate both in about a week, I think. Holy SHIT dude! I AM a hick! *sob*
"This is pretty cool, although I can think of a number of other things I would prefer to use the minimum $80,000 bid on." Indeed, sir. As would I. As much as I would think this is a neat thing, I am not even close to draining my 401k. :|
I hear you.No one's forcing YOU to collect them. So step off, yo. Lots of people like football. I am not one of those people. I don't, however, think they are *wrong* for liking it. And, while wer're at it...it *MUST* be an old trick. What they did on TNG to achieve this effect is pretty much a slight variant on what they used to do on the 60's trek. Duh! That being said, one can never be absolutely certain that what you buy is authentic. But there are several things to consider which I believe will help point you in the right direction. Again, its not fool-proof, but often I'll 1) Consider the seller. If you've been watching this category on eBay you get an idea of who can MAKE these things. Once you know who makes them, (and a few of them are out there) you get a sense of who is good at it and who is not. There is one guy (flagboy20@aol.com) whom I believe to make truly first rate stuff that would look good in any collection. However, I believe him to be disingenuous in his claims of authenticity. I have personally witnessed him selling the "Ops" and "Tactical" and "Transporter" stations from the Enterprise D. (for but a couple of examples) many times over. I believe he tries to create the impression that these were parts of the Hollywood set through what I believe to be intentionally nebulous and misleading language in his eBay ads. He sells parts of the Enterprise as if he were a one man Okuda Factory! Some of the other people on eBay who make these things are just lousy at it. And there is a range in-beween. You get a sense of who is who. The person whom I'll genuinely believe to be honest will have only one or at the most 3 to sell. They tend not to put a lot of effort into the ad. I will speak to them (if possible) and e-mail them to get a sense of whom I'm dealing with. And you get a feel for the process. Some of them have bought them at auctions (the non-internet, for charity kind at which mostly non-trek stuff was sold) and others that I've dealt with have webpages about themselves with pictures of themselves behind a camera and actually *on* the trek sets, as well as t.v. commercial and sit-com sets. This could be faked of course, but why bother? To sell one or two panels with an ad on eBay that they didn't even put any effort into making? 2) BWARE of ANYONE who is selling these panels in "PERFECT" condition. Perfect is actually BAD, because the only way these actually come into a private person's posession is through the "Striking" of a set. At that point, cast members and crew get first dibs on the panels they want. But, one thing you'll notice when you watch an ep of TNG is how damn plentiful they are! So obviously even after cast and crew claim their booty there is PLENTY left over. So they all get tossed in the trash. As I understand it, there are many folk on the Paramount lot who love Trek, but don't work on the show. These people then go "dumpster diving" to find the ones they like. These are the type that most frequently turn up on eBay. Also, just in the day to day use on the show, these panels get damaged. When they are removed through the strike process, especially no stage hand is ever going to give it the TLC a Trek geekoid would. So you actually WANT panels to be a little scratched and scuffed and little chunks missing out of them. 3) Look for the number 4027x on the panels. 4027 was Paramount's production number for the show. So, 40273 would indicate a 3rd season episode, 40274 would be a 4th, 40725 is 5th, yadda yadda, I'm sure you already got it with the first example. Even if you are just watching the show you will notice this numbering scheme over and over again. Most knock-off artists aren't perspicacious enough to know this and you will see some pretty weird number cominations that come CLOSE (like I'm pretty sure I saw something like 42071 on one of flagboy's panels. I let him know this was wrong and "coincidentally" all of his panels had the right number from then on...) but NO cigar. Also the number "47" turns up rather frequently. This has something to do with (I think) Pomona University in Califrnia which many of the Trek writers attended. Its some kind of school in-joke,apparently. 4) JOKES. This is a point that the counterfitters often screw up on. People who make the panels themselves rarely throw "in-jokes" into their work. The buttons on the panels are often the names of cast and crew. One panel I got (which I belive to be "real" and was from a person who was a camera person) has buttons that read PA STE (Patrick Stewart, no doubt) LE BUR (LeVar Burton) GE ROD (Gene Roddenberry), etc. You almost NEVER see this on a knockoff! One guy had a BIG graphic of the Enterprise D. In it the depiction had hidden amongst the decks Smiley Faces, Mickey Mouse heads and a VW Beatle.One of my panels has a sticker on it that reads "500,000 km per second. It's not just a good idea. It's the law!" Again, these are just general guidlines. And generally, you can never be TOTALLY sure. But I admit I get a little charge out of something that I strongly suspect is a piece of hollywood in my home. And even if they are not authentic, they still look nice. Even if it weren't sci-fi hollywood prop related I would pay what I've paid (between $150 up to $600 for some really quite large pieces) to have a piece of authentic art that I wouldn't be skilled enough or have enough time on my hands to produce. In my prowlings on eBay (I've been doing this for about 2 years now) I will go to the main page and type in "trek panel -shorts" (to weed out the "Trek Cycling Shorts" that inevitably turn up in these searches. Totally different thing!) Satisfied? I don't tell YOU how to suck the chrome off a trailer hitch, do I? ;P
By the way fuckface, /. has been my homepage (in various guises) since 1998. Put that in your anonymous loser pipe and smoke it, just like you smoke the tube steak to keep your uncles happy.
like the Black Flag once said...SMALL MAN, BIG MOUTH!
http://www.suburbias.com/punk/bf/
...ROTFLOL!!! Isn't it hilarious how shallow so many computer geeks egos are? I must've hit a nerve considering the intensity of that response. I also would suppose, considering the bile flowing from your fingertips at the slightest provocation that in your rage you have failed to consider that I might have multiple logins. I happen to like this name. I invite you to find out what my other ones are, you über hacker, you! :)
Why is the ego of so many a geek so goshdarn fragile? By the way, thanks for conceding my point by failing to address it and attacking me on so completely (read:lower) level.
Incidentally, exactly where in any of my posts do I "pretend" to use Linux?
My recommendation? Get a therapist! Or better yet, a girlfriend since you've obviously never gotten laid to be so fragile, you maloderous offal !