media underground

The Web Is Dead

'Over the past few years, one of the most important shifts in the digital world has been the move from the wide-open Web to semiclosed platforms that use the Internet for transport but not the browser for display. It’s driven primarily by the rise of the iPhone model of mobile computing, and it’s a world Google can’t crawl, one where HTML doesn’t rule. And it’s the world that consumers are increasingly choosing, not because they’re rejecting the idea of the Web but because these dedicated platforms often just work better or fit better into their lives (the screen comes to them, they don’t have to go to the screen). The fact that it’s easier for companies to make money on these platforms only cements the trend. Producers and consumers agree: The Web is not the culmination of the digital revolution.' (Wired article).

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Sleep Paralysis: Manifestation Of The Shadow People

A couple of nights ago I experienced what is commonly known as sleep paralysis. I've had a minor occurrence of it before, but on this occasion I found myself overcome with a feeling of intense terror. This coupled with what looked like a tall dark figure that appeared to be breaking into reality through one of the corners of my room next to the door. The figure was gaunt and somewhat Nospheratu-like in stature with what looked like a wide-brimmed had on it's head. I couldn't make out its features but my ears were filled with a pulsating sound and my body seemed to be vibrating as though I was somehow being phased out of reality, beamed up, or probed by some kind of scanner.

The terror that I felt wasn't so much due to the feeling of an evil presence in the room, but I got the impression that this thing was highly intelligent, had an agenda and that it regarded me as little more than an insect that stood in its way. All the while I couldn't move a single muscle.

"As flies to wanton boys are we to the gods" as Shakespeare put it, and eventually after several minutes my girlfriend shook me out of it because I was "howling like a terrified animal," she said.

It happened twice more that night but on the last two occasions I managed to get myself out of it by realising that this was merely sleep paralysis. After each occasion my waking perceptions were filled with mild hallucinations and the experience instantly made me think that these symptoms could be synonymous with the alien abduction experience.

Now, I don't for one minute think that this was anything other than an exceptional case of sleep paralysis as defined by modern psychology, however, the archetypes of the Shadow People and, in particular, "The Hat Man" intrigues me considerably.

Here's an interesting ten part interview with Professor David J. Hufford, author of the provocative study The Terror That Comes In The Night. (YouTube video stream).

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BP's Misadventures In Photoshop

'BP has released hundreds of photos aimed at giving us all an inside glimpse of the Gulf oil spill and the company’s clean-up efforts. But it’s BP’s enthusiastic use of Photoshop that’s getting it all the attention. Which is too bad because the Photoshop blunders are unnecessary, cast further doubt on BP and erase whatever minuscule image boost BP received when Bob Dudley took over the Gulf oil spill response.

'The doctored images aren’t egregious. Silly, shoddy and unnecessary are better descriptions. The three images that have been discovered so far all try to add more “activity” to the photo. For example, images were doctored to fill in the blank screens at BP’s crisis command center. The helipad in another photo was removed to give the appearance that a helicopter was flying.' (BNet article).

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The Decline Of The US As A World Power

'Robert Anton Wilson was perhaps the first to popularize the observation that during the history of human civilization, power and money has always moved west. From the beginnings of civility in Sumer to modern day China, there has always been a westward flow of technology, money, power and manufacturing capacity. In the beginnings of the Industrial Revolution, we witnessed the flow of influence from the Vatican to Britain, an empire on which it was said that the sun never set. As Britain's power waned in the early 20th century, so the flow moved westwards to America. Now in the 21st century we have witnessed a further flow westwards towards East Asia. While America still holds most of the cards as the world's richest economy, the focal point of industry and manufacture has long left its shores.

'It is an absolute mystery as to why this trend has continued without exception for nearly four millenia. Yet this trend isn't so powerful as to rend all countries utterly powerless before it. America is still the richest country in the world. It still possesses a near monopoly on the flow of culture, entertainment and ideas. It has the most powerful military industrial machine in all of human history, and the biggest financial and global corporate institutions are based there. So where is the decline? The answer to that lies not in GDP figures or Wall Street or the towering heights of financial markets, but in other social and economic factors. A fair measure on which to base America is by its own declaration as the 'land of the free'. Taking that freedom in both a political and economic context, we have a basis on which to judge America's decline.' (Helium article).

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Double Slit Anomaly Is No Mystery To Doctor PR

Jim Elvidge is, in my opinion, a goddamned genius. Here's his latest weblog entry. Whilst you're there go buy his wonderful book on programmed reality. I cannot recommend it highly enough.

'One of the keys to understanding our reality is found in a very unusual and anomalous experiment done over 200 years ago by Thomas Young. The philosophical debate that resulted from this experiment and its successors during the quantum era of the 20th century may hold the key to understanding everything - from bona fide scientific anomalies to cold fusion and bigfoot sightings.

'If you are unfamiliar with this experiment, please watch the Doctor Quantum cartoon on the Double Slit Experiment. It provides a good explanation of two paradoxes that have puzzled scientists for many years. In summary, here is the conundrum:

'1. If you fire electrons at a screen through a single slit in an otherwise impenetrable barrier, there will be a resulting pattern on the screen as you might expect - a single band of points.

'2. If you fire electrons at a screen through a barrier with two slits, the pattern that will build up on the screen is not one of two bands of points, but rather an entire interference pattern, as if the electrons were actually waves instead of particles.

'This is one paradox - that electrons (and all other particles) have dual personalities in that they can act like both waves and particles. Further, the personality that emerges matches the type of experiment that you are doing. If you are testing to see if the electron acts like a particle, it will. If you are testing to see if the electron acts like a wave, it will.

'3. Even if the electrons are fired one at a time, eliminating the possibility of electrons interfering with each other, over time, the same pattern emerges.

'4. If you put a measuring device at the slit, thereby observing which slit each electron passes through, the interference pattern disappears.

'This is the more mysterious paradox - that the mere act of observation changes the result of the experiment. The implications of this are huge because they imply that our conscious actions create or modify reality.' (The Universe Solved weblog & Doctor Quantum cartoon).

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How BP's Gulf Disaster May Have Triggered Doomsday

'Ominous reports are leaking past the BP Gulf salvage operation news blackout that the disaster unfolding in the Gulf of Mexico may be about to reach biblical proportions.

'251 million years ago a mammoth undersea methane bubble caused massive explosions, poisoned the atmosphere and destroyed more than 96 percent of all life on Earth. Experts agree that what is known as the Permian extinction event was the greatest mass extinction event in the history of the world.

'55 million years later another methane bubble ruptured causing more mass extinctions during the Late Paleocene Thermal Maximum (LPTM).

'The LPTM lasted 100,000 years.

'Those subterranean seas of methane virtually reshaped the planet when they explosively blew from deep beneath the waters of what is today called the Gulf of Mexico.

'Now, worried scientists are increasingly concerned the same series of catastrophic events that led to worldwide death back then may be happening again - and no known technology can stop it.

'The bottom line: BP’s Deepwater Horizon drilling operation may have triggered an irreversible, cascading geological Apocalypse that will culminate with the first mass extinction of life on Earth in many millions of years.' (Helium article).

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Misfits: From Asbos To Superheroes

This is undoubtedly the best TV drama series I've seen in a long time. Written by Howard Overman, Misfits follows five outsiders on community service who get struck by a flash storm and lumbered with special powers. In other words, it's like The Breakfast Club meets Being Human meets Grant Morrison's The Invisibles.

Here's the synopsis...

'Misfits follows five teenagers on community service who get struck by lightning and are given special powers. Kelly (Lauren Socha) becomes telepathic, Curtis (Nathan Stewart Jarrett) can rewind time, Alisha (Antonia Thomas) can send people into a sexual frenzy when they touch her skin, and Simon (Iwan Rheon) can make himself invisible. Seemingly left unaffected is smart alec Nathan (Robert Sheehan), although his power is revealed in the sixth episode.' (4OD video streams or Isohunt torrent download).

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Doug Stanhope's Comedy Death Camp

'It is very easy for a comic - or anyone I guess - to get bogged down in hate and cynicism.

'I am guilty of that most hours of the day. It has nothing to do with money or career or all the other trivia. While some of my bitterness could be attributed to excessive drink, it is mostly rooted in the idiocy that surrounds me and the shit people will accept as good or correct or real, etc, without any question whatsoever.

'Regardless, it is still hate and whatever angst I can't immediately turn into comedy proceeds to ruin my daily life. So I try to limit my exposure to it, recognize it for what it is and move on.

'Try something new. Travel someplace I've never been. Try food I've never tasted. Listen to music I've never heard. And hate all of it.

'It's important - especially in my business - to have a very deep well of hatred.

'One thing though that I've hated since even my youngest, hope-filled days as a comic - worse than bad comedy, hack comedy or even joke thieves - are people who teach stand-up comedy classes.' (Doug Stanhope article).

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Shutting The Fuck Up Is The New Talking

Does anyone else feel the same way that I do about the internet?

Basically, I'm bored shitless with anything anyone writes on it.

Okay, so I turned 40 a couple of days ago - so I guess I'm supposed to be disillusioned what with a mid-life crisis setting in - but I think my contempt has more to do with how the internet has mutated over the last ten years.

Don't get me wrong, the web has way more to offer today than it did a decade ago. For example, I can just about download any album or movie I want without forking out a single penny, and I can avoid watching TV entirely by going online and selecting the programmes that I want to watch when I want to watch them. At the moment I'm learning how to play the banjo and the quality and variety of online help and free video tutorials is so impressive it has eliminated any need for me to seek out a private tutor. In fact, there's all kinds of amazing funky things I can do online which has enhanced my life and fast-tracked me through pursuits that would have been laden with obstacles ten years ago.

So what the fuck is my problem?

Continue reading "Shutting The Fuck Up Is The New Talking"

Crises Of Capitalism

Watch this and get a lot smarter in just 11 minutes!

Radical sociologist David Harvey asks if it is time to look beyond capitalism towards a new social order that would allow us to live within a system that really could be responsible, just, and humane?"

From a speech given at the prestigious Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce. (RSA video animation).

Note: you can also watch his full lecture here.

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Gig Review: Shooglenifty - Gigha Island Music Festival (June 26th 2010)

"All the levers forward, all the time," was one of the text messages I received from the Sergeant Matron prior to the gig, however, on this occasion I think that one of the levers broke off from the control panel and his comment of being "45 going on 15" seems more appropriate as an epitaph to mark the memory of this occasion.

It had started in the usual kind of way, the mad dash to get everything together the night previous, followed by an annoying shift at work that had to be completed in the morning. This could've made things tight for getting to the island on time had it not been for my good friend and work colleague Dasbo The Asbo - who forfeited his Saturday off to help me complete my duty and get us on the road earlier.

You see, the Isle of Gigha is some 160 miles away and with Bingo at the controls there was every possibility of us getting lost or going in the wrong direction entirely. Fortunately, this time, he came prepared with "the analogue SatNav" as he referred to it: a small yellow post-it note stuck to the air-vent of his car's dashboard listing all the roads between Fife (aka Hazzard County) and Tayinloan ferry port.

You see, we had decided to go in heavy this time, taking the tepee, gazebo, tents, fold down chairs, table, and Aladdin Blue Flame paraffin droid for extra heat in the evening if required - and, of course, for cooking homemade bothy-style pizza on.

I had prepared around 8 pizza bases in the bread machine the night previous and - utilising the remains of a disposable barbeque - rigged up a grill-mod to the top of S3E3 (my Aladdin Blue Flame Paradroid) to make a tasty pre-gig munch. Who said camping out had to be without its luxuries? Provided we caught the 4 pm ferry across to Fantasy Island, we'd get there in plenty time to set up basecamp and stuff ourselves full of carbohydrates to help soak up the inevitable colossal consumption of liquid adult refreshments.

Continue reading "Gig Review: Shooglenifty - Gigha Island Music Festival (June 26th 2010)"

Another Unsolved Statistic

Just submitted this for consideration in next week's local press...

A couple of months ago my mountain bike got nicked from the Kirkgate outside The Creepy Wee Pub in broad daylight and I subsequently submitted a letter to the Dunfermline Press (Letters, May 20th 2010) expressing my disillusion at the way bicycle theft is regarded by the police.

At the time, I realised that the longer it took for those who "serve and protect" us to investigate the theft, the less likely there would be of any recovery, so, I pulled out all the stops and did everything I could to encourage investigation within the first few days after the theft took place.

My main objective was to see Fife Council's CCTV footage of the crime being committed in order to determine if I, or anybody that was present on the day of the crime, recognised the thief, however, at the time I was told that the footage was grainy and that any chance of me being able to view video stills of the event was "highly unlikely" given current Data Protection laws. As a result, I wrote the bike off, took the hit and bought another bike, making sure to insure it this time.

Fast-forward a couple of months and I get a phone-call from the investigating officer telling me that she finally has an image of the criminal riding my bike down St Margaret Street for me to look at.

Well, whoopty-do, thinks me, for what it's worth I might as well check this baby out.

Needless to say I didn't recognise the thief, despite the image being a pretty damned clear one: it was the usual kind of shaven-headed gorilla, eyes real close together with protruding forehead resembling some kind of human prototype; tearing down the road on my two-wheeled friend, locked in criminal-bliss, sphincter probably twitching like a base-jumping adrenalin junky.

"Sorry," I say to the officer, "but it looks like half the male population of Dunfermline, can I keep the image to show around?"

I might've well asked for a shot of her truncheon as apparently the image is police property and not allowed into the public domain.

I am therefore confused. Did this event actually take place in reality? Didn't this image show a picture of a crime being committed? What happens next in trying to identify this goon? How on earth can it be okay to show CCTV footage to millions of viewers on Crimewatch, but not be okay for me to get a copy of this photo?

The answer hit me after I signed a form stating that I couldn't identify the criminal. Basically, it's a case of sign here, case closed, another unsolved statistic and a burden off police hands.

I don't blame the investigating officer. She probably did everything in her power under a failing system, but having worked in CCTV a number of years ago, I know that it doesn’t take two months to get an image printed off…unless, of course, you work for Fife Council.

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ConDem Your Freedom

Apparently the UK's ConDem Government "is committed to restoring and defending your freedom" and they want us to participate. Yeah right!

Their website states:

'We're working to create a more open and less intrusive society through our Programme for Government. We want to restore Britain’s traditions of freedom and fairness, and free our society of unnecessary laws and regulations – both for individuals and businesses.

'This site gives you the chance to submit, comment on, or vote for ideas about how we can do this. Your ideas will inform government policy and some of your proposals could end up making it into bills we bring before Parliament to change the law.

'So if there are any laws or regulations you'd like us to do away with, then submit your idea. If you see ideas here already that you like the look of, then rate them and get them moved up the list. And if there’s more you’d like to say, then talk to others in the comments section for each proposal.'

Who knows though, maybe it's the only slither of power Clegg and his cronies have under oppressive Torie rule, therefore, I think I might submit the idea of abolishing politics and politicians for good.

So, sign up, have some fun, and lets see how far these gormless parasites are willing to go. (HM Government's Your Freedom website).

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Get Your Own Jetpack: A Sci-Fi Dream Come True

'Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the future. Please wipe your feet on the way in and take a glass of space juice from the replicator. If you look above you, you'll see what we are all here for. Hovering over your heads is the Martin Jetpack, the world's first commercially available personal flying machine.

'The Martin Jetpack is a personal helicopter. Its tradename calls it a "jetpack", but it is neither jet or rocket-powered. It has been developed by the Martin Aircraft Company of New Zealand, and was unveiled on July 29, 2008 at the Experimental Aircraft Association's 2008 AirVenture in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, USA. It is classified by the Federal Aviation Administration as an experimental ultralight airplane.

'Unlike earlier devices called "jetpacks", the Martin Jetpack is the first to be considered a practical device. It has been under development for over 27 years and uses a gasoline (premium) engine with two ducted fans to provide lift. Theoretically it can reach a speed of 60 miles per hour, an altitude of 8,000 feet, and fly for about 30 minutes on a full fuel tank. It costs $86,000. Martin Aircraft plans to deliver the first jetpacks to ten customers in early 2010.' (Martin Jetpack website).

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Humorous Reviews Of The World's Most Popular Pen

Check out the customer reviews for the Bic Cristal Ballpoint Pen. Here's a couple of excerpts...

'Received Bic Cristal a short while back and initially was very pleased with the product but after a couple of weeks usage it stopped working. There was no instruction manual, leads or power supply and didn't seem to be any way of charging it back up. I then decided to called the customer helpline regarding its warranty and to see if they would repair or replace it but the girl who answered my call just laughed and put the phone down on me. Very shoddy. Be warned.' - J.R. Hartley.

'My pen of choice when writing death threats and begging letters... especially the blood red version.' - Alan Smith.

'Whilst perfect as a general day to day writing implement, as I have many Pen Pals across the globe, I am wondering if it comes in any other languages? My foreign friends would be simply delighted to receive a missive from me in their native tongue and, not least, pretty damn impressed. If anyone can let me know that would be great.' - P. Day. (Amazon product listing).

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