Googlewhacking—finding a search combination that returned exactly one hit—used to be all the rage, with some people devoting astonishing amounts of time to it, only to report it on a blog, have Google index it, immediately invalidating it (because now there are two results). Below is one that I stumbled on recently:

Googlewhack May

At the time (May 12th, 2007), it returned exactly one result and, amazingly, has stood the test of time, returning only one relevant result today (as shown below):

Googlewhack July
... [More]

Keeping it short and sweet, Discrimination by Scott Adams throws out a few observations on paradoxes in our society’s of valid and invalid prejudice. For example, though most prejudices aganst traits people can’t control are regulated, “it’s totally legal for an employer to reject a stupid person” who applies for a job. To the hypothetical argument that this is a worthwhile exception, he retorts:

“You might argue that it is in society’s overwhelming best interest to discriminate against stupid people because... [More]”

Lucky Stars (Time) is an interview with George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Ellen Barkin and Matt Damon. The interviewees literally have no interest in promoting the movie, unless you count them parading their hilarious camaraderie that undoubtedly features heavily in the film as promotion. At any rate, it seemed incidental to just having a whale of a time.

The first question asked them how they kept their cool and turned out a quailty product—according to general opinion, the best of the series— instead... [More]

There are all sorts of sites that produce content meant to be funny, like The Onion, McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, Something Awful or a Pointless Waste of Time. Whether or not you think the invidual attempts at humor are successful or not, that is their purpose to at least some people. The Internet offers humor in unlooked-for places as well, like this collection of Cool Cybersex Logs, in which one or more users troll chat rooms to prank unsuspecting partners with frustrating experiences. For... [More]

Street Installations has a list of pictures of street art involving mannequins posed in realistic & strange positions.

The one below—with a walker kryptonite-locked to a parking sign—is probably the best of the bunch.

Locked-up Walker

So there’s this mime, David Armand, and he does a bit called Karaoke for the Deaf (Google Video) on HBO. His shtick[1] is acting out the song “Torn” by Natalie Imbruglia.

It’s wicked good, so he gets invited to do it at some awards show, Torn by David Armand (YouTube), in the middle of which Natalie herself joins him on stage and starts miming the song with him.

A good time was had by all.

You probably shouldn’t do this one at work because it takes a full six minutes of concentration and silence—during which bizarre sounds are emitted from your speakers. Either that, or you need some headphones. Test your musical skills in 6 minutes! is a Flash-based test for tone-deafness / musical ear. It plays 30 pairs of musical sequences that may or may not differ in tone: that’s for you to decide. For the really bored, there is also Can’t dance? Test to see if you’re rhythmdeaf!, which... [More]

Wally is Dilbert’s coworker. He is, without a doubt, the absolute king of work-avoidance. His talents are numerous and his fame wide-spread. This latest Dilbert cartoon shows him at his absolute best—right down to the Dr. Evil-like gesture of sipping from his slightly-oversized coffee cup.

Wally's Way

If you’re a regular peruser of Reddit[1], you’ve probably already seen at least one XKCD cartoon. They really do tend to be pretty unique and, often enough, have something interesting and funny to say. Dreams, for example, is a discussion between a firm embed of society and a doubter:

“The infinite possibilities each day holds should stagger the mind. The sheer number of experiences I could have is uncountable, breathtaking. And I’m sitting here refreshing my inbox. We live trapped in loops.... [More]”

Normally, optical illusions are the stuff of chain letters and AOL home pages. Those found on the pages at eChalk optical illusions are a cut above that. The two most impressive ones are Colour perception and Colour perception 2. It’s hard to believe that there is no trickery, but, if you need to, take screenshots of the before and after to prove it to yourself.

Color PerceptionColor Perception 2

These tests are especially interesting for designers, and especially graphic designers. On the web, not only must you remember not... [More]

See how fast you can type! is a simple JavaScript-based typing tester. It counts mistakes and words per minute. On a stationary (non-laptop) US-English keyboard, I got:

“Wow! Your typing speed (with 2 mistakes) is:

“98.14 wpm
404.52 cpm”

Read it and weep.

Exploding Blue DanubeIf you’re only familiar with Monty Python through the movies or audio albums (like the Final Ripoff), this list of 59 amazing sketches of the Monty Python will be something new. They are all hosted on YouTube (for now) and some have Japanese subtitles (though don’t let that throw you—they are in the original English).

Thanks to Reddit users, we also have another old favorite, The Four Yorkshiremen.

Humility should be taught in school, along with tact, ethics and critical thinking. And not just in graduate school, but early and officially. Naturally, out-of-class experiences at most schools impart valuable lessons in humility and tact, though these are, in general less structured—and more painful—than they ought to be. Instead of actually learning tools that will make us better people, we learn the coarse rules that make us better workers. Even though we spend at least 13 solid years... [More]

You know how everybody’s screaming about Borat being so over the top? How his schtick is so hilarious because he never goes out of character? It seems it’s catching. This guy—ostensibly from New Jersey—may be for real or he may be faking it too.[1] Either way, he’s hilarious as he tries to prove in just one minute that “[w]e got literally every girl’s costume in the god damn universe!”

Best line? It’s a tie between the announcer’s plea to “get up off yer ass and get the fuck down heah … I... [More]”

Received via email from several sources (and rewritten to satisfy the excruciatingly high standards here at earthli News):

One day, during a daily briefing, Donald Rumsfeld told president Bush that 3 Brazilian soldiers had been killed in Iraq.

Upon hearing this, the president froze and all the color ran from his face. He slumped forward, head in hands and whimpered softly.

After what seemed like an eternity, he composed himself and asked,

“Just exactly how many is a brazillion?”

It’s the... [More]

This photo montage of Postcards from Ken Lay (Whitehouse.gov) is one way to speculate a happy ending for the thousands of former Enron employees who may not have yet seen their way to forgiving “Kenny Boy” with quite the same fawning sycophantism to wealth mustered by Bush and his cronies.

Kenny and Dick: a Missed Connection?

'Ladder' in the SubwaySome artists in Bayview Subway Station, Toronto got together to create perspective art at a subway. The paintings are deliberatly distended in order to fool the eye into thinking that it is a three dimensional object. The picture of the ladder to the left is a pretty good example. I’m not sure how they make these—whether they really can draw the false persepective from their mind’s eye or whether they work from a sketch or design prepared beforehand. At any rate, these remind me of the... [More]

The International Philosophy World Cup brought to you by Monty Python—Greeks vs. Germans in a knock-down drag-out battle of the philophosers on a football pitch. If the embedded video below doesn’t work, try this link to the video at YouTube. It’s a touch on the long side, but the closing flurry of announcing makes it worth watching the whole thing:

“The Germans are disputing it. Hegel is arguing that the reality is merely an a priori adjunct of non-naturalistic ethics, Kant via the... [More]”

Attack #1Attack #2Attack #3Animator vs. Animation is a Flash animation that shows what happens when creative differences arise between the drawer and the drawee. In this one, an animator quickly becomes hostile to a freshly-minted stick figure drawing, which takes umbrage to the violence, using the environment (Macromedia Flash itself) to retaliate. It’s very cleverly done and very convincingly animated, giving the impression that the figure is actually fighting for its very life, using bow and arrow against an... [More]

Anyone who’s been in the business of web design for long enough—and does a good job of it—should be wholly familiar with the pie chart showing Time Breakdown of Modern Web Design. If the graphic isn’t available[1], the list is:

• Time spent actually designing anything (2%)
• Time spent trying to get the layout to work using only CSS before giving up and using tables (20%)
• Swearing (15%)
• Time spent trying to get the bastard to work in Internet fucking Explorer (40%)
• Time spent wishing a slow,... [More]

When even old grey elephant Arlen Spector stands up to protest domestic spying, you know there’s dissension in the ranks over at the GOP. Their normally single voice is splintering somewhat over this issue, as evidenced by this response from Dick Cheney to his outburst: Vice President Cheney Issues Diplomatic Response… (WhiteHouse.Org). Classic Cheney.

Though he spent years on the Daily Show and has been on the air with his own show since last September, Stephen Colbert first leapt into the national spotlight when he as named one of Time magazine’s 100 most influential people and when he handed George Bush his ass at the Correspondent’s dinner a few weeks ago[1]. There are always a lot of videos of his show online; the following few from the last week are particularly good:

Phone Calls: Wiretapping

Stephen takes to the phones to ease people’s... [More]

Louis C.K. has a new show on HBO and Jon Stewart’s interview with is hilarious. Jon makes the mistake of asking him about his family and he tells him about his two daughters—but with a slightly different take than most proud fathers.

Louis: The one-year-old I don’t have an opinion about … she’s kind of boring. The other one is four years old and I love her very much, but she’s kind of a fucking asshole.
Jon: Does she watch the show?
Louis: I don’t care, she can kiss my ass.
Jon:... [More]

Sternest Meanings features an anagram robot, which is kind of fun. Anagrams derived from the names of our fearless leaders in Washington are succinct peeks into their very souls:

• Donald Rumsfeld = Muddler of lands
• Paul Wolfowitz = Foul zap low wit
• Richard Perle = Pedlar[1], richer

The most fearless leader of all has two interesting variations: the first tells us what we already know, whereas the second reveals a side he has not yet revealed publicly.

• George Walker Bush = Blush, war geek[2]... [More]

Looking for all the comforts of living on a naval vessel while you’re confined to dry land? 28 Ways to simulate being in the Navy is here to help.[1] Some of the more helpful items are listed below:

1. Unplug all radios and TVs to completely cut yourself off from the outside world. Have a neighbour bring you a Time, Newsweek, or Proceedings from five years ago to keep you abreast of current events.
2. Cut a twin mattress in half and enclose three sides of your bed. Add a roof that prevents you from... [More]

The following video, Death Star (YouTube), is a hilarious deleted scene that George Lucas intended as the opening scene for The Empire Strikes Back. When Mark Hamill crashed up his bike and scarred his face, he added the whole “Ice Planet Hoth” thing instead.

Truly hilarious and well worth watching!

Get Your War On (MNFTIU) is frequently funny, occasionally published comic that’s featured on earthli several times. Every once in a while, they pack a serious wallop into a short rant, as in the following comic:

The quote is repeated in text form below, ‘cause it just makes me laugh:

“Sorry—after three years in Iraq, I don’t get excited by the word “progress”. That’s some bullshit. Maybe I’d be excited by progress if we had only spent, like, two million dollars, or if we had a bunch of... [More]”

Final Box CoverFinal Box Back

The Apple Product Cycle takes you through the life of an Apple product, from inception:

“An obscure component manufacturer somewhere in the Pacific Rim announces a major order for some bleeding-edge piece of technology that could conceivably become part of an expensive, digital-lifestyle-enhancing nerd toy.”

…to the actual appearance of the product…

“The product has sleek, clean lines, a diminutive form factor, and less than half of the useful features that everyone was expecting. Jobs... [More]”