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]”

Here’s a neat little take on a possible future for consumers in America called Summer Surveillance Campaign (Flash). It’s about a guy who’s just trying to order a pizza; little does he know that the pizza parlor has recently hooked into “The System”.

Fake Windows Features (Something Awful) is the latest installment of the Comedy Goldmine feature there. The two graphics below are the two I thought were the best, but feel free to have a look around yourself. They deal with the small things that Windows just can’t seem to get right: applications that steal focus and sorting by name in the programs menu.

It’s funny because it’s true.

Guide to SpringField USA is an excruciatingly detailed map of Springfield, home to the Simpsons. There is a ‘sliced’ version, which shows zoomed-in and browsable maps of the different sections, a Big Map (in PNG format) and also a PDF version, which can be printed.

The authors subjected themselves to “numerous viewings of most episodes of the Simpsons”, then built the map:

“While the placement of most locations is arbitrary, many are placed according to where they appear in relationship to each... [More]”

100-Pound Woman Downs Six-Pound Burger (ABC) is the story that shows that a women can be just as good at doing stupid stuff as a man. In fact, even better. I found it impossible to read this article without getting slightly nauseous as it tells of “Ye Old 96er”, which is a “six-pound hamburger − and five pounds of fixins’”. All to be eaten in under three hours and you get it for free. Plus a T-Shirt.

What’s amazing is that tiny Kate Stelnick, 19, all 100 pounds of her, managed what “420-pound …... [More]”

As you may have heard, Apple has had its annual MacWorld, at which it announced a couple of new hardware products (and a slew of software products). One of them is the iPod shuffle, which is quite small and is pictured on their website next to a couple of packs of gum for comparison.

Looks normal enough, but note the (2) next to the caption. If you scroll to the bottom of the page, you find the footnotes, as shown below (with the two helpfully circled for the numerically challenged).

“Do... [More]”

We’ve all heard about how hard it can be to vote in America.

1. If, God forbid, you want someone other than Kerry or Bush, their respective parties may have done a lot of legwork to keep your preferred candidate entirely off the ballot
2. If you’re in a state that dumps all of its electoral votes to whichever candidate gets the most votes, you’re out of luck for having your voice heard
3. If you’re in Florida and you’re black, there’s a good chance you’ll be turned away from the polls
4. If you’re in... [More]

Dear Limey assholes (Guardian Unlimited) documents the replies sent by Americans when over 11,000 Brits sent “voting recommendations” for people living in Ohio. The title of the article reflects the sentiments of at least half of the letters; they evoked personal stereotypes about the British, brought up “saving their asses” in the second world war or threatened all-out attack. About a third of the letters were just effusive thanks for support, falling all over themselves in joy at having found kindred spirits across... [More]

American liquor manufacturers have accepted the FDA’s suggestion that they display one or more of the following label warnings:

WARNING

The consumption of alcohol may leave you wondering what the hell happened to your bra and panties.

WARNING

The consumption of alcohol may make you think you are whispering when you are not.

WARNING

The consumption of alcohol is a major factor in dancing like a retard.

WARNING

The consumption of alcohol may cause you to tell your friends over and over again... [More]

A man was leaving a cafe with his morning coffee when he noticed a most
unusual funeral procession approaching the nearby cemetery. A funeral
coffin was followed by a second one about 50 feet behind the first.
Behind the second coffin was a solitary man walking with a black dog.
Behind him was a queue of 200 men walking in single file. The man
couldn’t stand his curiosity ..

He respectfully approached the man walking the dog, “I am so sorry for
your loss, and I know now... [More]

Question

“Why did Australia get all the convicts and America get all the religious nuts?”

Answer

“Australia got first choice.”