Stripping for the news

This is surreal! The Naked News is web newscaster, showing streaming video news reports with ‘on-air’ talent who strip naked as they read the news. But the read real news! No pole swinging but one newsreader was giving a story on a disgraced African bishop as she pulled off her panties. The site offers some content free but also offers a membership for $9.95 per month. For your money you get full screen video (not just a RealVideo window) and downloadable news clips, though I’m not sure this is worth the cash.

Wired News has a report on recent talent auditions.

No TV Today

Amazingly, for me, I did not turn on the TV today. And, not being a working person at the moment, I was home plenty. But was on the computer and phone instead. Plus lunch with someone wonderful and dinner with a pal.

A former Green comes clean

Are we, as a global society, blowing the future health of our planet and therefore ourselves through foolish activities? Or is the truth something different? A Danish statistician set out a few years ago to challenge a prominent economist who doubted the claims of environmentalists. He found out instead that the environmentalists were, generally, wrong. Interesting reading. Then again, there’s the old saying: lies, damn lies, and statistics. But given the author’s bias you have to doubt that he’s playing games.

Tonight’s TV: NEXT: The Future Just Happened

A and E broadcast part one (of two) of Michael Lewis documentary NEXT: The Future Just Happened. Oddly, I’d just written on the book version a couple of weeks ago. Still haven’t read the book but decided to watch the show. The problem, at least with part one, is that it’s too much of a mishmash, going from teens doing adult things on the ‘Net to a roundtable with old fogie lawyers (one of whom happens to be Lewis’s dad) to a town in Ireland that is possibly that most heavily wired of any in the world. Yes, Michael, the Internet is changing things immensely. We get it. I don’t think I’ll make it to part two tonight.

The NY Times weighs in on the show.

Today’s book: The Talented Mr. Ripley

I was going to do my usual review/writeup but Bob Wake has beaten me to it. His review is much more eloquent than mine would have been. I wonder if I look anything like Bob Wake…

Ha! Read this great novel and you’ll understand that crack. And yes, Matt Damon starred in the movie version. Roger Ebert has an interesting review that covers the Damon version as well as a review of the French iteration called Purple Noon and starred French great Alain Delon.

Author Patricia Highsmith also wrote four other Ripley novels plus Strangers on a Train, which Alfred Hitchcock made into a stunning film.

Reds ready to launch for the top–Not!

After an exhibition tour to the Far East and a disappointing result at the Ajax tournament, Liverpool FC face a Champions League home and away against Finnish side FC Haka before launching the new Premiership season. In prep, the club signed three key deals with young stars, while manager Houllier conceded the league title to Man U. After last year’s three titles and Champions League berth, fans have to be disappointed that the club isn’t aiming higher.

Learn more about yourself

Recently, I ran into two sites that helped me understand myself better as a person. One is Star Trek Personality Test, which is “based on the fundamental personality configurations developed by the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator…adapted it to Star Trek.” My result was an ENFP (Extrovert, Intuitive, Feeler, Perceiver). In Star Trek language, I share a basic personality configuration with James Kirk and Julian Bashir. I found the following paragraph of analysis very accurate and interesting:

“You’re deeply caring, sensitive and gentle, which, combined with your need to solve problems, may make you a little too eager to give others advice. You also process information very quickly, which may make others believe you’re not listening to them. Before you share your feelings, you have to have time to process them.”

The other test is HumanForSale.com, which “attempts to place a value on your life using a variety of criteria in 4 basic facets of life (physical,mental,lifestyle,personality).” The ite calculated my worth as $2,244,250.00, which is substantially above average, although it gives no breakdown of the answer. Questions included age, height, weight, gender, profession, income, state of residence, and whether or not one makes charitable donations. Youth, height and income seem to be significant in determining value for men, juding from the list of Today’s Most Expensive Males, who are generally much more valuable than Today’s Most Expensive Females.

Today’s movie: Planet of the Apes

We were looking for some action, some chest pounding, screaming action today. And hoping a bunch of apes could deliver. Did they? You bet. Tim Burton has reimagined Planet of the Apes, going back to Pierre Boulle’s original novel and mostly ignoring the cheesy Charleton Heston version–although the main character is American, not French, and he travels in time, not to another star. Mark Wahlberg keeps pushing the memory of his days as a Calvin Klein underwear model further and further into the dim recesses, Helena Bonham Carter shows the complexities of being an ape with a conscious, and Tim Roth is positively vicious as the human-hating general. Is Burton making a movie about racism and ignorance or an action flick?

Did you know Boulle also wrote The Bridge over the River Kwai, made into an excellent movie with Alec Guinness?

Enterprise: Can this be true?

The folks at Ironminds tend to poke at things with an odd sense of humor. However, there are often nuggets of truth buried among the fascia. Can Rick Chandler’s assertion in Exploring PlanetOut, that all the characters of the new Star Trek series are gay, be true? Well, September 26 isn’t that far off.

By the way, an excellent new commercial for the series has been digitized and posted, find out about the download sites at TrekWeb.

Yesterday’s book: Avatar Book II

Wait a second! I just read two books, or at least a novel split over two books, called The Avatar and nowhere in these books does the avatar make an appearance! Not that Avatar isn’t a good read but somehow I feel gipped. We do meet the new DS9 characters, including the Jem’Hadar Odo really sent (Taran’atar), the Andorian engineer Shar, ex-Starfleet/ex-Maquis security chief Ro Laren, and Starfleet troubleshooter and new DS9 XO Elias Vaughn. O’Brien and Worf are gone, although Worf will definitely turn up in other ST novels as the Federation ambassador to the Klingon Empire, and it’s unclear when or where Sisko and Odo will turn up. It will take awhile before we learn more, as there are only two DS9 novels to be published between now and September 2002, when we’ll get a four book series, and they’re both part of cross-Trek series.

PsiPhi has a bunch of info on the DS9 Relaunch including character, schedules, and excerpts.

Jumping The Shark

Thanks to Top5 (a very funny email list everyone should be reading), I found out about this site. Great place if you are a fan of TV or just love to bitch about it. A show “jumps the shark” in that instant that you know from now on…it’s all downhill. On this site you can post your two cents, read what others have said, and vote on when your favorite show hit that moment.The term is a reference to the “Happy Days” episode in which Fonzie jumps a shark with his motorcycle. Some of the big categories are: Ted McGinley (he cn kill a show just by appearing on it), Death, A Very Special Episode, and They Did It.

Techies can have a sense of humor too!

And I’m not just talking about SevTrek. Bill Nottingham of Red Hat posted a message that denies the existence of a new beta:

“It has come to our attention that rumors are floating regarding the appearance of a Red Hat Linux beta release, named ROSWELL. We would like to reassure you that there is nothing of the sort.”

He then goes on to list the major features, place to file bug reports, and place to get the docs, as well as a list of mirror locations to download the 2.5 gigabytes of software. He ends with

“However, there is no evidence to suggest the actual presence of a ROSWELL beta release. Those who claim otherwise would best not flaunt their naivete by telling anyone that they saw anything other than Rawhide.”

I love a good laugh.

Monday’s movie: The Wedding Planner

Saw this flick on DVD at a friend’s while in Vegas. Cute, Matthew McConaughey and Jennifer Lopez meet coincidentally and fall in love. But–oh no–they are supposed to marry others and Lopez is actually planning McConaughey’s extremely upscale affair. Predicatable but fun. Definitely a chick flick.

Please explain the appeal

Remixes are popular, Mariah Carey is popular and so we have her new Loverboy video, which features a remix of the song. I guess I’m just getting old, but the remixed version was just unlistenable like something from Wu Tang Clan. We all know why I think the latter is unlistenable but in general Carey has a pleasant voice and decent songs. This remix, though, reverbs multiple overdubs of her voice against an amped up bass line and not much else, playing the song’s chorus over and over again. Okay, I’m old and out of it, that’s all. At least she’s showing off her nice, if surgically enhanced, breasts.

Completely irrelevant but Mariah’s in the hospital after a nervous breakdown.

Yesterday’s book: The Avatar, Book I

I’ve just started Book II so I’ll defer a real review until that writeup. I will point out that this pair is the relaunch of Star Trek: Deep Space 9, continuing the story after the end of the TV series. The Dominion War is over, Odo has returned to the Great Link, Benjamin Sisko has gone to live with the Prophets, O’Brien has returned to Earth, and Coronel Kira is in charge of the station with Nog as her engineering chief and Ro Laren as head of security. With staff limited by the Federation’s need to rebuild and repair so many planets and facilities after the war, life isn’t easy but the only problem is time. Until three Jem’Hadar ships push through the Wormhole, destroy a Starfleet cruiser assigned to protect DS9, and nearly destoy the station itself. Until a religious leader shows up with a frightening accurate ancient book of potentially heretical prophecies, the next of which concern Jake Sisko and his unborn sibling, and is promptly murdered.

PsiPhi has a bunch of info on the DS9 Relaunch including character, schedules, and excerpts.

Tonight’s movie: Croupier

The Brits know how to make movies about crime and addiction. Not surprising that I liked Croupier, as its directed by Mike Hodges, who also did the original Get Carter (although Hodges did hit a rut in the ’80s). This one was on Starz! so catch it if you can.

This film is a tense little thriller about a would-be writer who can’t break into the paying ranks. Having been raised by a gambler/con man father he knows all about casinos and takes a job in one in London. The gorgeous Alex Kingston (ER’s Dr. Elizabeth Corday) plays into his life, although he’s living with the quite attractive Gina McKee, which gives us the requisite criminal element, although the film is as much about addiction. Many, many gamblers (such as Mr Tchai, a wealthy Chinese man who plays thousands of punds night after night) but also Clive Owen’s Jack Manfred as the title character, who drinks to hallucination and smokes constantly as he finally writes a bestseller based on his life at the casino.

Rock Reviews: Over the Top

For all I know, Ann Powers is correct down to the last punctuation mark in her New York Times article Keeping the July Fourth Spirit Rolling, a review of a recent Bon Jovi concert at Giants Stadium in New Jersey. I’ve never been to a Bon Jovi concert, although I think I’ve seen one or two of his concerts broadcast on TV, and I haven’t been to a concert a Giants Stadium since Bruce Springsteen’s 1987 Tunnel of Love Tour. Still, let’s post a few quotes and consider them:

  • “This was music from a town called Hope, or New Hope at least, which is almost in New Jersey, given Bon Jovi’s allegiance to the heartland within dreaming distance of the Empire State Building, a model of which formed the centerpiece of its stage set.”

    Here we have a reference to Bill Clinton, who hails from Hope, Arkansas, and used a similar reference in his first presidential campaign. New Hope is in Pennsylvania, although just across the river from the Jersey border. Dreaming distance? Oh, what a romantic turn of phrase, as if native New Jerseyans (such as your weblogger himself) can only lust after this golden city but never find it for themselves.

  • “Romantic pain was lightened by a frolicsome beat and amusing lyrics, as in the raucous “Bad Medicine,” and life crises were clad in Western garb and made epic, as in the soaring “Blaze of Glory” and the solemnly grand “Wanted Dead or Alive.”

    Romantic pain, frolicsome beat, amusing lyrics, life crises clad in Western garb and made epic… Oh my god, can I just throw up on your copy of the newspaper? Is Jon Bon Jovi the distant love child of F. Scott Fitzgerald and Louis L’Amour?

  • “Bed of Roses” shared a soaring climax with “Blaze of Glory,” while the recent hit, “It’s My Life,” was not only a lyrical sequel to 1986’s “Livin’ on a Prayer,” but also echoed the earlier song in its verse-chorus structure.”

    By shared a soaring climax and lyrical sequel, is the author implying the Jon is fresh out of ideas? And what’s with “echoed the earlier song in its verse-chorus structure?” Essentially every rock song written since before the blues and country morphed into Elvis, Buddy, and Bill Haley has used the verse-chorus structure. Some of the more imaginative musicians even throw in a bridge.

    One has to wonder if <a href="http://search.nytimes.com/plweb-cgi/fastweb?view=site&TemplateName=hitlist_MPoff.tmpl&dbname=unify&sorting=BYFIELD:-skey_pdate&numresults=10&operator=AND&simplesearch.x=10&simplesearch.y=10&query1=thedbs%3Dpast30days%26section%3DALL%26fields%3DALL%26thequery%3Dann%2520ADJ%2520powers&query2=sorting%3DBYFIELD:-skey_pdate&starthit=0&query8=from%20the%20past%2030%20days&query7=ann%20powers&query=(ann%20ADJ%20powers)%20AND%20(20010703Ms. Powers, as the Times’ own formal style would refer to her, has tongue firmly planted in cheek for this little doozy.

    • Yesterday’s movie: Cats and Dogs

    Having a four year old in your life has some unexpectedly pleasant benefits. One expects the smiles, hugs, and kisses when that special child is happy. But you also get to see movies an adult wouldn’t dream of watching (or admitting to watching anyway) like Cats and Dogs. This movie must have been amazingly hard to make–I mean, how do you ‘direct’ actual animals (not robots or mechanicals) even if they are trained? And all the special effects surrounding their dialog. Ninja cats and rocket sled riding dogs battling over a formula that would eradicate human allergy to dogs. Mr. Tinkles (voiced by Will & Grace’s Sean Hayes) is trying to lead cats back to domination of humans and the Earth. But dog agents Butch (Alec Baldwin) and puppy Lou (Tobey Maguire) are on the case. Jeff Goldblum’s gawky awkwardness is actually suited for his role as the scientist.

    While researching this entry, I found out that one of the film’s producers is named Andrew Lazar. Unfortunately not a relative but he has produced such outstanding movies as Space Cowboys (so he knows Clint Eastwood and James Garner), 10 Things I Hate About You (Julia Stiles), and The Astronaut’s Wife (Johnny Depp and Charlize Theron).