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The dialogue in this short film may sound like English, but it is mostly fake. Commenters who’ve taken English as a second language say this is what our language sounds like to those who don’t yet understand it. It may sound to you like someone who is mocking English. I can tell you from experience that this is the kind of thing a native English speaker hears when her sense of hearing is going downhill. NSFW language -I think. -via The Daily What
Previously: Italian musician Adriano Celentano sings nonsense with an American accent.
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A Japanese pop group has fooled their fans by creating a fake member. No I don’t mean this was just another airhead pop star with no personality or talent. This was an actual non-existent computer generated person made from the faces of her band mates. The group even offers an app on its website that allows you do make a similar person mash up.
This week, Eguchi Aimi, the newest member of the all-girl Japanese pop group AKB48, was revealed to be a fake human. She was perfectly cute, but Eguchi was nothing more than a computer composite of her six band mates; she existed only in a virtual world. The bizarre, and clever, publicity stunt was unveiled in the above video, which shows exactly how the virtual beauty was created.
Konapun is a Japanese toy that was produced by Bandai between 2007 and 2009. It allowed children to cook what convincingly appears to be food, but is not actually edible:
The toy goes to amazing lengths to make it look and feel like a realistic cooking process. So for example, if you are making something fried like donuts you drop the “donuts” into fake “oil” and it bubbles as if it was really frying. This bubbling/frying effect is used in several Konapun toys such as the hamburger grill and one that makes tempura.
It’s astounding how real each of the food items look in the end. For example, the rice separates into tiny clumps that look just like sticky rice. And the marinara sauce on the spaghetti is runny and looks just like real sauce. Couple that with the kits’ tiny mixing bowls, spatulas, cookie cutters, and other tools, and it makes for a fascinating toy.
Link -via Boing Boing
Books make for great decorative touches around the house, no doubt. But as the Kindle Uprising advances, fewer and fewer print books are being sold and, hey, maybe someday you’ll need a great title to slip under the side table lamp and there will be no book. For this highly unlikely situation, Italian artist Emanuela Ligabue has you covered. Her collection of wooden-blocks-turned-books is kind of quirky and interesting, though I confess that I’d paint my own fake books before buying one. Check out more of Ligabue’s designs on Flavorpill. Link
Image: Emanuela Ligabue
Just like eating fifty cent tacos, sometimes paying less for something isn’t always a good idea. Such is the lesson that some folks have learned buying bargain priced 500GB hard drives from China that turn out not to be a lot less than what they appear.
It’s a 128-MB flash-drive. Working in a “looped” mode – when it runs out of space, it starts overwriting from the beginning. My friend said they’re still trying to figure out how did the Chinese do that. Because the drive reports “correct” file sizes and disk-capacity. And the “looped-overwriting” does not touch the other files present on the drive.
It was a profitable but outrageous scheme, set forth in a trial going on now. Prosecutors are charging that David Deng recruited Chinese immigrants to join the “U.S. Army/Military Special Forces Reserve” to help their chances of obtaining U.S. citizenship, and that he charged hundred of dollars from his “soldiers.” The U.S. military has no such unit. The group is well known in Asian-American neighborhoods of Los Angeles, where community leaders had no idea they weren’t government issue.
Last year, one Chinese-language newspaper reported that an Alhambra taxi driver was arrested near Los Angeles International Airport after producing counterfeit military identification while trying to get out of a traffic stop.
Investigators learned that the recruits were told that the military IDs could be used to avoid getting traffic tickets and to receive certain types of military benefits and discounts, Eimiller said.
Some of the recruits were so convinced that they were part of the U.S. military that they actually visited real Army recruiting centers and tried to pay their monthly dues directly to the U.S. government, Eimiller said. That was another tipoff when investigators began looking into the group.
Local Chinese American leaders on Wednesday said they were shocked that a group that was such a familiar presence in the community is now being accused of being a fraud.
If convicted of all charges, Daniel Deng could face 11 years in prison. Link -via Metafilter
(Image credit: FBI)
History is full of hoaxes, and that includes people who aren’t really people. These “people” are handy, because they can be used as sources, they can be quoted, and they can be blamed. Because they don’t exist, they won’t mind!
Film fans and critics often rail against so-called “quote whores”—reviewers who are willing to write a positive notice for any movie as long as the studios wine and dine them enough—and David Manning of the Ridgefield Press was seemingly one of the worst. Around 2000, his glowing reviews frequently appeared on the posters for such universally loathed films as The Animal (“another winner!”) and Hollow Man (“stupendous!”). Manning would have been a running contender for America’s worst working film critic, save for one key detail: he didn’t exist. As it turned out, a marketing executive at Sony had invented Manning as a tool for building positive press for films released by the corporation’s subsidiary Columbia Pictures.
Read more about Manning and nine other nonexistent folks you may know at Top Tenz. Link
Spanish police have arrested an unnamed woman who faked her own kidnapping. She sent a photograph of herself with her hands and feet tied, along with a ransom demand of 20,000 euros.
The ransom request was repeated in later text messages as well as warnings that the man not go to police, which he ignored.
Police launched a search and spotted her car, which they followed to a shopping mall in the town of Gandia on the Mediterranean coast.
“The woman, who was travelling alone and was in perfect health, was the supposed victim of the kidnapping,” the police statement said.
At first she told police that she had been released that morning but later confessed to faking her abduction “to find out what her husband would be willing to do for her”.
There’s no word on whether the perpetrator found her husband’s response acceptable. Link -via Arbroath
(Image created with Ransom Note Generator)
Prank Packs are gift boxes with ridiculously fake products printed on the outside. Give a gift in one of these and be ready for an uncomfortably awkward expression of gratitude: “Uh, thanks, I always wanted a motorized rolling pin (or a talking coffee cup, or a hat that doubles as a fish net).” That’s when you show them the nice personal gift that you put inside! This year’s new designs include the pictured iArm, the Pet Petter, and the Family Blankeez. Link
A soccer team from Togo traveled to Bahrain to play against the Bahrain national team. Bahrain not only won, they were surprised at their opponent’s lack of fitness. When the Togolese soccer authorities heard about the match, they were dumbfounded, because Togo had not sent a team to Bahrain!
Investigations were launched, and the nation’s sports minister muttered to the press about “shadowy handlers” and “mafia groups.” After what must have been a grueling piece of detective work, the investigators pinned their suspicions on Tchanile Bana, a former national-team coach who had recently been suspended for taking another fake team to a tournament in Egypt. Bana confessed, apologized, was banned from the game for three years, and insisted—maybe a little too fervently—that he had acted alone.
Of course, there’s a lot more to the story, which you can read at Slate. Link -via the Presurfer
I must say I don’t always understand the purpose of certain furniture designs. My best guess is, much like the models who walk down the runway in ridiculous outfits, they are simply meant to serve as inspiration for the more mundane creations they spawn for the regular folk. Regardless, this is an interesting twist… a chair that’s useless by itself, but perfectly designed to integrate (and aesthetically enhance) any gross and uncomfortable chair you have lying around.
Titled the ‘Chair Dress’ by Design Studio Maezm, the actual product in this case cannot even be sat upon without bending too the floor – its soft frame and sofa-style is not sufficient to hold up your weight. However, the chair you place it over as a cover can (hopefully) pick up the extra pounds … and the ‘dressing’ has some basic structural rigidity from its thickness and shape.
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Fake Science is a tumblr blog of amusingly misleading scientific factoids and infographics. It’s a good source of information “when the facts are too confusing.”
Frank
McCourt (RIP) may be better known for his Pulitzer Prize winning memoir
Angela's
Ashes
Reader's Digest has an excerpt from another one of Frank's memoir, Teacher
Man
Isn’t it remarkable, I thought, how the students whined and said it was hard putting 200 words together on any subject? But when they forged excuse notes, they were brilliant. The notes I had could be turned into an anthology of Great American Excuses. They were samples of talent never mentioned in song, story or study.
How could I have ignored this treasure trove, these gems of fiction and fantasy? Here was American high school writing at its best—raw, real, urgent, lucid, brief, and lying. I read:
• The stove caught fire and the wallpaper went up and the fire department kept us out of the house all night.
• Arnold was getting off the train and the door closed on his school bag and the train took it away. He yelled to the conductor who said very vulgar things as the train drove away.
• His sister’s dog ate his homework and I hope it chokes him.
• We were evicted from our apartment and the mean sheriff said if my son kept yelling for his notebook he’d have us all arrested.
The writers of these notes didn’t realize that honest excuse notes were usually dull: “Peter was late because the alarm clock didn’t go off.” One day I typed out a dozen excuse notes and distributed them to my senior classes. The students read them silently, intently. “Mr. McCourt, who wrote these?” asked one boy.
“You did,” I said. “I omitted names to protect the guilty. They’re supposed to be written by parents, but you and I know the real authors. Yes, Mikey?”
“So what are we supposed to do?”
“This is the first class to study the art of the excuse note—the first class, ever, to practice writing them. You’re so lucky to have a teacher like me who has taken your best writing and turned it into a subject worthy of study.”
Everyone smiled as I went on, “You didn’t settle for the old alarm clock story. You used your imaginations. One day you might be writing excuses for your own children when they’re late or absent or up to some devilment. So try it now. Imagine you have a 15-year-old who needs an excuse for falling behind in English. Let it rip.”
The following reprinted from Uncle John's Giant 10th Anniversary Bathroom Reader.
It's interesting to study the paintings of
the great masters ... but sometimes it's even more fun to study the work
of the great fakers. Like these folks:
Han van Meegeren
Han van Meegeren painting his last forgery Jesus among the Doctors
Background: At the end of World War II, Dutch authorities
began investigating the sale of Dutch national treasures to Nazi officials.
They learned that Han van Meegeren, a struggling Dutch artist, had sold
a priceless 17th-century Vermeer called Christ and the Adulteress
to Nazi leader Hermann Goering for $256,000. Once the painting was repossessed
and authenticated as a work painted during Vermeer's "middle period,"
Van Meegeren was arrested and charged with collaborated with the Nazis
- a crime punishable by death.
The Truth: Van Meegeren defended himself by saying that
there was no Vermeer "middle period," and that he had faked
all six of the paintings attributed to those years of the artist's life.
Van Meegeren also claimed to have painted two works by Pieter de Hooch,
and one by ter Borch.
The judge didn't believe him. But to be sure, he sent the artist back
to the studio (under guard) and told him to "paint another Vermeer."
Van Meegeren quickly created something called Jesus Among the Doctors.
It was, by all appearances, painted in the style of Vermeer.
What Happened: The judge dropped the treason charges.
But as each of the paintings Van Meegeren took credit for were tested
and proved to be fakes, he was arrested again - this time for forgery
and fraud. He was convicted and sentenced to a year in prison; he died
from a heart attack one month after the trial.
David Stein Background:
In the mid-60s, a 30-year-old art collector named David Stein walked into
the shop of one of New York's top art dealers with three watercolor paintings
by Russian painter Marc Chagall. The dealer bought all three for $10,000.
The Truth: Stein had painted all three "Chagalls"
that morning before lunch. He made the new canvases look old by soaking
them in Lipton's tea, and forged letters of authentication at the frame
shop while waiting for the paintings to be framed.
What Happened: As Stein put it, "I should have
stuck to dead men." By pure coincidence, Marc Chagall happened to
be in New York that very same day ... and the art dealer who bought the
paintings had an appointment to meet with him. The dealer brought the
paintings to the meeting, and Chagall immediately denounced them as fakes.
Stein was arrested and spent nearly four years in American and French
prisons. But the bust was such a boost to his reputation that when he
got out of prison, he was able to make a living from his own original
paintings.
(Photo: Greatest
art forgers and fakers in the world - lots more info about art forgery
there!)
Pavel Jerdanowitch
Exaltation by Pavel Jerdanowitch
Background: In the spring of 1925, the Russian-born
Jerdanowitch submitted a painting called Exaltation to a New
York art exhibit. The red and green colors were unusual for the period,
and the face of the woman in the painting was distorted, but art critics
admired the work, and Jerdanowitch was invited to exhibit at a New York
show in 1926. He did - this time displaying a painting called Aspiration
and explaining that he was the founder of the "Disumbrationist"
school of painting. The following year, he showed two more paintings,
Adoration and Illumination. Jerdanowitch's groundbreaking
work caused a storm, and he was hailed as a visionary.
 The
Truth: "Pavel Jerdanowitch" was actually Paul Jordan-Smith,
a Latin scholar who hated abstract and modernist trend in art. When an
art critic criticized his wife's realistic painting as "definitely
of the old school" in 1925, he set out to prove that critics would
praise any painting they couldn't understand. "I asked my wife for
paint and canvas," he recounted after admitting the hoax. "I'd
never tried to paint anything in my life." The Disumbrationist School
was born.
What Happened: Smith admitted the ruse to the Los
Angeles Times in 1927, but the confession only fueled interest in
his work. A Chicago gallery owner displayed the paintings in 1928, and
later called the show "the most widely noticed exhibition I have
ever heard of."
More on Pavel Jerdanowitch at the Museum
of Hoaxes.
D. S. WindleBackground: In 1936 Windle entered a painting called Abstract Painting of Woman in the International Surrealist Exhibition taking place in London. The work was one of the most talked-about and admired paintings of the show. The Truth: D. S. Windle ("De Swindle") was actually B. Howitt-Lodge, a portrait painter who hated surrealist art. He created his painting out of "a phantasmagoria of paint blobs, variegated beads, a cigarette stub, Christmas tinsel, pieces of hair, and a sponge." Howitt-Lodge chose the materials, he later admitted, because he wanted to create "the worst possible mess" and enter it in "one of the most warped and disgusting shows I've ever seen." What Happened: Modernists were unmoved by his confession - they accepted Howitt-Lodge's work as a genuine surrealist art, even if he didn't. "He may think it's a hoax," one fan told reporters, "but he's an artist and unconsciously he may be a surrealist. Aren't we all?"Alceo Dossena Background:
In 1922 the Boston Museum of Fine Arts paid $100,000 for the marble tomb
of a wealthy Italian woman named Maria Caterina Savelli, who died in 1430.
The tomb was supposedly carved by a famous Florentine sculptor named Mino
de Fia-Savelli, and was so impressive that the museum set the exhibit
up right at the building's entrance.
The Truth: As Kathryn Lindskoog writes in Fakes,
Frauds & Other Malarkey ,
"No one seemed to notice that the Mino Tomb was dated one year after
its sculptor was born, and that the brief Latin inscription on the tomb,
which was naively copied from a book about the Savelli family, said, "At
last the above-mentioned Maria Caterina Savelli died."
What Happened: No one realized it was a fake until 1928,
when an obscure Italian sculptor named Alceo Dossena sued art dealer Alfredo
Fasoli for $66,000, claiming that without his knowledge, Fasoli had been
selling copies of his Renaissance art as the genuine article.
The Boston Museum of Fine Arts refused to accept that the Mino Tomb was
a fake ... until Dossena produced photographs of the work in progress,
as well as a toe that had broken off a figure carved in the tomb.
Museums all over the world scoured their collections looking for Dossena's
fakes - hundreds were found. The Cleveland Museum of Art was particularly
hard hit - after finding modern nails deep inside a "13th-century"
Madonna and child, it replaced the piece with a marble statue of Athena
that cost $120,000. That statue also turned out to be a Dossena fake.
For what it's worth, not everyone suffered from the scandal: Alceo Dossena
flourished. People became so interested in his work that he was able to
launch a career as a legitimate artist.
(Photo: A
History of Art Forgery)
Tom Keating Background:
In 1976 thirteen paintings by Samuel Palmer, a famous English
artist, inexplicably came on the market at the same time.
The Truth: When the London Times challenged
their authenticity, an English painter named Tom Keating wrote in to confess
that he had forged the paintings - as well as 2,500 other paintings during
his illicit 20-year career, including works attributed to Rembrandt, Degas,
Goya, Toulouse-Lautrec, Monet, Van Gogh, and others. Keating claimed he
left a clue in every painting that proved it wasn't authentic - sometimes
he used modern materials; other times he painted "this is a fake"
on the canvas using lead-based paint, which would show up on X-rays. But
he was never caught.
What Happened: Keating was in such poor health when
he confessed that he was never put on trial. He became a cult hero in
England for fooling art experts for so long, and his own paintings soared
in value. One which he called Monet and his Family in their Houseboat,
sold at an auction for $32,000. By the time of his death in 1983, his
work was so popular that other forgers were cashing in by copying his
work.
(Photo: Rod Ebdon via Fine
Art of the Fake Makers) |
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The article above is reprinted with permission from Uncle John's Giant 10th Anniversary Bathroom Reader, which comes packed with 504 pages of great stories.
Since 1988, the Bathroom Reader Institute had published a series of popular books containing irresistible bits of trivia and obscure yet fascinating facts.
If you like Neatorama, you'll love the Bathroom Reader Institute's books - go ahead and check 'em out!
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