OkTrends has an intriguing post about sex compiled from the data from the bazillion interaction data of members of the OkCupid dating site (you can read all 10 interesting statistics), but this one is particularly intriguing: active Twitter users have shorter relationships.
People who use Twitter every day tend to have shorter relationships, and the problem gets worse as a person gets older, according to its analysis of 833,987 OkCupid users. The average relationship for an 18-year-old who uses Twitter is about nine months, while “everybody else” usually has a relationship average of nine-and-a-half months. At age 50, the frequent tweeter has a 15 month-long relationship, while the non-frequent Twitter user stays in a relationship for an average of almost 17 months.
Photo: Venice311.org
What better day to raid a medical marijuana dispensary than 4/20 AKA National Weed Day? The LAist explains:
No better day for a tour of beachfront dispensaries than April 20th, or 4/20, the date/time a bunch of stoners once decided to use as code for smoking the pot. But to walk into a marijuana dispensary, one must have a medical marijuana ID card administered by a county health official (thanks to, yep -- CA Senate Bill 420). But for at least one store on the Venice boardwalk, the day began with an uninvited visit by card-carriers of the authoritative kind -- the ones dressed in blue.
Authorities raided the Medical Kush Doctor on Venice's Ocean Front Walk Wednesday, according to multiple reports. The dispensary, at 1811 Ocean Front Walk, is apparently also known as Medical Kush Beach Club.
(YouTube link)
The US has Isaiah Mustafa; the rest of the world has this. It's an ad for Old Spice Danger Zone that airs various other nations. Funny, yes, but I think America got the better end of the deal. -via The Daily What
Guess who's silently recording your movements? Charles Arthur of The Guardian broke the story that Apple's iPhone is keeping track of where you've been in a secret file:
"Apple has made it possible for almost anybody – a jealous spouse, a private detective – with access to your phone or computer to get detailed information about where you've been," said Pete Warden, one of the researchers.
Only the iPhone records the user's location in this way, say Warden and Alasdair Allan, the data scientists who discovered the file and are presenting their findings at the Where 2.0 conference in San Francisco on Wednesday. "Alasdair has looked for similar tracking code in [Google's] Android phones and couldn't find any," said Warden. "We haven't come across any instances of other phone manufacturers doing this."
Apple as Big Brother? Say it ain't so, Steve. And while we're at it, may we remind all you Apple fanboys of the company's iconic 1984 Apple Macintosh Commercial?
Update 4/22/11: Seems like Android does it too.You'd think that after wearing a meat dress, Lady Gaga wouldn't mind anyone making a parody of her - much less "Weird Al" Yankovic. I mean, wouldn't you be proud that Al made a music parody of your song? That's a milestone, fo sho!
But no. Lady Gaga didn't like it one bit (after she made him record the song, no less):
We send the lyrics to Lady Gaga and wait on figurative pins and needles for her to give us the go-ahead. After a few days, we get our answer: “She actually needs to hear it. Otherwise the answer is no.”
Hmm. Well, this was mystifying to me. At this point she has the lyrics… and hopefully she is familiar with her own song… and the parody is basically her music… with my lyrics. It really shouldn’t be that hard to decide – based on having the lyrics right in front of you – whether or not you’d be “okay” with a parody. But, alas, we’d been given an ultimatum. If she didn’t hear it, she wouldn’t approve it.
Okay then. I decided – based on my belief that people are basically good – to go through the trouble and considerable expense of actually recording the song. Now, I never do that – never. But because I was really excited about this parody, I decided I would faithfully jump through as many hoops as Gaga deemed necessary. [...]
A couple days later we got the final word: Lady Gaga says “no.”
*silent scream*
Even though he could claim "fair use," Weird Al decided to leave the single off his album and released it to everyone for free on YouTube: Link | "Perform This Way" on YouTube
Update 4/20/11: Issue resolved! Turns out that Lady Gaga's manager was responsible for the whole kerfuffle: Link - Thanks TW George!What does Barbie look like if she were a real person? For National Eating Disorder Awareness Week, high school student Galia Slayen decided to make a life-size Barbie, using the same proportion as the iconic doll:
Slayen brought the life-sized doll to the Today studios Monday to show off her handiwork. The Barbie stands about 6 feet tall with a 39" bust, 18" waist and 33" hips. She is made of wood, chicken wire and papier mache, and is dressed in a size 00 skirt that was a remnant from Slayen’s one-year bout with anorexia.
“I’m not blaming Barbie [for my illness] — she’s one small factor, an environmental factor,” Slayen said. “I’m blond and blue-eyed and I figured that was what I was supposed to look like. She was my idol. It impacted the way I looked at myself.”
The goal in creating Barbie’s likeness was to start conversation. “Talking about eating disorders is taboo to many people, and this made people talk about it,” Slayen said. “It’s a shocking image. A lot of people have seen it, and it’s started debates,” she said, particularly after she wrote about it for the Huffington Post. “Her proportions are not 100 percent correct, but her look is not invalid.”
Link | Galia's story in her own words at HuffPo
If you've ever wonder what the back of the web's most famous websites look like, Jeff Lam and Josephine Yatar have got you covered. I've got only this to say: !emosewA
Link - via Metafilter
Move over, Banksy - there's a new avant garde graffiti artist prowling the streets. Behold, Hanksy! via Wooster Collective
Previously on Neatorama: T.HANKS: The Tom Hanks Trash Bin
When Polish artist Rafal Bujnowski wanted to visit the United States in 2004, he decided to turn the visa application into performance art of sorts:
... Bujnowski painted a photo-realistic self-portrait in black and white, had it photographed and enclosed the picture as his official photo in the U.S.A. visa application form. The consulate workers failed to notice the manipulation and, eventually, the artist received a passport with a replica of his own painting. Using this document Rafal has crossed the U.S. border, the project was supplemented by the fact that the artist has attended a pilot’s course, which featured a training flight over Manhattan – this event was recorded by Bujnowski as a video ...
Piet Mondriaan has the clip: Link
Photo:David Schwen [Flickr]
David Schwen created this nifty can of Poké Beer. Gotta drink 'em all! See the rest of his Poké stuff here: Link (Don't miss the Poké Banana!)
Star Ball - $29.95
Kick your creativity into overdrive and have a ton of fun to boot with Roger von Oech's patented magnetic Star Ball from the NeatoShop. The Star Ball is composed of 32 magnetic pieces: 12 five-legged stars and 20 three-legged "tri's."
You can assemble the Star Ball into hundreds of shapes - spur your creativity into overdrive! Link | More Roger von Oech's Creativity Tools | Fun Cubicle Toys
