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NEWSLETTER: "MAY CONTAIN TRACES OF BRIAN BLESSED" "MAY CONTAIN TRACES OF BRIAN BLESSED"

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* BRIAN COX vs Weebl
* MARTIN AMIS vs Space Invaders 
* DUBSTEP CAT - need we say more?

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________  ____ __  ___
____/  _)|_  // /_/ _ |  "Happy 31st Birthday    
___/  _ |/_ </ __/ __ |     Paris Hilton
__/____/____/\__/_/ |_|      (thanks Wikipedia)"

B3ta email 516 - 17 Feb 2011

Read this issue twice and double our stats:
http://b3ta.com/newsletter/issue516/

       Wanky:  [email protected]
   Unwanky:  [email protected]
  
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: SPONSORED LINK
  Win a Brian Blessed T-Shirt!
  
  We've got 5 official Brian Blessed T-Shirts to
  give away. Just complete the tiebreaker on the
  /board, "I want a Brian Blessed T-Shirt
  because..."
http://b3ta.com/board/10694997

  Or just buy one for £15. Bargain.
http://www.blessedoriginals.co.uk/tshirt.php


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: WHAT B3TA PEOPLE HAVE BEEN MAKING THIS WEEK
  Other than farty noises on their arms
  
  >> What not to do on your date <<
  "Here's a new sketch we made," exclaims
  ravonski. "Dwayne goes on a Valentine's Day
  date that doesn't go entirely to plan." Good
  gag. We've all been there, right?
http://bit.ly/AbS2IP


  >> Open My Box <<
  "Love unboxing videos," claims ratbanjos.
  "Love em." Hence his own, disturbingly
  low-tech, take on the genre.
http://www.b3ta.com/links/Open_My_Box


  >> Professor Brian Cox <<
  Weebl's back, with a catchy, musical resumé
  for the BBC's favourite boy-faced
  space-boffin. Savlonic fans rejoice btw: "The
  next video is being made... it's rather epic,"
  confides Weebl.
http://www.b3ta.com/links/Professor_Brian_Cox:2

  
  >> Newsbomb: BAGBOY <<
  "She's got a pretty mouth if I do say so
  myself!" banjoes Smearballs. Another mashed-up
  apparition of the American news-scape.
http://www.b3ta.com/links/BAGBOY


  >> iPad Mona Lisa <<
  "Another of those painting-with-iPad-Brushes
  videos," scribbles precipio. "But this one - a
  reproduction of the Mona Lisa - is really
  awesome! Blows Hockney out of the water."
http://www.youtube.com/watch


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: QUESTION OF THE WEEK
  Random Acts of Kindness

  The cold, dark depths of winter are an
  excellent time to remind yourself that nice
  things do happen. Here's a whole bunch of them:
http://b3ta.com/questions/randomactsofkindness/

  * WAVING - "As a student, I used to stay with
  an aunt and uncle in Bury a lot. Of a morning
  (well, whatever time I would surface) I'd head
  up to the shop at the top of their road to buy
  a paper. Directly opposite was an old folk's
  home. One morning, as I approached the
  junction, I saw an elderly lady stood in the
  window. She was waving in a sad, almost
  mournful fashion - not even putting much
  effort into her wave. It was a saturday
  morning, grey and overcast. She was alone, in
  a home, probably not visited by friends or
  family in some time. She must have felt
  detached from the world around her, alone,
  desperate for someone to recognise her
  existence and bring the tiniest little bit of
  light into her life. I did what we all would
  do - put on a big shit-eating grin and waved
  back. After a second or so, her eyes met mine.
  I saw confusion, then a little fear, then
  finally, comprehension. She put down the cloth
  with which she had been happily cleaning her
  window, and waved cheerfully back at the
  grinning retard stood in the street waving at
  her like a massive fucknugget. Good of her, I
  say." (Bappage)
	 
  * BAKING - "Years ago, in a cookery lesson in
  school, I made an apple pie. In a fit of
  righteous philanthropy I decided I was going
  to give the pie to my elderly neighbour (she
  was frail, half-blind, had Parkinson's disease
  and lived alone - she was obviously in need of
  an entire apple pie). She was delighted, or at
  least she pretended she was, but the next day
  she presented me with a box of chocolates to
  thank me. I was incredibly annoyed by this, as
  my selfless gesture wasn't supposed to be
  rewarded and she was totally destroying my
  chance to bask in unadulterated altruism. I
  decided the only way to improve the situation
  was to bake another pie, and then when she'd
  paid me back for that I'd bake another, and
  another, and another, in some kind of fucked
  up cake arms race. Fortunately she died a
  short time later. I don't think it was
  pie-related." (crackhouseceilidhband)
	 
  * FLAPPING - "Out and about, I nursed an
  injured butterfly back to health. Got back
  home, my house has been destroyed in
  unseasonably high winds" (nightbuffalo)


  >> This Week: Random Acts of Evil <<
  Right. That's quite enough of that twee, happy
  bollocks. Tell us, has anyone ever been evil
  to you, out of the blue, for no reason? Have
  you ever been a total twuntcake against all
  logic?
http://b3ta.com/questions/randomactsofevil/


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: SITES IN BRIEF
  Stuff we like that wasn't made by our mates

  >> Composite characters <<
  Famous literary characters, recreated from
  their descriptions using law enforcement
  composite sketch software. Wow, this stuff has
  come on a lot since the early days of
  Identikit. 
http://thecomposites.tumblr.com


  >> Advice from Teller (of Penn & Teller) <<
  Emailed advice to a young magician from
  magical mime Raymond Teller. Truly
  inspirational stuff, if you're struggling to
  find your voice in any field of the arts. 
http://bit.ly/AkjKTz


  >> Martin Amis on videogames <<
  Much-feted novelist Amis has a skeleton in his
  closet. A low-rez, highly pixelated skeleton.
  In the early 80s he wrote a guide to Space
  Invaders and other classic arcade fare. Here
  it is - and it is wondrous. 
http://bit.ly/AmF2bl


  >> Amazing colourised photos of the past <<
  Photoshop nerds unleash their mojo on famous
  black and white photographs, torn from the
  very pages of history.
http://imgur.com/a/wapUe


  >> Breaded cats <<
  The internet cat-based craze that's sweeping
  the... well, you know the rest. Blah blah blah
  you will love it.
http://www.breadedcats.com


  >> Write your own text adventure <<
  Ageing nerds will enjoy typing stuff like "N,
  E, examine rock, fuck dwarf" here.
http://playfic.com 
  
  
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: VIDEO SCHMIDEO
  Imagine if your TV could b.b.b.buffering

  >> '1970s' pop charts <<
  An affectionate return to the baffling world
  of the 1970s Top of the Pops chart countdown.
  Who were all these people? Was there really a
  time when looking like that could make you a
  superstar?
http://youtu.be/TuD1alT1VVM


  >> Dancing dubstep cat <<
  This bespecced moggy is a lovely mover and
  appears to be some sort of Russian internet
  celebrity.
http://vimeo.com/36820781


  >> Awesome/awful psychedelic music vid <<
  Delete as applicable, after viewing this
  inexplicable, acid jazz oddity. It has that
  weird, slightly unnerving attempt at sexiness
  you get in old B-movies but, hey, that's
  probably what they were going for. 
http://bit.ly/AmPMgx


  >> The secret of the comedy phone voice <<
  Fans of 1970s sitcoms will recognise the
  gabbling voice of the unpleasant onscreen
  phonecall. But what is the voice actually
  saying? Scientists use space-age audio
  reconstruction technology to find out.
http://bit.ly/y8DImD


  >> Ping pong baby <<
  By now we've all seen the cats playing ping
  pong, but what about a baby? He's surprisingly
  good too. Okay, that's a very low bar. He's
  better than us. Also a low bar.
http://www.youtube.com/watch


  >> Jurassic Park Theme (Melodica Cover) <<
  Genuinely hilarious dinosaurian redub. A
  bathetic beauty.
http://bit.ly/xD364A


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: FUNNY NAME CORNER 
  Gay fanny
  
  * GAY - Mr Tea writes, "A Chicago street gang
  who surely deserve the title of 'campest gang
  in history' - not that you'd want to say that
  to their faces."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Almighty_Gaylords

  * FANNY NAME CORNER - @mikeisbrill writes, "It
  amused me that the top Google result for
  'lady's fanny' was a French singer-songwriter."
http://ladyfanny.com


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: SECONDHAND iPHONE 3GS
  Austerity corner - we buy secondhand phones now
 
  Recently the official B3ta iPhone 4 was stolen.
  We didn't have insurance and sulked for a bit
  when Orange wanted about £500 to replace it. We
  manfully struggled on with a tragic Nokia from
  about 2007 that horribly embarrassed us every
  time it rang. Then we thought, hang on, we
  could just buy a secondhand iPhone 3GS! Cost us
  about £120 and it's not hugely worse than the
  4. It's still a good phone and our kids like
  playing Cat Physics on it too.
http://amzn.to/w1ZtI6  
  

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: B3TA IMAGE CHALLENGE
  Results from the Cute/Ugly Challenge

  Last week we wanted you to make cute things
  ugly

  Your favourites included:
 
  * GRIFFIN - in which the boss-eyed BNP loon
  tries a new look to appeal to the cat lady
  demographic (Snappyuk)
http://www.b3ta.com/board/10686196

  * DISTRESSING - don't click the link.
  Seriously, don't click the link. You cannot
  un-see what you'll find (Michael Ellis)
http://www.b3ta.com/board/10686428

  * TV - afternoon televisual favourite
  Blockbusters isn't quite the show it used to
  be (Clay)
http://www.b3ta.com/board/10687572


  All these images, and the highest as voted by
  you can be found here:
http://www.b3ta.com/challenge/cuteugly/


  >> New challenge: Beards <<
  This week's one-word challenge is to celebrate
  the magnificence of chin topiary. So it's
  beards for the next seven days. BEARDS.
http://www.b3ta.com/challenge/beards/


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: WHAT HAPPENED NEXT?
  Follow-ups on previous stories.

  * WE ALWAYS ENJOY EMAILS LIKE THIS - "Hi
  there. I submitted the [redacted] link that
  was included in newsletter [redacted]. I'm
  about to apply for a job at Google, so... if
  you wouldn't mind, could you please edit the
  newsletter and credit the submission to my
  b3ta username, [redacted], instead of the
  first bit of my email address? Thank you very
  much!"


  * B3TA ART AUCTION - HappyToast writes, "Hi,
  as you may know we're doing another b3ta art
  auction at this years London Bash. To avoid
  repeatedly spamming the mainboard with the
  same info and annoying people who aren't
  interested I was going to keep updating this
  thread."
http://b3ta.com/links/749374


  * FREEROADING - ndeezy writes, "In response to
  your better name request for 'streetcycling',
  I call it 'Freeroading', not a great name in
  itself but if you are person who partakes in
  this activity, either a giver or a receiver
  then you are a 'Freeroader'. If you're
  Japanese then it's even better, although
  casually racist. It's such a buzz when a
  freeroader takes the time to knock on your
  door and say thanks and explain why it's so
  useful. Oddly enough, the only thing that has
  never been taken was a candyfloss maker,
  possibly because I was the only person unaware
  that pouring sugar into a red-hot oscillator
  results in perma-caramelised walls."


  * PISSING IN SINKS - markanchal writes, "My
  missus disapproves of toilet seat
  leaver-uppage - in fact, she's the one who
  keeps the lid up - but I've been a
  longstanding advocate of sink-winkling. Could
  happily extol the hygienic benefits of washing
  your dipstick en-point, or the environmental
  savings of water usage when rinsing a whizzy
  sink compared to flushing - But fuck it. I do
  so because the sink is cock-level, and I can
  rest my lager-slinger on the edge while miming
  drum-solos to The Surfaris' seminal 1963 track
  'Wipe Out'."
  
  Wait, *she* leaves the seat up?


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: STAR IN NEXT WEEK'S ISSUE

  Make something cool and tell us about it. If
  you are in it then people will see your stuff.

  Things we'd really like to see include

  * VIBRATOR PIXEL ART - we've just realised
  that if you got, say, 500 vibrators and
  painted them different colours you could make
  huge pixel art. Say of Steve Jobs, then turn
  them on and roll about on it shouting "I LOVE
  APPLE." This would be satire. Vibrating satire.
  
  * STUFFING MEAT WITH POPCORN - valentin
  writes, "I read this stuffed turkey recipe
  where the filling is corn. Apparently, when it
  pops, the turkey is blown out of the oven and
  it's done. Why don't you post a challenge on
  this? My wife refused to let me in the kitchen
  after my last petrol-and-eggs experiment and I
  wouldn't like to die without knowing the
  outcome."

  * SHIT OLD MEMES DONE BADLY - stick an iPhone
  into your crappy plastic blender that can't
  even chop a carrot properly.

  Send contributions via the mail form.
http://www.b3ta.com/mailus/

  BTW: If you've sent something in that hasn't
  been featured then don't be put off - we look
  at everything you send us.


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Join us:  [email protected]
Leave us crying: [email protected]

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  THANKS:
  This issue was written by Rob Manuel with
  David Stevenson. Stuff sent in by Holly Would,
  P-MONKE, groovypoodle, @takebacks, mr-lizard,
  @TheRangeLoner, @uuilson, @bushofgoats,
  @mattround. Additional linkage and image
  challenge by Fraser Lewry. Mike Trinder is
  QOTW bloke.
  
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  TOP TIP:
  Don't ever set your tech to bleep or display
  alerts for tweets / emails etc. Check it when
  YOU want. This has improved our lives
  immeasurably.

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