No Pants! Subway Ride

On Saturday, January 10th, 2009 nearly 2,500 people took off their pants on subways in 22 cities around the world. This is New York’s 8th Annual No Pants! Subway Ride, which had over 1,200 participants, spread out over four subway lines.

No Pants 2K9 at Improv Everywhere - I like the non-participant reactions. :)

Monty Python Puts Free Videos Online, Sells 23000% More DVDs

Monty Python Puts Free Videos Online, Sells 23000% More DVDs

Monty Python's YouTube Channel

From the site:

For 3 years you YouTubers have been ripping us off, taking tens of thousands of our videos and putting them on YouTube. Now the tables are turned. It's time for us to take matters into our own hands.

We know who you are, we know where you live and we could come after you in ways too horrible to tell. But being the extraordinarily nice chaps we are, we've figured a better way to get our own back: We've launched our own Monty Python channel on YouTube.

No more of those crap quality videos you've been posting. We're giving you the real thing - HQ videos delivered straight from our vault.

What's more, we're taking our most viewed clips and uploading brand new HQ versions. And what's even more, we're letting you see absolutely everything for free. So there!

But we want something in return.

None of your driveling, mindless comments. Instead, we want you to click on the links, buy our movies & TV shows and soften our pain and disgust at being ripped off all these years.

Playing for Change

Playing for Change - "Playing for Change is a multimedia movement created to inspire, connect, and bring peace to the world through music."

T-Mobile Dance - Liverpool Street Station

Fun!

The Commercial:


Reactions:


Rehearsal:

Links for the Day

Aim for Awesome - "an easy to grasp reality-based positive motivation and personal development blog".

Zen Habits - "achieving goals, productivity, being organized, GTD, motivation, eliminating debt, saving, getting a flat stomach, eating healthy, simplifying, living frugal, parenting, happiness, and successfully implementing good habits."

Executive Bomb - Are you frustrated with a company and don't want to deal with their first tier customer service? Use this service to search for the executive you want to contact. Looks like it's primarily US-based companies. Found via The Consumerist.

The Consumerist - speaking of The Consumerist, it's an endlessly entertaining site, where "shoppers bite back".

Wikiquote - search for quotes. Neat.

Hee!

Streamy Awards (Nope, Not Pee)

Nominate The Guild or Dr. Horrible!

The Story of B17

G. Edward Griffin - A World Without Cancer - The Story of B17 - a very interesting video. I intend to do additional research, obviously, because you can't believe everything you hear; however, I do believe that nutritional treatment does more than a lot of people believe.

It's All In the Name: Hillbilly Flamenco

The background behind "hillbilly flamenco":

Two words, to describe your music, can change your career.

David Feder and his band Salagua-Azul always wanted to get into big music festivals. They had been performing for years, and doing OK, but the agents that book music festivals would never give them a chance.

At a show, a drunk fan said, inbetween songs, “You know what? You guys are HILLBILLY FLAMENCO!” The crowd laughed, and so did the band. They joked about it again on stage that night, and again on the drive home.

The next day they started to notice that they all STILL remembered those two words, “hillbilly flamenco”. It was funny, but described their music well. The crowd liked it. They decided to use it more often.

They started telling the audience, each time they played, “If you are wondering what kind of music this is, this is hillbilly flamenco!” And the end of the show, they’d ask the audience, “And when you tell your friends what kind of music you heard tonight, what kind of music is it?” The crowd would say, “HILLBILLY FLAMENCO!”

And believe it or not… it worked! People started telling their friends about this band, because it was so easy (and fun) to describe.

And then, one day, they were talking to one of those booking agents who books festivals, and told him, “This music is perfect for your festivals. This is hillbilly flamenco!” The booking agent laughed and said, “Ok - I’ve GOT to hear this!”

Now David Feder and his band are playing the festivals they always dreamed of. He told me his career took a definite turn the day they started using those two words to describe their music.

Find more here: http://www.davidfeder.com/

Links for the Day

Geekologie - "Geekologie is a geek blog dedicated to the scientific study of gadgets, gizmos, and awesome." I love gadget-y blogs.

The "Blog" of "Unnecessary" Quotation Marks - thoroughly entertaining.


Photoshopped Subway Ads Get Exposed in Berlin - clever.


A Case for Salary Transparency - is an end to confidentiality the key to closing the pay gap? I don't think it could hurt.

Actors Who Get Fandom - "The best part of falling for a show is discovering that the actors in it are just as shamelessly fannish as you are. Lo and behold, there are a lot more actor geeks than you think!"

Links for the Day

Where is Your Username - type in the username you typically like using (or want to use), and see where it's already taken and where it's available. Pretty cool, and now there's a whole list of sites I've never been to, where I also suddenly want to register. Must resist.

Should We Not Dress Girls in Pink? - an interesting article that looks at whether or not we should dress girls in pink; just this morning, I read the term "shrink it and pink it", referring to technology companies making versions of their products geared towards women. Pairing a random colour with everyone of the same gender just seems, well... stupid. I don't know how damaging it really is, but it couldn't hurt to have a bit of variety.

Instructables - Make, How To, and DIY - a web-based documentation platform where passionate people share what they do and how they do it, and learn from and collaborate with others.

The Karaoke Channel Online - need I say more?

Business Buzzword Bingo - sadly, it's fairly accurate.

The Story of Stuff

The Story of Stuff with Annie Leonard - awesome video; watch it.

What is the Story of Stuff?

From its extraction through sale, use and disposal, all the stuff in our lives affects communities at home and abroad, yet most of this is hidden from view. The Story of Stuff is a 20-minute, fast-paced, fact-filled look at the underside of our production and consumption patterns. The Story of Stuff exposes the connections between a huge number of environmental and social issues, and calls us together to create a more sustainable and just world. It'll teach you something, it'll make you laugh, and it just may change the way you look at all the stuff in your life forever.