Sdtrk: ‘Gorilla tactics’ by Death in June

Right: the LOLCATS thing was funny the first couple of times, but at this point, it’s starting to reek from overuse. But before you pitch it into the aged memes bin to ferment alongside All Your Base, that ‘race car insanity test’, and that peanut butter jelly song, I just thought I’d point out this one I’d spotted:

That’s awfully cute. 🙂
Also, it’s the twenty-third again, which means it’s time to stop round to Sidore’s Dailymotion page — the link’s beneath the banner — for yet another glimpse into the World of Synthetiks *waves hands around like Doug Henning* Happy 23rd!

Sdtrk: ‘Cracked actor’ by David Bowie

She’ll probably flense me for publically reporting this, but my friend Marika claims that as a child, she once had a squirrel urinate on her from an upper perch on a fence. All told, she got off pretty easy.

Squirrel goes on rampage, injures 3
Thu Jun 14, 2007 11:00AM EDT

BERLIN (Reuters) – An aggressive squirrel attacked and injured three people in a German town before a 72-year-old pensioner dispatched the rampaging animal with his crutch.

The squirrel first ran into a house in the southern town of Passau, leapt from behind on a 70-year-old woman, and sank its teeth into her hand, a local police spokesman said Thursday.

With the squirrel still hanging from her hand, the woman ran onto the street in panic, where she managed to shake it off.

The animal then entered a building site and jumped on a construction worker, injuring him on the hand and arm, before he managed to fight it off with a measuring pole.

“After that, the squirrel went into the 72-year-old man’s garden and massively attacked him on the arms, hand and thigh,” the spokesman said. “Then he killed it with his crutch.”

The spokesman said experts thought the attack may have been linked to the mating season or because the squirrel was ill.
(emphasis mine)

Maybe it’s time I started a subcategory dealing with cute animals behaving in a peculiar manner. Cos between the bus-riding moggy, the Mouse Torch, the kitty burglar, and the murderous packs of Russian squirrels, I’m ending up with more of these kinds of stories than I thought possible.

Perhaps this squirrel simply had a series of bad experiences happen to him, one piling on top of the other, until one day he just snapped and began his fatal rampage. Maybe he was fired from an accounting firm. Unfortunately, we’ll never know, but let his example be a lesson to you. I, err, honestly don’t know what kind of lesson we’re speaking of here, but let’s not obsess over details

Sdtrk: ‘Tony Williams deathspace’ by Merzbow

Recently, Erin O’Brien, writer for the Cleveland Free Times, wrote a tale entitled ‘Guys and Dolls‘ (a popular title! I can’t imagine why) about her experiences hanging out for a couple of weeks on The Doll Forum.

Owners of the eerily realistic dolls are the butt of jokes and the subjects of unsolicited psychological analysis and feminist soapboxes worldwide. Nonetheless, RealDoll fascinated me and I smoldered with curiosity about those who admire her.

Granted, there are a couple of parts where her impressions come off as unflattering, but for the most part, it’s an even-handed piece which doesn’t condemn, as she took direct quotes from Doll owners themselves. She’d also written a companion post in her blog, as well as a follow-up post.

Her article caused a bit of a storm in a teacup, as several iDollators weren’t initially civil to her, which may have coloured her opinions slightly. But being an iDollator myself, I can entirely understand, as there have been several occasions where opportunistic writers have come a-calling to the Forum, looking to dig up some dirt on this weird and creepy subculture of bizarre perverts, and with a topic like this, frankly, a single smear campaign is one too many. So a natural reaction to outsiders is one of snarling suspicion, which, as far as I’m concerned, is pretty justified. More writers — particularly, writers who genuinely want to present Doll owners in a positive, or at the very least, neutral, light — need to do their homework beforehand, and realise that we iDollators are fiercely protective of our interest, our hobby, our lifestyle, our partners. Cos as time goes on, we’ll be swelling the ranks, but right now, we’re in the minority, and at this stage, bad publicity is worse than none at all.
But, having said that, I do admire Erin for not only sticking to her guns, but for coming up with a non-prejudicial piece. At the very least, she made an honest effort to understand our culture, which is more than I can say for most people.

Moving on! Naturally, anyone that knows me on any level above that of ‘aquaintance’ knows that I’m very pro-robotics, particularly when those robots closely resemble Organiks. However, in the interest of objectivity and possible debate, here’s an article that presents the other side of the coin:

Should robots be built to look more like us?
By Eric Hand
ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH | 05/29/2007

When it comes down to it, Lewis the robot isn’t much more than a red trash can on wheels. And its designer, Washington University computer scientist William Smart, likes it that way.

“I don’t want to put fuzzy heads on my robots,” he said. “It’s a tool. You don’t have an emotional relationship with a robot.”

Whether or not the relationships are emotional, robots are certainly becoming more social. Especially in Japan, where robots are doing everything from collecting garbage to bathing the elderly to providing child care. Lewis, a picture-taking robot, also has a social role — to linger on the edges of gatherings and catch people in candid poses.

As these social robots lurch their way into our lives, a question arises: What should they look like? Some scientists say they should look and talk like people, and take advantage of people’s tendencies to personify. (Think C3PO.) Others, such as Smart, say they should remain fundamentally nonhuman — intelligent and capable of reading people, but not obviously anthropomorphic. (Think R2D2.)

“It’s definitely a design decision, and it’s one that doesn’t have an obvious answer,” said Brian Scassellati, a Yale University computer scientist.
the rest of the article is here

I can respect where Mr Smart is coming from, but obviously I can’t agree with him. As robotic creations edge their way into mainstream society, I definitely believe there’ll be a need for non-anthropomorphic robots to perform non-obtrusive, behind-the-scenes tasks, but there’ll also be a need for more human-like Synthetiks, such as Actroid et al, to undertake more social duties, such as child-minding, nursing, err, receptionist… ing. And you certainly can’t call something with any advanced artificial intelligence a ‘tool’. There’s absolutely no reason why all robots have to resemble rolling wheelie bins; it’s limiting and unimaginative. That’d be the equivalent of decreeing that all cars must resemble the Subaru 360. Waitaminute — that’s a fantastic idea!

And finally, something on the Good end of the Interesting spectrum: Nick Rucka of DiY film studio Maboroshii Productions is preparing to screen his 2002 documentary, ‘Real Doll Doctor‘. He was kind enough to post me an advance copy, and despite the tired appeal to ‘pervs and fans of the weird’, it’s a rather objective documentary. Clocking in at 14 min, it simply details our favourite Doll refurbisher inking up someone’s arm at his day job, and at work repairing a lass. There’s no soundtrack, but I find that could focus the viewer’s attention to what’s being said. Much like Erin’s article, it’s open-ended and entirely nonjudgemental, although it could do with a wee bit of narrative background, especially over the scenes in the (old) Abyss creations studios. I look at it this way — there’s always going to be a viewer who really doesn’t know what the whole RealDoll phenomenon is, so a bit of background wouldn’t go amiss. Hell, I’d volunteer to do the narration if I had the technological means to do so…
Nick tells me that IFC.com has confirmed that they’ll be hosting his film, so keep an eye out for it!

‘Shouting to hear the echoes’: Synthetiks news you can use! As per usual

An alternate universe Erin logs into ‘The Organik Forum’

Technorati tags: robots, RealDoll, Abyss creations, iDollators, documentary

Sdtrk: ‘Hide away’ by Midnight movies

It’s hardly a secret that I’m a dyed-in-the-wool Japanophile, but who can blame me? Seriously, what other country would come up with the idea of marketing one of their auto company’s latest vehicles by using a giant robot?

Now THAT’S a sport utility vehicle

Technically, the Nissan Dualis isn’t a robot, but a ‘powered suit’ (think the Garland from Megazone 23, or the Knight Sabers’ Motoslaves from Bubblegum crisis), but then technically, the real Dualis, which is merely another SUV, doesn’t transform. Way to get my hopes up with your false fecking advertising, Nissan. And the videos hosted on YouTube, that feature the Dualis skating around Japan’s busy metropolitan streets, don’t help either. Still, it certainly gives one something to look forward to.

The Dualis powered suit was apparently designed by Shoji Kawamori, the most overworked mecha designer in Japan. Good lord, man, wasn’t working on most of the Macross series / the Armored core series / GUNHED / Escaflowne / Eureka7 / Aquarion / the AIBO ERS-220 enough for you? When was the last time you slept, sometime in the Seventies??

Sdtrk: something from the Otogi sdtrk

In looking over a recent set of stats for visitors to ‘Shouting etc etc’, I’d spotted the efforts of some poor misguided tosser’s search:

Gods, how I laughed. A ‘cure’ for robot fetishism?? What good could possibly become of that?? Their silly question aside, that individual couldn’t have been looking in a more inappropriate place…

In light of that, Sweetie’s got another couple of videos uploaded o’er on her Dailymotion page for your perusal, the link being nestled atop this site beneath the title banner, as per usual. Yes, you have to register in order to see them, as all of the clips are considered ‘explicit content’ — despite the fact that ‘explicit’ apparently means ‘look out: bOObies‘, and most of the clips don’t even feature that — but at least it’s not YouTube.* Happy 23rd!

*Is it just me, or has anyone else noticed that if you consistently read YouTube comments, you can actually feel yourself losing IQ points? Not since the heyday of AOL have I seen a larger confluence of misspellings and general shitwickery. And that’s saying a lot

Sdtrk: ‘Fluorescent grey’ by Deerhunter

Not having paid any previous attention to the Japanese Doll company make pure, as their models hold no appeal for me, I was pleasantly surprised when I learned of their brand-new Synthetik companion, Deep ~L~. Very pleasantly surprised. Wow.

N.B.: not actually enrolled in classes

Babelfish comes to the rescue (or as Babelfish itself would say, ‘Babelfish comes for the rescue’) with this translation of the newspost that tipped me off to Deep ~L~:

Adult doll Deep~L~. compact with the height 130cm, having got big breasts, and complete & figure and atmosphere, too the homepage of make pure. It drank and the page joined. ｢The maximum feature is a groin part. The device that not is before though it is a hall type is given. ｣ To our regret, the details are being controlled voluntarily.

‘It drank and the page joined’. Noted!
Granted, make pure’s new lass is flat-out luscious, no question, but there’s something familiar about her appearance. I couldn’t put my finger on it, until I visited 4chan’s Sexy beautiful women sub-board, and it hit me like a ton of silicone bricks after seeing a certain thread — they’ve gone and made half-Filipino half-French model and unstoppable sexbomb Leah Dizon. A grand choice!

Left, Leah; right, Deep ~L~

You can now have your very own Leah Dizon. This, then, is proof that we are truly living in the Golden Age! One wonders if she’s aware of this, though. If not, you’d be well advised to get your orders in for the Dolls as soon as they announce it before she activates her lawyers

Technorati tags: Leah Dizon