Boing Boing: August 25, 2007 Archives

Cruggs?

Posted by Xeni Jardin, August 25, 2007 10:28 PM | permalink

The only thing in the world I hate more than Crocs are Uggs. Evidently, the two have mated, spawning this vile demon bastard footwear spotted recently in Houston. Where it is 100 degrees. (Thanks, Katie)

Reader comment: Samir M. Nassar says,

I might not be a proud Crocs owner, but my feet are happy. I work a twelve-hour night shift at a hospital. This entails lots of walking to and fro. After years of suffering at the hands of sneakers and tennis-shoes I put down my money for a pair of Crocs and my feet have been singing the praises since.
For the record, mine are black, and don't have the stupid holes on top and I do cringe when I see them worn out in the street. Tacky!

Brett Burton says,

How did you miss the opportunity to make one of the nearly limitless puns available for your Cruggs post? Say No To Cruggs, Don't Get Hooked on Cruggs... Crugg Abuse ? Anyway, thanks for helping raise Crugg Awareness. It's good to see Boing Boing doing it's part to aid in Crugg Prevention.

Previously:

Crocs banned in Swedish hospital for generating a "cloud of lightning"

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LOL Street Journal covers the ell oh ell cats

Posted by Xeni Jardin, August 25, 2007 9:46 PM | permalink

Link to a feature article on cat macros and the websites that love them, including Eric Nakagawa's icanhazcheeseburger. LOLcats may not have started there, but whatever, I love that site. In other news, HELLL FREEEZIZ OVAR.

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Hipster Olympics, An Epic Battle of Apathetic Grandeur (video)

Posted by Xeni Jardin, August 25, 2007 7:04 PM | permalink

Scott Beale points to this video, inspired by a classic Monty Python sketch.

LIVE, from Williamsburg, Brooklyn: Hipster Olympics! Brought to you by POYKPAC Sports.

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The IT Crowd -- season two, episode one

Posted by Cory Doctorow, August 25, 2007 3:37 PM | permalink

Hurrah! The first episode of season two of The IT Crowd has aired and it's already available for download!

The IT Crowd is the nerd sitcom about sysadmins from Graham Linehan, creator of the convulsively, piss-yourself funny Father Ted. The US adaptation of it that NBC picked up is reportedly not so hot, but I loved the Brit version and was immensely pleased when it got picked up for a second season.

Channel 4, the show's homebase, has a ridiculous DRM-based web-viewing option, but I can't get that to work (though I live in London, I'm travelling in Australia, which means it won't let me get access to the show, and even if I could get at it, it won't play on Linux). Lucky for me -- and you -- intrepid fans of the show have already put episode one online on a variety of torrent servers, and I'm downloading it now with eager anticipation.

Season two, episode one is called "The Work Outing."

Pirate Bay torrent, Eztvefnet torrent, Mininova torrent

IMBD info about the episode (Thanks, Sebadog, David and Clay!)

(Disclosure: I was an unpaid consultant to Season One of The IT Crowd, and I live with a Channel 4 commissioner))

Update: Chirag's put together this handy streaming page for all the old episodes!

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Microsoft WGA servers down; XP and Vista installs marked as counterfeit - UPDATED

Posted by Xeni Jardin, August 25, 2007 9:03 AM | permalink

UPDATE, 2:10pm PST: Looks like MSFT has fixed the immediate problem with WGA, for now: Link. But the product is still, as they say, defective by design. (Thanks, Marius)

- - - - - - - - - -

BB reader David McBride says,

DRM bites again: the Microsoft Windows Genuine Advantage servers (which every XP and Vista install phones home to) all failed sometime earlier today.
The result? Every single Windows XP and Vista installation -- except possibly those with volume license keys -- is being marked as counterfeit when it tries to check in. Installations which are flagged as counterfeit switch to a "reduced functionality mode" which results in features like Aero and DirectX being disabled.
So far, the only public response from Microsoft has been indirectly via their technical support forums, where a user has posted the following snippet from an email he received from MS's technical support address:
Thank you for your response.
I’m sorry to inform you that the Windows Genuine server might be down for few days. I have escalate the issue to our Genuine team, kindly try to validate again on Tuesday 28 Aug 2007.
Thank you for contacting Microsoft Technical Support.

Link.

Update, 12:03pm PT: David McBride says,

Phil Liu, the WGA Program Manager has responded on the Microsoft forums to say, effectively, "we know, we're taking it seriously and we're working on it."
I understand the frustration you all are going through. I'm investigating the issue right now.
I guarantee that we're working on this issue right now. For folks wondering, MACHINES ARE NOT SHUTTING DOWN with reduced functionality.
I guarantee that I will personally resolve this issue before I go to sleep - whether or not it is Tuesday I sleep. My goal is to identify a FIX for this issue - afterwards get you all what you are looking for, an explanation and cause.
The message from the Supportability team will be addressed appropriately as well. I encourage folks to keep an eye out on these forums.
I promise I will have an explanation and resolution as soon as humanly possible.
-Phil Liu @ Microsoft
Program Manager, WGA
Link. This is also not the first time that this has happened.

Reader comment: Thomas Hruska says,

Here's a possible explanation for what happened, spanned across two blog entries over the past 24 hours: one, two.

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Mash up Red Hat's anti-DRM video

Posted by Cory Doctorow, August 25, 2007 6:41 AM | permalink

Colin sez, "I operate a current events and free culture blog for Red Hat. We made this anti-DRM agit-prop cartoon, and are inviting people to mash it up and add to it. It's licensed to share. Originally, it was supposed to tell the whole story of music, throughout all of civilization and its inevitable industrialization and ultimate trascendancy, but we couldn't actually handle that, so we got as far as we could using a cute bird. If this one flies, we intend to make a lot more. It was fun, and we're really proud of it." Link (Thanks, Colin!)

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