The Buzzwords of 2008

The Buzzwords of 2008 is a New York Times article by Mark Leibovich and Grant Barrett about the words that made it big in 2008.

According to the article, "Grant Barrett is a lexicographer specializing in slang and new words. He is a co-host of the public radio program 'A Way With Words' and head of the New Words Committee of the American Dialect Society. Here are some of the words he tracked this year."

For some reason, they illustrated said words in a horrid font but with interesting patterns. The list included some compound words, and seemed skewed towards politics. My favorites:

1) FAIL: Largely used online, this is a verb turned into a mass noun, as in “A bucket of fail.” Common forms include epic fail, meaning a huge overall tendency toward failure or a great example of failure, and FAIL! as an interjection or derogation. Often an antonym of win, seen online in forms like “Full of win!” which means, 'It’s good!'

2) Terrorist Fist Jab: A knuckle-to-knuckle fist bump, or “dap,” traditionally performed between two black people as a sign of friendship, celebration or agreement. It was called the “terrorist fist jab” by the newscaster E. D. Hill, formerly of Fox News. The name was taken up by opponents of Barack Obama, who is prone to do the bump with members of his family. He and his wife, Michelle, were featured making the gesture in a cartoon on the cover of The New Yorker in July. The expression is now used ironically across the political spectrum.

3) Caribou Barbie: A nickname for the former vice-presidential candidate Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska.

Enjoy your last day of 2008!
(From The Kottke)

YouTube Videos Andy Baio Linked To

YouTube Videos Andy Baio Linked To is, not surprisingly, a page listing all of the Youtube video links posted by Andy Baio of Waxy.org. (In addition to Waxy.org, Andy Baio keeps a daily link blog containing a wealth of highly interesting links.)

The ones that have been removed by Youtube have been crossed out. Enjoy the trip back in time via the internet meme superhighway! IE: remember back when Alanis Morissette covered "My Humps"?! Lollercoaster.

(From Metafilter)

Songs To Wear Pants To

Songs To Wear Pants To is a ridiculously pretty music request website by Andrew, who grew up in Ottawa and lives in Toronto.  He honors requests making songs for pay and for free. 

From his FAQ: 

"How old are you?"
I was born in 1984.

"How long have you had this website?"
Since April 9, 2004.

What differences are there between free and paid song requests?
          I only make a song for free if I really like the idea and have a lot of spare time. Free songs are always posted on STWPT, and usually paid songs are not. 
          For the first three years of Songs To Wear Pants To, free songs never exceeded one minute and eleven seconds in length, partially to keep things short and sweet, and partially for the challenge. Now I am done being challenged, and make songs any length at all. I am also done being short and sweet. 

Do you make music that isn't from requests?
I do! You can hear most of it at my other website, ANDREW IS MUSIC.
          I also play upright bass in a country & western band, produce and sing and emcee for a few "urban music" type groups, score indie films, and do worship music for churches.
"So you'll really write any kind of song at all?"
No, I'd rather not use swear words or hateful messages or mean things in general. But other than that, yeah, pretty much. It's only a matter of time... until I've made every song ever...

According to his site, Andrew is married to a minister’s daughter, is no longer vegan, is no longer straight edge, has his left nipple pierced, likes swearing but thinks it’s bad, is partially deaf, wants to run a daycare center, and is an INFP personality type.

In his other site, Andrew attempts to write one song per day. Which I think is the key to making something good: produce large volumes of crap, so that once in a while, by accident, you'll stumble upon (or perfect something) worth sharing. It's working for the internets so far, and it's worked for this, my new favorite song: 

Never Been In Love

What would it sound like if a rapping robot was really nervous about asking a girl out?

(From GEL 2007)

Sam Brown at Gel Conference

Sam Brown at Gel Conference is a wonderful video of a talk by Sam Brown, the artist behind Exploding Dog dot com, focusing on his creative process, his failures, and his upcoming book Amazing Rain (none of which are mutually exclusive).

Sam spoke at this year's Gel conference, which stands for "Good Experience Live."

Surely you're thinking: great, that title told me nothing about this conference. And don't call me Shirley. You're right. In their own words: 

"Instead of focusing on just one thing (design, technology, user experience, business, etc.) like many conferences, Gel touches on many things. This challenges attendees to find, and learn from, the patterns that underlie good experience, even in disciplines vastly different from their own..."

So that's a roundabout way of saying it's a conference about nothing, or everything. And Sam did their logo. The point is, I really like Sam's work, and I would post the video, but it auto starts. So just go check it out already. 

Sam's process is simple: people email or post phrases, and he draws minimalist cartoons based on those phrases.  He has a delicate, naïf simplistic style that is totally hip and precious at the same time.  The unsteadiness of his lines is slightly reminiscent of old Snoopy... with a dash of Parkinson's, only totally indie. (Clearly, I've been reading too much Pitchfork. I digress.)

At the end of the video he does an impromptu drawing from an audience suggestion, making it well worth your 6 minutes.  (Well, an audience member gets in a one-liner that I thought made the video worthwhile). Enjoy!

(From Kottke)

Jizz In My Pants

Jizz In My Pants is a humorous song and music video about a minuteman. Not the colonial kind. Not the Mexican-hating kind, either. Yeah. Ugh.

"Jizz in my Pants" is The Lonely Island's first single from their debut album "INCREDIBAD". The Lonely Island is of course, a comedy group consisting of Andy Samberg, Akiva Schaffer and Jorma Taccone. This music video was directed by Kiv.

(From Megan at the party)

Typealyzer

Typealyzer is a site that analyzes your blog and tells you what your blog's Myers-Briggs personality type is. Silly? Decidedly.

In the dawn of the Internets, people used to take these personality tests about themselves and their friends. In the decade of web 2.0, we take these about our blogs. I can't wait until they come out with tests about which blog has a crush on which other blog. For the record, TOTI is ESFP:

"The entertaining and friendly type. They are especially attuned to pleasure and beauty and like to fill their surroundings with soft fabrics, bright colors and sweet smells. They live in the present moment and don´t like to plan ahead - they are always in risk of exhausting themselves. 

The enjoy work that makes them able to help other people in a concrete and visible way. They tend to avoid conflicts and rarely initiate confrontation - qualities that can make it hard for them in management positions."

Oh not! Looks like no CEO jobs for TOTI.  Sigh.  They're right about several things though: Writing something EVERY DAY is exhausting, and I never know what the internets will bring ahead of time (carpe diem!). And the header is bright red, so they're right about loving bright colors. 

Metafilter, in contrast, is ISTP.

"The independent and problem-solving type. They are especially attuned to the demands of the moment are masters of responding to challenges that arise spontaneously. They generally prefer to think things out for themselves and often avoid inter-personal conflicts. 

The Mechanics enjoy working together with other independent and highly skilled people and often like seek fun and action both in their work and personal life. They enjoy adventure and risk such as in driving race cars or working as policemen and firefighters."

Enjoy!




(From Metafilter)

Propaganda de Natal Zaffari 2005

Propaganda de Natal Zaffari 2005 is a Christmas-themed commercial by Brazilian retailer Zaffari.  I've never been to a Zaffari store, and I'm still not really sure what they sell exactly, (so far as I can gather it's "everything") but I do remember seeing these commercials A LOT.  So they kind of remind me of Christmas at home.  It's from 2005, and its still sickly sweeet and cute as ever. 

Good thing the little girl didn't want to add elephants and zebras to her dollhouse. 

Merry Christmas!

Rap Battle Gone Bad Translated

Rap Battle Gone Bad Translated is a video on Break.com that is all kinds of wrong and sad. Basically, it's a rap battle that ends in a fist fight... but translated into a college kid's idea of jazz-age proper white-person speech. Check it out.
(From my friend Guy)

Andy Samberg's the Lonely Island Tell All!

Andy Samberg's the Lonely Island Tell All! is an article on Pitchfork about the Lonely Island Boys. Supposedly,  "'Saturday Night Live's' Andy Samberg, Akiva Schaffer, and Jorma Taccone announce their debut album, reveal their deepest secrets. "

How can it not be awesome?

Exerpt:

"In addition to INCREDIBAD and dick humor, we talked to Samberg, Schaffer, and Taccone about the music they love (including their favorite T-Pain songs), their roles on "SNL", amazing/bad/horrific album covers, and being forced by Justin Timberlake to watch 'N Sync videos on YouTube.

Pitchfork: Just for the sake of our transcriber, could you guys each take turns saying your names?

Schaffer: Yeah, hi, I'm Akiva. We've done this before, by the way, and it never works.

Pitchfork: [Laughs] Okay, cool.

Jorma Taccone: We all sound identical. Okay, so do it again.

Schaffer: I'm Akiva. This is my voice. This is the sound of me talking.

Taccone: Okay, he sounds bored.

Schaffer: Yeah, I'll try to keep this tone throughout.

Taccone: This is Jorma. I have kind of a deep, manly, sort of commanding voice.

Andy Samberg: And this is Andy. My voice is the kind of voice that somebody who is in the cast of "Saturday Night Live" would have.

Schaffer: It's a really famous-sounding voice.

Taccone: He's like a total dick.

Samberg: Like someone who's way more important than the other two.

Taccone: You'll put all of his quotes in bold. And then a parenthetical "(dick)" afterwards.

Schaffer: Yeah, write anything he says in a gold, sparkly font. Instead of quote signs put dollar signs.

Taccone: Sort of like a champion asshole.

Pitchfork: Done. So you guys are watching Kanye rehearse right now?

Schaffer: It's on the feed in the building, yeah."

(From Waxy)

Ninja Video

Ninja Video is a website that features streaming TV shows, movies, and more. It's a busy site, and one might have to download some DivX app/Ninja video helper for it to work... But after that it seems to work well.

(From my other friend Ed)