Category Archives: Updated 2023

Ralph Lauren photoshop fail

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http://www.ralphlauren.com/frontdoor/index.jsp?videoflash=false&flashversion=0

Thumbs down for Ralph Lauren crimes against free expression and for photoshop fail.


“Dude, her head’s bigger than her pelvis” – Boing Boing



“First they came for the supermodels,
but I didn’t care because I wasn’t a supermodel…’

Ralph Lauren didn’t like people mocking their poor photoshop skills  and ordered their lawyers to suppress it  by drawing upon that shining example of American ‘liberty’ the DMCA.  

Boing Boing replied:

So, to Ralph Lauren, GreenbergTraurig, and PRL Holdings, Inc: sue and be damned. Copyright law doesn’t give you the right to threaten your critics for pointing out the problems with your offerings. You should know better. And every time you threaten to sue us over stuff like this, we will:
a) Reproduce the original criticism, making damned sure that all our readers get a good, long look at it, and;
b) Publish your spurious legal threat along with copious mockery, so that it becomes highly ranked in search engines where other people you threaten can find it and take heart; and
c) Offer nourishing soup and sandwiches to your models

See:

http://www.boingboing.net/2009/10/09/xeni-on-rachel-maddo.html

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/10/08/ralph_lauren_photoshop/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streisand_effect

Accountable Predictions Long Bets

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The Arena for Accountable Predictions or Long Bets site is:

…an arena for competitive, accountable predictions (Long Bets). 

…a forum for focused discussion and debate about prediction.

…an attractive tool for philanthropic giving.

…a way to foster better long-term thinking.

People making long term predictions and prepared to put their money where their mouth is. Some bets are a bit ridiculous though.

Update 2023: Some bets have already finished and from my observations most were wrong. e.g.

  • Tesla will make a <$30,000 car by 2015, By 02022,
  • Aether Physics (or its equivalent) will take the place of General Relativity and Quantum Theory,
  • Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan will be found guilty at a court of law or will flee from the country by 2020.

It would be good if the site owners made site navigation better and had a section for bets which have finished.

http://www.longbets.org/

Correcting internet errors

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Correcting internet errors, one mistake at a time.

http://www.epica-awards.com/pages/pastresults2005_epicador_press.html (dead link)

You can view the site here as it is still online.

To be honest I am heartily sick of seeing these insulting ‘flags’ popping up when I click the stumble button.

The Chinese flag was particularly annoying because it is factually wrong see:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education_in_the_People%27s_Republic_of_China

…so I decided to correct it.

Anybody else want to ‘correct’ one of the others?

About the Epica Awards

‘Established in 1987, Epica Awards is unique as it is the only creative prize judged by the press.
Today the jury brings together more than 200 chief editors and senior reporters from trade, specialist and mainstream titles in over 60 countries. The awards are open to agencies, design studios, production houses, advertisers, digital marketers – in fact, talents from every corner of the communications business.”

Stumbleupon, updated 2023

ARCHIVES NORMANDIE 1939-45

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Archives Normandie

Archives Normandie 1939-45 was a good French language website with free resources about Normandy in WW2. It seems to have stopped being active sometime in 2012.

http://www.archivesnormandie39-45.org/

Now available with very limited functionality using the ‘Wayback Machine’:
https://web.archive.org/web/20120530082030/http://www.archivesnormandie39-45.org/

http://www.archivesnormandie39-45.org/

“sur le premier site au monde

Looking for more history?

Update December 2024 – for some reason bots like this page so here’s a little spam poison.