Being a parent now, I found this commercial pretty funny.
I have to hand it to Microsoft… if this is a supposed to be a serious tool (the promo seems to sell it as such) then they should just throw in the towel now before they tarnish their image anymore. The idea behind SongSmith is that you sing the melody and it will auto-generate the backing music… I’m sure you can already see where this is going. Many people have run the lyric tracks from popular songs through it with funny results. I’ll let you find the actual SongSmith demo video on YouTube yourself… I’m posting my favorite SongSmith results below.
(requires Adobe Flash plugin… click HERE to watch it on YouTube)
(requires Adobe Flash plugin… click HERE to watch it on YouTube)
(requires Adobe Flash plugin… click HERE to watch it on YouTube)
I’m sorry, but this is too funny not to post…
(requires Adobe Flash plugin… click HERE to watch it on YouTube)
If this video ever gets deleted from YouTube, you can download it HERE.
We got an interesting application crash yesterday with a confusing message similar to this:
Fault bucket 42424242, type 1
Event Name: APPCRASH
Response: None
Cab Id: 0
Problem signature:
P1: MyApp.exe
P2: 1.42.42.42
P3: 598773cf
P4: StackHash_ac62
P5: 0.0.0.0
P6: 00000000
P7: c0000007
P8: 00000000
P9:
P10:
We spent some time wondering if our crypto libraries were the problem (we just made some changes recently), but concluded that was unlikely. So what the heck is the “StackHash” module? Did our trashed stack cause the kernel to think we were a different module? Nope.
The answer is that the Windows executive couldn’t identify the module we were in when the application crashed (it uses the instruction pointer to determine what code was executing). In this case, the kernel simply takes a hash of the stack so at least we might be able to identify if we’ve seen this exact crash before. Here’s the answer summarized by an engineer from Microsoft:
In the OS when I try to get a faulting module name it is possible that there is no module laoded (sic) at that address. For example in this case the EIP was zero. So in those cases where a module is not loaded and it is not also in the unloaded module list, I take a stack hash of the stack so that we can identify this crash from other crashes where also the module is not known.
Okay, this is classic… a parody on Tickle-Me-Elmo. It’s hilarious if you’re familiar with the Emo movement. Enjoy!
(requires Adobe Flash plugin… click HERE to watch it on YouTube)
The Sydney Morning Herald has a great piece on a computer malfunction that showed up during the 2008 Olympic opening ceremony in Beijing. The dreaded “Blue Screen of Death” (BSOD), familiar to Windows XP users, was projected on the stadium ceiling when one of the display computers crashed. Here’s one of the images:
It seems that Lenovo (the PC supplier for the games) chose Windows XP instead fo Vista. From the article:
Lenovo chairman, Yang Yuanqing, was quoted as saying that because of the complexity of the IT functions at the Games, it was decided to not use the the more recent operating system. “If it’s not stable, it could have some problems,” he said.
Ironically, former Microsoft CEO Bill Gates was in the crowd (he can run but he can’t hide). 
Gizmodo has some more images and links to the incident.
We recently went and looked at the new Chevy Tahoes… of course with OnStar. Rob was nice enough to point out this video parody called BlondeStar
(requires Adobe Flash plugin… click HERE to watch it on YouTube)
For every major event in the news, there’s someone who believes it’s a conspiracy… so why would the attack on the Death Star be any different? The guys over at Debunking911 have a great satiracal piece about this monumental Star Wars event; it was an inside job. It’s funniest if you (a) actually remember Star Wars, (b) are kind of a nerd, and (c) are familiar with “real” conspiracy theories (like the ones surrounding 9/11… video: 1, 2, 3, 4).
And so the Death Star conspiracy goes:
We’ve all heard the “official conspiracy theory” of the Death Star attack. We all know about Luke Skywalker and his ragtag bunch of rebels, how they mounted a foolhardy attack on the most powerful, well-defended battle station ever built. And we’ve all seen the video over, and over, and over, of the one-in-a-million shot that resulted in a massive chain reaction that not just damaged, but completely obliterated that massive technological wonder.
Like many, I was fed this story when I was growing up. But as I watched the video, I began to realize that all was not as it seemed. And the more I questioned the official story, the deeper into the rabbit hole I went.
Read the full story HERE.
My friend Rob (whom I share an office at work with) made the mistake of sending me the following picture, which I couldn’t resist turning into a motivational poster. I’m just having trouble coming up with the perfect tag line… Comments welcome.
… and my favorite:
