SurfTheChannel is a site that aggregates videos of TV shows and movies from across the Internet for your viewing pleasure.  Legallity is sketchy, but for anyone that wants to see their favorite show that they missed and don’t have a DVR, it can be a life-saver.

SurfTheChannel

USniff provides a nicely styled web 2.0 interface for multi-site torrent searches and allows you to query up to eight sites simultaneously.  It sorts by seeds, and is very usefull for anyone looking for a rare difficult to find file.

USniff

Maybe it makes a point, but I can’t help but think Duracell may have gone a little overboard in selling their batteries.

In all the discussion of John McCain’s recently recovered memory of a religious epiphany in Vietnam, one thing has been missing. The torture that was deployed against McCain emerges in all the various accounts. It involved sleep deprivation, the withholding of medical treatment, stress positions, long-time standing, and beating. Sound familiar?

According to the Bush administration’s definition of torture, McCain was therefore not tortured.

Cheney denies that McCain was tortured; as does Bush. So do John Yoo and David Addington and George Tenet. In the one indisputably authentic version of the story of a Vietnamese guard showing compassion, McCain talks of the agony of long-time standing. A quarter century later, Don Rumsfeld was putting his signature to memos lengthening the agony of “long-time standing” that victims of Bush’s torture regime would have to endure. These torture techniques are, according to the president of the United States, merely “enhanced interrogation.”

No war crimes were committed against McCain. And the techniques used are, according to the president, tools to extract accurate information. And so the false confessions that McCain was forced to make were, according to the logic of the Bush administration, as accurate as the “intelligence” we have procured from “interrogating” terror suspects. Feel safer?

The Daily Dish

Ahhhhh lawsuits.  Free money.  A great tradition.

If you need a lawyer, or think you have a case but are not sure, a new site for you is coming out.

The site was unveiled at the Annual Meeting & Expo of the American Bar Association in New York. Performing what is quaintly referred to as “online legal matchmaking,” the site submits anonymous claims to lawyers for potential litigation. Attorneys can then bid on clients.

The site announced that it will waive 500 lawyer enrollment fees until the end of the year. Really, it’s about as American as a bald eagle eating an apple pie in the middle of a baseball diamond.

What could be better?

WhoCanISue

Late night commentary from this week:

Jon Stewart: We just heard that Iraq has announced an 80-billion dollar surplus.  How are they gonna spend this money?
John Oliver: Well John, like everything in Iraq now, it is up for reasoned discussion. Some have suggested a few infrastructure improvements and then socking the rest away.  Others would like to construct a giant bed, cover it with all the money, and then let everyone in the country just roll around on it Scrooge McDuck-style. Others still would like to hire a mercenary army like Blackwater to drive out the infidel American force.
—The Daily Show
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“President Bush is on a week-long tour of Asia. He’ll visit South Korea, Thailand, and China. Or as the White House calls it: the Everything Sold At Wal-Mart tour.”
—Jay Leno
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“Now, to highlight what a charade proper air pressure is, the McCain campaign has started handing out Barack Obama ‘Energy Plan’ tire gauges. You see, it’s a great way to drive home what a ridiculous plan this is. Plus, it’s an easy way to check your tire pressure, and that can save you a lot of money. That’s not just me talking. The government’s own website says that proper tire inflation can save up to 12 cents a gallon immediately. So thank you for the tire gauge, Senator McCain. And good work. You stuck it to all the left-wing nutjobs who advocate proper tire inflation. Radical liberals like your potential vice presidential nominee, Florida Governor Charlie Crist, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Joe Lieberman, Triple A and the pinkos over at NASCAR. I’ve had my eyes on those guys ever since they had that car sponsored by the ACLU.”
—Stephen Colbert
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“Security is very tight for the Olympics in China, which has been very hard on the locals there. Many stores and factories in Beijing have been forced to close, and people have been forced out of their houses. Sort of like here in the United States, only for them it ends in a couple of weeks.”
—Jimmy Kimmel
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“There’s excitement in the air over the Olympics…also lead, arsenic, benzene…”
—David Letterman
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“The skies over Beijing are very smoggy. The government says the pollution is just a harmless mist. They made a similar statement about the treatment of prisoners—it’s not torture, it’s Pilates.”
—Craig Ferguson

You have to be old enough to remember Abbott and Costello, and too old to REALLY understand computers, to fully appreciate this. For those of us who sometimes get flustered by our computers, please read on…

If Bud Abbott and Lou Costello were alive today, their infamous sketch, ‘Who’s on First?’ might have turned out something like this:

COSTELLO CALLS TO BUY A COMPUTER FROM ABBOTT

ABBOTT: Super Duper computer store. Can I help you?

COSTELLO: Thanks. I’m setting up an office in my den and I’m thinking about buying a computer.

ABBOTT: Mac?

COSTELLO: No, the name’s Lou.

ABBOTT: Your computer?

COSTELLO: I don’t own a computer. I want to buy one.

ABBOTT: Mac?

COSTELLO: I told you, my name’s Lou.

ABBOTT: What about Windows?

CO STELLO: Why? Will it get stuffy in here?

ABBOTT: Do you want a computer with Windows?

COSTELLO: I don’t know. What will I see when I look at the windows?

ABBOTT: Wallpaper

COSTELLO: Never mind the windows. I need a computer and software.

ABBOTT: Software for Windows?

COSTELLO: No. On the computer! I
need something I can use to write proposals, track expenses and run my business. What do you have?

ABBOTT: Office.

COSTELLO: Yeah, for my office. Can you recommend anything?

ABBOTT: I just did.

COSTELLO: You just did what?

ABBOTT: Recommend something.

COSTELLO: You recommended something?

ABBOTT: Yes.

COSTELLO: For my office?

ABBOTT: Yes.

COSTELLO: OK, what did you recommend for my office?

ABBOTT: Office.

COSTELLO: Yes, for my office!

ABBOTT: I recommend Office with Windows.

COSTELLO: I already have an office with windows! OK, let’s just say I’m sitting at my computer and I want to type a proposal. What do I need?

ABBOTT: Word.

COSTELLO: What word?

ABBOTT: Word in Office.

COSTELLO: The only word in office is office.

ABBOTT: The Word in Office for Windows.

COSTELLO: Which word in office for windows?

ABBOTT: The Word you get when you click the blue ‘W’.

COSTELLO: I’m going to click your blue ‘w’ if you don’t start with some straight answers. What about financial bookkeeping? You have anything I can track my money with?

ABBOTT: Money.

COSTELLO: That’s right. What do you have?

ABBOTT: Money.

COSTELLO: I need money to track my money?

ABBOTT: It comes bundled with your computer.

COSTELLO: What’s bundled with my computer?

ABBOTT: Money.

COSTELLO: Money comes with my computer?

ABBOTT: Yes. No extra charge.

COSTELLO: I get a bundle of money with my computer? How much?

ABBOTT: One copy.

COSTELLO: Isn’t it illegal to copy money?

ABBOTT: M icrosoft gave us a license to copy Money.

COSTELLO: They can give you a license to copy money?

ABBOTT: Why not? THEY OWN IT!

(A few days later)

ABBOTT: Super Duper computer store. Can I help you?

COSTELLO: How do I turn my computer off?

ABBOTT: Click on ‘START’…………..

Cannon Balls - Bet You Didn’t Know This….

It was necessary to keep a good supply of cannon balls near the cannon on old war ships. But how to prevent them from rolling about the deck was the problem. The best storage method devised was to stack them as a square based pyramid, with one ball on top, resting on four, resting on nine, which rested on sixteen.

Thus, a supply of 30 cannon balls could be stacked in a small area right next to the cannon. There was only one problem — how to prevent the bottom layer from sliding/rolling from under the others.

The solution was a metal plate with 16 round indentations, called, for reasons unknown, a Monkey. But if this plate were made of iron, the iron balls would quickly rust to it. The solution to the rusting problem was to make them of brass - hence, Brass Monkeys.

Few landlubbers realise that brass contracts much more and much faster than iron when chilled. Consequently, when the temperature dropped too far, the brass indentations would shrink so much that the iron cannon balls would come right off the monkey.

Thus, it was quite literally, cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey. And all this time, you thought that was just a vulgar expression, didn’t you? You might like to send this fabulous bit of historical knowledge to at least a few uneducated friends.

GIZMODO