we love the web email us go to messageboard newsletter archive home NEWSLETTER: "NEWSLETTER TIME - READ IT, MAIL BITS TO COLLEAGUES, FUCK OFF HOME" next issue » « previous issue This Week: * CALENDAR - Tory George and his leather chaps * PODCAST - Room 404 actually happened * CHALLENGE - Literal Song Titles ------------------------------------------------- ________ ____ __ ___ ____/ _)|_ // /_/ _ | "In 535 issues' time, our ___/ _ |/_ > Sponsor B3ta << Sit on our cyber-face and wee'll guess your advertising weight. http://b3ta.com/mailus/ ------------------------------------------------- : WHAT B3TA PEOPLE HAVE BEEN MAKING THIS WEEK ConDem cal, internet, Room 404 >> ConDem Calendar 2011 << Our sexy ruling overlords, brought to you in calendar form by asciifaceofbob, with a little help from Waspbox. "Get yours now!" exclaims asciifaceofbob. http://www.b3ta.com/links/ConDem_Calendar_2011 >> "The Internet has been wheel-clamped!" << So claim Joel Veitch and top celebrity chum Phil Zimmerman. After watching this, it's hard to argue with, well, with anything. Baffling. http://www.b3ta.com/links/The_Internet_Has_been_Wh... >> Room 404 << Room 404 is a podcast, where nerdy guests talk about four vintage gadgets they'd like to recover from the vaults of Room 404, plus one current techy thing they'd like to consign to oblivion. "To be honest grabbing some geeks on Skype and getting them to talk wistfully about old computers is pretty easy," confesses Ewan. Still, this is a rare instance of somebody making one of the things we ask for at the end of the newsletter, so massive kudos to him. http://room404.thepodcastcorner.com/ ------------------------------------------------- : WHO'S THE KING OF ANNOYING CELEBRITIES? A special quiz Your Ginger Fuhrer and Tom Scott are working on a secret and evil project to work out the answers to lots of important questions by doing a quizzy / surveyey combo. Lots of questions, lots of answers, including the one about celebs. Top-voted answers so far include: Jedward, Jordan, Justin Bieber, Lady Gaga and Piers Morgan. http://www.b3ta.com/kingof/ ------------------------------------------------- : QUESTION OF THE WEEK I'm glad nobody saw me Last week we asked you to fess up incidents that till now have remained anonymous because nobody saw you. Except me. In the bushes. With my night-vision goggles: http://www.b3ta.com/questions/nobodysawme/ * SPEAR HEAD - "I was snorkelling and spear-fishing just near the cliffs in Babbacombe. I'd caught a couple of nice fish and left them on a rock. When I next came up there was a gull snacking on my hard-won catch. I tried shouting. No reaction whatsoever from a gull. So I aimed the spear-gun, and pulled trigger. The initial result? Missed the gull by a smidge. The rest of the result? The discovery that spear-gun string, when used in air, is actually *very* elastic. The spear missed my head by much less of a smidge. Interestingly, in the moment that it took the spear to come back, I had time to imagine how ridiculous a way this would be to die and what the post-mortem report would have said... but not to duck. I think that the gull flew away, although it may have just fallen off the rock laughing." (BeatsWork) * BALL BONCE - "Was walking back from football when I saw my whore of an ex-g/f strolling along with some of her skanky chums. Without even really thinking about it I gave the ball a real punt in their direction - even cackling to myself as it left my foot - but as it flew through the air realised it was a bit of a childish thing to do, so hid behind a bush. It walloped her in the back of the head and spilt Pepsi all over her clown-caked face. The ball ricocheted off her noggin, over a garden fence and was nowhere to be seen. They looked around in confusion then, after a minute, carried on walking. I was about 19 at the time and it's probably one of the most immature things I've ever done, but it still makes me laugh." (Regger) * POO TONGUE - "Got back to my car after a long day at work, only to discover an enormous bird poop right in the middle of my windscreen. I had nothing in the car to clean it off with - no water, no tissues, no scraper, nothing. But I couldn't have driven as I wouldn't have been able to see anything. So I cleaned it off with my hand. Then, as I pulled out my keys, I had a bizarre moment of brain-fade and thought "What's that all over my hand?" and cheerfully licked it to find out. Followed by hacking, gagging and spitting to try and get the bird poop out of my mouth. I am an idiot. An idiot who was lucky not to be ill. An idiot who was also very lucky not to be seen by anyone." (biscuitbiscuit) >> This Week: Needless to say, I had the last laugh << Do your best Eamonn Holmes impression and tell us your tales of smug oneupmanship and merciless humiliation: http://www.b3ta.com/questions/lastlaugh/ ------------------------------------------------- : SITES IN BRIEF Stuff we like that wasn't made by our mates * HOW THE DAILY MAIL WORKS - Long, long blog entry, but interesting and quite damning. To put it bluntly, they make stories up. http://goo.gl/acMZq * METAGAMES - Andy Baio of Waxy fame has been compiling a special list of games about other games. We're very proud that something we produced for E4 makes the grade - Janey Thomson's Marathon, a game only complete-able by 3 hours of furious button-waggling. Includes video of some poor sod actually doing this. http://waxy.org/2011/02/metagames_games_about_game... * HEADLINE OF THE YEAR - and quite frankly a great idea for one of these "pornographic movies" that we keep hearing about. http://yfrog.com/hs1jncwj * WRITING ON BANANAS WITH BIROS - everyone loves doing this and it was only a matter of time before there was a shitty website dedicated to the art. Apple should make writing on the iPad as pleasurable as this and they'd earn enough money to buy back the world economy from China. http://bananalala.blogspot.com/ * THE MIDDLE-CLASS HANDBOOK - can you spot yourself? Can you spot your friends? Or maybe our readers are too common and need the Pikey Scum handbook instead. http://bit.ly/gqA4sZ ------------------------------------------------- : VIDEO SCHMIDEO Like Spotify but with moving pictures * THE UK EXPLAINED - the difference between UK, Great Britain, England, The Crown etc, for our foreign readers who don't know and, frankly, for us, as it's very confusing. http://goo.gl/NKFzG * YOUTUBE SATIRE LOLS - "This about sums up YouTube for me", complains Mictoboy. http://goo.gl/MSHSW * STAR WARS REDUB - The Dayjob Orchestra lend surreal new meaning to A New Hope. Chewbacca's a lesbian? http://www.b3ta.com/links/Latest_vid_from_Dayjob_O... * FIREFOX CLEANS WINDOWS - Do you see what we did there? Anyway, the main thing to take away from this is that foxes have enormous, meaty tongues. http://www.b3ta.com/links/firefox_attempts_to_clea... * BBC CAT LADIES SKETCH - We thought this was going to be horribly woman-hating for a moment, but no, pleasantly surprised: http://goo.gl/vb0Lb ------------------------------------------------- : FUNNY NAME CORNER Kuntz and Manhood redux * SURELY WE'VE DONE THIS ONE BEFORE - but Google says no. We know who we're booking to do the food at the next B3ta/Bilderberg retreat. http://www.randykuntzcatering.com/ * REGARDING MANHOOD COMMUNITY COLLEGE - beanojam writesm "it gets better as it's named after the surrounding area; the Manhood Peninsula." BTW: another person who we'll leave nameless twittered in to complain about our even-handed write up last week, as he'd been expelled from the school and was still peeved by it. Expelled from Manhood. he. he. ------------------------------------------------- : B3TA IMAGE CHALLENGE Results from the Goth Challenge Last week we wanted you to get dark. Your favourites included: * BEARS - gloomy outsiders exist in all sections of the animal kingdom (drbroon) http://www.b3ta.com/board/10317504 * GAME - the find-the-goth game all the family can enjoy (HappyToast) http://www.b3ta.com/board/10317332 * DARK - the classic American Gothic given an extreme gothic makeover (Captain Howdy) http://www.b3ta.com/board/10317877 All these images, and the highest as voted by you can be found here: http://www.b3ta.com/challenge/goth/ >> New challenge: Literal Song Titles << I am the Walrus. Big in Japan. Dancing Queen. Foxy Lady. Take song titles and interpret them literally, using the magic of image manipulation software. Challenge suggested by sandettie light vessel automatic. http://www.b3ta.com/challenge/literalsongtitles/ >> Bonus Challenge << Design a logo for the Cat Survival Trust and win prizes! http://www.b3ta.com/challenge/catsurvivaltrust/ ------------------------------------------------- : WHAT HAPPENED NEXT? Follow-ups on previous stories. * JOEL IN THE DAILY MAIL - and it isn't his wife writing a sob story, "My husband gave up cigs and became addicted to pork" but all about the advertising project he's engaged in with Samsung to prove that their SD drives make very effective paper aeroplanes. http://bit.ly/dNsEy7 * MORE SWEARY TRANSLATE LOLS - barandis_arkenstone writes, "A Hungarian-speaking friend told me to add some trees to the mix when I mentioned the translation of cheese from this week's newsletter." http://goo.gl/rRCYQ * BETTER LAPTOP BATTERIES? - Matt Fowler writes, "The Pandora open-source community-hippy-type tiny-computer-thingy is now available for much-more-immediate purchase than previously, is very ace at running emulators, and gets a genuine 10 (ten, yes, really!) hours of battery life. The device itself is about the size of an original 'fat' Nintendo DS. Runs Linux (naturally), has a SNES-set of game controls plus dual analogue nubsticks, and a qwerty keyboard. It's about £370 inc VAT and P&P to the UK." Co-incidentally, Craig, the chappy behind Pandora, has been in regular touch with B3ta for years - older readers will remember the rather fabulous GP32 he imported from Korea, and Craig promises to get a Pandora in the post to us so we can check it out properly for B3ta readers: http://gbax.com/pandoraprivate.html * I USED DIET COKE THIS TIME - Black Moon, whose excellent Coke & Mentos vid we featured last week, writes, "I had too many comments about the last one being normal Coke and not Diet, so I felt compelled to do another variation on the theme." Oh Black Moon, Black Moon, pandering to internet pedantry is truly the way to insanity. http://goo.gl/mtVjj * B3TA iPHONE APP UPDATE - App developer Jon Grant says, "After a long wait, B3ta app v1.2 is finally ready for download on the app store! This version is mostly bug fixes and caching so that it doesn't break if it can't connect to the site. There are some UI improvements too. Try it" http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/b3ta/id400451018 * CHARIDEE COMEDY NIGHT - B3ta buddy Boyce Bailey is running a benefit gig for MERU. Writes Boyce, "MERU is a charity that exists to improve life for children and young people with disabilities. If you like laughter, or disabled children, there's a tip-top line-up, 9th Feb, The Star Inn, 2 Cheam Street, Ewell, KT17 1SA. Doors at 8pm." http://goo.gl/dWXzu * OLD SCHOOL B3TAN RAISES MONEY FOR PROSTATE CANCER CHARITY - your Ginge Fuhrer has bunged in £25 as he says, "Prostate cancer frightens me - it gets so many men. Hopefully this is some payment into a karmic bank to prevent it wiping me out." http://www.justgiving.com/Liz-Alvis ------------------------------------------------- : STAR IN NEXT WEEK'S ISSUE Make something "sick" and tell us about it. Maybe poison a rabbit or something. If you are in B3ta then people will see your stuff. Things we'd really like to see include: * ALCOHOL THAT DOESN'T MAKE YOU FEEL LIKE CRAP THE NEXT DAY - and women think they have it hard with pregnancy? The real morning sickness is hangovers. Let's claim this phrase back for alco-men. * WASHING MACHINES THAT DON'T BEEP LIKE 1980s DIGITAL WATCHES FOR YOU TO UNLOAD THEM - we're quite happy to let our washing moulder. It's the incessant beeping that pushes us closer to a horrid murder/suicide incident that'll at least make people remember us for something other than shoddy kitten-based animations from the early 2000s. * THE WHITE STRIPES TO REFORM - we're missing them already. The campaign starts now. Send your love, hate and indifference via the super futuristic mail form. http://www.b3ta.com/mailus/ BTW: If you've sent something in that hasn't been featured then don't be put off - we look at everything you send us. ------------------------------------------------- £1 join fee: [email protected] £2 leave fee: [email protected] ------------------------------------------------- THANKS: This issue was written by Rob Manuel with David Stevenson. Stuff sent in by quim-faced cunts, @TheMichaelMoran, The Vomiting Hitchhiker, yanmaniadotcom, SnowyTheRabbit, itsallaboutcake, @jamsandwich, @danielbevis, Meglos, Stashie, miltonlives, Pazuzu, dirtyscarab. Top Tippery by A Vagabond. Additional linkage and image challenge by Fraser Lewry. Mike Trinder is QOTW bloke. Subjlols via Afinkawan. ------------------------------------------------- TOP TIP: Pour cement into a bucket and stick a broom handle in the middle. When turned upside-down it makes an ideal - if somewhat cumbersome - "umbrella" for very thin things about a foot wider than a broom handle. next issue » « previous issue Newsletter We run a free weekly B3TA email reporting on the coolest stuff on the net. _____________________ [ go ] -------------------- THIS WEEKS HEADLINES -------------------- * TYPE-IN MAGAZINE - LAUNCHED FOR YOUR FINGERS * AI SLOP - GET READY TO OINK FOR IT, PIGGIES * GET WELL SOON - WISHING WELL TO DAVE BAGPUSS READ LATEST ISSUE archive