we love the web email us go to messageboard newsletter archive home NEWSLETTER: "IMAGINE BONO. THERE YOU GO, RUINED YOUR DAY" next issue » « previous issue "IMAGINE BONO. THERE YOU GO, RUINED YOUR DAY" This Week: * ENORMOUS - Gigantic Toffee Crisp * INNUENDO - Masterchef muck * UNHELPFUL - One-Star Amazon reviews ------------------------------------------------- ________ ____ __ ___ ____/ _)|_ // /_/ _ | "Sticking poo in your ___/ _ |/_ > Masterchef Professionals innuendo << "I finished a new Masterchef: The Professionals filth vid at 4am this morning (as it was the Masterchef Final last night and I don't sleep)," confesses Cope&Dalton's Henry. "If you want it, it couldn't be hotter off the presses!" Oh, we want it alright. http://bit.ly/yMNkji >> Giant Toffee Crisp << "A while back I made a giant KitKat Chunky," reminds corruptia. "The sugar high wore off, so I made this giant Toffee Crisp. Enjoy!" A perfect slice of nerdy cookery - we even loved the music. http://www.b3ta.com/links/Giant_Toffee_Crisp >> Decided to become a Reply Girl << "Reply Girls are cleavagically gifted young ladies who find popular videos on Youtube and post reply videos to them saying nothing in particular, but focus on their boobs," reports Cap'n. "I thought this was a brilliant idea, and as an attractive, sexually comfortable young woman I decided to make a couple." http://bit.ly/xIIkuX >> Stuart Ashen gets advertising gig << Ashen's rise to the top has been extremely exciting for us B3ta overlords, we feel like proud pigeons seeing their young fly for the first time, swooping majestically over the landscape rather than plummeting to their death. Ashen has produced a really quite unusual advert too, which deserves your attention. Firstly you need to watch the set-up which is unobtrusively placed in one of his normal videos: http://www.youtube.com/watch#t=423s Then watch the payoff. Oh my fucking God. http://www.youtube.com/watch >> Draw the Shitler << Self-explanatory printed toilet paper, invented by liathan and now for sale. "I could use your help," he pleads, "It's really funny, it's my idea and I printed 1000 rolls in China. And now my room is overcrowded!" http://www.drawtheshitler.com >> Trolling bigoted protesters in Adelaide << "Like all great cities, Adelaide has her very own bunch of local bigots. Every Friday a group of 15 oh-so-Christian twats meet in a place called Rundle Mall to shout out "Slut!" or "Fag!" at passersby and generally spoil everyone's day," explains Sanderson Jones who, like all comedians, is touring Australia right now. "I decided it would be fun to wind them up a bit." http://youtu.be/iaz2rxmcWyg >> An Open Letter to 1998 << "With apologies to John Cooper Clarke," adds Bela Lugosi's Dad with a series of dour, northern warnings to the era of Seinfeld, Pope John Paul II and the 333MHz Pentium chip. http://bit.ly/wEhRlg ------------------------------------------------- : SPONSORED LINKY WOO Recursive todo lists Do you know the three Rs? That's recursion, recursion, recursion. The difference between Pendactive and just any todo list is that it allows infinite nesting for tasks. Imagine that. No more lists falling apart because you get three levels deep and the software just can't cope. Genius on a stick. http://www.pendactive.com/ ------------------------------------------------- : QUESTION OF THE WEEK Lies that went on too long We asked for the little lies you had to keep going a lot longer than you wanted: http://b3ta.com/questions/liesthatwentontoolong/ * TWENTY YEAR LIE - "Last year of university, five blokes trying to find jobs. Bob had a good opportunity with a bank, his absolute dream job. Now Bob professed to taking massive drugs. The night before his interview as he was giving us his drugs stories, Mike produced a small pink pill, saying he didn't know what it was, but it was reputedly strong stuff. Bob necked it and for the rest of the evening said he was a little light-headed but nothing odd. Next day Bob returned with a tale of woe: told there was a drugs test, Bob had run out of the offices. Bye-bye nice job. Mike felt awful. He'd told the rest of us that it was a child's sore-throat tablet, but now Bob had messed up the offer of a good job and Mike couldn't bear to tell Bob the truth. We eventually found jobs, girls, then marriage, kids. Except Bob: he drifted in and out of temporary jobs, travelling to Eastern Europe, Asia and then Australia, where he moved in with a girl and took a job which was nothing special, but allowed him to live. All this time Mike was convinced he'd caused this by his lie. Ten years on when we all met up, Mike couldn't hold it back any longer: he was so sorry, he felt awful. "That's all right mate. Still, I wonder what might have been, eh..." Mike left soon after. As soon as he was gone Bob burst out laughing. He'd realised the pill was nothing. In reality he'd had a change of heart. He'd had a great time travelling the world, and he couldn't be happier. That was 10 years ago. Bob still hasn't told Mike. The twenty-year lie, still going." (Smale) * YESH - "Walked into a quiet pub and for some inexplicable reason, I ordered a pint in a Scottish accent. It just came out. I think I'd been thinking in Sean Connery's voice (which I heartily recommend to add a bit of character to your own internal monologues) Got chatting to the barman while waiting for my friend to turn up. Still in Scottish accent. When he turned up, I explained what was going on, and continued sitting at the bar and speaking in a Scottish accent all night. Got easier and more natural as I drank more, strangely." (SnowyTheRabbit ) * HEARD IT ALL BEFORE - "God made me pregnant, Joseph, I swear". (TheManWithThePlan) >> This Week - Training Courses << Have you been trained? Did it make much difference? Or did you merely learn how to drink a lot in a hotel? Talk to us here: http://b3ta.com/questions/trainingcourses/ ------------------------------------------------- : SITES IN BRIEF Stuff we like that wasn't made by our mates >> Rock'n'roll tedium << Imagine spending a few seconds with the gods of our age. You'd write about it too, even if it was a bit dull. http://rockandrolltedium.tumblr.com/ >> Classic nudes, improved << Famous paintings of naked ladies get magazine photoshop treatment. To be fair, there was a time when the standard for beauty was 'looks like she can afford to eat food'. http://bit.ly/zYzG37 >> Cholafied << Mystifying tumblr of celebrities made over as latina gangstas. The Hoff is the best - but then when is he not the best? http://bit.ly/wXnTfg >> Michael Jackson sightings << Is Jacko really dead? Or did he fake it, to escape from the grind of fame - but is sending coded messages back to his fans? Draw your own conclusions from this entertaining collection of 'sightings'. Spoiler: He is dead. http://www.michaeljacksonsightings.com/ >> Jazz Nazis << Stringent set of musical rules laid out by the Nazi Party on what is and isn't permissible for musicians. BTW: It's worth looking up some stuff on Berlin's 1930s jazz scene - those guys were fighting the Nazis before it was cool. What a bunch of hipsters. http://bit.ly/xKLcLm >> Autoplay internet sounds << There's nothing we used to enjoy more than opening a website and having it abruptly serenade us with some crappy tune. Relive those heady days of late 90s web design, with this collection of sites with soundtracks. http://soundsoftheinternet.com/ >> Chain pub piss-dungeon << One of those tales of sexual depravity that you swear must be an urban myth but - look - there are photos of the scene, plus the guy who found it is my wife's sister's boyfriend's cousin. http://bit.ly/z4xWyu >> Least helpful reviews << Big lols from a liberal dollop of those one-star Amazon reviews written by young children or "morans". Eg. Animal Farm - one star - "unrealistic because the animals talk". http://leasthelpful.com/ ------------------------------------------------- : FOLLOW FRIDAY Suicide has been staved off another week with small bits of misanthropic humour from the imaginary season of Friends 11. Best bit? The cast photo with Jennifer Aniston replaced with Iggy Pop. (A comparison that George Clooney's g/f Elisabetta Canalis made famous in 2010; how bitchy!) https://twitter.com/FriendsSeason11 ------------------------------------------------- : VIDEO SCHMIDEO Like a VHS but with no tapes. AMAZING! >> Michael Bolton meets the Lonely Island << Peacocking for the ladies sabotaged by colossal, insurmountable nerdiness. http://tinyurl.com/3ep5og3 >> 21st century's first great protest song << "My first thought on seeing Ill Manors was 'my wife will want to blog this,'" scribbles Ginger Fuhrer Rob. Raging rapper disturbingly framed against the flames of last year's riots. http://www.youtube.com/watch >> Interviewed by your past self << In 2002, two friends made a pact to meet up in ten years' time and complete the interviews they recorded for their future selves. This is that year. Now they're raising the cash to make a professional job of it. http://beta.indiegogo.com/decades >> The Gravity Stool << Add iron powder to a plastic resin and apply super-strong magnets and you get furniture extruded by science. "I so want one of these," wheedles Chthonic, in a vague attempt to get someone to buy him one. http://vimeo.com/34773498 >> Milligan's '70s race-based sitcom << Sadly, only one episode of The Melting Pot (1975) was ever broadcast, but here's a brief taster of Spike Milligan's lost, black-face masterpiece. http://www.youtube.com/watch >> iPad ukulele << Hipsters! Throw away those tiresome, authentic wooden instruments - now you can carry out even more of your daily routine without ever having to relinquish grasp on your precious, precious iPad. http://t.co/0SdFDGA3 ------------------------------------------------- : FUNNY NAME CORNER Funny with an invisible 'un' * DOC DOC DOC DOC DOCTOR KUHNT - The Coast Of Yemen writes, "Is the Funny Name Corner still considered funny? A friend of mine had the pleasure of dealing with this amusingly-named lecturer whilst studying in Germany." http://www.statistik.tu-dortmund.de/kuhnt.html * RANDY BAUMGARDNER, COLORADO LEGISLATOR - as Wikipedia states, "He is possibly more well known as the recipient of the American Academy for Humorous and Unfortunate Names (AAHUN) award for 'Most Unfortunate Name in a Political Profession' for 2008, 2009 and 2010. He lost the title in 2011 to New York Representative Andrew Weiner." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Randy_Baumgardner * MINGE - WillF writes, "I suspect that only Anglophiles such as myself noticed this story in my local paper, and I immediately thought of the newsletter's funny name corner. Here you go." http://bit.ly/AsGkKg ------------------------------------------------- : ON THE B3TA RECORD PLAYER Give these a spin, plop pickers * SYMPHONY OF SCIENCE IS A MUSICAL PROJECT OF JOHN D BOSWELL - you've probably heard the Carl Sagan one but this week we learned that there's a whole album to buy. It's lovely. And you can name your price - or even get it free. http://symphonyofscience.com/ * NEW KUNT ALBUM, SLOPPY SECONDS - Kunt writes, "The story behind one of the tracks 'You brought a paedo along to 5-a-side' - it's a real life story about this bloke who came to our Monday night indoor footy who got convicted of being an online nonce. He used the offer of free furniture on Habbo Hotel to lure them in - I suppose that's the modern day equivalent of puppies in his boot. Actually re-reading it there's not much funny about it. It's quite harsh. But the song is nice and jaunty." http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/B007I7OOZ... BTW: Kunt is doing a gig at Fiddlers Elbow, North London, Friday week (March 23). Seeing as this is literally a 15-minute walk from B3ta HQ, we'll be there. Maybe you will too? http://kunt2012.eventbrite.com/ ------------------------------------------------- : THINGS THAT MAKE YOU GO AAHH Meta-Gerbils Vampyre_gem writes, "For your 'things that make you go ahhh' section. We're a little obsessed with pets, 10 gerbils, cat, dog and fish and no signs of slowing down really. But it turned out one of the boy gerbs was a girly gerb and ended up getting knocked up. She had 6 pups, one of whom died. 4 are doing well and growing and the other is called 'Tripod' as he one has 3 paws and is tiny compared to the rest. Anyway, took this picture of him, thought the rest of the world would like to see. Hope he pulls through!" Hmm. Vampyre_gem didn't give us a link and it vaguely amuses us to have all that build up them FLUMP! No link. So use your imagination to think up some disabled gerbils. Yay, how cute. ------------------------------------------------- : B3TA IMAGE CHALLENGE Results from the Hedgehogs Challenge Last week we wanted you to celebrate hedgehogs Your favourites included: * ATTACK: terrifying confrontation with prickly foe (maiden) http://www.b3ta.com/board/10716838 * ITCH: awww! look at the distressed little hog, all riddled with disease! (E Dubya) http://www.b3ta.com/board/10713603 * DARWIN: startling flora/fauna interface action (Joe Scaramanga) http://www.b3ta.com/board/10712394 All these images, and the highest as voted by you can be found here: http://www.b3ta.com/challenge/hedgehogs/ >> New challenge: Beasts Of War << Dogs, horses and pigeons are all well known for being used in wars to patrol borders, carry soldiers and pass on messages. Show us the lesser known animals that have been put to use in the art of war. Challenge suggested by ferret http://www.b3ta.com/challenge/warbeasts/ ------------------------------------------------- : A WARNING FROM HISTORY The Radar chap, Sir Robert Watson-Watt Brilliantly the inventor of RADAR was caught speeding in his car by a radar gun and wrote an ironic poem about it: "Pity Sir Robert Watson-Watt, strange target of this radar plot And thus, with others I can mention, the victim of his own invention. His magical all-seeing eye enabled cloud-bound planes to fly but now by some ironic twist it spots the speeding motorist and bites, no doubt with legal wit, the hand that once created it." We mention this not simply as whimsy but that it's an eternal story - you make your idea real with the best of intentions but you have no control of how it'll be used by authority. A story that parallels this is this week's complaint from influential programmer and blogger Andy Baio, who talks "How Yahoo Weaponized My Work." http://bit.ly/yQavXt ------------------------------------------------- : WHAT HAPPENED NEXT? Follow-ups on previous stories. * SOME THOUGHTS ON CYBER-UTOPIANISM - Official B3ta wife writes about Adam Curtis, Cyber-utopianism & Education 2.0. Not something we'd normally run but we think there's a subset of B3tans who'll enjoy this. You big bunch of (lovely) Cyber-utopians in decaying fractal T-shirts and listening to The Future Sound of London. http://bit.ly/A8WU5w * THE TASTE OF FEMALE MUSCLE - Kung_Fu_russ writes, "Do male and female chickens taste different? Fuck knows, but I can tell you that Mussels taste different depending on their sex. When you buy mussels, you'll notice that some of them are clearly more orange coloured, and much sweeter tasting. They're the female ones. So, just to clarify, Lady-clams are tastier than man-mussels." * YOUR RIGHT TO PARODY RUMBLES ON - Video artist Swede Mason (of 'Masterchef Synaesthesia' fame) tells ORGZine why he needs the right to parody. http://bit.ly/xG5MRl * PSYCHOTIC EMAIL OF THE WEEK - really don't know what they are referring to. Dissuper writes, "You can take your fu(&Y(*^&^ games off any new computers. I have been playing your stupid games for 2 weeks and have not won once. This is bull shit. I guess you delight in pissing people off. Well I will delete all of your dam games and use my own, at least I have more fun, where I can win. You can stuff your games up your ass. You ought to be tarred and feathered and ran out of town." * IN DEFENCE OF QR CODES PART TWO - krang writes, "My new bicycle has a QR code next to the serial number. Rather than having to jot it down, I just scanned the code with my phone and emailed it to myself. This clever implementation of technology saved me a total of about four seconds." * PISSING ON YOUR CAR REDUX - several years ago your Ginger Fuhrer wrote a track about peeing on a car. Googling for it finds this epic and disturbing remix from a mysterious person on the YouTube. http://www.youtube.com/watch * ON THAT BANKSY VIDEO LAST WEEK - apparently he didn't actually write the text. The chap who did amusingly describes himself as "a beautiful flower angel sent from heaven to inspire Banksy." http://bit.ly/ywg9UB * READERS' SHEDS: CALL FOR SHEDS - @unclewilco writes, "Entries now open for Shed of the Year." http://www.readersheds.co.uk ------------------------------------------------- : STAR IN NEXT WEEK'S ISSUE Make something cool and tell us about it. If you are in it then people will see your stuff. Things we'd really like to see include: * SHOUT LIKE BRIAN BLESSED DAY - October 9th would be a good day as that's his birthday. Can someone organise it please? * BANK CARD READER HACKS - we worked out that the LloydsTSB PinSentry has a graphic resolution of 60x14 - should be enough to play Snake. Someone should hack it. * SONGS WRITTEN FOR V/O FUN - write a song about being a lonely and poor V/O artist. Send the lyrics to one of those crowdsourced V/O sites to be read out. Mix into a song using some pitchy shifty stuff. http://voicebunny.com/ * SCOTCH EGGS - delicious eggs pickled in scotch. Yum. Send contributions via the 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. ------------------------------------------------- : THREE THINGS WE'VE LEARNED THIS WEEK Learn from us, wise grey-bearded B3tans * If TV reflected real life, East Enders would just be couples using separate laptops and occasionally muttering. "What did you say?" "Nothing" * Twitter is a conspiracy to record our stupid comments so that if we ever gain power we can be hung by our own words * Flicking Vs and waving a potato peeler is a particularly ineffectual way of getting the neighbours cat to go away ------------------------------------------------- : SPONSOR B£TA We're the Goldman Sachs of Internet newsletters The best way for you to support B3ta is to tell your friends about it. Tell them to read the B3ta newsletter. Simple. Also you could consider buying advertising with us. Especially if you're sitting on a bit of marketing budget and nobody will really miss it if you bung a few quid our way. We wish to export our version of economic liberalism to rival Internet newsletters but we can't afford the guns. http://b3ta.com/mailus/ ------------------------------------------------- : DARTH VADER T-SHIRTS Clever winners announced Last week we asked you to complete the sentence , "If I met George Lucas I'd like to...." Your 5 bestest replies were: * "Ask him if he can survive the winter, using only the food he has stored in his neck pouch" (masamoony) * "Wobble his fucking goitre going 'graaaah' like Chewbacca" (drbroon) * "Blow a raspberry on his hairy belly, glistening with sweat." (Windy Pig) * "Take him to a strip club and convince him to drunkenly fuck one of the strippers. Then I'd blackmail him. With the money I'd buy a T-shirt. And Wales." (Noctu) * "Tell him I think Little Britain is shit and he should go back to doing Shooting Stars." (2 Can Chunder) If you didn't win then you can buy a Darth Vader shirt at Truffle Shuffle. http://bit.ly/rWMefg ------------------------------------------------- Friends : [email protected] Haters : [email protected] ------------------------------------------------- THANKS: This issue was written by Rob Manuel with David Stevenson. Stuff sent in by @Matt_Muir, Matt Round, uke, @shenannegins, nickbeddows2002, sinisterduck, @whoojemaflip, Rosie Leland, @pieceoplastic, Dougald Lamont, @dotmund, @codepo8 Image challenge by Fraser Lewry. Mike Trinder is QOTW bloke. Top Tip by Lord Darkheart The Destroyer. QOTW minion ScaryDuck has a book out, "Samuel Pepys: Lust for Glory", and the Kindle edition only costs £2.56. You should buy it: http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/B007K8VOW... ------------------------------------------------- TOP TIP: Save money on McCain Baked Potatoes by buying a potato and baking it. 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