Archive for December, 2007
Tech giant Microsoft admitted Friday that they had “dropped the ball” by forgetting to assign a team of developers to work on their upcoming Internet Explorer 8 web browser, blaming the oversight on mid-level management.
“I know it sounds far-fetched, but please try and remember we also made up Windows Genuine Advantage,” said company spokesman Jen Parbly, “We didn’t realize those three floors were unoccupied until Bill [Gates] asked what the hell was going on with the IE team. For a few days, we were convinced we just kept checking in when they were at lunch.”
According to sources inside the company, after the release of Internet Explorer 7, a decision was made at an executive level to “start from scratch” to come up with a brand new approach to web browsing, including “taking a long, hard look at these things they call ’standards’.” Unfortunately, the task of assigning developers to begin brainstorming was lost in the shuffle when it was discovered customers had realized Vista was really Windows 3.1 with added transparency.
To make matters worse, sources indicate IE Project Manager Marcel Duplessis had unknowingly switched to Firefox several months before, and believed “perfection had been achieved, so they might as well take a break”. It was at his recommendation that the web browser team was assigned to other projects like the Zune, which analysts say “explains everything”.
At a press conference in Redmond Friday, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates pledged more transparency on the IE project in the future.
“We’re working hard to make it easier for you to see what we’re doing inside the company,” he said to a room full of tech reporters and programmers. “We realize we can’t force thousands of companies around the world to update their entire websites to meet our crazy new code quirks if we don’t have half-competent monkeys learning what kinds of things you really can’t afford to have broken. We haven’t done a great job recently, but we really do want to embrace you all. Embrace and extend. And then smother.”
Online collaborative encyclopedia Wikipedia came under fire Friday amid accusations a small group of editors have abused their authority and have broken many of the fundmental rules of the site, including a plot to rewrite history for personal gain.
“We have many documented cases of individuals altering articles against site policy,” said Elle Ellis, an investigative reporter for The Register. “Some are harmless, like saying Beethoven was Billy Joel’s piano teacher and secretly fathered Louis XVIII of France. But others are obviously untrue.”
Ellis says the most disturbing case of abuse was when senior contributor Stanislaw Van Der Meer edited his own write-up to suggest he was the nephew of Microsoft founder Bill Gates, and that he ran a charity to provide vaccinations to children in Africa. A link on the Wikipedia article lead to a PayPal donation page, where visitors were encouraged to “Save the Kids From Poleo [sic]“.
However, using archaic techniques Ellis referred to as “telephoning people”, the Register was able to determine that Van Der Meer is actually a graduate student at the University of Amsterdam, and acts as the Treasurer of an off-campus group known as the “Weedmasters”. When reached for comment, the president of Weedmasters told PTTBT: “Duuuuuuuuuude… your voice is so tiny, it’s like I could squish it under my thumb!”
The Wikipedia Cabal refused an interview for this story, saying only that they “adhere to the strictest levels of professionalism in the maintenance of Wikipedia, despite allegations to the contrary.” They also threw doubt on Ms Ellis’ claims by referring us to her write-up, which outlines her history of pedophilia, armed robbery and wire fraud convictions. Ms Ellis declined to explain the paragraph about her involvement in a sex-change doomsday cult in Guatemala in the 1990s, leading many to believe she is persecuting the Cabal for no reason.
Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales refused comment on this story, citing “another IRS tip-off I just don’t need”.
The White House today accused the Iranian government of trying to purchase large quantities of chemicals from China, after an Egyptian freighter was seized on its way to Tehran.
“The United States is shocked and furious that Iran would stoop so low,” said Defense Under-Secretary James Gibbons, “These types of materials, while not strictly illegal, are harmful to human health. In some circumstances. Sometimes. Now I’m not saying this is a pretext for war, because the President wants to do that. But it is. And we’re mad about it. So look out.”
Sources inside the Pentagon tell PTTBT that the chemicals in question are unspecified quantities of the product known as “Aquadots”, which can have hallucinatory effects when swallowed in large enough doses. A popular toy, they were pulled from shelves in November over fears they would give children a very different kind of holly jolly Christmas.
“It’s hard to say what Iran might do with a warehouse full of Aquadots,” said Langley Granger, a defense analyst with Fox News, “If they combined it with their illicit nuclear weapons program and worked with Al Quaeda to equip the insurgents in Iraq to bring about another 9/11, I think it could be catastrophic for the USA. I don’t want to sound alarmist, but I think we need to nuke those f**kers before they kill us all.”
However, in a surprise move Friday afternoon, Iranian ambassador Faisal al-Bayan admitted to reporters that his country had indeed imported the Aquadots, but not for military purposes.
“President Ahmadinejad ordered the toys for the use of the governing council,” said al-Bayan in an interview in New York, “It was decided that the best way to understand American foreign policy was to get high as a kite too. Unfortunately, even after Vice President Dawoodi’s apparent coma, we were still not able to make heads or tails of what Mr Bush has been saying. We are looking into marijuana next.”
Just in time for the holiday season, the Parker Brothers company is announcing a major revamping of its flagship board game in a new release it is calling, “Subprime Monopoly”.
Whereas players in the original Monopoly earned money to buy and develop properties at fixed prices, in “Subprime Monopoly” players borrow obscene amounts of money to purchase overvalued properties with skyrocketing prices and borrowing costs.
“With the advent of the ongoing housing bubble and mortgage loan crisis, we thought the time was right to make some major changes to the rules of the game”, says Parker Bros. creative director Mitt Mason. Originally invented by Charles Darrow in 1935, Monopoly first became a huge hit in the middle of the great depression, and has since been played by over 750 million people. “It seemed somehow fitting that we change the rules now that property prices are falling nationwide, given that the game was first popularized the last time this happened in the 1930’s. And the way Americans buy and sell property has changed a lot since then. Who in America buys anything these days with money they have actually saved up, and who today buys property at a stable and reasonable price?”
While the goal of the original version was to end the game with the most money, in the revamped version all players finish the game broke or highly in debt, competing to finish with the least total debt and lowest number of foreclosures.
Rules updated
Players still move around the same classic Monopoly board buying properties and collecting rent, but with a few key differences. In Subprime Monopoly, the game is split into two phases. The game begins in the “Irrational Realty Whore” phase, during which every player must buy any unowned property that his/her piece lands on, regardless of price, and develop houses and hotels on every owned property to the maximum potential. Every time a player passes ‘GO’ during this phase of play, all property, development, and borrowing costs in the game double for everyone, while rent fees always stay absolutely the same. Players undoubtedly end up borrowing large sums from the Monopoly bank to finance these purchases.
After all players have navigated the entire board three times, the “Reality Sets In” phase kicks in, and the rules dictate that the bank stop lending money to players. At this point, it is not long before all the players can no longer finance their debts, and so property investments are foreclosed for pennies on the dollar. Finally, one lone player not quite yet in solvency emerges the winner of the game with a mountain-load of debt and a pile of properties that nobody else is left to buy.
“I don’t think I’m exagerrating when I say it really is fun for the whole family”, beams Mason. “There’s nothing that says 21st century America quite like a night of living beyond one’s means, destroying your credit, and happily following an investment ponzi scheme that is doomed to failure”. Indeed, Mason planned to call the game, “Housing Doom Monopoly”, but changed the name at the last minute in order to not be confused with a popular U.S. housing bubble commentary website.
Read the rest of this entry »
The noise about the upcoming Canadian DMCA made me remember the Pig and the Box, which is well over a year old now. And strangely enough, I just happen to have new translations available as of today!
The Russian version is courtesy of Nikita, Katja and Kirill, who have done a great job introducing me to a language I have no hope of understanding on my own. Many thanks to them for helping me through the Great Italics Disaster of 2007 
You can download the Russian version here.
The Swedish version has actually been finished for a long time, and I humbly apologize to Patrik for not announcing it before. I see by my email records that I first received his work over a year ago, which means I’m far too stupid to live. You can download the Swedish version here.
And finally, I have the Dutch version for you! This one comes courtesy of Marco, who also did the Dutch Crow book. He did a ton of really hard work on this, and I feel extra-super-bad that I didn’t make a proper announcement in a timely fashion (although it was available to download). You can download the Dutch version here.
I’d just like to thank everyone that’s sent in translations over the last year, and let you know how cool it is for me that my silly little book is able to travel so far thanks to all of you. This is what Creative Commons is all about, and I’m so glad I could be part of it!
