Tab clearinghouse, everything must go…

If there is such a thing as Internet power animals or suchlike, mine might be the magpie. My tab habit gets fairly ridiculous, in part because I know several people who share really interesting things with one another. I’ve spent the last hour (or more) or so replying to things and reading and trying to thin the herd.

Some things, though, I just can’t close without sharing. So here goes.

- Platinum Books, in which Sarah at Smart Bitches contemplates the limitations inherent in the way we judge a book’s success, and wonders aloud about why there’s no real cumulative benchmark system for books.

- From the free speech front, Atheist Ireland has published a list of 25 blasphemous quotes in challenge the new anti-blasphemy law which goes into effect in Ireland today. The law imposes a €25,000 fine for speech (written or otherwise) which “is grossly abusive or insulting in relation to matters held sacred by any religion, thereby intentionally causing outrage among a substantial number of adherents of that religion.” I’m a polytheist, not an atheist, but I’m a firm believer in free speech and a secular legal system. I also worry about the effect this will have on creatives, and on the free exchange of extant materials. Ireland’s law is a bad one, and I wish Atheist Ireland the best of luck fighting it.

- Someone sent me a link to The Particle Zoo, which makes charming soft toys to represent various subatomic particles. Delightfully geeky, and their t-shirt design is very cool.

- From the department of utterly random things I stumble across while I’m writing a brief (and relatively recent) review and shareware download for Apogee’s 1993 first person shooter, Blake Stone: Aliens of Gold. Amusingly enough, I think I still have the install floppies for this one in a box somewhere.

So that’s the first day of the New Year sorted, because suddenly it’s the second day of the New Year and I am curled up in bed with a snoring, blanket-stealing dog.

This post has been mirrored from Christian A. Young's Dimlight Archive. To see it in its original format, visit dimlightarchive.com

In which the future is still here, sans police presence.

I got the Wii Fit out of the box today.

My yen for one of these, much like my random 'watch NCIS!' urges are mostly down to copperbadge and his witty commentary on the subject. It seemed at least as good for entertainment value as for getting me off the couch away from the netbook a bit more often. The boyf caught the hint and gave me one for Festive Winter Holiday (which is extra hilarious because of previous conversations about how he figured getting one a Wii Fit as a gift for someone is kind of like calling them fat), but it's been waiting for the right moment.

Which was about 90 minutes ago.

Wii Fit is like two completely different universes crammed into a box and then wrapped up with duct tape until they quit struggling.

The first is the world in which your Mii exists. It's full of little games with hula hoops and boxing and such, which all feel sort of charming and lo-fi. And, it has to be said, vaguely humiliating for my Mii. I mean, really. The things they do to that poor bastard. What's weirder -- and worse, because exercising around people I know weirds me out -- the boyf's Mii shows up somewhat randomly to join in with the torture. Is it too much to ask that the people throwing hula hoops at my head are all randomly generated? Does he really have to jog past and give me a little "wassup!" wave? Also, it's very white in the little white box. The only dark-skinned Mii I remember encountering offhand was the Very Serious boxing instructor.

The other is the world in which you and your trainer (and the Strength and Yoga exercises) exist. This world is the near future of science fiction in which fit, expressionless, pristine white human analogs (with really great hair) use clever technology to extrapolate your posture. They're kind of compelling in an uncanny-valley-meets-the-sex-bots kind of way. I worry a little about how I'm going to react when they start making small talk about their personal lives, or subbing out for one another, because then my writer's brain will want to toddle off and start dreaming up the ramifications of a world in which this second alien race exists, and that will either end in tears or something completely amazing.

Also, I burned a few calories whist being entirely undignified in my pajamas.

So yeah, I'm calling FUTURE. Yogabots in my teevee -- and seriously, watch their hands because it's mesmerizing -- is automatically FUTURE.