I spend a lot of time listening to hip-hop. I like it a lot. It’s my shit, if you will. But now and then I’m partial to something a bit different. Variety is the spice of life and all that. And something that definitely adds a nice bit of variety to my musical life is Cobra Starship. I stumbled on their music when I got their first album before seeing them support Fallout Boy (FOB weren’t good. CS were), and I’ve been a pseudo-fan since. They’re fun and catchy and entertaining.

The other day I saw someone wearing a Cobra Starship t-shirt and remembered that it had been a while since I gave them a listen, so I casually went to their site to see what they were up to and by golly gosh, they have a new album! ¡Viva La Cobra! (dope title btw) is more of the same fun infectious vaguely alternative rock type of shizzle from the first album, if not a little harder to get into (though maybe that’s because I’m old and jaded), and it’s good stuff. Two thumbs up. Go and buy it, it’s out now. Or, click here to listen to the entire album and then buy it.

I actually saw these photos a while ago but lost the link and became upset. So imagine my joy about 5 minutes ago when I stumbled on this site again!

Some really nice images here; lots dealing with crabbing in the Bering Sea. Reminds me of ‘Deadliest Catch’ which I never got round to properly watching but wished I had. (Edit: and I just found out that he was in season 2 of Deadliest Catch, which explains a bit).

It looks terrifying. I’m not a good swimmer, I don’t really like the cold and I’m not a fan of giant man-eating crabs. (I’m not 100% that this variety of crab is of the man-eating kind but I’m not willing to put them to the test. I’m sure they are). So kudos to people like Corey who are willing to go out and take photos so that we can look at them from the comfort of home. Yay.

Go and look: http://coreyfishes.com/portfolios/p02_beringsea02/p13.html

The results of a survey of 200 U.S. students (but really, the results could apply to students anywhere) presented in a nice little video.

I especially like this bit..

I will read 8 books this year.
2300 web pages
& 1282 Facebook profiles.

Online learning is the future.

via cpluv

I just want to start by saying that I’ve never used OiNK, I wasn’t a member, I’ve never downloaded music illegally, and piracy is bad. In fact, it’s a crime.

That said, I’m sad that OiNK.cd (formally .me.uk) is no more because (I’ve heard that) it was a really good torrent site. All sorts of rarities and random things could be found and it really did open people up to new music. It was nice while it lasted.

I don’t particularly want to get into the whole ‘is downloading music wrong’ thing, but generally, I don’t think it is. I genuinely believe that people still buy music that they like and want to support and only download things that they wouldn’t really buy anyway (which could then turn into something they like and end up buying). Personally, I’ve been put on to tonnes of music via downloading listening to my friend’s tape cassettes that I’d never would’ve listened to normally and have then gone on to buy/see live because of it. It sucks that something like OiNK, which really wasn’t the big evil crime syndicate that some people are portraying it as, has been subjected to what sounds like quite a heavy raid and shutdown. There are plenty of worse crimes that should warrant more attention before targeting file-sharing websites is deemed as a good use of police time.

Tis a shame. But let’s be honest, it’s not going to stop anything. Napster > AudioGalaxy > Kazaa > OiNK > ???. Fill in the gap with your favourite BitTorrent site.. There’s plenty to choose from.

There’s this new series starting this week on BBC Four which could very well turn out to be the only thing I’ve ever watched on BBC Four, called ‘The Genius of Photography‘. It looks quite promising. We shall see.

The point of this post however, is to point out that on the programme’s minisite, they have an image which is uncannily alike a photo I took this summer and recently added to my flickr page. Witness!!

Naturally, I’m taking this as a sign that I’m a genius in the realm of photography (and not just that lot’s of people have taken photos like that). I’m gifted! You can go and have a look at the rest of my photography at flickr (I just added another 40 or so photos from California which I’ve just got ’round to sorting through). Treat it accordingly and bow down..

Still at work, having to listen on FiveLive, which isn’t normally too bad (but still no substitute for watching it) but the commentary is via mobile phone because radio lines are down from Moscow. Ridiculous. But still, come on England!!

edit: 5:52pm.

Shit.

Wu-Tang Clan coming at’cha..

This post at Chris’ Invincible Super-Blog is brilliant. Just wish it was longer.

p.s. Still nearly 2 months ’til ‘8 Diagrams’?! Far too long..

So way back in August, I signed up for ‘blog action day‘ with the genuine intention of coming up with a decent post that related to the environment and all that..

But here we are on October 15th and I’m fresh out of posts. Blame it on work. Nah, actually, blame it on me. The few times I sat down and tried to come up with something, I ended up writing tripe. Not good. So I’m not really sure why I’m bothering posting anything.

I suppose it’s because I think that the whole ‘action day’ thing is a good idea and it’d be nice to be a part of it somehow.. even if that means posting something as relatively meaningless as this. So here it is. Better than nothing surely(?) Even if the very least I’ve done here is brought your attention to the main blog action day site, then that’s enough for me.. There’s thousands of blogs who have committed to posting something today and while I’m sure that some of them will probably end up in the same boat as me, the vast majority should come up with good stuff. Have a look at the participants.

More generally, if you’d like to read stuff from people who actually manage to find the time to write good things about the environment, I wholeheartedly recommend treehugger. I used to subscribe to it but frankly, they post too much for me to keep track of. So now I just pop back occasionally..

Save the environment and all that!

To be honest, I wasn’t particularly interested in seeing the film, but these credits are very nicely done and have slightly changed my mind. I have no idea how historically accurate the ‘facts’ are and I’m not really fussed.. They’re put together superbly. Good work.

Go and watch the massive HD version here: http://movies.yahoo.com/feature/thekingdom.html?showVideo=1