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Yesterday β€” 17 July 2024MetaFilter

GROW IS BACK

By: JHarris
17 July 2024 at 16:58
Now on Youtube, there is GROW Kingdom! Watch each short animation, then click to determine what to do next. See if you can predict what your actions will do. I bet you won't guess correctly! It's still fun, absurd, amazing, charming and wonderful. If you don't remember GROW, as it's been a few years, see inside....

Once upon a time on the internet there was Adobe Flash, which ushered in an era of light and fun games on the internet. And then Adobe killed it. Although you can still play Flash kind of using Ruffle. One of the things that Flash made possible is Eyezmaze's wonderful GROW series, which used to be common sights here. On, the maker of Eyezmaze, had some health issues, and a kid, but is still around. Previous Eyezmaze things that are still playable (Ruffle may be required for some): β€’ The original GROW (a.k.a. GROW Planet, 2002) β€’ GROW 2 (2006) β€’ GROW SunBoy (2007) β€’ GROW Tower (2009) β€’ TRANSFORM (2009) β€’ GROW Cannon (2011) β€’ GROW Figure (2011) β€’ GROW Maze (2013) β€’ GROW Recovery (2015) β€’ GROW Cube (2016) β€’ GROW Comeback (2018) Several GROW games were made for mobile platforms, but because Apple and Google care nearly as little for software preservation as Adobe does they're unplayable now. Someday they'll be on history's trash heap too, and I hope the GROW games outlive them all!
Before yesterdayMetaFilter

Follow the Crypto

By: JHarris
14 July 2024 at 16:59
Molly White, independent journalist, maintainer of the site Web 3 is Going Great and the newsletter and podcast Citation Needed (not the podcast about Wikipedia), has a new project called Follow the Crypto. In 2024, the cryptocurrency industry has raised hundreds of millions of dollars to influence races across the US, more than the health or energy sectors despite being a much smaller fraction of the economy. Follow the Crypto reveals what's been learned about their enormous pile of lucre and the ways it is being wielded to distort the United States' political processes, by organizations like FairShake, "Defend American Jobs," and "Protect Progress."

Strength? High. Badness? Very high!

By: JHarris
6 July 2024 at 00:03
Back in 2012 there existed, on the doomΓ©d Hub network, a kids show too awesome for this world: The Aquabats Super Show (Season 1 and Season 2, both on Youtube), starring the superhero-themed ska band fighting a variety of weird creatures, ranging from ManAnt to the Krampus. One sign of its unappreciated greatness was the fact that some episodes were written and/or directed by Matt Chapman, half of The Brothers Chaps who created and still sometimes make more of Homestar Runner. One episode of the show was CobraMan (22 minutes), where they fought a snake person with a snake's head and snakes for arms that shot snakes from them. However, CobraMan had a manager, that helped him along in his nefarious career, called "Carl." Thing about Carl... he wore a familiar wresting mask, and spoke in a veeeeeery familiar voice. He doesn't wear boxing gloves though....

Magical Retailism

By: JHarris
1 July 2024 at 08:11
Mall Wizard is (so far) two episodes of a short Youtube animated series, created by Alistair Boubli, about low-level employees Adya and A Wizard, who both work at a mall pop culture store, where the wizard keeps making magical trouble: New Guy and Children of Cotton. Episodes about three minutes each. Another project of his is Hugo's Mind Palace (14m), currenly only a pilot, also about retail shlubs trying to make ends meet. Not by Boubli, but relevant to Mall Wizard, are the animations Sunday at Castco (2 1/2 minutes) and 3 AM at SchmArby's (40s). Why are all these mages going to the mall?

Because I'm coming to believe ever more strongly in linking to personal sites to help keep the web healthy and not just the surface-visible ends of each of Google's tentacles, here's Alistair Boubli's home page. Here's his Youtube user page.

Frasier Meets Columbo, with voice acting

By: JHarris
29 June 2024 at 13:08
Back in October 2022, there was linked a fancomic where Frasier and Niles tried to hide Maris' (partly) accidental murder from Lt. Columbo. It's now been voice-acted (not by the original actors of course) and put on Youtube. (12 minutes)

Note: The comic in the first post was on Twitter. It's also on creator Joe Chouinard's website, so I linked to it there. I try not to link to Twitter or Reddit now unless absolutely necessary. Also from Joe Chouinard, you might enjoy: - Niles and Crane in Bloodborne - the residents of Springfield participating in a fighting tournament - and the ongoing series Clown Corps, about crime-fighting clowns

Ready to give them life, Henry? (click)

By: JHarris
27 June 2024 at 09:35
The following message is for workers from the planet BARBARBARA currently stationed on EDITÉ-FRIGNIM or "EARTH." It's by Peter Serafinowicz, and it involves our fantastic plans to construct human replicas and Eiffel Towers. Now, stand by for our fantastic leader, ARPOOVIAN SHEBBER-SHENTY!

. . I was sure I first saw this video linked from Metafilter, but a search didn't reveal its post. I had figured that it probably got hit by an account wipe. Which would have meant that it's no longer a double, thus there was no reason not to post it again! But... on preview, the old post did turn up, from EXISTENZ IS PAUSED here. Thanks, wild E.I.P.! So, this is a double, but it's a double after eleven years, so I'm posting it under the recently relaxed attitudes towards ancient doubles. It's another classic by Peter Serafinowicz, and it's been lodged in my brain since I first saw it. I still often can't resist playing it at MST Club.

"Wow, pinecone!" It's an apple.

By: JHarris
26 June 2024 at 03:14
Tales In Mushroom Village is a Chinese computer-animated TV series from 2009. It's considered partly lost media. 2009 was 15 years ago, but that was the year Pixar's Up came out, and Toy Story was 14 years old by then, so the animation can't be that bad... right? Here's a trailer (2 minutes). Two compilations have been uploaded to Youtube (A, B, both 1h40m, Chinese with terrible English subtitles) How long can you survive them? There's also a trailer for a sequel series called Tales In Mushroom Village II: Alien Visitors, which you'd be forgiven for thinking was a completely different bad CGI thing edited into the original, but its oh so all too very much real.

I won't mince words: it's baaaaad, y'all. But it can be enjoyable to watch bad things, if you're of a certain diseased frame of mind. I have had that illness for a long time; maybe some of you are sufferers too. Each of the two long videos has five episodes. Things to look/listen for in the first episode alone: Disturbing character design throughout "What a bad lucky day! You will be accused by me." Unexpected cameos by Zelda music Unnecessary transitions in a shot, to the same shot Four Chinese sentences that get translated into "Ugh..." The ice cream cone that becomes a banana in an edit The door step that's clearly too tall for any character to climb "Bad brother, compensate us..." "Mum, he must compensate us." Endless rabbit whining Rabbits here have tapering tails instead of cottontails Baby rabbits suddenly spinning around the Fox elder's head Sheriff Volcano-head "Village head, my grandpa has said the misunderstanding is the devil! Or you'll be the devil!" "I have heard that impulse is the devil." Naonao sleeps at night resting stiffly on his bed in his clothes with his baseball cap over his face "Get up everybody...! Do cleaning...!"
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