Entertainment: Stupid People, Alcohol, and Fire

YouTube - Okay, part of me just wanted to see what it would be like to embed a YouTube file. So there, now I've done it. But this is awfully funny, to me at least. Can you imagine a worse combination, drinking and being on fire? I particularly like the kid's screaming dance while is leg is burning. That'll help. I've seen other videos where the flaming drink trick goes wrong, and you'd think people would realize that playing with fire is dangerous enough, let alone while you're intoxicated.

Tech: The Future of Interface

TED (Technology Entertainment & Design) - There is a video from one of their conferences I recommend watching. You can download the zip file here. I'm not sure how long ago it was shot, but it demonstrates some new technology in multiple point touch screens. The use of the interface seems to be very intuitive and smooth. The cool factor aside, I think this sort of technology will have a lot of great real world application. Just the thought of having your keyboard be part of the screen, and have it scalable to whatever size or shape you want, is wonderful.

The speaker references how seemless it is and how there's no visible interface, giving you more screen to look at what it is you are actually doing. This made me think of two video games I've played, Homeworld and Black & White. Both games did a great job of using the motions you could draw with your cursor as a means of executing commands that they were able to remove all buttons or side bars from the screen. This gave you the whole screen to look at the world the games were creating, instead of having half that real estate taken up with interface. It made for a much more enjoyable gaming experience.