Gmail fans have been building unofficial extensions to spice up their
inboxes for a while, but up til now themes haven’t been an integral
part of Gmail. We wanted to go beyond simple color customization, so
out of the 30 odd themes we’re launching today, there’s a shiny theme
with chrome styling, another one that turns your inbox into a retro
notepad, nature themes that change scenery over time, weather driven
themes that can rain on your mailbox, and fun characters to keep you in
good company. There’s even an old school ascii theme (Terminal) which
was the result of a bet between two engineers — it’s not exactly
practical, but it’s great for testing out your geek cred. We’ve also
done a minor facelift to Gmail’s default look to make it crisper and
cleaner — you might notice a few colors and pixels shifted around here
and there.
To customize your inbox, go to the Themes tab under Settings.

“A frail old man lost in space and time. They give him this name
because they don’t know who he is. He seems not to remember where he
has come from; he is suspicious and capable of sudden malignance; he
seems to have some undefined energy; he is searching for something as
well as fleeing from something. He has a ‘machine’ which enables them
to travel together through time, through space, and through matter.”

The Genesis of Doctor Who.

Grim Fandango,
which was released in 1998, is considered by many to be one of the best
Lucas Arts adventure games ever made. It tells the story of Manny
Calavera, a travel agent working in the land of the dead. The game
combines Aztec and film noir imagery to create a game that is wholly
unique and still has a rabid fan base. Tim Schafer, the primary writer for the original (and a mastermind behind recently critically appreciated games such as Psychonauts through his company Double Fine Productions has released the full 72 page design document that was written in 1996. [direct pdf link]. This is great reading for those who get nostalgic just thinking about the game.
Here’s the opening scene of the game to help you develop an appreciation, if you haven’t done so already: youtube link

The Doctor is set to regenerate once again as David Tennant calls time on Doctor Who. “When Doctor Who returns in 2010 it won’t be with me” Tennant, widely acknowledged as one of the most popular actors ever to play the Doctor, said. “Now don’t make me cry. The 2009 shows will be my last playing the doctor.”

Speculation now turns to who will play the eleventh incarnation of the Doctor. With the 2008 Christmas special named ‘The Next Doctor‘, it is possible that we may not have long to wait until we get some clues. Check out the trailer for ‘The Next Doctor‘ here.

I’ve got to say, Tennant is probably my 2nd favorite Doctor (next to the Legendary Tom Baker), I’m gonna miss him, its going to be neat to see who they get next… New Writer, New Doctor, heres to hoping it doesn’t mess with the chemistry too much.

Congratulations!

You have been selected to join us in closed beta! Your recent
participation in our Friends and Family stress test has earned you a
spot in our next phase of development. We would like you to try
Stargate Worlds again and see all the new content that you did not see
in the Friends and Family phase. Please return to us and be active in
our beta community once more. You will see a lot of changes within
Stargate Worlds over the next months. We hope that you will continue to
be active in our community and further experience and explore Stargate
Worlds.

Closed beta is a significant release of content
into Stargate Worlds. You can now play as a member of the Stargate
Union and travel to many new worlds. This is the start of closed beta,
therefore new content will constantly be updated. We will be providing
you with information about upcoming patches, as well as Event Night
information. Check the beta forums and your e-mail often!

Here’s a formula for fun: Arm two superpowers to the teeth with thousands of nuclear warheads. Make sure they are deeply hostile and suspicious of each other. Now, cut off diplomatic communication, stir in about 50 smaller countries with their own agendas on each side, and–voilà!–you’ve got yourself a cold war!

1. Suez Crisis

On November 5, 1956, during the Suez crisis, the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) received warnings that seemed to indicate that a large-scale Soviet attack was under way: a Soviet fleet was moving from the Black Sea to a more aggressive posture in the Aegean, 100 Soviet MiGs were detected flying over Syria, a British bomber had just been shot down in Syria, and unidentified aircraft were in flight over Turkey, causing the Turkish air force to go on high alert. All signs pointed to the ominous, except that, not long after, each of the four warnings was found to have a completely innocent explanation. The Soviet fleet was conducting routine exercises, the MiGs were part of a normal escort–whose size had been exaggerated–for the president of Syria, the British bomber had made an emergency landing after mechanical problems, and, last but not least, the unidentified planes over Turkey? Well, they turned out to be a large flock of swans.

2. SAC-NORAD Communication Failure

On November 24, 1961, all communication links between the U.S. Strategic Air Command (SAC) and NORAD suddenly went dead, cutting off the SAC from three early warning radar stations in England, Greenland, and Alaska. The communication breakdown made no sense, though. After all, a widespread, total failure of all communication circuits was considered impossible, because the network included so many redundant systems that it should have been failsafe. The only alternative explanation was that a full-scale Soviet nuclear first strike had occurred. As a result, all SAC bases were put on alert, and B-52 bomber crews warmed up their engines and moved their planes onto runways, awaiting orders to counterattack the Soviet Union with nuclear weapons. Luckily, those orders were never given. It was discovered that the circuits were not in fact redundant because they all ran through one relay station in Colorado, where a single motor had overheated and caused the entire system to fail.

3. U2 Spy Plane Accidentally Violates Soviet Airspace

U2 spy planes were high-altitude aircraft that took pictures of the Soviet Union with extremely powerful long-distance telephoto lenses. During the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962, U2 pilots were ordered not to fly within 100 miles of the Soviet Union to avoid antagonizing the Soviets. However, on October 26, 1962, a U2 pilot flying over the North Pole made a series of navigational errors because the shifting lights of the Aurora Borealis prevented him from taking accurate readings with his sextant. As a result, he ended up flying over the Chukotski Peninsula in northern Siberia, causing the Soviets to order a number of MiG interceptors to shoot his plane down immediately. Instead of letting him be shot down, however, the United States responded quickly by sending out F-102A fighters armed with nuclear missiles to escort the U2 back to American airspace and prevent the MiGs from following it. Unbelievably, the tactic worked. Even more amazing: the decision whether to use their nuclear missiles was left to the American pilots, and could have easily resulted in a nuclear conflict.

4. When Camping, Make Sure to Hide Your Nuclear Weapons

On October 25, 1962, again during the Cuban Missile Crisis, a security guard at an air base in Duluth, Minnesota, saw a shadowy figure scaling one of the fences enclosing the base. He shot at the intruder and activated an intruder alarm, automatically setting off intruder alarms at neighboring bases. However, at the Volk Field air base in Wisconsin, the Klaxon loudspeaker had been wired incorrectly, and instead sounded an alarm ordering F-106A interceptors armed with nuclear missiles to take off. The pilots assumed that a full-scale nuclear conflict with the Soviet Union had begun. The planes were about to take off when a car from the air traffic control tower raced down the tarmac and signaled the planes to stop. The intruder in Duluth had finally been identified: it was a bear.

5. A Terrifying Crash

On January 21, 1968, fire broke out on a B-52 carrying a nuclear payload near Greenland, forcing the crew to bail out. The unmanned plane then crashed about seven miles from the early warning radar station in Greenland. The damage done could have been remarkable. The plane exploded, as did the explosives surrounding the radioactive core of the nuclear weapons (which require conventional explosives to detonate). Given the state of nuclear weapons technology at the time, this type of unintentional detonation of conventional first-stage explosives could have theoretically triggered the second-stage fission reaction, resulting in a nuclear explosion. Luckily for the world, it didn’t. The resulting explosion would have not only severed regular communications between the early warning station and NORAD, it would have also triggered an emergency alarm based on radiation readings taken by sensors near the station. The only conclusion at NORAD headquarters, in this grisly hypothetical but very plausible scenario, would have been that the Soviets were launching a preemptive nuclear strike, and the United States would have responded in kind.

6. Comp Fear

On November 9, 1979, four command centers for the U.S. nuclear arsenal received data on their radar screens indicating that the Soviet Union had launched a full-scale nuclear first strike on the United States. Over the next six minutes, planes were launched and nuclear missiles initialized for an immediate retaliatory strike. The president’s National Emergency Airborne Command Post–an armored jumbo jet (pictured) with radiation shielding and advanced communications capabilities, meant to allow the president to remain in contact with the government and armed forces during a nuclear war–was also launched, though curiously without the president aboard. However, the alarm was canceled because no sensors or satellites detected an actual Soviet missile launch. The alarm had been caused by computer software used for training exercises depicting a nightmare scenario Soviet first strike. Senator Charles Percy, who happened to be at NORAD headquarters during this event, said the reaction was one of overwhelming panic and terror. Justifiably so.

7. Comp Fear, Part 2

Electronic displays at NORAD, the SAC, and the Pentagon included prominent, highly visible numeric counters showing the number of enemy nuclear missiles detected. They normally displayed four zeros–“0000”–indicating that no nuclear missiles had been launched. However, on June 3, 1980, at 2:25 in the morning, the counters started randomly substituting the number “2” for “0.” As a result, crews manning bombers carrying nuclear weapons were ordered to begin to warm up their engines, Minuteman missiles were initialized for launch, and airborne command posts were also launched. It was determined that this
first event was a false alarm, but three days later it happened a second time–causing the entire emergency response procedure to start rolling once again. The problem was eventually traced back to a single faulty computer chip combined with faulty wiring.

8. WarGames!

Once more, a wise-guy teenager tries to prove he’s smarter than any
adult-and nearly destroys the whole world in the process-in WarGames.
Computer-game aficionado Matthew Broderick inadvertently taps into a
hush-hush Pentagon computer, then proceeds to inaugurate his favorite
game, “Global Thermonuclear War”. What we know, but Broderick doesn’t,
is that the Pentagon, hoping to eliminate the chancy “human element” in
the event of an actual war, has given its computer total, irreversible
control over the launching of nuclear weaponry. Broderick and
government official Dabney Coleman race against time to reverse the
computer’s resolve to send bombers to Russia.

Friday Flash Fun! It’s two great flavors that taste great together in White House Tower Defence!

The History Channel just aired a 2-hour program about the Dust Bowl in the 1930s in the central United States called Black Blizzard. 
What struck me most during the program was the description of a series
of massive storms that hit on April 14th, 1935 known as “Black
Sunday”.  The History Channel had computer recreations of what this
looked like.  Here is an image from the show (and the History Channel
website) showing one of the storms approaching.  Inside the car are a
reporter and photographer who, after stopping and taking pictures of
the approaching storm, are trying to outrun the storm.

During the show they also showed several real photographs of the storms of Black Sunday and doing a quick search on Wikipedia produced one spectacular photograph of a storm as it approached Spearman, Texas:

Here is another photograph of a storm as it approaches Stratford,
Texas.  This photo is perhaps even better than the one above as the
buildings are closer to the camera and give a better scale to the size
of the storm:

According to Rogers ‘s listing there is another showing of this
program on 10/25. It is definitely worth
watching. *cough* torrent *cough*

“She handed me the box and I studied it carefully, squinting, even
allowing my eyes to blur, to try and see what I was missing. She
pointed- ‘Do you see?’ See what? I didn’t see anything. Just broccoli.
Her finger tapped on a certain part of the box and she urged me to look
closer. ‘There- right there. Do you see it? I’m not going to tell you
what it is if you don’t see it.’ And then, it suddenly became clear to
me. WHAT THE HELL?”

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