Google Says It Didn’t Kill a Donkey with a Street View Car in Botswana

Sometimes truth really is stranger than fiction. We’ve seen some odd photos turn up on Google Street view over the years. My personal favorite was the little girl who played dead on the side of the road as the Street View car rolled by. A donkey has now played a very similar game with a Street View car in Botswana.

street view donkey

To make this an even stranger story, it started to go viral after a tweet from the account of fictional character Dr. Sheldon Cooper saying that “I think Google Street view ran over a donkey in Botswana.” The story gained enough traction the Google has had to come out and offer up an official explanation of the circumstances surrounding the downed donkey.

Google says that because of the way its 360-degree imagery is put together it appeared as though it’s Street View car cruising down a dirt road in Botswana had run over the poor creature. Google says that in fact the donkey was laying down and taking a dirt bath as the car approached, and then stood up and moved to the side of the road as the vehicle drove by.

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Having known someone who rear-ended a cow, and assuming running over a donkey would work basically the same way as running over a cow, I can say without a doubt that there would have been donkey poo all over the front of the Street View car had an impact actually taken place. If you’re curious, the rear-ended cow survived with nothing more than an significantly cleaner colon after the impact. Sadly, the same can’t be said for the vehicle.

[via TheNextWeb]

The PC Briefcasemod: Desktop Luggable

Redditor yoshiwars wanted a portable gaming machine but he didn’t want to spend a fortune on a high-end laptop. So he stuffed a desktop computer’s parts into a briefcase. Looking at it, you wouldn’t mistake it for anything else. But I think the mouse pad balances out the junkyard chic.

briefcase computer by yoshiwars

Inside the briefcase is a 15″monitor, a Gigabyte motherboard, a Core i5 2500K CPU, 16GB RAM, an XFX Radeon HD 6670 and two solid state drives. One drive has a 30GB capacity and holds yoshiwars’ Windows 7 setup and the other is a 90GB drive that runs Mountain Lion. That’s right; as if a briefcase computer wasn’t impressive enough, yoshiwars also made it a dual-booting Hackintosh.

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You know yoshiwars, if all you wanted was to play Uplink, you could’ve gotten an iPad. Seriously though good job. With the mouse pad.

[via Reddit via Computerworld]

Woman Posts a Half-Naked Pic on eBay: This is Why You Check Your Images Before Uploading

Like most people who have something they don’t need anymore, Aimi Jones decided to put a yellow skater dress she had up for auction on eBay. She didn’t bother to check the pictures she took of the dress until after she posted the listing – and that’s when she spotted her humiliating mistake.

ebay auction yellow dressIn one of the listing’s photos, Aimi can clearly be seen in the reflection of her mirror, taking a picture of the dress wherein she was wearing nothing more than a bra. In other words, she was buck naked from the waist down. She quickly ended the listing, but it was still up and viewable online.

Sure enough, some eagle-eyed shoppers spotted Aimi’s listing and the rest is history: it went viral. eBay has since taken down the listing and sellers worldwide have learned an important lesson from this – always check your images before uploading them. You’ll never be able to hit the “undo” key on the entire internet.

Here’s Aimi with her infamous yellow dress, fully-clothed now.

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[via Gawker]

Lomography Smartphone Film Scanner Hits Kickstarter

My mother has boxes of old 35mm film from my youth tucked away in closets and the attic. Most of those pictures we have probably never looked at because the prints were lost long ago. If you have a bunch of old 35mm film around, a new product is on Kickstarter which will help you get these images into your smartphone in digital form.

lomo film scanner

The Lomography Smartphone Film Scanner is a device which lets you feed through 35mm film through and a backlight. That backlight makes the images glow and then you use a smartphone, such as the iPhone and an app to take a digital photo of the 35mm film. The film scanner works with any 35mm film and also works with 35mm analog movie film. It’s also a perfect companion to the LomoKino 35mm moviemaker.

The film scanner is relatively inexpensive, and at this point a pledge of $60(USD) or more will get you one of the first of the devices manufactured. For around $100, you can get a bundle which includes both the scanner and a cheap 35mm camera. The project was seeking $50,000 and so far has raised over $99,000 with 18 days to go. The expected delivery date is March of 2013.

Disney Promote Wreck-It Ralph in London with 8-bit Lane

Wreck-It Ralph has been released in a lot of places worldwide, my country of residence included, and I really found it entertaining and enjoyable. If you like video games at the very least and played a couple of games when they were still all pixelly and in 8-bit form, then chances are you’ll like the movie, too.

The film doesn’t come out in the UK until February 8, 2013, so Disney is going the extra mile – or is it the extra lane? – to promote the movie by setting up 8-bit Lane in London.

8Bit LondonIt’s basically a street art exhibit where, if you look closely, you’ll spot a few things that aren’t as they should be. For example, water flowing out of a pipe looks suspiciously pixelated. Two pigeons on a pipe also get treated to some 8-bit action.

All of the sculptures on 8-bit Lane were created by Aden Hynes, who is Disney’s film production sculptor. Check out more of the exhibit in the gallery below.

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Photos taken by Michael Reeve.

[via it8bit via Laughing Squid]

Star Wars AT-ST Trophy Heads Fit for a Rebel’s Man Cave

Last week we saw mockups featuring taxidermy heads of Star Wars creatures. These AT-ST trophy heads on the other hand are real. Well, they’re not real real, but realer than the Photoshopped images. I’m not saying the images don’t exist, but dammit you know what I mean.

star wars at at trophy head by trilda

The trophy heads were made by YouTuber Trilda from Star Wars toys that he bought on eBay. He made two AT-ST heads, one from the Battle of Hoth and one from the pivotal battle at Endor.

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You can check out larger images of the trophy heads on Trilda’s website (they’re under the Vintage Taxidermy link); head to his YouTube channel for videos. He says in the description of his videos that he’s willing to sell his creations, but I’m not sure if they’re still available and for how much.

[via Obvious Winner]

The Cave Release Date Announced

If you pay attention to all the game announcements made at E3 each year, you may remember the cool looking adventure game from SEGA and Double Fine Productions called The Cave. Now that we’re all burnt out on our holiday game purchases, we could use another good game early in 2013. Thankfully, you won’t have to wait long to play this one, from the guys behind the classic Psychonauts.

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In the highly-stylized, side-scrolling adventure game, players will choose three uniquely-skilled characters from seven available and then descend into a cave to explore. During their journey, players will find an underground amusement park, a medieval castle, and even a nuclear missile.

SEGA has announced that The Cave will be available on January 22 for PlayStation gamers via the PlayStation Network and on the Nintendo Wii U the same day. Xbox 360 gamers and PC gamers will have to wait one day extra for the game’s release on January 23. PC gamers will be able to get the game via Steam. The Cave will cost $14.99(USD) or 1200 Microsoft points.

Amazing BMO Adventure Time Birthday Cake Has a Colorful Surprise on the Inside

The multifunctional BMO crosses over with Nyan Cat in this spectacular birthday cake that was baked for somebody named Pen. I’m sure those who were were in attendance at Pen’s birthday party had an awesome time that was made even more awesome, thanks to the mere presence of this fantabulous, multi-layered and multi-colored cake.

Adventure Time CakeThe image was posted on Reddit, where users were quick to analyze how the BMO cake was made.

In case you were wondering yourself, here’s how, according to user static80085:

  1. Separate the batters out and individually dye them with food colouring like so.
  2. Prepare 6 shallow, square cake pans (size is dependent on your cake size).
  3. For each cake pan, pour all of the colors in the color scheme you’d like at the middle of the cake pan (e.g. pour the red in first, then the yellow, then the green, etc.). Example would be here.
  4. Bake and assemble!

This cake is just pure win.

[via Obvious Winner]

Leap Sensor Virtual Harp: Heavenly Tech

Early demos of the much-awaited Leap motion sensor mostly showed how it can be used to control graphics programs, browsers and video games. But the motion sensor can also be used to make an audio program, as shown by software developer Adam Somers with his AirHarp demo.

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Proof of the responsiveness and accuracy of the Leap, AirHarp can recognize the speed and position at which a string is hit.

Adam has a fantastic sound system. Head to his website to download AirHarp, and to Leap Motion’s site to pre-order the Leap for just $69.95(USD).

[via Smarter Planet]

Sir Hammerlock’s Big Game Hunt DLC Launches for Borderlands 2

If you’re a big fan of the cooperative shooter Borderlands 2, you will be thrilled to hear that as of today the latest add-on campaign content is available to download. The new campaign is called Sir Hammerlock’s Big Game Hunt. The content will be available at no cost to gamers who purchased the Borderlands 2 Season Pass.

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The new campaign takes place in Aegrus, which is uncharted territory deep in the swamps of Pandora. Players will meet up with familiar characters from the game including Sir Hammerlock and Claptrap, and will also meet up with new enemies including Hyperion Scientist Professor Nakayama who tries to disrupt the hunting trip.

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The DLC will explore new environments of The Sun Swamps on a quest to find new loot and defeat new bosses. Other new enemies players will encounter include the spider-like Two-Legged Drifters, flying Slagged Spores, and insane Vampire Witch Doctors. That last enemy can unleash swarms of bats that will attack the player. Yeesh.

The Borderlands 2 season pass is available for $29.99(USD) or 2400 Microsoft points. The new add-on campaign content is available for gamers playing on the Xbox 360, PS3, or PC. To buy this add-on campaign alone will cost you $9.99 or 800 Microsoft points.