CrankyRants.com

How do you get a spider in the mood? Pour some wine, drop the needle on a scratchy Barry White album, and un-dim the ultraviolet lights. Ohhh yeah, baby. Just like the human species crica 1978… nothing sets the scene like the back of a van with shag carpet, avacado-green bean-bag chairs, and Jimi Hendrix posters glowing in beautiful black-lights.

Same for spiders, though instead of glowing guitars and unicorns… it’s their face that glows in ultraviolet light. And the ladies? Oh yeah… they swoon. Big time.

Apparently both male and female jumping spiders, Cosmophasis umbratica, have markings on their faces and legs that glow in ultraviolet light, researchers led by Daiqin Li at the National University of Singapore reported, before carefully coming down from their chairs and lab tables… trying their best to stifle a quiet, “eww… spiders.”

Many animals possess UV vision and use it for foraging, navigation and sexual selection, Li explained. Jumping spiders are known to have good eyesight, he said, adding that many of these spiders are colorful, with the males generally more colorful than females.

So if you happen to know of someone who is a little put-off by the creepy-crawly critters, now you know what to get them for your next gift exchange. Natural, wholesome ultraviolet lights for their basement. “Helps kill mold!,” you might explain.
 

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For quite some time now, women have chosen to engage in an activity that continues to severely confuse me.  High-end, fashionable, designer handbags exist in this world for the sole purposes of aiding a woman in feeling classy, powerful and almost euphoric.  The perfect handbag can take a look to an entirely different level, resulting in observers believing that you are on a fashion plateau that is all your own and that is simply unattainable.  This is the very reason that I cannot process why, with the existence of such exquisite handy work available, women choose to purchase bags that are such horrific and obvious imposters in the efforts of appearing fashionable. Financial concerns can get in the way at times, but if you’re going to show off your new feathers, better make sure they’re not painted on.

These days, one can find imposter designer handbags just about anywhere.  All over the world, women proudly adorn their shoulders with them as if other women are too unintelligent see the difference between high-end and complete hideousness.  The ways in which a woman can attain such a bag are endless; from their local malls, to the internet, to individuals selling them on the street and even from such a thing called a “purse party.” Like Tupperware. But with purses. These are gatherings of women who get very excited about purses, and hop about in hopes of coming home with about three or four imposter bags.  I’ve actually seen a Prada imposter on the internet that was so terrible that the pathetic excuse for a designer bag actually bore the label Prado! Seriously. Advertised right next to a new Sorny DVD player and Freddie DeBauer wallet.

The thing that I really cannot get past, and refuse to, is that each of the imposter bags range in price from approximately $80.00 and upwards of $150.00.  With women snatching up these babies by the masses, they are spending more than enough to actually purchase one magnificent, first-rate specimen of a handbag that they could carry with much more pride.  I’d think it would make more sense to own one legitimate and beautiful designer bag than five imposters. But then, I’ve been known to wear black socks with shorts in the summer, so I’m probably not the best fashion plate to follow.

As a way of thanking their many loyal customers for choosing the XBOX360 over the less-available systems during the holiday season, Microsoft has decided to give a gift to each and every owner this new year. A large, gift-wrapped notice that their new Christmas toy is slow, defective, and officially obsolete.

That’s right… XBOX360 Version 2 is in the works and nearing production. Same game system… same games and controllers… but new processor that runs cooler than the original. It’s also rumored that the new version, codenamed Zypher, will have a larger hardrive and built-in HD DVD… most likely to compete with Sony’s PS3.

But the most welcomed new addition is support for true digital HD video. The current XBOX360 only supports outputs of RCA, S-Video, Component, or VGA… all of which are still analog-based forms of video. They provide excellent image quality… but the new version will have native support for HDMI, which combines digital audio and video into the same cable, and is common on most HD TV’s.

One can’t help but wonder if this was Microsoft’s plan all along. Throw out what we can to get a jump on Sony… then fix everything after the Holidays. Screw our existing customer base, they’ll get over it. We’re Microsoft! When we tell them to get over it… they will. Because we’re Microsoft, dammit!

Well, Bill? Enjoy you new extra notch up the “Evil Company” ladder. More to come, I’m sure.

If you’re not a sports fan or a coach hater… all that’s left for you to do is start a gambling site. Of course, gambling is illegal throughout most of the country, and online-gambling is being restricted more and more each year. So If you’re going to start one, here’s a few tips.

1. Move to Malaysia. International gambling sites are still cool with the Feds for some reason, and you’ll have access to all of the Malaria you can carry.
2. Run it out of your basement and hire some guys named after things. “Johnny Carburetor” or “Donny Two Ears” or “Jimmy The Fuzzy Ducky Gorbano” or whatever. Makes you feel like your site has a real mob connection.
3. Take the time to get your site a real mob connection. Why fake it when you can do what the pros do. Don’t know much about it myself, but as far as I can tell you gain instant access to plenty of financial and labor-related resources with practically no strings attached, apparently.

Finally, if you don’t want to actually dabble in the illegal and limb-bending world of organized crime… just go for the perfectly legal and legitimate arena of handicapping. You can make whatever predictions you want, charge people to listen to a poorly recorded mp3 of you giving them, and claim each week that you hit 12 out of 14 picks… and no one’s there to correct you because it’s for member’s only. What a deal! Plus you get to use cool phrases like “triple-stunner cast-iron lock of the century” every week.

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More prominent than the hater sites, nothing pumps more rich creamy worthless sporting news-pulp through the GAFT like a manaical sports nut with an FTP account. Now that anyone can get a website for $3.95 with free ad-infested hosting account and the goDaddy instant blog hack, those overweight rabid body-painting wack-jobs you see shrieking into the camera every weekend have moved indoors and online.

Fan sites nearly eclipse Lithuanian Granny Porn and mySpace Template sites in number these days, and most of the content is about as useful. Sites like RaiderNation.com, ColtsDrive.com, and SteelersFever.com take the whole notion of “Our Team Doesn’t Stink Nearly As Bad As Your Team” to a new level.

Here’s what’s fun about these sites. Pick any one of them at random, settle into a nice comfy chair, and post a note or comment about how their team is pretty good, but “plays a little too soft to compete with the elite teams.” Now lean back and watch the fireworks.

The entertainment value of the average fan site completely revolves around the insults and mud-slinging rage that most rabid fans will blindly dive into when anyone even remotely suggests that anyone on their team is anything less than a direct descendant of the holy union between Thor and Hillary Swank. So massive is the machismo-lust that a fan-site member would rather take the Nestea plunge into an inflatable pool of boiling Gatorade than accept that maybe the players on their team might have lost their recent game because they were tired, hurt, or looking forward to a quiet afternoon in bed.

So before you sign up and fire off some tasty posts, make a checklist of the following words and phrases.

“Soft on defense.”
“They’re a Finesse Team.”
“Can’t win a game when it counts.”
“Crumble under the pressure.”
And my true favorite: “Would probably have won more games if they would just suck less.”

Remember, post often… and post responsibly. And never give your real name. These guys own guns.

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At any given moment, there is exactly one sports site for every individual sports fan in the world. That’s how many there are. Like the sentinals in the Matrix, one to one is the most efficient way to keep us all hooked into the Global Athletic Feeding Tube, or GAFT as it’s known in the addict community. The GAFT can include team sites, fantasy sites, gambling sites, and even hater sites that promote the firing of coaches before they’ve even been hired. Indiana University still had Bob Knight shaped ass-groves on the sideline bench when Mike Davis got his own “Fire Him” site. And Davis was still coaching the team down the tubes when FireCoachSampson.com got thrown into the ring to bash Kelvin Sampson. Good job. Bad job. No job yet… doesn’t matter. Web prospectors are always thinking, especially in the turmoil of the sports world.

We’ll talk about the other types of sports sites down the road, but the hater sites are the most interesting because they essentially strive to put themselves out of business. The goal of sites like the one above is to raise the ire of fans so high that the coach gets fired. Thus the domain name. But once that happens… there goes your traffic. Everyone is happy the coach is gone… and happy people don’t post nearly as much as pissed off people do.

So the life cycle of the typical hater site, at least the Coach hater site, goes like this: Domain is regged when the poor guy is still some assistant somewhere and doesn’t even have the job yet. Gets the job, site owner dances like he hit the $20 scratch and win lottery, and a new site is birthed into the world. Coach sucks or succeeds, people flock to the site to grip and complain, traffic goes up bringing more complaining from fans and haters alike.

Finally, the coach leaves one way or another… and the site owner tries desperately to offload the whole thing to someone willing to follow the coach around.

Quality web content? You bet! And the sad thing is… a lot of people make a lot of money and traffic from it. Thanks… to the GAFT. Next up, true fan sites.

“Hey, Kids. Drugs aren’t cool.”  

The Bush administration is taking its fight against illegal drugs to YouTube, the trendy Internet video service that already features clips of wacky, drug-induced behavior and step-by-step instructions for growing marijuana plants.

The decision to distribute anti-drug, public service announcements and other videos over YouTube represents the first concerted effort by the U.S. government to influence customers of the popular service, which shows more than 100 million videos per day.

If just one teen sees this and decides illegal drug use is not the path for them, it will be a success,” said Rafael Lemaitre, a spokesman for the drug office.

Um…. I guess that’s possible. More likely, however, is that kids will stumble across the videos while looking for the singing dog video, laugh at how stupidly out of touch the makers of the video are, then go light one up so the singing dog looks like it’s actually in the same room with them.

Nice work, government. Way to connect with today’s youth. No doubt they’ll find it really “groovy”, daddio.

Exactly how many variations can you make on a digital camera. Point. Click. Shoot. That’s all you need, right? Not according to the fine folks at Sony, Canon, and Nikon.

I spent the better part of last week trying to find a new camera. My Sony DSC P100, only 3 years old and top of the line at the time… died. Doesn’t open, gives an error, doesn’t work. Of course, Sony will fix it for me. Starting price is $180 plus shipping. That’s the exact retail price of their latest camera.

Thanks Sony. Not making me feel very “Welcome to The World of Sony.”

During my search I’ve found that the digital camera market has changed quite a bit in the last 3 years. If you’ve been away from it for awhile as I had, I’ll sum up the current state for you. Think Barbie. Here’s a Barbie with a new hat! Here’s another with different shoes! Wow! Here’s a third with that new hat AND those new shoes!

Each manufacturer has no less than 12 active variations on the point and shoot camera alone.

Just yesterday, Canon introduced four new point-and-shoot cameras plus three Digital Elphs, along with updated versions of their G-series cameras.

And Sony has released even more Cybershot cameras with the DSC S500… not 6 months after releasing an S600. They’re both practically the same price. Same features. What the hell? How do you release a new camera with a model number that’s LOWER than an older camera. How are we supposed to know which is better? Reviews don’t do any good, they’re releasing so many cameras now, your average digital camera review site can’t keep up with them!

The model number thing really trips my trigger, though. Take a look at the Nikon Coolpix P4. Nice little 8 megapixel point and shoot. So nice in fact that Nikon released another camera identical in every single way… but they added wi-fi access to your computer for wireless picture transfers and printing. Neat. The upgraded camera costs an extra $40 for this new feature. Can you guess what the upgrade to the Coolpix P4 is? You got it! It’s the Coolpix P3!

I’ve decided to protest the whole lot by taking a notepad and pencil to the next family outing. Screw the digital camera companies and their over-saturation tactics. I’ll just have everyone stand together for a group sketch. I can colorize it later with photoshop.

Dust off your video scripts… CBS has a few hundred million bucks burning a whole in their pinstriped pockets… and they’re on the prowl.

CBS Corp has announced that they are interested in spotting the next big phenomenon in user-generated programming over the Internet, not buying market leader YouTube, Chief Executive Leslie Moonves said on Thursday.

“It is obviously phenomenally successful,” Moonves said of YouTube. “I doubt we would buy it at this point. Maybe we would look for the next YouTube, the next great idea that’s not spread across the world.”

So think you’ve got the next big MyTubeSpaceBook and thinking about retirement? Give them a call. Just remember to remove those downloadable episodes of Survivor before taking them on the tour of your site. Never know what might set those corporate types off.

So much for your new life.

Second Life, the fast-growing online site where hundreds of thousands of people play out fantasy lives online, has suffered a computer security breach that exposed the real-world personal data of its users.

Linden Lab, the San Francisco-based company behind the Second Life site, said in a letter to its 650,000 users this weekend that its customer database, including names, addresses, passwords and some credit card data, had been compromised.

This story would be a little more tragic if it weren’t for the buckets of irony pouring out the sides. Think of the John Carpenter flick “They Live!”. In a flash, that hip young coffee house waitress from Boston that you’ve been “seeing a lot of” in your new little fantasy world turns out to be a 42 year old maintenance man from Newark. How’s that conversation going to go?

“So… listen. We can still be friends, right? We kind of had a special thing going there, didn’t we?”

Coulda been worse, I suppose. The information could have included photos. That’s why I always pad my information in a plausible way. “Sure I have a regular job. I’m just an average joe. Most of my international crime syndicate investigations happen at night and on weekends. Makes it easier to go unseen in the larger crowds… since, as you can see from my photo, I look too much like Matthew McConnahe to typically go unnoticed.”