1. Improv Everywhere stages fake funeral prank on April 1st, fools thousands
2. CW 11 News reports prank as real, broadcasts IE’s video footage without permission
3. IE posts clip of CW 11′s news report on youtube, notes the shoddy journalism
4. CW 11 files copyright claim against IE

Read all about it on IE’s site.

I love this. Astronaut Don Pettit invented a coffee cup that works in null gravity. It’s so simple and inspiring, and the video is just plain fun.

I don’t understand how this design prevents sloshing, however. Maybe because it tapers toward the bottom?

From the Google Chrome terms of service:

By submitting, posting or displaying the content you give Google a perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, royalty-free, and non-exclusive license to reproduce, adapt, modify, translate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display and distribute any content which you submit, post or display on or through, the services. This license is for the sole purpose of enabling Google to display, distribute and promote the services and may be revoked for certain services as defined in the additional terms of those services.

This means I can never use Chrome to send email, upload images I created, or share documents without handing Google the rights to publicly display these things or appropriate my creative work for their own ends.

If I’m reading this correctly, then I can write a screenplay, email it to a friend using gmail and Chrome, and now Google has the right to shoot my movie.

How is this not a dealbreaker?

This College Humor video synchs The Dark Knight trailer with a trailer for Tim Burton’s Batman (1989). The results are impressive (though I’m not sure that’s an actual trailer from 1989)

Akoha, a startup working on a “new type of multiplayer online/offline social game”, has raised $1.9 Million in funding from angel investors. The company won’t release details about the exact nature of their game until this Fall, but they have stated that it was inspired by “elements of social entrepreneurship, massively multiplayer and reality-based games.” As far as we can tell, it will mix user-generated content with casual gaming elements, both online and in the real world (think geo-tagged photos taken on a cell phone). People will play for both fun and charity.

The Akoha site promises “meaningful play” “kuz karma’s contagious.” I’m looking forward to seeing how this shapes up. I just signed up for the beta, in fact.

A librarian friend recently told me that people in her field are talking about how Alternate Reality Gaming can benefit libraries. She was musing on how a local ARG could drive involvement for summer children’s programs.

With ARGs being designed for charity, making an impact at librarian conferences, and McDonald’s sponsoring an ARG which is not even branded McDonald’s (and this being reported in a NY Times article), it’s clear that ARGs have a mainstream appeal which has captured people’s imaginations.

What’s unclear is if they are financially viable as standalone ventures, and not as part of a marketing campaign for another product.

The New Museum is hosting a discussion about Improv Everywhere tonight (Friday) at 7:30.  I’m one of the panelists, along with Charlie Todd and Chad Nicholson. Scott Brown moderates.

More info at IE’s site or the New Museum’s site.

Improv Everywhere’s 7th annual No Pants subway ride.  This year we had 900 people in New York, and 2000 across the world.

Way to go, Judge Carlos Alberto Simoes.

This article says “it’s alleged EverQuest is harmful because players are asked to accept both ‘good’ and ‘bad’ quests, the psychological burden of which is said to cause problems.”