Mike's List
Film Sampling: Threat Or Menace?

AUSTIN POWERS STAR Mike Myers and DreamWorks announced Friday that they plan to acquire the rights to existing films, then use computers to insert Myers into scenes from those movies for comic effect.

They call it "film sampling."

You'll hear a lot of annoying hysteria from critics about film sampling over the next couple of years, but I don't think it's necessarily bad, as long as the rights are legally purchased. (In fact I'm looking forward to the movie.)

Unlike the Ted Turner initiative in the 1980s of "colorizing" old black-and-white films, film sampling doesn't seek to replace or modify movies. The idea is to "borrow" from movies, and use a series of specific scenes as a kind of "holodeck" where Myers can interact with characters who admittedly never imagined they would one day play supporting actor to the creator of "Dr. Evil."

Film sampling is more akin to Woody Allen's 1966 movie "What's Up, Tiger Lily?", in which Allen dubbed his own absurd dialog into a Japanese spy movie, or those annoying "dead celebrity" commercials that featured John Wayne, Fred Astaire, Jackie Gleason, Art Carney, Lucille Ball and others.

Some movies -- especially Mike Myers comedies -- tend to be highly referential and derivative. Film sampling is just a way for Myers to be totally referential and perfectly derivative.

Nobody will confuse the real thing with the fake.

On the contrary, such high-visibility computer-generated illusions are probably the most effective way to boost public skepticism about video and film by demonstrating how successfully you can lie with film and computers.

Film sampling: threat or menace? Let's hear YOUR take: [email protected] 

Japanese Take Miniaturization to New Extreme

Japanese toy maker Takara plans to offer a new 1950's style doll house ($166) with a fully functional 1.5-inch TV. The controls for the tiny TV will be full size and mounted on the front of the doll house. Despite the vintage decor, the mini-TVs will reportedly be able to record video and serve as game consoles. (Japanese readers: If you get your hands on a picture of this product, please send it in!)

The Perfect Lawnmower

The German company Wolf-Garten has created a concept lawnmower called the Zero Lawn Tractor that defies belief. It's an environmentally friendly street legal (based on the European Smart Car) two-seater that uses laser beams to cut, shred and dry the grass. Because it uses a "catalytic afterburning" engine and laser beams, it's almost silent. The grass is instantly zapped into a dry powder and sprinkled on the lawn as mulch. Oh, and it has a wireless Internet connection on the dashboard. The lawnmower was designed by Cognito Design and Engineering and was unveiled at the International Gardening Fair in Cologne and GLEE in the UK. The company has not announced whether it will go into production with the product.

Like Handing Out Fur Coats at a Peta Convention

Presenters and performers at Sunday's Grammy Awards will each be given a bag full of gifts that includes a 20-gigabyte iPod MP3 player (worth $500) -- even though the music industry is trying to shut down MP3 sharing worldwide.  

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Proof You Can Buy Anything on the Web

For the price of an inexpensive house, you can buy your own 60-foot wide satellite tracking dish featuring "full azimuth and elevation rotation" and complete with 1000-square-foot underground control room. Imagine the TV reception...

Mike's List on the Radio

Craig Crossman's Computer America features Mike Elgan every Thursday night. The show runs from 7pm to 9pm SVT (Silicon Valley Time). Listen to Computer America on your local Business TalkRadio station or over the Internet every weeknight. Don't miss Computer America!

Twisted Game

Hungry Spiders

Gotta-Get-It Gadget

Interactive Imaging Systems has created monitor glasses for viewing your Pocket PC screen on a large virtual display. The ultralight (40 grams) M1110 is readable in darkness or bright light. It connects to any PDA or laptop CompactFlash or PCMCIA slot, providing full 640x480 resolution zapped directly into your retina. The focus is ajustable, so if you wear glasses you can adjust the display system to match your own eyesight. The M1110 sucks power from your device, so no additional batteries are required. You see a large screen floating in space, but other's can't see what you see, so it's perfect for cheating on tests. 

Wacky Web Sites

Let's face it: The Oscars are tired. Who can stand to sit through four more hours of self-congratulatory bull$#@! by Hollywood's pathologically self-absorbed airheads? Here's the internet's antidote: The Alties! Vote for your favorites in categories like the "Guilty Pleasure Award," the ever popular "Best 'Feel Bad' Movie" of the year and of course the coveted "Reinvention of the Chick Flick" award.

Don't get enough unsolicited e-mail advertising? Spam You Silly to the rescue. After signing up with Spam You Silly, you'll start receiving hundreds of spam e-mails per day. (Note, I don't know if this site is real or a hoax, but I've signed up and haven't yet received any additional spam. It's still wacky..)

You're about to buy some expensive gadget from a random stranger on eBay. But how do you know if they suck? Where else but eBayersThatSuck.com

Now you can be a bad DJ from the 70s.

Building your own submarine at home? You're not alone.

Googlism digs into Google's database and tells you about anything you enter. Here's what Googlism thinks of Mike's List.

And now for sometime completely mindless: a virtual kalaidascope.

Last Week's Mystery Pic

No, it's not "Sim City 4000," "Saddam Hussein's secret hideout" or even "plans for Michael Jackson's newest Neverland amusement park" as suggested by some readers. It's an artist's conceptual drawing of a future "Cyber City" in Mauritius, an island country in the Indian Ocean east of Madagascar. The city will serve as an international data center for web hosting, e-commerce and financial transactions -- an African Bangalore. The city will be connected to the internet via satellite and fiber-optics. A 12-story tower should be built within a year, and the rest of the city is planned for construction after that. Most of the workers building infrastructure have been shipped in from India. Congratulations to Ian Jones from Bristol, UK, for being first with the right answer.

Mystery Pic o' the Week

What is it? Send YOUR guess to [email protected] (be sure to say where you live). If you're first with the right answer, I'll print your name in the next issue of Mike's List!

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