WE ARE EXPERIENCING TECHNICAL DIFFICULTIES


[dun-duh-nun-duh-nun dun-dun-nuh-dun-duh-nun-duh-nun…]

That’s 70s hold music. I think it’s Walk On The Wild Side. Which is kind of an odd selection for hold music.

Uh…

We don’t have the capability to stream it to you. Please use your imagination.

NO! NO! DON’T USE YOUR IMAGINATIONS!

Ah, crap. I should never have said that.

Well, look… let’s just… let’s just do this tomorrow, OK?

If you need a topic of discussion, please consider these:

– Phil Schiller: “Super keen” or “the bee’s knees”?

– Who’d win in a fight: former Apple exec Jean Louis Gassé or iPod division SVP Jon Rubinstein?

And let’s just go ahead and spot Rubinstein a sock full of nickels, just to make it sporting.

55 thoughts on “WE ARE EXPERIENCING TECHNICAL DIFFICULTIES”

  1. I think I’m the only one awake at this time. See I can write a long post without fear of being gazumpt. I may even read the article before I press post.

  2. I’m having technical difficulties.

    I can’t use my imagination.

    Sorry,

    It’s hanging outside to dry..

  3. Lets forget Jean Louis Gasse and Jon Rubinstein, how about Nancy Heinen, Carly Fiorina, bikinis a large inflatable paddling pool and some baked beans.

    Winner takes on Ann McLaughlin Korologos.

  4. THE SEXBOTS ARE COMING (ooh err)

    Sex and the single robot

    Jonathan Watts, East Asia correspondent

    Wednesday February 2, 2005

    The Guardian

    Scientists have made them walk and talk. There are even robots that can run. But a South Korean professor is poised to take their development several steps further, and give cybersex new meaning.

    Kim Jong-Hwan, the director of the ITRC-Intelligent Robot Research Centre, has developed a series of artificial chromosomes that, he says, will allow robots to feel lusty, and could eventually lead to them reproducing. He says the software, which will be installed in a robot within the next three months, will give the machines the ability to feel, reason and desire.

    Kim, a leading authority on technology and ethics of robotics, said: “Christians may not like it, but we must consider this the origin of an artificial species. Until now, most researchers in this field have focused only on the functionality of the machines, but we think in terms of the essence of the creatures.” That “essence” is a computer code, which determines a robot’s propensity to “feel” happy, sad, angry, sleepy, hungry or afraid. Kim says this software is modelled on human DNA, though equivalent to a single strand of genetic code rather than the complex double helix of a real chromosome.

    Kim said: “Robots will have their own personalities and emotion and – as films like I Robot warn – that could be very dangerous for humanity. If we can provide a robot with good – soft – chromosomes, they may not be such a threat.”

    Although he admits his ideas sound fantastic, Kim is no crank. In the mid-1990s, the professor launched the robot football world cup, which has since become one of the most popular means for robotics researchers to measure their progress against competitors from around the world.

  5. Gasse would kick Rubinstein’s ass! But only because he would fight way dirty…have you ever really smelled a European? I rest my case.

  6. Reporter to Mahatma Gandhi. “What do you think of western civilisation?” Mahatma Gandhi to reporter. “I think it would be a good idea.”

  7. Why has no-one made a pun of the name ‘Gasse’ yet, eh?

    Just what the *hell* is going on here?

  8. France has neither winter nor summer nor morals. Apart from these drawbacks it is a fine country. France has usually been governed by prostitutes.” – Mark Twain

    “I would rather have a German division in front of me than a French one behind me.” – General George S. Patton

    “We can stand here like the French, or we can do something about it.” – Marge Simpson

  9. Kim Jong-Hwan IS a crank. We don’t want sexbots to have sex with EACH OTHER! (Unless, I suppose, they are lesbian sexbots.)

    I mean, aren’t sexbots the dream of geeks who can’t find other humans to have sex with…er…wait a minute… that may be too harsh.

    On another topic, does any one else find John’s obsession with Phil Schiller a little creepy. I know some people would consider Schiller Apple’s Ballmer, and thus worthy of ridicule and laughter, but comparing Schiller to Ballmer is like comparing dustdevils to hurricanes.

    Hey Streetrabbit, people aren’t picking on “Europeans”, ( except for the crack about smell), Americans like English speaking foreigners. Its those foreigners that we can’t understand we don’t like. ( Actually, there are a lot of “English” speakers from England we can’t understand, but we find that quaint. )

  10. Damn Foreigner.

    It was really Urgent that I put my Foreigner music on my iPod and I was having a lot of trouble getting it to import right. It was like my computer was playing Head Games with me. Well That Was Yesterday. Today I thought I would try again and with all the trouble I’m still having it Feels Like the First Time that I did it. It is giving me such a headache that now I have Double Vision. Plus it is Cold as Ice in my office today so my hands are frozen while I’m trying to do this.

    Oh well I’ll try again when I get home, but I live such a Long, Long Way From Home that I’m going to get through all the music I currently have loaded before I get there tonight. I Can’t Wait until I get this working right. I Have Waited so Long for my iPod and now I’m Counting Every Minute until I get it working right. Oh well I’m going to fight Tooth and Nail to get it loaded tonight. Now little iPod I’m going to put you Back Where You Belong.

    This is all Foreigners fault.

  11. I Have Waited so Long for someone to ask me that. Yes I am available for parties, dances, & grand openings.

  12. Del:

    That’s one of the top 10 funniest CARS posts ever!

    (That may not be saying much, since most are just dumb, but it WAS funny!)

    I hope you’re not planning on going on a JOURNEY!

  13. Del that’s way too much AOR for one iPod, I know they’re not tamagotchi but you’ve still got to feed them right.

    If you’re going to put all that Foriegner on you can’t have any Toto or Styx and for God’s sake no REO Speedwagon!!!

  14. I just checked my iPod Streetrabbit and I have plenty of Toto, Styx & REO Speedwagon.

    Most of all I have plenty of Survivor.

  15. I’m sorry, but I’m going to have to step here and nix the Styx: Mr. Roboto? – access denied.

    This has all gone too far – it’s Revving On The Red Line, for christsakes.

    Oh shit…

  16. Del,

    Don’t Let Go of your dream. Women are not often Juke Box Heroes, but Do What You Like. The Modern Day has seen many women take non traditional roles and we are Waiting for a Girl Like You to crack the ranks of top DJs.

  17. Is the iPod streetrabbit the next big thing from Apple?

    “The new iPod streetrabbit: automatically rejects any AOR that may have found its way onto your hard drive, especially Toto, Styx, and REO Speedwagon”

  18. I can see no Reasons To Be Cheerful with the musical tastes around here. What A Waste of an iPod. Take a look at mine You’ll See Glimpses of tastefulness and you’ll say to yourself There Ain’t Half Been Some Clever Bastards.

    I can’t take anymore. Time for my medicine. I need some Sex And Drugs And Rock And Roll.

  19. We should give this new way of communicating a name like delspeak or songspeak or something. Throw some ideas up in the air, write them on paper, I don’t mind.

    BTW there are no songtitles in this post. Not intentional ones anyway

    …except the words air, paper and mind could be Talking Head songs, I don’t know.

  20. Hey, people have be looking for a game. How about Quess the Band/Artist? Each entrant posts a sentence/paragragh/(In Del’s case – story) using song titles. The rest of us can try to guess the band.

    I would suggest two rules:

    Rule One. No googling the song titles. Googling suspected bands to check titles is ok.

    Rule Two. iTunes is out of bounds. Even just searching by bands is too easy.

    We should probably agree about the minimum number of titles and whether or not they should be capitalized

    Here is a sample:

    IÂ’m Old so I CanÂ’t Run until I Learn to How to Fall without breaking a hip.

    Maybe this belongs in the Mage-post.

  21. Its all about you isnÂ’t Bellidancer. DonÂ’t start me up on wasted posts. All this drivel is like sewage going down a hole. We should be discussing hot stuff on the market for Macs. IÂ’m worried about you, Bellidancer. You used to be respectable. Now you just let it loose.

  22. Bellidancer! Bad dancer-of-jiggly-midriff!

    Did you just ‘Monica’ that little thing we were rolling with?

    Back off; ‘Monicaing things (or whatever the male equivalent . . . ‘Malcolming’?) is *my* preserve.

    I have a reputation to maintain.

    Tsch…

    And the worse thing is that in the last five hours I have gone through all my Steely Dan, then Foreigner, and am just starting on Toto.

    I can even feel Boston coming in to land in that crappy ‘spaceship’ of theirs.

    You bastards; and I thought you were my chums…

  23. Bellidancer your sample was too hard. It’s either Bon Jovi or Paul Simon and I had to cheat to get that far.

    The Kilo-Post could do with a bit of new life so maybe we play it there

    http://www.crazyapplerumors.com/archives/000359.html

    for those who’ve been neglecting it.

    And it would fit right in with the theme there at the moment (Lost discussion – starts here tonight. I’m so excited)

    I’d also like to say that I’m disappointed no one ran with my Nancy Heinen, Carly Fiorina and Ann McLaughlin Korologos idea. I think that had a lot of smut potential.

  24. You got it Streetrabbit, Paul Simon.

    Brother Mugga, I’m sorry if I trespassed. But don’t blame me for your hours of tortured listening. I’m not responsible for you music library.

    Streetrabbit, I think maybe the problem with your Nancy, Carly, and Ann idea is most people aren’t sure what they look like.

  25. But *someone* must be to blame for my music library.

    I mean . . . ‘Petra’, ‘Amy Grant’ . . . what was going on there?

    I don’t *remember* blanking out.

    Now . . . where was I…?

  26. Amy Grant NOOOOoooooo. Make it stop. Actually the only thing I have against Amy Grant are all the stupid lectures I had to hear in school about how we should no longer listen to her music because she “went secular” and sold out. Followed by rants of possessed by Satan…etc etc.

  27. Hah! See, that’s the joy of being a Brit; we get all that fraggle-eyed Christo-path stuff second hand.

    But ‘in school’ – oh my. You poor boy.

  28. There’s no doubt Gassee would win, and here’s why: his former CTO from Be Inc., Steve Sakoman, is head of the iPod Software Division. And Sakoman, although a very nice man, is quite large. The two of them would ambush Rubinstein, trounce him solidly, and start deploying BeOS from 2001 on iPods.

  29. Hang on . . . are there *girls* on this site!!?

    No-one said there were going to be girls on this site!

    What the hell’s going on?

    For verily where there are girls, there is the potential for *sin*?

    What about my soul?

    My eternal destiny?

    My restraining order…?

  30. restraining order? your not allowed to come near girls? Excelent … now I just need to get one put on some one more ….. local (evil grin)

  31. Brother Mugga just reading this site damns your soul to hell. On the plus side though reading this site also ensures the hell you go to does not have Windows. So really it can’t be that bad.

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