I'd say this ad's going for the market of the middle-managerial types who remember the days when Seinfeld was at his best. It's like the WoW adverts with Shatner and Mr T - they're going for a more mundane audience than the "cool, arty types" aimed at by Mac.

As others have said, it does a good job of humanising Gates, but more specifically, it makes him come across as "one of the guys at the golf course" or whatever. That would appeal to the "old, boring, and know it" market.

I say it's quite cleverly done - this just isn't the target audience.

What the fuck. That is all.

While the art is nice, that horrible use of flash makes it impossible to see the top and bottom bits of the taller images without an unusually high-resolution monitor. Grr.

http://i66.photobucket.com/albums/h256/Calatar/religion.gif

left: Orc
right: Elf

amirite?

1) RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGE
2) NYTimes is still living in the 20th century and thinks I'll register to read an article -- you might want to replace that link with a different source. Until then, Bugmenot for the win!

hmm. Lulu registered to make post #3. I think that just set off my Astroturf Alarm.

#4 Evil Jim, THC may not save lives per se, but it sure can dramatically improve the quality of life for those with, say, Alzheimer's, multiple sclerosis, or arthritis.

So... yes, I'd say so.

(sources: the usual suspects)

Previously on BoingBoing: soon the animal cyborgs will rise up and overthrow their puny human masters.

Another bitten by region locking, here. Grr.

**applause**

Thanks, guys. You've restored my faith in the internet, for the time being at least.

It's down, but the NYUD mirror works for me.

All these comments about non-christians "acting christian" (or similarly, non-buddhists "acting buddist" or whatever) remind me of the idea of Christian Atheism. (Previously mentioned on boingboing.) Interesting stuff, IMO.

Oh, and re #69 - please don't feed the trolls, folks. :)

Damn. Dougie Adams, RA Wilson, and now ACC. All my favourite authors keep dying. :(

I can't believe they completely missed what's clearly the best switch of all:

the industrial machinery emergency stop switch

How could you say no to a 10cm-wide shiney red dome, that's expressly designed to be whacked in a hurry when you get your tie stuck in the woodchipper? They have a really satisfying "clunk" to them, too.

#58: people choose what to publicly "get upset about" not by what they deem the "most important" cause, but by where they think their actions will have the most positive effect.

There's already plenty of protesters getting bent out of shape regarding "We are at "war", PEOPLE ARE DYING"; that cause already has the journalistic spotlight, an extra few hundred protesters isn't going to make much more impact. But, up until Anonymous stepped in, there wasn't anyone protesting Scientology; each individual will be having a much greater effect on raising awareness about the cause.

Besides, it's a matter of opinion how worthwhile any protest is -- including those regarding the "war". I'm not going to get into off-topic ranting about the middle-east, but there's plenty of debate, and plenty of people who don't believe in the causes of any relevant protest. That those people are protesting some other cause they believe in is something worthy of applause, not derision, I say.

#43: As #39 said above, something's only worth protesting if your protests can actually make a difference. Getting an organisation's religion status revoked 'cos they do bad things is a damn slight easier than sorting out the midddle east.

Indeed, I've read a letter from an alledged Scientology insider which claimed that the CoS are scared sh^H^Hwitless over the protests. If that's the case, then at least Anon've made a difference to them, even if the CoS survives. =)

#23, #29: Ah, so first Scientology's not so bad after all, then Anon's tactics are bunk. The paranoid in me tells me you're a Scientologist trying to sow seeds of discontent.

Fortunately, I know to take anything my paranoid side comes up with with a pinch of salt, but it's enough to make me wonder.

#22, okay, I mis-took your comment to #15 as saying that you sided with "moron group a" rather than "moron group b", as it were.

Anonymous're newsworthy because they're doing something newsworthy. This scale of protest against Scientology is unprecedented; sounds like news to me.

I fail to see how uniting under a cause makes you a sheep. Sure, if you only march under a banner 'cos all the cool kids are doing it, that's sheepish, but if you follow a cause because you believe in it, that seems diametrically opposed to being a sheep to me.

Also, bear in mind that there's many cliques of "Anonymous"; the only unifying feature is that they tend to move in such circles as 4chan and Something Awful. They all have rather different ideas of what constitutes the "true Anonymous", too - sure, some branches like the absolute chaos thing, but the Scientology-protesting lot seem to consider themselves more of a "voice of the people" than a "face of chaos".

In other news, your sweeping generalisations ("they're just a bunch of kids and neckbeards with too much time on their hands") do you no favours.

#19: I think you may need to re-assess your priorities if you think trashing a MySpace page or raiding the Habbo Hotel pool is worse than infiltrating the government, forging bomb threats in your enemies' names, preying on the vulnerable and taking all their money, ...

shenanigans!

Don't restrict me, bro!

All together now:

awwwwwwwwwww

There's a more detailed biography here; I love that the Company adopted a picture of him as their badge. (There's another pic of the badge here.) - that's the sort of thing I'd quite like on a t-shirt or something, actually. Vaguely military look, who couldn't love an anthropomorphised bear, and there's even a decent story behind it! =]

#2 - the "A-Z" link between the back and forward buttons take you to an index.

"if he was agitated, it was probably because he got tired of being questioned"

Thank god, a bit of common sense from a police officer. That line was so refreshing to read.

Hoorj~!

I hate that blasted advert. Nice to see someone with a bit of clout have a go at it.

I think it's worth noting that, when they say "copper", they mean plutonium. Codenames an' all that. Apparently the Manhattan project people called the real stuff "honest-to-God copper".

#9 - that'd the same temporal rift in which the leader of the British Lib Dems hire Brian Eno to "advise them on youth issues".

I suspect the easiest way of having 4d pong would be to have two squares shown on-screen; given axes (w,x,y,z), have one square show the (w,x) positions of the bats and ball, and the other show the (y,z) positions.

You could also do something with the classic representation of a hypercube (as #18 suggested), but i think your users' heads would explode.

#28 - since when isn't it? Burden of proof, matey.

Regardless, searching, say, PubMed turns up many clinical trials on homoeopathy. From my quick rummage, they all find nothing statistically significant in terms of the effects of a homoeopathic "remedy" vs a placebo.

re #11, Coldplay also did a similar thing for the video for The Scientist: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V3Kd7IGPyeg

After he'd paid for the verse and would be thinking he owned it, you'd have to tell him no, it was your only card, you just wanted him to see the sentiment on it, it had cost you a nickel, so please mister could you have it back?

That old tactic's alive and well among Big Issue salesmen round these parts. Half of 'em, if they actually manage to sell you their crappy magazine, will try to beg the copy back off you(!)

I guess they figure anyone who'd buy the thing in the first place's more generous/gullible than the rest of the population, so more likely to fall for the trick. "Mate, that's my last copy, I need to sell it another three times so I can afford the three quid for the night shelter." <:(

So much for "working, not begging".

Wow, that's not bitter at all(!)

#6: "It may be accompanied by dozens of falsehoods, but is that really a problem?"

It is when one of those falsehoods is, say, "Iraq has WMDs", and this "evidence" is then used to justify an invasion. Or "these people are terrorists", and those people are abducted and similarly tortured based on the falsehoods. Sure, with ample manpower, all statements can be tested -- but ample manpower's one of those things you'll only find in your ideal world.