The ads about clever mobile phones abound these days. Download games to one, take pictures with another, play duck-duck-goose (or “gray duck” for our Minnesota audience), etc.

Amidst all this unisex marketing, Samsung has spotted an opening. What if they could release a phone that sported woman-friendly features such as:

• A calorie calculator!
• A “fatness index”!
• A “pink schedule” menstruation calendar!

I’m thinking there’s a reason the specifications aren’t found on the US site.

Hat tip to Ars Technica, where I discovered this. And isn’t the Internet cool? Without it, how would we see what they’re shilling in other countries?

Update [15:12]: Geez, it’s five hundred bucks with two-year contract. (Assuming S$888 denotes Singapore dollars.)

When Gateway wanted to run an ad on the nation’s highest-rated television network, they were turned down flat. The reason: the rather tame commercial‘s accompanying Web site* (theme: “Rip. Burn. Respect.”) features content that contravenes CBS policy against running ads which advocate a position on “any divisive issue,” as the L.A. Times summarizes a spokesperson. Gateway says it’s not the first time CBS has turned them down.

Most reporters note that CBS parent Viacom is a vocal supporter of the Fritz Hollings bill the Gateway site indirectly condemns (“There’s even a bill in the U.S. Senate…”) Another network has agreed to run the ad.

Meanwhile, the English-language site of Arab news network Al-Jazeera is back online after hacking and massive traffic made the server’s content inaccessible in recent days.

The return comes no thanks to Akamai Technologies, the “edge distribution” company whose 13,000 Internet servers help the big boys serve their pages to a wide audience. Akamai cancelled an Al-Jazeera contract, saying only that they “ultimately decided not to continue a customer relationship with Al-Jazeera, and we are not going to be providing them our services.”

By definition, corporations can’t censor. But one old saw seems as true as ever: Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one.

* Anyone else think the bad Frutiger 95 kerning has a Star Wars feel?

George Lucas wanted to show Episode II on 3,000 digital projectors. Analysts projected there would be 1,000 by last year. They were both off: just 74 digital projectors are in use in the US today.

On Thursday, Microsoft announced that number will increase. The software company has partnered with Landmark Theatres to equip 177 screens with a digital projection system. The Digital Cinema Solutions system, at $70,000 per unit, costs twice as much as a mechanical projector but less than half the price of a DLP machine.

The interesting part about this deal is that it’s being pitched as a boon for independent filmmakers, who have embraced Mini-DV and other digital technologies due to their low cost. Theoretically, the upgrade means an all-digital pipeline for exhibition in all 53 Landmark theaters will be available next year to those artists who can’t pay the $1,500+ per print needed for 35mm reels…provided the filmmakers use Microsoft’s Windows Media Services 9, of course.

I’ve long been intrigued with the idea of digital projectors, particularly in small markets. When each theater doesn’t have to first recoup two grand for the cost of prints, it means theaters have more options and can show a greater variety of films.

That won’t happen immediately — all the Landmark theaters I’ve been to are in cities of at least a million — but I will be watching this development very closely.

For some, marketing to the gay and lesbian community is a tricky task. You want to engender that fabled brand loyalty, but of course not be perceived as a “gay brand.” (The horror!) In the quest, there are those who get it right, those who get it wrong, and those who just don’t get it.

Bridgestone falls squarely in this last category with these totally weird banner ads:

I don’t think they’re stereotypical (but “accessorize”?) so much as cluelessly half-assed, with hilarious results: click the ad and notice the gay-friendly appeal consists of one tortured sentence and two guys/girls just sitting on tires.

Sitting on tires! It makes me laugh every time.

Note: these ads ran on PlanetOut.com, and are presented solely for purposes of criticism. For more gay-targeted advertising, visit CommercialCloset.org.

“An Oregon anti-terrorism bill would jail street-blocking protesters for at least 25 years in a thinly veiled effort to discourage anti-war demonstrations, critics say. … The bill contains automatic sentences of 25 years to life for the crime of terrorism. Critics of the bill say its language is so vague it erodes basic freedoms in the name of fighting terrorism under an extremely broad definition.”
—Oregon Law Would Jail War Protesters as Terrorists

“[S]ome students at Bellingham High School have been taken out of class and sent to the principal’s office for refusing to stand during the Pledge of Allegiance as a way of protesting the war in Iraq.”
—ACLU Concerned With School Pledge Policy

Dissent is as American as it gets. Let’s pledge allegiance to that ideal, and not to some object.

Update [04 Apr]: Holy crap! Let’s not forget A Christian Response to AIDS.

I got this e-mail yesterday, so I had to double-check to make certain it wasn’t a hoax. But no: a company called “Paper Free Technology” is actually e-mailing out invitations for its document imaging seminar.

The catch: “Paper Free” is sending 300K TIFF files, and telling the reader to “print out the 2 page flier attached to this e-mail. Then complete page 2 of the flier with your registration information and fax it back.” If you prefer, the message continues, you can “1. Mail the completed form back; 2. Scan the completed form and e-mail it back; or 3. Call us.”

So you print out a piece of paper to register for a marketing presentation telling you how to use less paper? Have these people never heard of Web forms?

I recently joined a major online service that has, as one its many categories, some fairly substantial (PG-13) gay content. I went “cruising” through the section and found a place where members post self pictures. While most of them were stunningly average, a few were simply stunning.

Observe (sized to 125px height; click for 100%):
  

(And just for the record, the majority of men were actually fully clothed. They just weren’t as funny.)

Not to lift from SI‘s playbook, but today I discovered an ad for something I would pick for This Week’s Sign of the Apocalypse. It’s not sports-related, but it’s still scary as hell.

I think this just might be a glitch. When I updated the drivers for an Intel 100Mbps network card, I got a message that said a network cable was unplugged. Then, as the install completed, it said:

Wouldn’t that be sweet?

A large crowd stood in line outside the court before the oral arguments [of Lawrence v. Texas] in hopes of getting a scarce seat for one of the court’s biggest cases this year. A knot of protesters stood apart, holding signs that read “AIDS is God’s revenge,” “God sent the sniper” and other messages. — AP story

God sent the sniper?

Am I alone in thinking the Iraqi state TV broadcasters should have been hit long ago? If it’s essentially the propaganda channel, which it is, and we don’t want captured US/UK soldiers paraded about, which we don’t, then the choice seems clear.

How accurate were Patriot missiles during the Persian Gulf War? Did they hit:

• A. 95% of Scuds?
• B. 79% of Scuds?
• C. 40% of Scuds?
• D. 9% of Scuds?
• E. 2% of Scuds?

The correct answer: all of the above, depending upon how you look at it. The first figure came from initial reports of 45 out of 47 Iraqi missiles destroyed. That’s the figure you heard on CNN, with plenty of Pentagon puffery. The B and C numbers are the new official figures, representing the percentage of intercepted missiles originally targeted at Israel and Saudi Arabia, respectively. The 9% figure comes from the Government Accouting Office, which found only that many attempts resulted in destruction. The last figure comes from the Israeli Defense Force. (All these figures come from Patriot Games, a story in Slate.)

Just something to keep in mind when Rumsfeld tells us how precise our technology is today. (And remember, these weren’t ballistic missiles.)

I always watch the Oscars, but this year I just didn’t. It wasn’t anything war-related; I just didn’t feel much need to watch them this year.*

But there’s one thing I wish I did see:

A few, Susan Sarandon and Tim Robbins among them, showed up in fuel-efficient gasoline-electric hybrid vehicles instead of limousines as a statement against U.S. dependence on overseas oil. — Salon

That’s so cool. As someone who is now on his 3d tank of E-85, I feel solidarity.

*I did maintain my tradition of seeing all Best Picture nominees, however.

If you happen to stop in the Gateway Country in Orland Park, IL and discover the IE homepage is Dell.com, that was me.

If you happen to look at the IE history and discover www.Dell.com/careers, that was the store employees.

After returning from my trip to Milwaukee, I noticed the ol’ fuel indicator was heading south. What better time to test out the E-85 (85% Ethanol, 15% gasoline) capabilities of my mother’s flexible fuel vehicle? And at $1.759 a gallon (here in Illinois, not the corn-friendly Iowa where mid-grade is actually cheapest) the price wasn’t even prohibitive.

Now if it all works out, the only problem is finding places to re-fuel. There’s a site at home, but it’s not available to me…yet. Perhaps if I commit a felony…