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Firey Sandals Fail!

Published April 22, 2009 by djsteen in Featured

The first I Can Has Cheezburger image/postOne of the biggest memes ever to go around the Internet is almost as popular in real life too. “Fail!“, short for failure, has been attached to photos and short videos on the Internet since the early 21st century. I only recall discovering the meme a couple of years ago, but it’s been around for longer than that.

In 2007, Eric Nakagawa and Kari Unebasami created a blog called I Can Has Cheezburger? It features LOLcats and other animals doing things that make us LOL (Laugh Out Loud – duh).

Many spinoffs of the website have been created in the years since then. One such spinoff is the FAILblog (subscribe). The FAILblog is no doubt the sole destination for those needing some of the Fail meme in their lives. It features many posts in a day of people being completely stupid or incompetent of completing a task. There are generally more photos than video, but fail videos are on the rise!

Rachel (Viddler’s Community Support) even showed me that she’s subscribed to the FAILblog e-mail newsletter which is delivered full of failness to your inbox at 2:02 a.m. EDT every day.

Here’s a perfect fail to start your day! Tip: when playing with fire always have a hose handy.

Watch more FAILblog videos…

If you’d like to know more about the Fail meme, then check out Rocketboom’s explanation we featured back in November 2008: Do You Know Your Meme: FAIL
All you need to do to get your awesome video featured on Viddler is to send me a message and tell me about it.

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New things mean change.

Published April 21, 2009 by djsteen in Featured

One of the biggest promises America’s current president made during his presidential election campaign was change. People throughout the world were/are excited for this new change. Especially during these tough economic times.

A constantly changing thing is the Internet. There’s always something new on it, and sometimes it completely changes the way we work and live that we wonder how we did without it. Google’s Gmail is a good example. When it launched in 2004 it offered 1GB of storage for free. This was way above the storage limits for other e-mail services such as Yahoo! Mail and Hotmail, and those companies had to change to keep up with their new competition.

In this episode of Beach Walks with Rox (subscribe), Rox (friend: roxanne) discusses the stress of new things and how to embrace change in a positive way. During her daily beach walk with her dog Lexi and the ‘Secret Cameraman’ (Shane) she mentions how her nephew was forgetful under the pressure of learning to drive. This further enforces the point of practice makes perfect.

Social media is a relatively new use of the Internet that involves the instant sharing of information between friends, family, and the overall population of the Internet. Many companies/people have realized that they need to overcome the stress of figuring out how to use services such as Twitter (we’re @Viddler) & Facebook (become a fan of Viddler), and just keep at it until they’re accepted as part of the community.

Dude! What finer place is there for going on a daily beach walk than Hawaii!

If you’d like a video featured on The Viddler Blog and front page, please send me a message, or leave a comment below.

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MVM: Pretty Early Mourning

Published April 20, 2009 by djsteen in Featured

It’s Monday morning. Early. You step outside in a daze to head to work. Your bare foot plunges in to three feet of snow. You forgot to get dressed. It happens to all of us.

A hot rod blaring music pulls up to the traffic light in front of your house. It’s light is red. The music is Wee Boy Pretty. By now you’ve walked ten feet from the door and both your legs are beginning to numb. It’s a giant contrast to the warmth your bathrobe is supplying to the upper half of your body. Time to frolic!

You dance around to the alternative pop music as the traffic light doesn’t seem to be turning green any time soon, and desperately attempt to circulate warm blood to your legs. The music makes you jump high out of the snow. Flailing your arms and legs as you create large holes in the snow.

In a blink four minutes have passed, the song has ended, and the hot rod is long gone. You’re feeling giddy on what most people would consider a dismal day.

Ahh, the power of Vancouver’s musical talent Wee Boy Pretty (subscribe).
See below the video for info on the band and their upcoming gig.

About the band

weeboyprettyWee Boy Pretty is a band based out of Vancouver, Canada. The five members of the band consist of Joanna Cairns (vocals), Sandor Gyurkovics (guitar), Josh Knepper (bass guitar), Andrew Newton (drums), Erin Sharp (percussion). Their adventure has taken them over 5000 miles in six years and it’s only just the beginning.

They’ve been compared to bands like G-Love, Feist, and Elbow, yet they have their own unique zest to separate themselves from the rest. Creating such home grown music videos as the one above is their passion and — with enough positive quotes from critics to fill up this entire post — I have to say they make me passionate about music!

Wee Boy Pretty Live!

Wee Boy Pretty is playing at the benefit party for the Strachan Hartley Legacy Foundation.

Party with a Purpose Vancouver
Heritage Hall 3102 Main Street
May 2nd, 2009 – 8:00 pm to 1:00 am

The Venue: heritagehall.bc.ca
The Charity: shlf.ca
The Fun: Fabulous “priceless” silent auction, Nintendo Wii competition and more.

Purchase Tickets: Click here ($25 before midnight April 30/$30 after April 30 and at the door.)

Friend up Wee Boy Pretty on Facebook, mySpace, Twitter, and all future gig information on weeboypretty.com.

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Pre-Conception Healthcare

Published April 19, 2009 by djsteen in Featured

Many people these days are living alternative lifestyles. There’s countless religions, punk, goth, hippy, geek, and the average citizen whom doesn’t conform to anything different from what is on day-to-day television. What I mean by that is: to everything in life there’s an alternative. You may never see the alternatives in the mainstream because it would negatively impact a company or the values of the government. Why doesn’t everything run on solar power? Because energy companies make more money by other energy creation methods. I digress.

What should be taken from this is that — when life is involved — care should be taken. I am not a parent, but I’ve been around many parents and young children, so I keep an open eye to how parenting works. Dr. Joseph Mercola (subscribe) tells of how the health of future parents (prior to conception) can effect a child’s health and ultimately who they become.

With all the wireless technology around us these days, it’s hard not to keep away from them, but a few savvy tips may discourage your child from disorders such as A.D.D. and other health risks.

Remember folks, take all this with a grain of salt and a pinch of pepper. A short video shouldn’t determine how you choose your health and lifestyle, but give you insight in to something you might want to discuss with your doctor.

About Mercola

Dr. Joseph Mercola has made significant milestones in his mission to bring people practical solutions to their health problems. He’s a New York Times Best Selling Author, and is author to The No-Grain Diet and Take Control of Your Health. He’s appeared on many mainstream news sources, and as you can see is spreading his knowledge via the internet to educate as many people as possible.

Joseph’s passion is to transform the traditional medical paradigm in the United States, and that consumes most of my free time after seeing patients.

Here’s a example from Dr. Mercola’s website to get you thinking about your healthcare more independently.

You are wise to question who you can trust when it comes to maintaining, enhancing or rebuilding your health.

With all websites, newspapers, magazines and other publications offering health advice, with every new multi-million dollar TV ad for another proclaimed miracle drug, with any recommendation offered by traditional and natural physicians, it is essential to answer this question above all others: what is their real motivation?

Only if the answer provides you with a sense of security, move on to the next important question: what are their qualifications? The primary trick of the existing medical establishment is to get you to forget that first question – their real motivation – by dazzling you with what appears to be magnificently trustworthy qualifications.

But clinical trials conducted by heavily biased “researchers,” advertisements and news stories carefully scripted to scare you into belief, highly polished corporate offices and corporate websites, and an extreme focus on whatever has the most profit potential – not lifesaving or life-enhancing potential – are not qualifications. They are scams.

Is there something you do out of the norm that other people find weird? Feel free to comment below.

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Cheese Adventures

Published April 18, 2009 by djsteen in Featured

You may remember when we featured an episode of The Escape Adulthood Show on Tuesday where they discovered how pasta was made. Remember the giant wheel of cheese that had aged for a few years? Well, Caroline Alexa McBride from Behind the Burner (subscribe) is going to take you on a quick tour of the Artisanal Premium Cheese Center.

Artisanal Premium Cheese began in the dining room of the two-star Michelin restaurant, Picholine in New York City. Since then it’s been on a mission to curate the world’s finest cheeses; Artisanal selects from thousands worldwide to offer 200 remarkable, unique, and handcrafted cheeses. Denis Cottin, Artisanal’s Director of Affinage, has spent a lifetime developing a complete understanding of cheese. He cares for the cheeses in Artisanal’s caves as though they are his children, meticulously washing, flipping, brushing, bathing and tasting the hundreds in his care. You know have a new appreciation for cheese, don’t you?

The Cheese Caves is the first true affinage center established in the United States. It consists of is a five chambers because they host five custom-designed cheese caves masterminded by the world-renowned French affineur Philippe Alléosse and refrigeration expert Jean-Claude Soilen. Each of the caves have carefully regulated temperatures for the different cheeses that they age. Different cheeses age at different temperatures.

Check out the delectable process that goes in to creating the cheeses you might be chomping on very soon!

Artisanal pairs coffee & cheese together on their website. That seems unusual to me, but looks like it fits well. What is an unusual drink or food you like to pair cheese with?

Feel free to send me a message if you have a giddy video you’d like to share with the Viddler Community.

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Absinthe. Distilled.

Published April 17, 2009 by djsteen in Featured

Alcohol. It’s something almost every single one of my friends has tried in one form or another, and yet I’ve never had any before. With all the fun flavored drinks out there, I’m often tempted to, but then I just think a soda is cheaper, and I prefer good ol’ water anyway. The fact I haven’t tried it isn’t because I’m afraid of the effects. I just find that I can get a similar thrill from candy and/or water.

Ever since I discovered Wine Library TV (subscribe) in 2007 I’ve been very intrigued about wine, and tried to decide what would be tasty to me. The same goes for STeaP TV (subscribe) — a fantastic show show about tea. I’ve only ever tried tea twice, but I really want to experiment more with it.

Moreover, I want to try new things, but I feel subjecting my taste buds to something I may not like would be mean. Oh, I sound so lame.

I used to work at a candy store that imports products from around the world and there was a whole section of the store dedicated to licorice and aniseed. The latter I can deal with, but it’s really not my cup of tea. I was once hanging out with some friends and they were all trying shots of flaming absinthe. The place smelled of aniseed. It was interesting.

On this episode of WLTV, Brian Robinson of the Wormwood Society debunks many myths about absinthe and gives some background on its history in Europe and the United States.

Fascinating, hey! I wasn’t aware there were so many different kinds of absinthe, nor that was banned in some places for so long!

What’s your favorite absinthe to enjoy?

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Unigo’s Jordan Goldman

Published April 16, 2009 by djsteen in Featured

The vast majority of students cross the globe apply to colleges to further their education in something they enjoy and can use for their current and/or future career(s).

Back in February we featured Unigo on The Viddler Blog. Around that same time Sarah Austin of Pop17 (subscribe) met up with Jordan Goldman, founder and CEO of Unigo. Just in case you don’t remember — Unigo is a platform for college students to share and discover various aspects of colleges all over North America.

Sarah discovers Jordan’s reason for founding Unigo and why everyone is buzzing about him. *Insert Viddler Buzz*

Are you in university right now? You should share your experiences on Unigo. It’s also a great resource if you’re looking for a good college to attend; what’s better than the students telling you that the teachers bring cake to every class? Okay, that’s exaggerating, but it’d be cool!

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Keeping exercise simple!

Published April 15, 2009 by djsteen in Featured

Ever since mass media (magazines, newspapers, television shows, etc) has told the world at large how to look we’ve been frantically dieting, joining gyms, taking weight loss supplements, and just trying anything to look like how they say we should.

In my opinion, if you feel comfortable, then don’t let other peoples’ judgments get to you.

For years it’s always been my philosophy to use your surroundings as a place for exercise, rather than a gym. Why spend hundreds of dollars a year to frequent a gym when you could jog down to your local park. No park nearby? Run flights of stairs. Heh.

You can also create a great exercise routine without the need of any expensive equipment. Again, why spend so much money when you have many great tools in your surroundings?

BodyRockTV (subscribe) believes in these simple forms of exercising too. Host Zuzana shows you how to lead a healthy lifestyle with effective exercises that can be done at home, or outside using little or no equipment. Usually the resistance of your own body weight is enough to keep you fit and healthy.

To some this episode might look like a workout on its own, but it’s just the warm up.

Sure, if you’ve been slacking on the exercise lately, then you could use this as a workout for a couple of days. After that you’ll then discover you can do longer repetitions, and will want to check out more BodyRockTV videos.

If you have a fun and free technique for exercising, leave it in the comments below.

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Escape Your Adulthood

Published April 14, 2009 by djsteen in Featured

The majority of content I consume is via the internet. I may as well just say 100% of it is via the internet. A lot of that is independent video productions created by people like you and me. Usually these independent shows are far better — and hold attention spans longer — than high-budget mainstream television shows.

A few video shows I watch are Geek Brief TV, Wine Library TV, and The Rest of Everest.

Before I introduce you to one of the coolest shows ever, let me quickly describe a little story about my changeover to “adulthood”. I’ll always have the kid inside me appear on the surface. Seeing this trait in a person is very welcoming. When my friends and I turned eighteen I would give them birthday card that said “Welcome to Adulthood”. I let them choose to do with that what they will. Those that lost their kid-like features made me sad.

This is where The Escape Adulthood Show (subscribe) comes in! Colin (our Technology Evangelist) recently told me about the show and I love it! Kim and Jason are out helping grown-ups of all ages to slow down and Escape Adulthood. In this episode they discover how passion prevails and reminisce with a childhood interest about how things are made. In this case it’s pasta. Nom!

About Kim & Jason

Kim & Jason is all about an idea. It’s the crazy notion that there is more to life than the hectic busyness, cynical melancholy and overwhelming stress that is typical of most modern lives. Adultitis tricks us into missing out on the best parts of life and causes us to take ourselves WAY too seriously.

K&J believe that life is meant to be lived to the fullest, that our lives should be bursting with big dreams, oodles of passion, and an enthusiastic playfulness. That way things always work out for the best.

Childhood is threatened everyday by things like poverty, disease, and abuse. K&J are committed to do what we can to help ensure that kids growing up today have wonderful childhoods to look back on tomorrow. That’s why they pledge 3% of all merchandise sales to organizations that help meet the needs and improve the lives of children.

Aren’t they just the giddiest people ever! I’m going to watch more past episodes now.

If you have a favorite show you enjoy watching online, send me a message and let me know about it. Viddlerers love discovering new content!

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MVM: Again and Again and Again and Again

Published April 13, 2009 by djsteen in Community Spotlights,Featured

Ahhh. Another lovely Monday morning to dance around to some groove-inducing music.

This track — Again and Again and Again and Again by The Bird and the Bee — was released in October 2006. Since then, this indie/alternative band from Los Angeles has been on tour with Lily Allen, performed on numerous late-night talk shows, and had their music featured in Grey’s Anatomy, Forgetting Sarah Marshall, and Sex and the City: The Movie.

The band — which consists of Greg Kurstin (the “bee”) and Inara George (the “bird”) — just wrapped up a short U.S. tour last month to promote their new album Ray Guns Are Not Just the Future.

Of course, this music video wasn’t funded or created by the band at all. Dennis Liu (friend on Viddler), an up-and-coming filmmaker/director in NYC, created the video on his Mac with a budget of $100. The actor in the video is Larkin Clark. Dennis used over 50 different functions and applications in the Mac OS X operating system. To find out more about Dennis and how he created this video check out his interviews conducted by The Unofficial Apple Weblog and the Annual San Diego Asian Film Festival.

Now, the video!

Dennis’ video was entered in the 2009 Portable Film Festival (subscribe) — an international film festival that allows an online audience to download entire curated films and videos to any portable device.

The festival gives the audience freedom to the film making and viewing process regardless of their location, experience, or technical knowledge.

Every August the Portable Film Festival holds its annual competition featuring videos in the categories of Short Film, Music Video, Get Animated, Look At Me (webisodes/video blogging), First Hand Capture (footage from mobile phones and digital cameras), and Feature Film.

Submissions for the 2009 festival are open until April 30th, 2009. You don’t have long before this deadline. Get together with some members of the fantastic Viddler community and create an amazing story for the 2009 competition! We’ll be watching!

If you want a music video featured on Music Video Monday, then just send me a message with a link to the video. Giddy!

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