Silly/Odd News Stories from around the World

[MrTerrorist]

Originally Posted by Haak

CHILLI GRENADES!!!

This is all kinds of awesome.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/8119591.stm

No really, they not the first country to uses pepper as a weapon.

[ZephyrLeanne]

Originally Posted by MrTerrorist

No really, they not the first country to uses pepper as a weapon.

I think the first to use it was uhm, Singapore on the ISA detainees. Or was it South Korea on the DPRK spies?

[Haak]

Originally Posted by MrTerrorist

No really, they not the first country to uses pepper as a weapon.

Oh screw you, it's still funny.

[MrTerrorist]

Daily sex 'best for good sperm'
The best excuse for sex. lol

[TinyRedLeaf]

Air New Zealand bares all to stand tall

Hong Kong (June 29): Air New Zealand is baring all — literally.

Passengers on the 7am flight from Auckland to Wellington got something a little different to shake them out of their early morning reverie today: Air New Zealand's first screening of a new in-flight safety video featuring staff members — clad in nothing but body paint.

The 3min 28sec clip, and a similar 45sec television ad introduced six weeks ago, takes a tongue-in-cheek swipe at competing airlines, which Air New Zealand says often tack extra charges on their fares.

"At Air New Zealand, our fares have nothing to hide," the slogan goes. "Which is why the price you pay includes everything — up front."

But the new effort to promote, er, transparency is not as revealing you would think, or perhaps even hope. Yes, cabin crew, a pilot and baggage handlers — one of whom is played by the company's buff chief executive, Mr Rob Fyfe — don immaculate uniforms of mere paint. But seatbelts, luggage and life vests are always positioned to conceal where appropriate.

The mundane "undo the seatbelt by lifting the flap" may never have received such rapt attention as it now gets on this airline's domestic flights.

The clips — complete with a cheerful soundtrack of Under My Skin, by New Zealand singer Gin Wigmore — provide unusual levity in an industry that has been savaged by drastic drop-offs in passenger numbers and air freight. Around the world, airlines — including Air New Zealand — have had to cut flights, staff and investment plans.

And some, like Air New Zealand, have gone that little bit further in the quest for visibility and passenger loyalty. This year's cheeky ad campaign and the video, Bare Essentials of Safety, introduced today, have received the attention Air New Zealand was hoping for.

The Nothing To Hide ad clip has been viewed nearly two million times on YouTube — the most-viewed clip ever to come out of New Zealand, Mr Steve Bayliss, the airline's marketing manager, said by telephone.

Each clip took a day to shoot and cost about 10 to 15 per cent of the cost of a major brand commercial, Mr Bayliss estimated. As for the Air New Zealand staff members, they got no extra cash — just a moment in the spotlight.

- THE NEW YORK TIMES

The ad...

...and its making

[jpawelw]

They do it, too:
http://www.china.org.cn/china/photos...t_18038370.htm

nyaa

[Tiberium Wolf]

Girl Gets Haircut By Hooded Assailant

This keeps me wondering why in the hell did the assailant want the hair for.

[Irenicus]

Originally Posted by Tiberium Wolf

Girl Gets Haircut By Hooded Assailant

This keeps me wondering why in the hell did the assailant want the hair for.

[Skane]

Originally Posted by Tiberium Wolf

Girl Gets Haircut By Hooded Assailant

This keeps me wondering why in the hell did the assailant want the hair for.

Originally Posted by Irenicus

Spoiler for tidiness:

Darn, beaten to the punch.

Narf.

[Nobodyman9]

Anyone else hear about this? Apparently they found some unknown lifeform in an NC sewer.

Spoiler for Really gross:

Hmm, so that's where all the trolls go to hibernate.

[Clarste]

Originally Posted by Nobodyman9

Anyone else hear about this? Apparently they found some unknown lifeform in an NC sewer.

It's really not that weird compared to all the stuff that lives underwater (polyps and whatnot). Frankly it surprises that there aren't more of these kind of things living in our sewers.

Edit: Google indicates that the internet's having a weird reaction. All we have are videos and few if any news reports or whatnot, along with "paranormal" and "alien" explanations. Considering how it spread on the internet first, seems like a hoax to me, but it also doesn't seem odd enough to be worth hoaxing. Am I just desensitized to weird animals?

[Kamui4356]

Originally Posted by Nobodyman9

Anyone else hear about this? Apparently they found some unknown lifeform in an NC sewer.

Spoiler for Really gross:

Hmm, so that's where all the trolls go to hibernate.

It's either a, unusual slime mold, or viral marketing for an upcoming movie. I'd lean towards the latter. The video quality seems a bit too good for it to be a typical robot used to inspect sewage systems. Not so much the resolution, but the consistancy of the image. I've seen some footage from such a robot, and the image went out a bit when it moved. I'm not seeing that same effect there

[Clarste]

Originally Posted by Kamui4356

or viral marketing for an upcoming movie.

Good thinking. That would explain a lot.

[Nobodyman9]

Well, apparently officials say that it's a colony of worms or something. Well, that was short-lived. Still gross though.

[Solais]

The Hive Cluster is Under Attack!

Btw, they say, these are Tubifex Worms, known for living in polluted areas and sticking together like that.

[MrTerrorist]

Found this report on the BBC except it's kinda offensive but funny.

Spoiler for NSFW News:

Spoiler for Your sure?:

Spoiler for Trust me, you won't like it:

Spoiler for Last Warning, okay here it is.:

A marketing blunder in Nigeria has got online communities all of a twitter, after a joint oil and gas venture with Russia was named Nigaz.
Told you it was offensive yet funny.

[james0246]

Ant mega-colony takes over world:

While ants are usually highly territorial, those living within each super-colony are tolerant of one another, even if they live tens or hundreds of kilometres apart. Each super-colony, however, was thought to be quite distinct.

But it now appears that billions of Argentine ants around the world all actually belong to one single global mega-colony.

"The enormous extent of this population is paralleled only by human society," the researchers write in the journal Insect Sociaux, in which they report their findings.

However, the irony is that it is us who likely created the ant mega-colony by initially transporting the insects around the world, and by continually introducing ants from the three continents to each other, ensuring the mega-colony continues to mingle.

"Humans created this great non-aggressive ant population," the researchers write.

Unlocked: the secrets of schizophrenia - Scientific breakthrough offers hope of new treatments for mental condition

Scientists have discovered a remarkable similarity between the genetic faults behind both schizophrenia and manic depression in a breakthrough that is expected to open the way to new treatments for two of the most common mental illnesses, affecting millions of people.

Previously doctors had assumed that the two conditions were quite separate. But new research shows for the first time that both have a common genetic basis that leads people to develop one or other of the two illnesses.

Three different international studies investigated the genetic basis of schizophrenia by pooling their analysis of about 15,000 patients and nearly 50,000 healthy subjects to find that thousands of tiny genetic mutations – known as single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) – are operating in raising the risk of developing the illness.

[Xellos-_^]

Originally Posted by Tiberium Wolf

Girl Gets Haircut By Hooded Assailant

This keeps me wondering why in the hell did the assailant want the hair for.

they sell the hair to whig maker who sells them to western countries.

[Dilla]

Originally Posted by Kamui4356

It's either a, unusual slime mold, or viral marketing for an upcoming movie. I'd lean towards the latter. The video quality seems a bit too good for it to be a typical robot used to inspect sewage systems. Not so much the resolution, but the consistancy of the image. I've seen some footage from such a robot, and the image went out a bit when it moved. I'm not seeing that same effect there

For the record, the video wasn't recorded by the city, but rather by a contractor hired by the property owner. I don't know if he would use the same equiptment.

Originally Posted by Solais

Btw, they say, these are Tubifex Worms, known for living in polluted areas and sticking together like that.

No go on the viral movie promo and I don't think they're tubifex worms:

Raleigh blob goes viral as 'Sewer Monster'
By Josh Shaffer
josh.shaffer@newsobserver.com
Posted: Thursday, Jul. 02, 2009

More Information
Video: Watch it pulse


RALEIGH It looks like blob of wriggling pudding staring out through a single, puckered eye. You can see it caught on camera, clinging to the concrete pipes below Raleigh's Cameron Village: the Sewer Monster.

It's really a colony of prehistoric creatures known either as bryozoans or moss animalcules, thousands of wormlike animals, biologists report. Clustered together in a glistening mass, they feed through tentacles on whatever floats past. More common in ponds, they have turned up in a set of sanitary sewer pipes under one of the country's oldest shopping centers.

Living in a 6-inch sewer main, the clusters of worms are about the size of a golf ball, estimates Ed Buchan, an environmental coordinator with the city. But the video footage, captured with a tiny snakelike camera, makes the monster appear at man-eating size to viewers watching at home.

That may explain why a two-minute video tour of the Sewer Monster's lair has spread across the Web like flesh-eating bacteria, prompting nationwide cries of horror and disgust.

“Mystery Life Form in NC Sewer!” read one headline, followed by this comment: “It looks like meat. HEART MEAT!”

At Cameron Village on Wednesday evening, visitors were split into two groups: Those who had seen the sewer monster video and been horrified, and those who planned to Google it the minute they had the chance.

Maria Schmitt, 21, Jeff Lepley, 21, and Annie Powell, 21, were in the latter camp, but they quickly rectified that using Schmitt's iPhone.

“It looks like a brain or something,” Schmitt said. “That's in the pipe?”

“I keep expecting a baby's head to pop out,” added Lepley said.

“I'm glad I don't live here,” said Powell, a Houston native.

The trio immediately regretted their decision to watch the video before eating dinner at the Village Draft House.

“I'm glad I didn't order pasta,” Schmitt said.

Contractor shot video

Raleigh's Public Utilities Director Dale Crisp said the video was not shot by the city, but rather a contractor hired by the property owner. Lynne Worth, property manager for Cameron Village, was out of the office Wednesday and could not be reached.

Crisp said the city first learned of the video several weeks ago when a link was sent to an employee in the stormwater division. Raleigh has two teams of employees whose sole task is to send tiny cameras into sewer lines and then review the footage.

This video surprised even the pros who thought they'd seen it all.

“I don't know if we've seen anything move on its own inside a sanitary sewer line,” Crisp said. But shop owners in Cameron Village only laughed.

This isn't the first time a bryozoan has ventured inside a sewer pipe. Denver's utility workers discovered some last year, but opted to leave them alone. So far, said Mitch Terry, of the Colorado city's water and sanitation district, they hasn't clogged anything.

Critters are harmless

Bryozoans are harmless, said Thomas Kwak, a biologist at N.C. State University.

If they were to take on the qualities of a Sewer Monster, it would be a very slow attack. Bryozoans move 1 to 10 centimeters a day, Kwak said.

http://www.charlotteobserver.com/loc...ry/812094.html

Admittedly, I've never seen bryozoa pulse like that though, or be all mucused up. I dunno. However, I don't think it's an hoax, since the city of Raleigh would have jumped on that bandwagon already.

Bryozoans, humph, it's only a matter of time before this blob reveals its true self. . . the alien from The Thing. I've been fearing this my whole life.

[Shadow Kira01]

Russia bans all gambling and shuts casinos

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia closed down its casinos overnight as gambling was banned nationwide, a move the industry says could throw a third of a million people out of work.

The July 1 ban shut gaming halls, from gaudy casinos crowned by extravagant neon structures to dingy dwellings containing a handful of slot machines.

"I feel terrible. We just let 1,000 people go," said Yuri Boyev, general director at Metelitsa, an upmarket casino where billionaires rolled the dice and Russia's gas giant Gazprom held a lavish Christmas party.

Vladimir Putin, now prime minister, came up with the idea in 2006 when he was president after the Interior Ministry linked several gaming operations in Moscow to Georgian organized crime.

The Kremlin plans to restrict gambling to Las Vegas-style gaming zones in four rarely visited regions deemed to need investment, including one near the North Korea border, but nothing has been built and critics say the zones will fail.

Though gaming establishments knew the shutdown date for at least a year, few thought the government would go through with it, but officials moved in overnight to close them down.

The industry says the ban will axe at least 300,000 jobs but officials in Moscow put the national figure at only 11,500.

Rows of slot machines, usually blinking around the clock in smoky, crowded halls, lay dormant and wrapped in cellophane.

Moscow deputy mayor Sergei Baidakov, watching men dismantle poker tables and lay roulette wheels on the floor, said the state was ready to thwart any big to move gambling underground.

"We are confident we will control the situation," he said.

He said the ban was to protect the health of society. Many critics in the gambling industry say it has more to do with Russia's poor ties with Georgia. Georgians are thought to run many Russian gaming halls.

City police stood on guard in case of protests by disgruntled former workers in the popular gaming halls that have sprouted since the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991 and now pepper Russia's cities.

A hotline was set up Wednesday to report on those suspected of operating illegal gambling, Itar-Tass reported.

Moscow had around 550 gambling places, including 30 casinos in prime spots, symbolizing the capital's love of excess.

Midnight on Novy Arbat street, the heart of the gambling scene, was muted as its flashing lights and loud music were turned off for the first time in over a decade.

"I'm upset but I guess I'll have a little rest and re-visit my job situation in August," said Elena, a slot machine operator who has worked in the gaming business for five years.

Each year gaming brought in up to $7 billion and paid $1 billion in tax, a gap the industry says will cause the state a budget headache.

The development replacement zones -- in southern Krasnodar, the Baltic enclave of Kaliningrad, east Siberia's Altai region and the Far East -- require investment of up to $40 billion and have not been built.

"The zones have no roads, water or electricity. We fulfilled the law by shutting, the government did not fulfill it as the zones are not ready yet," said casino director Boyev.

The industry has raised eyebrows at government guarantees of work in restaurants and shopping centers that are to replace casinos when unemployment in Russia has hit an eight-year high.

But some addicted gamblers thought the ban might help them.

"Maybe this is all a good thing. I'm a family man and I come here every day and lose all my money. I'll be happy to see them go," said a 40-year-old Muscovite near the flashy Shangri-La casino in the city center.

Is this a joke?