cliff richard dying inside
As with a lot of pictures of Cliff, at first glance he looks happy. But if you look closely, if you really search his eyes for signs of life, you soon realise that he is dying on the inside.

[Updated] The rise and fall of personal computing | asymco
Note the log scale.

bloodrunsclear’s real trailers for fictional films | MetaFilter
The sci-fi and fantasy trailer edits of bloodrunsclear range from a more diverse recasting of The Last Airbender and a more accurate version of the upcoming live-action Akira film to a moody treatment of The Sandman to the retro-looking adaptation of Neuromancer and the haunting Call of Cthulhu film. Want trailers to video game adaptations? To wargamers he has a live-action Warhammer 40,000 teaser. To LARPers he gives you Vampire: the Masquerade. To video gamers? Well… which kind are you interested in?

Going Cardboard: A Board Game Documentary
Do you have fond childhood memories of gathering around the table with the family for a game of Monopoly, Scrabble, or LIFE?

Cardboard is making a comeback.

In an era of tech-based entertainment, word is spreading about a new breed of board game. Going Cardboard takes you into the designer “German-style” board gaming scene, from its community of enthusiastic fans to the creative passions of the designers and their journeys from concept to reality.

Notes on Ezekiel
The point of all this is to note the fact that none of the elements of Ezekiel’s vision are foreign to religious iconography of the times (or before Ezekiel’s era).  The cloud / storm element of the vision is very common to the Old Testament, and is chiefly aimed at Baal, the king of the gods at Ugarit (the storm god), which is outside Babylon, both terribly common to Israelite thinking.  Hence the vision of Ezekiel, in many respects, is an amalgam of familiar (early) Israelite theophanic portrayals of Yahweh and Babylonian elements, all designed to put Yahweh “in the picture,” ousting the pagan god(s).

The (Real) Definition Of Standard & Poor’s Credit Ratings….. ‘Tom Pride’ (Satire) via reddit.com
A lot of people are talking about credit rating agency Standard & Poor’s downgrading of several EU countries yesterday but not many people actually understand what the ratings mean.

So here’s a quick guide from S&P itself to help you understand the ratings system.