Animated concept vector ship Flash loop

Since the inception of this spaceship art blog, I've not had much time for my own personal art. So, I thought I'd start the new year off and running.

This is a vector ship I drew up in 2005 using CorelDRAW. I rasterized individual components of the ship and lit them up in Lightwave. I then comped all of the shapes in Aftereffects, animated a camera zoom and recomposed in Flash.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!








Sweet alien landscape painting by Andree Wallin!



Keywords: animated concept vector spaceship flash loop art for 2010 new year weekly header ship in flight with camera zoom depth of field dof background matte painting by andree wallin composite by igorstshirts.com igor tkac

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Changing the User Password without Permissions

You can just download

http://ophcrack.sourceforge.net/

.

It reportedly works for Windows, Linux and OS X.

More about → Changing the User Password without Permissions

Using SMPlayer with hardware video acceleration such as VAAPI - Fixing various crashes etc. with VAAPI

If you've also tried to use VAAPI with SMplayer, you may also have experienced the crash every single time you try to watch anything. These things might also apply to VDPAU and xvmc.

Here's the solution

1. Disable screenshots:

General -> General -> Enable Screenshots [ ] (uncheck)

2. Set to single thread decoding:
Performance -> Performance -> Threads ... [1]

3. Disable subtitles and postprocessing.

Here's what doesn't help:

Upgrading to the current version 0.6.8.

If you want to know how to get VAAPI working SMPlayer in the first place: Select

General -> Video -> Output Driver -> Custom -> "vaapi,xv," and

Advanced -> Options for Mplayer -> Options -> "-va vaapi".

Let me know if it worked for you. Someone should probably inform the author of smplayer and/or mplayer. Excellent programs!

More about → Using SMPlayer with hardware video acceleration such as VAAPI - Fixing various crashes etc. with VAAPI

Woman named as journalist Helen Bain

The name of the woman who was swept away in a Wairarapa river while riding her horse is out now, and it is journalist Helen Bain. Bain worked at Parliament, was an award winning journo at the Dominion, and was the communications manger for Forest and Bird. She was well-known and someone who I held in extremely high regard.

Bain wrote some great stories. She even got John Tamihere (her former boss) on record opposing the Foreshore and Seabed legislation. That annoyed Helen Clark so much that Mike Munro(Helen Clark's Press secretary) immediately issued a media statement retracting the comments.

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Over 9 Hours of Video on Battery with the MSI Wind U110

After I've managed to set up the video acceleration, it was time to test if it's really as power efficient as claimed. I just tried that with some SD and HD video. HD video wouldn't play properly of course, so it's silly to compare battery times.

But with SD video and vaapi, I managed to get down to 6.1 watts (9.1 hours). Without vaapi it was around 6.3-6.5 watts (8.5 hours).

I used a few tricks to achieve this:

1. disabled wifi and bluetooth.
2. lowered the display brightness to minum (still good though). This has to be done before boot in 2.6.31.
3. moved the system to an SDHC card. While the power in standby is the same (5.7 watts both with only SDHC or only hard disk), the active power is much lower with the SDHC (only +0.5-2 watts instead of 3-5 watts).
4. used by powersave script to optimize the kernel settings for low power mode:

echo cpu

echo 1 | tee /sys/devices/system/cpu/sched_smt_power_savings

echo 1 | tee /sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu*/cpufreq/ondemand/ignore_nice_load

echo 95 | tee /sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu*/cpufreq/ondemand/up_threshold

echo 50 | tee /sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu0/cpufreq/ondemand/powersave_bias

echo

echo usb

echo 2 | tee /sys/module/usbcore/parameters/autosuspend

echo auto | tee /sys/bus/usb/devices/*/power/level

echo

echo misc

echo 1500 | tee /proc/sys/vm/dirty_writeback_centisecs

echo 0 | tee /sys/block/sdb/queue/rotational

# broken echo 10 | tee /sys/module/snd_hda_intel/parameters/power_save

# not better echo 1 | tee /sys/module/psb/parameters/disable_vsync

killall -q hald-addon-storage knotify4 NetworkManager

hciconfig hci0 down

More about → Over 9 Hours of Video on Battery with the MSI Wind U110

Ubuntu One Privacy in the EU

I was just about to look into using Ubuntu One. But I chose not to, because I would have had to install tons of Gnome dependencies and use the Gnome client. It's not integrated to KDE yet. Then I read about their privacy policy, because recently we see a lot of bad privacy policies I would say. And I'm not too happy about what I read.

"Canonical may disclose any or all personal data and contents you have sent, posted or published if required to comply with applicable law or the order or requirement of a court, administrative agency or other governmental body." (https://one.ubuntu.com/terms/)

So if the local village chief somewhere in East Timor wants ("requires") to see your private documents, he is welcome to. Or do we use eiusdem generis rule? Well, I would still say any administrative agency is not very narrow. I think we can at the very least expect not only secret services or police, but any part of the US federal and local government to have access to any of your saved data at any time they require it and without any court orders. The link also lists as administrative agencies: the labor relations board or the Farm Credit Administration, the Maritime Administration, Environmental Protection Agency, Food and Drug Administration, Immigration and Naturalization Service or FCC and IRS. So quite a lot of people with potential access to all of your private information.

We don’t share your personal information with anyone except to provide you with services, comply with the law, or protect our rights. (https://one.ubuntu.com/privacy/)

Canonical's rights could be a lot of things I think. Maybe it could include the right to get payed by you? If you didn't pay in time, it looks to me that by the contract terms they might share your personal information with "anyone" to protect their right to be payed.

The quotes are from the UK version of Ubuntu One, but probably apply similar everywhere. I think they actually really tried to make it privacy friendly. But at the same time, they really wanted to make sure they couldn't possible get in trouble through protecting your privacy.

DISCLAIMER: I am not a lawyer - this is not legal advise. This is just a discussion view and a try to inform the general public about something that may or may not be interpreted by professionals as here stated. You are invited to share your views in the comments.

More about → Ubuntu One Privacy in the EU

How to Boot Floppy Disks with Grub e.g. to upgrade your BIOS

If you have a modern notebook, it's likely you don't have a floppy drive. But still, many companies offer either floppy images or windows tools to upgrade your BIOS. Both not really great for Linux users. Of course, you can use the tools of OpenBIOS, but that can be pretty difficult. Here's how you can boot any floppy directly in memory via grub:

1. You need to get memdisk. It's included in the syslinux package.

2. You copy memdisk to your boot folder:

e.g. cp /usr/lib/syslinux/memdisk /boot/memdisk

3. You uncompress (if it's zipped) and copy your floppy image to the boot folder, e.g. to /boot/floppy.ima.

4. You create the grub entry, use your normal values for root and the path:

title Floppy Image

root (hd0,0)

kernel /boot/memdisk

initrd /boot/floppy.ima

boot

5. Reboot, select it. It should boot normally, only without the annoying floppy drive noise. Done!

More about → How to Boot Floppy Disks with Grub e.g. to upgrade your BIOS

How to set up X and VAAPI Accelerated HD Video on the MSI Wind U110 (GMA500 - Poulsbo) and Ubuntu Karmic 9.10

The following guide is now slightly outdated as Ubuntu 10.04 is out and new drivers are necessary, also some of the repositories I originally used have disappeared. If you use Ubuntu 10.04, try following my much easier directions here instead. (The largest detriment to the Ubuntu 9.10 driver is a complete lack of suspend to ram for me. I will leave my guide for 9.10 online as reference, though. It seems to have been the first good description and I'm happy about the major online media coverage. :)

I've finally managed to get it running. Here is what I did. First you need to get Ubuntu 9.10 running with poulsbo. The first steps 1.-4. describe how to set up the driver for X. The second part (5.-10.) describes how to set up VAAPI and mplayer to get video acceleration. (There is already an early stage GMA500 driver for Ubuntu 10.04.)

The image shows the phoronix test suite benchmarking when I play Grey.ts in a loop (-loop 0) with mplayer and vaapi but without sound (-nosound) on my netbook. During the entire time, the CPU frequency is also downscaled to 800 Mhz. Compare to phoronix vdpau benchmark on a core 2 duo system (which obviously shows even less cpu usage, because the CPU is much more powerful) or the Atom and Nvidia ION benchmark on Phoronix.

CPU usage when playing a 10 minute fireworks recording in 1080p @ 50 fps without sound and then two FullHD movie trailers. The CPU is clocked at 800Mhz the entire time. The spike is caused by a bug in my test sequence: I didn't start a new mplayer process for new files but passed them all at once on the command line.

I can watch FullHD (1080p @ 50 fps + AC3) videos with about 30% or less CPU utilization (Atom@800 Mhz) on my netbook now. Looks really nice, too. Some videos produce artefacts, especially self-recorded AVCHD m2ts files. If you use the right demuxer, AVCHD videos play fine, but deinterlacing does not work. Sometimes the video seems not to run very smooth, etc. It's not perfect yet, don't expect too much! But most videos work perfectly, no matter what resolution.

The only real problem is with suspend to ram. You can't use suspend to ram or VAAPI at the same time: If you used VAAPI and try to suspend, the system doesn't suspend and/or crashes. If you suspend, then use VAAPI or even xv I think, the system crashes really hard. So suspend doesn't really work as expected yet. I think the sound also doesn't work properly after suspend. Suspend works fine for me even after resume if I do a double console switch (Ctrl-Alt-F1 wait until you see the console, then Ctrl-Alt-F7).

Here's what you need to do

1. Basically you add the GMA500 Repositories for Ubuntu 9.10 (karmic) and 10.04 (Lucid) to /etc/apt/sources.list.d/mobile.list. (If the entry below doesn't work, check this page.)

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:gma500/ppa && sudo apt-get update

2. Then you install the poulsbo-driver-3d including the firmware and everything.

2.a. Check if you can load the psb module: sudo modprobe psb. If you see this in dmesg instead of a switch to the correct resolution,

"kernel BUG: unable to handle kernel NULL pointer dereference at (null)" (2.6.31)

you need a manual hack to get the driver working, as I just reported.

3. Once that's done, for a more stable and speedy operation, you need to add an /etc/X11/xorg.conf:

Section "Device"

Identifier "GMA500"

Option "AccelMethod" "EXA"

# someone suggested UXA? but that's for the i965 drivers

Option "DRI" "on"

Option "MigrationHeuristic" "greedy"

Option "IgnoreACPI" "yes"

Driver "psb"

EndSection

Section "DRI"

Mode 0666

EndSection

4. Reboot and make sure that it works! If X doesn't work properly yet, VAAPI won't, either. After a short black screen, you should be greeted in the correct resolution. Full screen xv video should already work fine. Suspend to RAM also worked perfectly at this point for me.

If  the system goes to DPMS standby and from there switches to other modes (DPMS suspend, etc.), then my screen actually turns on again (showing all black with backlight active). So make sure you chose only one setting for DPMS. A constantly running screen is not good at all.

VAAPI Video Acceleration setup

Now comes the part where we install the hardware decoding acceleration. If you just want X you can stop now. ;) This is written for Ubuntu 9.10 with old repositories, so 5+6 might not be necessary anymore or work for Ubuntu 10.04!

5. Install the Libva library from http://www.splitted-desktop.com/~gbeauchesne/libva/pkgs/i386/libva1_0.31.0-1+sds8_i386.deb. This replaces your current libva1 with a newer version.  also works for me. Don't forget to install the -dev version (http://www.splitted-desktop.com/~gbeauchesne/libva/pkgs/i386/libva-dev_0.31.0-1+sds8_i386.deb) as well if you want to compile mplayer later.

wget http://www.splitted-desktop.com/~gbeauchesne/libva/pkgs/i386/libva1_0.31.0-1+sds8_i386.deb
http://www.splitted-desktop.com/~gbeauchesne/libva/pkgs/i386/libva-dev_0.31.0-1+sds8_i386.deb&& sudo dpkg -i libva1_0.31.0*i386.deb

6. Create a link of your video driver to the vaapi driver directory:

sudo ln -s /usr/X11R6/lib/modules/dri/psb_drv_video.so /usr/lib/va/drivers/

A. Precompiled setup. (You can alternatively skip to part B: compiling the source code setup)

7. Download and unpack the precompiled mplayer:

http://www.splitted-desktop.com/~gbeauchesne/mplayer-vaapi/mplayer-vaapi-20090914.i686.tar.bz2

8. Install a normal mplayer and libmad with apt-get.

sudo apt-get install mplayer libmad0

9. Unpack mplayer and create necessary links to the libraries it expects.

"ldd mplayer" tells you what library (names) mplayer expects.

Just to go /usr/lib and create links to them:

e.g

ln -s libx264.so.67 libx264.so.65

This should work as long as your libraries are newer than the expected ones. It may actually work out of the box in Ubuntu Jaunty.

10. Start mplayer from the package you downloaded:

e.g. ~/mplayer-vaapi-20090914.i686/mplayer -fs -vo vaapi -va vaapi HDtest.avi

B. Compiling the Source Code

I've also manged to get the source code to work. This is less bothersome, because you need not link the libaries. Hence less man hours, but more disk space and computer hours for compiling. Didn't take as long as I feared, though. And it's using a slightly newer version of mplayer-vaapi, which includes some rudimentary OSD in vaapi mode now.

7. Install the build environment:

sudo apt-get build-dep mplayer

sudo apt-get install libdrm-dev

wget http://www.splitted-desktop.com/~gbeauchesne/libva/pkgs/i386/libva-dev_0.31.0-1+sds8_i386.deb && sudo dpkg -i libva-dev_0.31.0-1+sds8_i386.deb

maybe: sudo apt-get -f install

8. Download the source at http://www.splitted-desktop.com/~gbeauchesne/mplayer-vaapi/mplayer-vaapi-20091106-FULL.tar.bz2. Unpack it and execute the checkout-patch-build.sh.

9. Check if it works, e.g.

mplayer -fs -vo vaapi -va vaapi ~/HDtest.avi

10.

sudo make install.

X. Done! Enjoy e.g. a nice HD trailer for a start! Post your results! I can recommend using it in smplayer for more comfort(e.g. automatically continue where you left of last). If it crashed, check out by blog entry about smplayer crashing in vaapi mode.

Update: It turns out deinterlacing not working is not due to VAAPI, but a limit in the psb driver. It works with the current iegd driver and other drivers from AMD and NVIDIA (press the D putton in mplayer I think). If I could just get one of those iegd drivers... Thanks Gwenole from splitted-desktop.com for answering my email and of course for writing the mplayer-vaapi patches in the first place! He seems to be the absolute VAAPI expert.

Also some experiments show that I can attach an external screen and watch videos with VAAPI on it. That means I should be able to actually use the netbook for decoding HD video and displaying it on an external screen. (But it does not work for me with except in mirror or single display mode.) Only thing missing now is a digital display port to connect a FullHD display... ;)

You might also be interested in Surround Sound and Battery Life
And I did get a USB surround sound card working wonderfully now. Also here's some advice I wrote on decreasing your power consumption.

More about → How to set up X and VAAPI Accelerated HD Video on the MSI Wind U110 (GMA500 - Poulsbo) and Ubuntu Karmic 9.10

Ahmed and Jane Hussein are thrilled to announce the arrival of their son Al Qaeda

Who on Earth - well in Masterton anyway - would be nutty enough to name their kid Al Qaeda?

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X Video finally works - Poulsbo and Linux on the MSI Wind U110 - Fix for BUG: kernel NULL pointer dereference at 00000000

If you tried to get poulsbo to run on your system and you get a message like this, you should try the fix posted below.

"kernel BUG: unable to handle kernel NULL pointer dereference at 00000000" (2.6.28)

"kernel BUG: unable to handle kernel NULL pointer dereference at (null)" (2.6.31)

Thanks to a post on Ubuntu's bugzilla, the poulsbo video module now finally works on my MSI Wind U110 (full review & installation guide). Download the psb-kernel-source module You only have to comment out the two lines in intel_lvds.c starting with

if (edid)
....

e.g.
/* if (edid)
drm_add_edid_modes(output, edid); */

Then reconfigure the package and it should be recompiled. The next time you start it, it should work instead of creating kernel BUG

Update:

Xvideo actually works better than in Directx video in Windows XP, where I often see blocky video scaling. The CPU usage is not too high, either. Currently it's only working under Ubuntu 9.04 for me. Though I had managed to compile the module with kernel 2.6.30 before, I don't remember how I did that... And I haven't gotten actual video acceleration to work yet.

Of course I'll keep you updated and I'll post a little howto once it's all working. But feel free to ask, anyway. And thanks so much to the person from the Ubuntu bugzilla who helped me to finally get it all working!!!

Update2: Keep checking the page. I will post a link to an archive with a script that will manage the compilation in Ubuntu 9.10. If someone could help me figure out how to, I'd love to create, upload and post a .deb for dkms so it all works automatically... Or ultimately, we could modify the driver to check for the MSI's signature and then skip the edid check.

I've created a package for Karmic that you can use to manually install the driver with the fix already applied: http://www.megaupload.com/?d=BB23R7K2. Extract it and execute the script make_psb.sh, then reboot and try to modprobe psb. Let me know when the 10 downloads run out and it it works for you.

Update3: Here is a step by step howto. It explains setting up X and then VAAPI (hardware video decoding) in Kubuntu 9.10.

My script for making the psb module out of the package:

KERNEL=/lib/modules/`uname -r`/

make KERNELRELEASE="$(uname -r)" LINUXDIR="/lib/modules/$(uname -r)/build" DRM_MODULES=psb || exit 1;

sudo cp drm.ko $KERNEL/kernel/drivers/gpu/drm/drm.ko

sudo mkdir -p $KERNEL/updates/dkms

sudo cp psb.ko $KERNEL/updates/dkms/psb.ko

ls -l $KERNEL/kernel/drivers/gpu/drm/drm.ko $KERNEL/updates/dkms/psb.ko

sudo depmod -a

More about → X Video finally works - Poulsbo and Linux on the MSI Wind U110 - Fix for BUG: kernel NULL pointer dereference at 00000000

Name suppression breacher off to court

A blogger is off to court for breach of name suppression on 5 January, the same day a certain comedian, who has his name suppressed, faces sexual assault charges. I wonder if they`ll exchange pleasantries - and I wonder if the blogger will ask for name suppression :-).

The blogger has also been asked to take the offending images off his website to prevent a 'continuing offence'. If convicted he could be fined up to $1,000.

Another blogger has identified this blogger in his own blog by identifying the recipient of the court summons. In doing so he has provided a link enabling people to find the identity of the unnamed offender.

Two questions:

Why has the blogger removed the images, after sending out a media release saying that he wouldn't? The offending images are still available on the cache as I write.

Why didn't the police press charges when he breached suppression in the same way the first time?

update Probably won't get name suppression then. I have been advised that he will be pleading not guilty on all counts - including two of three breaches of suppression on his blog, one of which remains.

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Merry Christmas and happy holidays from Concept Ships!

Dug up a header from last year... Merry Christmas to all of the CS readers and thanks to all of the ridiculous artists for the amazing support. I appreciate it!!!

Look for a new header before the new year as well as a little paragraph about what is to come in 2010... Later!

Santa illustration by Kirsten Zirngibl.



Keywords: Merry Christmas from conceptships! santa over city in rocket powered sleigh by kirsten zirngibl for provantage catalog cover

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Police attacks

Judith Collins has been thinking aloud. She wonders whether people who are convicted of attacks on police should be given harsher sentences as such attacks are attacks on the rule of law. On that reasoning, attacks by the rule of law - police officers who rape people while on duty, or offer sexual favours in lieu of issuing fines, or who drive home drunk in their police cars or beat up people while arresting them - should also be given harsher sentences. I wonder if the Police Minister would likewise agree and tell journalists.

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Gesunde und fröhliche Weihnachten wünscht Rolf Faisst

More about → Gesunde und fröhliche Weihnachten wünscht Rolf Faisst

Lord Monckton interviews Greenpeace activist on global warming

This is a classic. From the streets of Copenhagen. Here's a sample:
MONCKTON: In the last 10 years, how much has the global temperature gone up?
ACTIVIST: 0.7 degrees.
MONCKTON: In the last 10 years?
ACTIVIST: No, not in the last 10 years but in 20…
MONCKTON: But I’m asking you about the last 10 years.
ACTIVIST: Uhm, well, I will just have to guess. I would say, uhm… 0.1 degree…
MONCKTON: Right. It has actually gone down very slightly. About 0.05 degrees. It has gone down for 10 years. In fact it hasn’t increased statistically significantly, for the last 15 years, out of the 20 years you were talking about.
ACTIVIST: May I ask you a question? How do you know that?
MONCKTON: Because I take the data from the satellite and I then plot what is called the least squared linear regression trend…

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Jonathan Bach concept spaceship environments

Jonathan's blog.
















Keywords: concept spaceship art environment designs from jonathan bach attended art center college of design worked for lucasfilm spark unlimited hotwheels los angeles california

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Archdeacon falls for the fourth time

Gee, its like Stations of the Cross on drugs.

Auckland Anglican Archdeacon Glynn Cardy, who erected that notorious billboard in Auckland, with the assistance of Saatchi and Saatchi, has changed his story for the fourth time. Just to recap:

Story one: The billboard was erected to inspire people to talk about the Christmas story.

Story two: It was erected to provoke conversation about spiritual matters by lampooning the literal Christian conception story.

Story three: It was set up to oppose fundamentalist beliefs that the virgin birth never really happened.

Story four: it is now about opposing what Cardy calls fundamental beliefs, that the fundamentalists don't actually believe. In other words he is criticising beliefs that don't actually exist in Christendom. Cardy wanted to question the belief that a male God sent down sperm so a child would be born. But Christians don't believe that any sperm was actually sent down. So all of a sudden its not a spiritual matter.

Furthermore, Cardy reported the attack on the billboard the the police, saying they'd press charges if he was caught. A person was arrested for the second attack but was not charged as Cardy didn't want to press charges.

Glynn Cardy is a class A dickhead for failing to keep his story straight. And given the company he keeps, and the fact he has admitted to a higher belief in Santa on the sleigh than the God of the bible, it's no wonder he can't keep his story straight.

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Prominent entertainer, comedian, and name suppression

A comedian has been charged with child abuse. He denies the allegation but will "fight to clear his name".

What name, you ask?

Exactly. That name is suppressed. We may not be allowed to know if his name will even be cleared after the fight.

So far, Jeremy Ellwood, Jeremy Corbett,Mike King,Ewen Gilmour, Michelle A'Court, Dai Henwood, and Oscar Kightley have each publicly said it is not them.Rhys Darby has no daughters.

As usual, the breach of suppression is publicly available on the Internet. So go look there. Not here.

Update: something I didn't mention, this suppression is not a decision that the judge made, it was a decision that parliament made to protect the victim, who happens to be the man's daughter.

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Gerhard Mozsi concept ship

Gerhard's website and blog.









Keywords: concept art ship helicopter plane osprey vehicle over turbulent ocean waves by gerhard mozsi out of sydney australia technical digital painting concept art world earth planet matte concept artist and matte painter involved the VFX industry for the last 5 years

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The billboard - changing the story

Over the past few days it has been apparent why St Matthews in the City, an Anglican Church, erected a billboard in Auckland depicting a sad Joseph and his wife Mary in bed. It was not to inspire people to talk about the Christmas story, as initially claimed. Nor was it to provoke conversation about spiritual matters by lampooning the literal Christian conception story, as claimed later when fellow clergy disapproved.

The real reason why the billboard was erected was to slag off the idea of a male god impregnating Mary, and to deny the literalism of the virgin birth at Christmas.

In other words it was there purely to express a particular church's viewpoint( via an attack on opposing fundamentalist viewpoints) that the virgin birth never really happened and a belief that it is a fantasy story, with the consequent implication that Jesus was not sinless.

These guys call themselves progressive Christians - but it is not so clear what they are progressing to, or whether they are reactionary Christians who react to literal orthodoxy. Promoting beliefs that some Christians would describe as heretic is hardly going to inspire people to speak about the Christmas story,

the virgin birth story, or any other story save the story that this church is merely looking to create a story to get publicity. The atheist bus campaign is a much better campaign, in terms of getting people to talk about God matters, and some of these idiot Christians can learn a thing or two from the so-called atheists on how to publicise minority opinions.

The billboard has now gone down. Perhaps it will be replaced by this one. Can anyone let me know if so.

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So, what would happen?

Referring to this story, what would happen if Rodney Hide was to resign from Parliament, and Winston Peters was to win the subsequent by-election as NZ First leader?

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Must Have Cookbook This Christmas

Must have addition to a cookbook shelf : Formally the domain of eccentric celebrities, now polititions, business men such as Richard Branson, and mainstream health professionals are recognising the benefits of eating less meat for both optimal health and the environment.

It's getting to the stage where you'll soon be branded a food fascist or culinary racist if you can't provide a delicious and innovative healthy vegan dish at your restaurant.

The chance of a vegan guest at your Christmas celebration or dinner party is now greater than at any time in history - there has been a massive surge in interest in vegan diets and swanky new vegan restaurants such as Saf in London have helped to destroy preconceptions about limitations on cooking with plant foods.

If you are thinking "where do I start" then this cookbook is the book for you. If your friends are frightened by cooking without meat then this is the cookbook for them.

If you you are short of a Christmas Present for someone this cookbook may bring a sigh of relief to someone with a hole on their kitchen shelf.

More about → Must Have Cookbook This Christmas

Heilkraft von exotischem Obst

Heilkraft von exotischem Obst

von S. Schneider
Wenn das Angebot an frischem, einheimischem Obst knapper wird, können bunte Exoten diese Lücke auffüllen. Sie erhalten heute meist eine Reihe von frischen exotischen Früchten auf dem Wochenmarkt, in Obst- und Gemüsegeschäften sowie im gut sortierten Bioladen.

Die Exoten liefern viele wertvolle Nährstoffe. Sie enthalten Vitamine, Mineralstoffe, sekundäre Pflanzen- und andere wichtige Vitalstoffe. Diese gesundheitlichen Vorteile bringen die Exoten mit:

x exotisches Obst liefert aufgrund seines Traubenzucker- und Fruchtzuckergehaltes schnell verfügbare Energie.

x Bananen, Datteln, Feigen, Granatäpfel, Guaven, Kiwis und Passionsfrüchte haben einen sehr hohen Kaliumgehalt, das entlastet Ihr Herz und senkt Ihren Blutdruck. Zudem enthalten die Exoten viel Magnesium, was Ihre Herzleistung verbessert.

x Bananen, Datteln und Feigen enthalten viel Tryphtophan und eignen sich als "Stimmungsaufheller". Aus dieser Aminosäure bildet der Körper das "Gute-Laune-Hormon" Serotonin. Das ist besonders in der dunklen Jahreszeit wichtig.
x Fruchtsäuren und Aromastoffe liefern den guten Geschmack, regen den Appetit an.

x Sie sind kalorienarm, denn Hauptbestandteil der meisten exotischen Früchte ist Wasser.

Helfen Sie sich mit exotischem Obst
Eexotisches Obst liefert Ihnen viele wertvolle Nährstoffe. Die Früchte enthalten Vitamine, Mineralstoffe, sekundäre Pflanzen- und andere wichtige Vitalstoffe. Diese gesundheitlichen Vorteile bringen die Exoten mit:

x Aufgrund ihres hohen Enzymgehaltes helfen exotische Früchte bei allem, was mit der Verdauung zusammenhängt - vom Durchfall bis zur Verstopfung.

x Papaya und Ananas unterstützen mit ihren Enzymen Papain und Bromelain die Eiweißverdauung, die vor allem bei älteren Menschen häufig nicht mehr so gut funktioniert. Sie wirken dem Völlegefühl nach dem Genuss eiweißreicher Speisen entgegen.

x Die Enzyme regen die Bildung von Zytokinen an, mit deren Hilfe sich die Zellen des Immunsystems untereinander verständigen. Sie helfen ihm, sich mit Krankheiten auseinander zu setzen.

x Papain und Bromelain gelten auch in der Krebsvorsorge als hilfreich. Das Ananas-Enzym Bromelain soll die Fibrinbildung der Krebszellen stören und so ihre Einnistung im Gewebe verhindern. Darüber hinaus sagt man ihnen nach, dass sie im Blut zirkulierende Tumorzellen, die Metastasen bilden könnten, schädigen oder zerstören zu können.

x Pektine und andere Ballaststoffe fördern die Verdauung, binden im Darm Abbauprodukte und befördern sie gewissermaßen mit hinaus. Gerbstoffe unterstützen sie dabei.

Bleiben Sie natürlich gesund!
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More about → Heilkraft von exotischem Obst

Should a non binding referendum that asks if legislation on non binding referenda should be changed to binding referenda, be treated as binding in a non binding referendum?

Larry Baldock has had his petition question amended and approved. The question is : should Parliament be required to pass legislation that implements the majority result of a citizens initiated referendum where that result supports a law change? And the answer to that question should be No.

Who decides whether the result supports a law change, and who decides on what form the legislation is to take? Not citizens that initiate referenda. In addition, Baldock doesn't even get to decide whether his referenda, if successful, is enacted, as his petition, if it progresses to a referenda, will be a non binding referenda that asks if non binding referenda should be binding - and it is the government who gets to decide that one, not parliament. So this petition is actually directed at the government.

Had this referendum been enacted with a Yes vote, and in place before the smacking referendum, the Government could easily say that the question asked did not "support a law change".

But Larry Baldock is happy

I am very pleased that the object of the Question is Parliament and not the Government."That is because it was Parliament and not the Government that passed the Anti-smacking law, as it was a member’s bill.

A members bill had nothing to do with it. Parliament passes all legislation, not the Government.

If only 20% of the population bother to vote in a referendum, why should that be binding on parliament? I note that two years ago, a similar question regarding making citizens initiated referenda binding was approved by the clerk, but that question was quickly withdrawn.

If Baldock is successful, imagine what he would say if 40% voted in a CIR supporting, say gay marriage, or opposing home schooling.

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Alternative Heilmethode

Angela Winkler ,Systemaufstellerin und René Schölgens, Facharzt für Allgemeinmedizien, unterstützen Sie durch alternative Heilmethoden wie Homöopathie, Blütenessenzen, Farblichttherapie und Familienaufstellungen um gemeinsam einen neuen Weg der „Heilung“ zu finden.
Infos unter : www.hagal-institut.org

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Identity politics v class politics

One of New Zealand's best political blogs, Liberation, is running a series examining the controversy of Goff’s ‘Nationhood’ speech, attempting to show how the speech and resulting controversy can best be understood within the conceptual framework of ‘identity politics versus class politics’. It argues that to understand what’s going on in the Labour Party, what Goff has recently pushed for, and indeed what’s happened to the Green Party, is not a case of social liberalism versus social conservatism; nor is it left versus right; but instead it’s liberalism versus leftism – or simply: identity politics versus class politics.

Keep an eye out for it.

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Concept ships by Jordan Lamarre-Wan

Jordan's blog.








Keywords: spaceship concepart from jordan lamarre-wan artist visual development department disney interactive studios junction point studios austin texas tx

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Maori disagree over Maori flag

updated
Pita Sharples and John Key have announced that the tino rangitiratanga flag will fly over the Auckland Harbour bridge on Waitangi Day next year, at Parliament and at Premier House. But the chairman of the Waitangi Trust Board, Pita Paraone is not so sure that the decision is a good one and doesn't appear to want to fly it at Waitangi on Waitangi Day. Apparently the flag is linked with the Maori Party too much and Paraone (and Shane Jones and a few others) would like to see the United Tribes flag flown,I guess.

I find it ironic that Paraone is the chairman of the Waitangi Trust Board. This trust offers Treaty of Waitangi workshops. This includes workshops on the relevance of the principles of the Treaty, their practical applications, and how they can be applied today.

Yet Paraone, a former NZ First MP, was a key figure behind NZ First's unsuccessful attempt to delete the principles of the Treaty from all legislation - including the Treaty of Waitangi Act, in 2006. In fact the party, in its 2005 confidence and supply agreement with Labour, had a clause that forced Labour to vote for the first reading of the bill and send it to select committee -and Pita Paraone, as a board member of the Waitangi Trust Board at the time, supported taking out all references to the principles of the Treaty in legislation, while Trust conducted seminars on the practical relevance of leaving these principles in legislation - and nobody in the House bothered to point that out at the time.

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Government's new PR campaign targeting jobless couples

Make your own here

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Goff appears happy with electoral suicide

Well, Goff got his bounce in the polls he was looking for when he did his Nationhood speech. The problem though, is he doesn't know if it was because of the Nationhood speech or because of a National dip consequent to passing the the ETS, and announcements on ACC.

Labour is still only on 30.8% with Goff on 8% as preferred Prime Minister. Goff appears happy, even though the shift is within the margin of error.

I’m finally getting the chance to get around, to talk to more New Zealanders, to meet more New Zealanders, and speak out on their behalf

I wonder how many of these people are Maori. If Goff wants another rise in the polls - but at the expense of Maori, it won't do him any good, as he won't be able to form a government if he is going to alienate the Maori Party. It's not just time to go back to the drawing board for Labour - its time to get a new drawing board and another person to hold the pencil. Only then will Labour have a substantive rise in the polls when the Nats dont make mistakes.

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Concept ships from the video game SPACE ACE

Don Bluth is one of my favorite artists and SPACE ACE was one video game I finished in the arcade (on the most difficult "ace" setting) just so I could see the whole animation... My buddy used to work at Showbiz pizza and gave me tokens for days so I could finish it. I'm thinking about getting this in the HD format version... Mr. Don Bluth is a MASTER! *EDIT* I just bought this for the iphone... Amazing with headphones on! I bought Dragon's Lair and Cobra Command too! Dorking.... out....so.....hard... right now.













Keywords: concept animated spaceship art from space ace 80's eighties arcade game from don bluth born into a family of seven children in el paso texas grew up on a dairy farm in payson utah in a highly creative environment when he was not milking cows he was drawing cartoons

More about → Concept ships from the video game SPACE ACE

Another blogger breaches name suppression

A New Zealand Olympian accused of sex and violence offences that include raping his wife will have his name suppressed at least until the New Year. Trouble is that one blogger has revealed his name by posting some images identifying the persons name, but the file name of the name of the images meant that there was no deciphering to do. Although the file name has been changed, there is a link to a site that reveals this person's name, meaning that the victim is also identified.

This is breaking suppression. It can also be argued that it is a contempt of court. The blogger has also put out a media release, and is available online. I would have thought that posting this release online is also a breach of suppression as it identifies the name of the blogger and his blog, leading to the suppressed name.

Additionally, naming the man's lawyer now leads to the man's identity, so I can't even do that.

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Traditional media concept ship illustrations by Jean-Pierre Normand

Tons of amazing magazine cover illustrations done in acrylics by Jean-Pierre Normand.





















Keywords: concept sci-fi traditional illustrations by jean-pierre normand professional illustrator specializing in science fiction and fantasy for the past 20 years over one hundred book and magazine covers featuring his work has been published in Canada and the united states works in ink and liquid acrylic applied with brush and air-brush

More about → Traditional media concept ship illustrations by Jean-Pierre Normand

Fotos

In Lanke

In Kiel

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Stützkow bei Angermünde, Fotos

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Nationalpark Stützkow bei Angermünde
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Nationalpark Stützkow bei Angermünde
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Concept ships by Kai Lim

ukitakumuki on deviantart and Imaginary Friends Studios.





















Keywords: digital concept spaceship art by ukitakumuki kai lim from imaginary friends studio singapore art from star wars galaxies trading card game destroyer robotech macross transformed valkrie fighter

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