The Most Heartwarming Cluster Bomb Video You Will Ever See

I don't have much to add to this video, just it's nice to see people in Syria making the most of a bad situation

You can contact the author on Twitter @brown_moses or by email at brownmoses@gmail.com

After Buying Followers Menshn Buys Some Tweets

Following reports by Political Scrapbook that the Conservative MP and founder of social networking website Menshn, Louise Mensch, had suddenly been followed by thousands of fake accounts it now appears Menshn has been purchasing Tweets from dozens, if not hundreds, of Twitter bots to promote Menshn.  For example, here's a small list of mentions of Menshn from a small time frame

Now if you have a quick look at what these accounts and others have been Tweeting you'll see the same articles have recently been Tweeted, with result like this

And so on through dozens of accounts, the same articles Tweeted by all of them, clearly indicating that Menshn has purchased Tweets to promote the site.  Between this and Louise Mensch's recent addition of thousands of followers it does seem that she's getting a little desperate in her attempts to promote her latest project, not surprising after all the teething problems its had.

Related Posts
More Teething Problems For Menshn
Even More Teething Problems For Menshn 

You can contact the author on Twitter @brown_moses or by email at brownmoses@gmail.com

Celeb Boutique Tweets A Tasteless Message About The Batman Theater Shooting

With terrible events such as last night's Dark Knight Rises theater shooting in Aurora, Denver which has left 12 dead and many more injured social media plays a role in disseminating information about the events that took place, but unfortunately it also leads to some very tasteless Tweets, such as this one from the official Celeb Boutique Twitter account

Not a classy move by Celeb Boutique after such terrible events, I wonder what "Kim K" would think?

You can contact the author on Twitter @brown_moses or by email at brownmoses@gmail.com

Russia Today Publishes Another Stupid Article - The Great Islamist Pyramid Hoax

Update - Russia Today has now realised their error and retitled the piece Holy hoax: Calls to destroy Egyptian pyramids bogus, without referring to their earlier error.

Following on from my earlier article on Russia Today's journalistic failings, it seems they've continued their tradition of posting nonsense by this time reporting on Radical Islamists calling on the Egyptian Pyramids to be destroyed

Egypt’s new leader Mohammed Morsi receives disturbing calls to destroy ancient pyramids. Some Radical Islamists deem the monuments “symbols of Paganism,” and are encouraging the president to tear down the relics.

­Bahrain’s president of National Unity, Abd al-Latif al-Mahmoud, has called on Cairo to demolish the pyramids and “accomplish what the Sahabi Amr bin al-As could not.”

This is a reference to the Muslim Prophet Muhammad’s companion, Amr bin al-As, and his ancient tribesmen, who invaded and conquered Egypt in 641.

Scary Islamists trying to destroy one of the Wonders of the World, or Russia Today being fooled by a fake Twitter account?

Calls from a Bahraini Sunni cleric urging President Mohamed Morsy to destroy the Giza Pyramids were issued from a parody Twitter account online, the Daily News Egypt has learned.

Several right wing online portals ran with the controversial news as a means to raise alarms over the rise of an Islamist-led government in Egypt and its threat to rich historical sites. According to the rumours, Shiek Abd Al-Latif Al-Mahmoud denounced the pyramids as idolatry and asked President Morsy to destroy them.

So another fine example of Russia Today posting a load of old nonsense.

You can contact the author on Twitter @brown_moses or by email at brownmoses@gmail.com

Life Of Brian - What Has Hackgate Done For Us?

A humorous piece from a regular contributor.

*A wine bar, somewhere off The Strand*

Reg: We get into the Royal Courts of Justice under the arch here...slip past the Annex marquee here... up these stairs here.... nip down this unguarded corridor, through the back door... jump out from behind the blue curtains... ignore Tony Blair.... and forthwith issue our demands. Any questions?

Tony: What exactly are our demands?

Reg: We're giving Leveson two days to dismantle the entire apparatus of the Inquiry and if he doesn't agree immediately we shout through megaphones - "chilling effect!" and "freedom of expression!" and stuff.  We had a nice cosy bit of self-regulation ticking over till that bloody Desmond stomped off. Bloody Desmond.... Splitter.

All: Yeah, Splitter. Splitter!

Reg: So now we got that Leveson and his lot sticking their noses into our culture, practice and ethics. They're trying to stifle our free speech, the bastards. They're trying to take every dodgy practice we've ever used, not just from us, from our proprietors.... and from our proprietors' executives.

Stan: And from our proprietors' executives' editors.

Reg:  Yes.

Stan:  And from our proprietors' executives' editors' assistant editors.

Reg: All right, Stan. Don't labour the point. And what has Leveson ever given us IN RETURN?

Lucy:  Operations.

Reg:  Operations...? You mean, medical procedures for amnesia? Like elping Andy Coulson's forgetting about still being paid by News International and overlooking those New Corp shares worth forty grand?

Lucy:  Operations...like Caryatid

Reg: Caryatid? Well, that's not your Romans, is it!  *consults Wikipedia*  That's your Greeks... an architectural, draped figure supporting....

Lucy: Police operations. Caryatid, Weeting....

Reg:  Oh yeah, yeah.... gave us that. Yeah. That's true.

Tom:  Forum.

Reg:  What?

Tom:  Forum.

Reg:  Ah, the Forum... the spectacle of gladiators doing battle, the cut and thrust of...

Stan:  No, Reg - that's the Colosseum.

Tom:  Forum. *consults Wikipedia*  A public space, originally of a Roman city, where judicial and matters of public concern could be debated. 'Pro Bono Publico' an' all that.

Reg:  Alright, I'll grant you that the police operations and a public forum are two things that this hacking business HAVE done ...

Len: Justice. Y'know - vindication for Nightjack. And the opportunity to see a top flight legal expert at work.

Reg:  Robert Jay?

Len: No, Alastair Brett.

Ben: And the Judicial Review. The one fought for by John Prescott, Chris Bryant, Brian Paddick and Brendan Montague, all alleged victims of phone hacking....

Reg: Yes, yes. Alright, the Judicial Review, but apart from that...

Den:  The sanctity of evidence under oath... Piers Morgan, Tom Crone...

Len:  Yeah, that's something I'll really miss, Reg.

Ken: Legions!

Reg:  Legions??

Ken:  Yeah, legions of resignations.... James Murdoch, Rebekah Brooks,..

Stan: and Andy Coulson. Twice.

Reg: Alright.... Alright.... But apart from Caryatid, Motorman, Glade, Weeting, Elvedon, Tuleta, a healthy public forum for debate, vindication for Nightjack, the Judicial Review, Alastair Brett, Piers Morgan, Tom Crone, the resignations of James Murdoch, Sir Paul Stephenson, Rebekah Brooks, John Yates, Andy Coulson twice, Les Hinton and Dick Fedorcio.... What HAS hackgate ever done for US?

Lucy:  You forgot Baroness Buscombe.

(Silence)

You can contact the author on Twitter @brown_moses or by email at brownmoses@gmail.com

Apple's iCloud – Fighting iCrime

At one time or another modern technology has defeated us all, but now Apple's iCloud has shown it's one of the most wily of foes.  For those of you who are unfamiliar with iCloud it’s a system where separate Apple devices can share files, such as photographs, music, video, etc, without needing to be connected to each other.  For example, you take some photographs with your iPhone and they automatically upload to your iCloud allowing you to access them from your home computer.

One young man from Brandon, Florida, was a proud owner of several Apple devices, and took full advantage of the iCloud system, but one day he returned home to find his empty home had been broken into, with over $1000 of goods stolen, along with his Apple iPad

The alleged thieves took their booty home, and began to use the iPad as their own, taking photographs of themselves:

And big piles of meth pipes:

All of which were handily uploaded to iCloud, and appeared on the victims home computer.  The photographs have now been passed onto the police, who probably had a good idea of who would have a big pile of meth pipes in the area, and have already visited one of the individuals in the photographs, who are of course innocent until proven guilty.

So it seems the moral of this story is if you are going to rob people of their high end electrical goods make sure you buy a subscription to Wired first.

You can contact the author on Twitter @brown_moses or by email at brownmoses@gmail.com

Failed Russian Missile Test Spotted Across The Middle East

UPDATE 4 - MSNBC's Cosmic Log noted this about the spiral pattern

At the time, NBC News space analyst James Oberg said he had indications that the Topol's "third-stage spin is a 'feature,' not a malfunction, and may be associated with guidance, or decoy deploy, or enhancing hardness against U.S. boost-phase antimissile weapons."

UPDATE 3 - The Russian's have declared the launch a great success

The Strategic Missile Forces of the Russian Federation have conducted another successful test of the “Topol” Intercontinental Ballistic Missile, this time from the firing ground at "Kapustin Yar" in Astrakhan in Southern Russia.

The exercise saw the missile accurately hit its target on the firing range "Sary-Shagan" in Kazakhstan.

The test was conducted to confirm the stability of the basic performance characteristics of this class of missile reported the Ministry of Defense.

The ministry representatives added that all of the objectives of the test launch were met in full. In particular, it was possible to obtain information that will be used in the future to develop the means to overcome missile defense systems.

UPDATE 2 - It seems like the path of the missile started in southwest Russia, and headed southwest towards Israel and Jodran, with reports of it being spotted in Armenia, Azerbaijan, Iran, Turkey, Syria, Israel and Jordan.  It seems likely it would have been spotted in northern Iraq as  well, but no reports of that as yet.  It was reported in January that Russia would be testing "70 new missile systems" in 2012 at the Kapustin Yar Missile Test Range in southwest Russia. 

UPDATE - Ynet has reported the following

Russia's Defense Ministry says the Russian army successfully test-fired an intercontinental ballistic missile.

The Topol missile was fired at 9:39 Moscow time, according to a statement published by the Novosti news agency. (Ynet) 

Around 7pm BST reports started to come in from Syria that helicopters had started spraying white smoke/chemicals across cities in Syria, with activists posting videos from across Syria:

 

Then to add to the confusion Israelis began to call in UFO sightings

Hundreds of Israelis nationwide flooded police hotlines Thursday evening with reports about seeing an unidentified flying object in the nation's skies.

A prominent Israeli astronomer said the object flew above Lebanese territory and is not a meteor. The UFO was also clearly visible in Palestinian territories. A similar sighting in Norway three years ago turned out to be a failed missile test.

This video shows the above mentioned sighting over Norway

This video of tonight's event also shows a spiraling pattern at around 24 seconds in

So it seems like it could be a missile test.  It's also interesting to note it's been reported as being spotted far and wide, with this video apparently from Azerbaijan:

And the same spiral pattern filmed in Armenia:

And another from Armenia

If you've spotted any other videos from countries around that region let me know on Twitter @brown_moses