Living in USA is Bad for Your Health Too

I posted about increase of the health risks in Russia recently, but the situation in rest of the world isn't much better and USA is an example. The richest country of the world actually is the least place I would like to live. The cause is that if you'll look deeper - it is the same as Russia (and I think in future Russia will be very much alike US), but corruption is legalised (through the lobby institution) and religion de-facto took the upper hand in the temporal power. 

Legalised corruption is worse than a regular because it is harder to fight it. If the mighty one do not like the law he pays for the authorities to close their eyes, but when corruption is legalised it is more efficient to pay for changing of the law. Such law changes were paid by oil and gas companies (and Bush administration got some nice revenue) and it is possible for them to avoid laws for air and water protection... And here the story of the "Gasland" documentary starts (cool thematic map on that site by the way).

Have you ever seen the water on fire? Of course you remember about the explosion and the oil spill on the BP's platform and burning oil on the surface of the sea. But what about the tap water? Scary?

I suggest you watch the "Gasland" documentary and not jus because it is about environmental issues, but because the film itself is great! Especially I loved the moments with cool maps and space imagery. There are plenty of them and they help to understand the scale of the disaster

For now here is the trailer:

Beauty

Terje Sorgjerd sacrificed his sleep for a week to create this: 

The Mountain from Terje Sorgjerd on Vimeo.

Night and fog

Yesterday I've send a great time with friends of mine in Solnechnoe (Eng). There were as always a disguise party and a "Shit Was Gushing" filming, but that's another story imprinted with a lot of cameras.

Even I had my DSC-W310 (which has one of the best price to quality ratio) they've brought me back from a 1,5 month trip across the India. In the night on the way back to the electric train station the covered the landscape. I had to take some pictures despite I had no tripod, which would provide a great help in such conditions.

For this picture I've used a parapet to replace a tripod. 

Spring night's fog

Unfortunately it was imposiible to replace tripod with something for other pictures. Nevertheless the fog's drops in the flash-light looks mysterious.

Mel's Ramos nacked chicks

I'm not a fan visual arts like pop-art, modern art, etc. What I like is realism. Not the realism as art division (I can't stand the most of its examples as I can't stand cubism), but realistic representation of the objects at the painting: the more object is detailed - the more I like it (even if I know that this object is just imagination of its author). 

But the other day a friend of mine send me a link to the site with pictures of the famous representative of the pop-art - Mel Ramos to check out naked chicks... I have to admit, I viewed all the pictures from the gallery. Women's bodies look very realistic. So I suggest you to take a look   ;-)

How to get a heart attak at 27?

That is the first question in my head after the 1st minute of the "When You're Strange" documentary. The recipe is simple: one just have to drink hard, take LCD and cocaine at least for 54 months (exact terms and results may vary).

Actually, the film is very good and definitely you should see it. And not a censured version as I did.  That is a stupid idea to censor an archived tapes, especially when it is about "The Doors" rock band and its singer - Jim Morrison. Unfortunately uncensored version is very hard to find and in a downloaded file you can find something different to the desired. - Consider yourself warned!

Despite the answer for the first question was simple, the answers for the others remained a mystery to me. Why does Jim Morrison was so wasted during this period of his life? Why does no one was able to help him to get rid of alcohol and drug addiction, especially when the profits of the band depended on him? Or may be it is just some kind of poet's curse - to die prematurely?

Africa exploitation

I like maps and GIS. But I want to show you something that is neither one nor another, but quite similar. It is very nice flash animation for information about export from Africa to developed countries - exploitation in other words. You can play with it here and I will just provide a couple of screen-shots.

Here you can chose country of your interest and click to see stats

Example of the stats

The Yes Men Fix The World

"If we let the free-market cult  keep running the world, there wouldn't be a world left to fix."  ["The Yes Men Fix The World"]

 I strongly recommend you to see "TheYesMenFixTheWorld" p2p edition movie. It's a very funny documentary film: you will laugh a lot watching it even if revealed subjects are not funny at all. 

"THE YES MEN FIX THE WORLD is a screwball true story about two gonzo political activists who, posing as top executives of giant corporations, lie their way into big business conferences and pull off the world's most outrageous pranks. This peer-to-peer special edition of the film is unique: it is preceded by an EXCLUSIVE VIDEO of the Yes Men impersonating the United States Chamber of Commerce. Because the Yes Men are being sued for this stunt, p2p is the only way that this film will get seen. Please spread the word!"

You can find official site of the project here.

Special thanks (from me of course) to thepiratebay.org which puts info about this film on its home page!

BP rebranding

It is hard to find some one who is not aware about one of th biggest crime against environment that was done by infamous British Petroleum. They loosing so much money with that oil spill every day that no one of us would be able to gain even in ten honest lives. The stain on the company name is irremovable. But... it's face is rebrandable! I bet in a three years they will re-brand the enterprise. But some good fellows already did this hard job for BP... for free! Rebranding competition organized by Greenpeace is almost over and I want to put here the works which are on the top of my list.

Here we go:

Best rebranded logo:

That's it!

Best illustration:

1-st place

2-nd place

Best wildlife:

It's leading anyway

Best slogan:

1-st place

2-nd place

3-rd place

Best "WTF?!":

Double hit

But is it satisfying enough? NO! Until the lust BP's toilet seat will be sold from auction to remediate (if it only would be possible!) destroyed environment, until every last motherfuker director and owner of the company will be drowned in the oil - there won't be any satisfaction >:(