Lorem Ipsum

I've been posting a lot of personal stuff, and occasional sf-related stuff, but not very much Links To Cool And/Or Interesting Stuff stuff. I apologize to those of you who come here primarily for the Links To Cool And/Or Interesting Stuff. Here are a few items, as a start:

• According to a Sci Fi Wire item from a couple weeks ago, "Paramount has pulled the plug on its proposed film version of Watchmen" after a change of studio presidents. Alas.
• Gullible.info provides about half a dozen fact-like items every day. A site that linked to them says that gullible.info claims that all their items are true, but I see no such statement on the gullible.info site itself. Most of the items aren't easily checkable with the resources I have on hand, but I did check one. They said (in the entry for June 15, 2005): "The world's first movie using red and blue glasses to create a three dimensional effect was released in 1902." According to Wikipedia's article on 3-D film, "The very first publicly shown short 3-D movie . . . was made by the Brothers Lumiére in 1903. . . . It could only be viewed by one person at a time on a modified stereoscope. . . . [On] June 10th 1915, . . . the very first 3-D movies [were shown] in which the audience had to wear red/green anaglyph spectacles." So the item at gullible.info has elements of truth but in fact is false. If you trust Wikipedia, of course. (Thanks, Jeff!)
• That wacky Penn Jillette. He and his wife Emily have had a daughter, who they've named Moxie Crimefighter Jillette. Yeah, I thought it was a joke too, but apparently not. She fights crime! Josh S adds that he encountered someone (online?) who wants to name his daughter "Antigone Ninja Sanchez." It's no Interferon Immunoperoxidase Hartman, but it'll do. (Thanks, Josh!)
• "Ultra-Lifelike Robot Debuts in Japan," sez National Geographic. See the Intelligent Robotics Laboratory page for more about "Repliee Q1 'An adult type android,'" including a couple of nifty video clips. The Nat. Geo. article is right in noting that it's the little motions (especially the eye-blinks) that feel particularly human; the larger-scale motion is a little jerky, and the hands don't appear to be articulated at all. But if you watch the eyes in that first video clip, the effect is kinda spooky. Reminds me obliquely of Ken Liu's story "Algorithms for Love." I'm not at all sure how this compares to state-of-the-art Disney animatronics, but it's still pretty cool. (Thanks, Aaron!)

I think that's enough for this morning. Have a good weekend, all!