And now I’m checking to see if the videoconferencing app we use at Auth0 (where I work) has a potato filter.
Category: Geek
Existential Troopers is Auralnauts’ latest Star Wars remix in which they take the classic “Stormtroopers” scene from the final season one episode of The Mandalorian and turn it from simple comedy gold in great philosophical comedy gold.
It’s a great premise. One speeder bike trooper has been thinking about how in spite of their superior numbers and technology, The Empire always loses. He even brings up the the topic of how the best-trained, best equipped army in the galaxy has such terrible aim and got defeated by “a bunch of weekend warriors and their pet teddy bears on Endor”. He’s reasoned out that it might be their destiny to lose, and existential hilarity ensues…
If you liked what Auralnauts did with Existential Troopers, be sure to catch my article spolighting another Auralnauts creation, Go To Sleep Baby Yoda, which takes scenes of The Mandalorian and The Child on the Razor Crest (the ship) and turns it into a sweet bedtime story, complete with catchy synthpop tune!
Go to sleep Baby Yoda, a fan-clip video put together by Auralnauts last December, takes video from The Mandalorian and adds all-new dialog to create something that probably happens but we’ll never see: The Mandalorian trying to get The Child to go to bed, first with a little playtime, then some TV, and finally, a lullabye!
If you haven’t seen it yet, watch it now:
Halloween should be both fun and frightening, and what better way to combine the two than to re-cast the Muppets as horror film icons, as Jason Beck’s “Muppet Maniacs” did?
If you’ve ever bought inexpensive goods online, there’s a chance that their poorly-written instruction manuals were supplemented with a card pointing to a quickly-made YouTube video that does a better job of explaining how to use your new thing. The videos are usually narrated by a Mandarin speaker with a decent grasp of conversational English and royalty-free music. But only one of these videos is for an internet-enabled penis-restraining “chastity” device, and only one of them is backed with the “Super Mario” theme, enhanced with extra synths and sampled sexy moans.
The device in question is the Qiui Cellmate Chastity Cage, which “lets users hand over access to their genitals to a partner who can lock and unlock the cage remotely using an app.”
While there are all sorts penis cages that you can buy — there are dozens on Amazon (and now that I’ve looked at the web page, I’m seeing all kinds of promos and ads for all sorts of…things) — the Cellmate is an “internet of things” device. It’s connected to the internet, which means that you can control it with an app, which means that if you’re the Donald in the relationship, you can slap this bad boy on the penis of your Lyndsey, and you can control their penile freedom from theoretically anywhere in the world.
The problem is that the API — application programming interface, which is basically the way that the app talks to the device — isn’t secure. The appropriately-named Pen Test Partners, a UK security firm, have proven that it’s possible for an unauthorized party to remotely seize control of the device and permanently lock in your nether bits. It also lets you access the user’s messages and location.
(Oddly enough, I just landed a job for a company whose product can be used to secure APIs. Qiui, if you’re interested, drop me a line.)
Even without the internet vulnerability, there’s the matter of another flaw — the device has a knack for unexpectedly locking you in. And there’s no emergency override function. If you’re locked in, you’re locked in. And apparently, once you’re locked in, the only way to get out is with the delicate use of bolt cutters or an angle grinder.
By way of explanation, Qiui chief executive said in emails to TechCrunch, “We are a basement team…When we fix it, it creates more problems.”
If you’re looking for some kind of penis-restraining device, don’t buy the Cellmate.
And if you’re making an instruction video for a commercial product and you’re not Nintendo, don’t use the “Super Mario” theme as background music.
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This is the way.
