Central Perk

marți, 2 noiembrie 2010

Damn Cool Pics

Memory Card Testing
Funny Wedding Pictures
Vajoliroja, Johny Depp's Luxury Yacht
Evil Dictators Before They Were Famous
Dead Drops: A New Peer-to-Peer File-Sharing Network
Don't Do Meth
The World’s Billionaires

Posted: 02 Nov 2010 11:24 AM PDT

An overkill edition by Samsung a nice viral clip.

Posted: 02 Nov 2010 10:28 AM PDT

A pretty huge quantity of photos is taken during the most special day of your life and you may find some awesomely weird, funny and awkward shots among them, whether they were made on purpose or not. Anyway, here are some of the best of these pictures.

Vajoliroja, Johny Depp's Luxury Yacht

Posted: 02 Nov 2010 10:14 AM PDT

This is Vajoliroja. Johny Depp's Luxury Yacht. It's named for the first letters of the names of his family (longtime girlfriend Vanessa, Johnny, daughter Lily Rose and son Jack). Vajoliroja was built in 2001 in Turkey. It's 156 ft (47.6 m) long, has 2 Caterpillar 480 hp engines. Yaht's max speed is 14 knots. There are 5.5m Ranieri Soverato tender with 115hp engine, 4.9m Nautica tender with 60hp engine, 2 x kayaks (double & single), 2 x windsurfers, waterskis, wakeboard & tows, and snorkelling gear.

Evil Dictators Before They Were Famous

Posted: 02 Nov 2010 09:56 AM PDT

These are photos of some of the most ruthless dictators in history before they were famous. Some were painters, some poets, some lawyers, some well educated, some doctors, and all were infamous. Too bad they didn't stick with their prior professions.

Adolf Hitler: Postcard Painter

Here's Hitler as just one in a crowd, a position he apparently found unsatisfactory. The world's most famous jingoist was once a professional, though mediocre, artist who failed to exceed painting postcards. The Academy of Fine Arts Vienna twice rejected him, citing 'unfitness for painting', and he was told he was better suited to architecture. Yet though he dreamed of designing great edifices, he lacked the academic preparation. Instead, he became an architect of war.

Benito Mussolini: Author

Mussolini led a colourful and varied career before becoming Italy's 40th Prime Minister and key founder of fascism. He qualified as an elementary schoolmaster in 1901, and spent periods working as both a stonemason and an editor of socialist publications. He also wrote literary essays, short stories and a novel. The Cardinal's Mistress is a much-derided bodice ripper about a love affair between a fictional cleric and his mistress. A study in purple prose, it is unintentionally entertaining.

Pol Pot: Teacher

Among the victims of the Khmer Rouge were professionals and intellectuals, or anyone suspected of having an education. Yet the regime's leader, Pol Pot, was himself a university-educated man, and his hypocrisy went deeper still: although he was apparently a poor student, he was fluent in French, and spent some time teaching French literature and history at a private college.

François 'Papa Doc' Duvalier: Physician

Francois 'Papa Doc' Duvalier was a physician and advocate for life before becoming Haiti's leader and self-declared 'President for Life'. For ten years he practiced medicine in Port-au-Prince, providing salve to patients ravaged by tropical diseases. It was during this period that he acquired the affectionate nickname 'Papa Doc'. Yet in 1957, after being voted in as president, saving lives ceased to be his occupation; he opted instead to extinguish anyone expressing opposition to his rule.

Mao Zedong (Mao Tse-tung): Librarian

Mao, who controlled China between 1949 and 1976, and who is held largely responsible for over 50 million deaths in the country, was a poet and philosopher who nurtured his communist ideals through reading. His bookish tendencies found him working as an assistant librarian at Peking's University Library. It was there that he was influenced by Li Dazhao, the library's curator, and co-founder of the Communist Party of China.

Fidel Castro: Lawyer

There is a long-standing rumour that Fidel Castro tried out for, but was rejected by, a Major League baseball team. However, this is apparently merely a fabrication by an American journalist. In fact, the extent of Castro's involvement with the sport was playing for the University of Havana's law school. Having studied law and graduated, Castro went on to practice in Havana between 1950 and 1952, before attempting his first coup d'état in 1953.

Dead Drops: A New Peer-to-Peer File-Sharing Network

Posted: 02 Nov 2010 09:42 AM PDT

As part of an inventive art project titled "Dead Drops," Aram Bartoll has embedded countless USB drives into walls, buildings, and curbs around New York City. Why? To create an anonymous, offline file-sharing network in a completely open and public space. Each dead drop contains a readme.txt file explaining the project.

So, essentially, passersby can upload or download random files from the sticks. Yes, most people might fear catching a virus from a mean-spirited uploader, but the curiosity of what else might be on the drives would likely surpass that worry.

The dead drops can be found here:
87 3rd Avenue, Brooklyn, NY (Makerbot)
Empire Fulton Ferry Park, Brooklyn, NY (Dumbo)
235 Bowery, NY (New Museum)
Union Square, NY (Subway Station 14th St)
540 West 21st Street, NY (Eyebeam)

Don't Do Meth

Posted: 02 Nov 2010 09:25 AM PDT

Let's see how destructive methamphetamine is. The first photo of this Russian girl was made in 2004. She was already taking meth. In the next pictures you will see how she looks like several years later.

2004

2005

2008

January, 2010

October, 2010

The World’s Billionaires

Posted: 02 Nov 2010 02:42 AM PDT

For the third time in three years, the world has a new richest man. Riding surging prices of his various telecom holdings, including giant mobile outfit America Movil, Mexican tycoon Carlos Slim Helu has beaten out Americans Bill Gates and Warren Buffett to become the wealthiest person on earth and nab the top spot on the 2010 Forbes list of the World's Billionaires.

Slim's fortune has swelled to an estimated $53.5 billion, up $18.5 billion in 12 months. Shares of America Movil, of which Slim owns a $23 billion stake, were up 35% in a year.

That massive hoard of scratch puts him ahead of Microsoft's co-founder Bill Gates, who had held the title of world's richest man 14 of the past 15 years. Gates, now worth $53 billion, is ranked second in the world. He is up $13 billion from a year ago as shares of Microsoft rose 50% in 12 months. Gates' holdings in his personal investment vehicle Cascade also soared with the rest of the markets.

More Infographics.

Click to Enlarge.