Today's Daily Illuminator link, posted by Steve Jackson himself: Internet Access CAPTCHAS. I've tried it a couple of times, and the question changes.
Edit: Bob, you might want to mention this one in your fanfic-writer's guide...

-Rob Kelk
"Read Or Die: not so much a title as a way of life." - Justin Palmer, 6 June 2007
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012

Today's User Friendly Link of the Day: The DM of the Rings. What the movies would have been like if they were a D&D game.
Edit: Set a decent block of time aside for this - it's 142 webpages long.
-Rob Kelk
"Read Or Die: not so much a title as a way of life." - Justin Palmer, 6 June 2007
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012

Okay, from the Three Graces thread, and probably one of the early plotbunny posts, we know that the ship name Enterprise is banned.
Are there any others, or should we work up the series of events that banned it?
Candidate for Banning:
Millenium Falcon -- for similar reasons to the ban on Enterprise
Contrast With:
Most common ship names in Fenspace
--Anything ending in -prise among the Trekkies: NCC-1701-Q USS Reprise, NCC-1071 USS Second Prize
--Systems among the Warsies for those ships that get named: Dagobah, Yavin-4, Naboo, Corellia
--The same as the common Yacht names for those vessels already named before they lifted off: $name's Toy, John Bee etc.
''We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat
them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary.''

-- James Nicoll

Something about this reminds me heavily of One Piece (although, to be fair, I haven't watched/read much of One Piece). Maybe it's the art style, maybe it's the tone of the story, maybe it's the group of characters, but it just resonates.
In a way though, this manga reminds me of Black Lagoon -- not in any way because of the style but because Lucy is like the Rock of the Fairy Tail guild. I don't think it would be a stretch to say she's the most stable person in the guild despite her quirks (and those of her summons; Aquarius really has to be seen to be believed), and we view the menagerie of characters through her eyes.
One of the other main characters, Natsu, reminds me of Luffy. He has that same bravado, the same characteristic of setting high goals and doing ridiculous things and going through for his friends.
This manga is also rather rpg-ish. Erza-san (who is awesome), for ex., uses ex-quip to fight. Ex-quip is short for exchange-equip as far as I can tell. Basically, she whips out diff. armors and weapons as the situation warrants.
There are various guilds in the land and they survive by taking on missions of various rankings and this follows the adventures of this particularly ... destructive... guild. Or to put it another way, they subscribe to the Lina Inverse method of completing missions. ^_^
Fun manga; kefi.org has been doing it if you'd like to check it out.

Californian govt blocks compulsory microchipping for people
Quote from the article:

Quote:

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CityWatcher.com, a Cincinnati video surveillance company, has required employees who work in its secure data center to have a microchip implanted in an arm.

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Quoting from Anime News Service:

Quote:

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9-1-07 (8:44PM EDT)---- Negima! Drama Lead Selected
13 year old actress Kashiwa Yukina will play the roll of nine and three quarters-year-old child prodigy, mage and teacher Negi Springfield in the forthcoming TV Tokyo Live Action drama Maho Sensei Negima! Parallel. The news came out during a production symposium held in Tokyo September 1st.

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Quote:

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I guess in this case we won't be getting a hot springs/pool episode for a swimsuited Negi to stumble in upon the girls in their swimsuits.

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Well, maybe. But, according to this CBC News article, the Shaolin Temple might take a Japanese internet user to court if he doesn't apologize for saying a ninja beat them all...
(Having not heard anything about the alleged match at the time, I suspect the Shaolin are in the right in this one... but I have no proof either way.)

-Rob Kelk
"Read Or Die: not so much a title as a way of life." - Justin Palmer, 6 June 2007
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012

According to this blog post, there's a flight simulator built into Google Earth. Two aircraft are available - an F16 fighter jet and a Cirrus SR22.
I haven't tried it myself, and I'm not going to - I suck at flight sims. But I have forwarded the article to my relative who's a pilot...

-Rob Kelk
"Read Or Die: not so much a title as a way of life." - Justin Palmer, 6 June 2007
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012

For all you technophiles out there.
---------------
Epsilon

From: www.angryzenmaster.com/
This is Rebuild of Evangelion.
Its been twelve years since Neon Genesis Evangelion hit Japanese airwaves and theyre still making toys, manga, and video games based on the series. Check out this growed up version of Rei Ayanami along with this highly articulated Rei. Eva fandom is still very much alive.
Instead of launching a new series to continue where the first left off as many anime and manga tend to do, Gainax has decided to revamp Neon Genesis Evangelion with four feature length movies. Now dubbed Rebuild of Evangelion, the first three films will retell the television series using modern animation techniques including CG assisted animation while the fourth movie will cover all new material. From the trailer footage, it looks like some scenes will be redone shot for shot along with completely new animation. Unit 1 is sporting a slightly revamped design which looks quite good. I cant wait to see it in action.
The first film hits theaters September 1. Could be good. Could be just as confusing as the series which is always fun.
Youtube promo links:
uk.youtube.com/watch?v=9M5F2Yr0NEw
uk.youtube.com/watch?v=ql8bxKTzJME
uk.youtube.com/watch?v=bmMal5YjDmA

Link for picture of mentioned slightly nsfw rei figure:
www.dannychoo.com/blog_en...i+Ayanami/

stage6.divx.com/user/gree...Evangelion
stage6.divx.com/user/Mall...-Rebuild-2
Edit: Stage 6 links to the two trailers!