the adventures of teapot the cat

New Youtube Features Suck

So it looks like YouTube has rolled out a new version of it’s embedded flash video player. I use Youtube alot because they have such a huge content base, and I always embed the clips to the blog. But let me also say that the horrible video quality and ugly user interface bug me to no end. The new embedded player makes me want to never embed a youtube clip again. There are all sorts of annoying UI bits in your face - prev/next circles with no tooltips about what they do, OS X dock style expanding ‘related’ thumbnails (that arent even very relevant) complete with extraneous reflections and worst of all an overlaid “menu” that sit right on the video you’re watching. And to make this all go away you have to mouse off for 3 or 4 seconds!!! GRRRR. Hit play below to see what I’m talking about.

So I guess this is what happens when you take Google’s amazing design sensibilities and apply it to Youtube’s already spectacular UI work. UGH. time to look for new embedded video options…

Add comment June 6th, 2007

Japanese OCD video

Right Place. What Japanese OCD looks like.

Add comment June 6th, 2007

Edible Insect Foods

mmmmm, tasty. 32 Edible Insect Foods You Can Buy Online

Add comment June 6th, 2007

Weird Japanese Animation

This is such a weird, demented animation by Bill Sneed that combines Little Red Riding Hood with frenetic Japanese commerical styles. The translations are eye-opening, as is the bizarre storyline.

[via tokyomango]

Add comment June 6th, 2007

Monkey Majik + Yoshida Brothers - Change

I’d not heard of Monkey Majik before, but stumbled across this video of their song Change, that combines traditional Japanese shamisen instruments, english vocals with a rock sound. The Yoshida brothers on the shamisen are pretty amazing in this track. It works surprisingly well and I like it even though it’s not really my cup of tea. Looking up Monkey Majik seems to indicate they’re based out of Japan - which is quite fascinating for a (mostly) english singing band. This track (which is pretty cheesey) has them crooning fluently in Japanese.

Add comment June 6th, 2007

Extreme Japanese Custom Vans

I’ve posted about crazy Japanese vehicle mods before, here is a more recent article showing more extreme Japanese vans.

Add comment June 6th, 2007