Google is now offering a voluntary service called Account Activity wherein they send you a weekly mailer to summarize your activity within the realm of Google products. It's opt-in so you'll need to sign up here. Do I think this is a potentially bad idea to openly give Google permission to track your activity? Maybe. Are they doing it regardless? Probably. So why not just go ahead and get something out of it?

I should probably be saving this for Friday entertainment but Awkward Stock Video is too ridiculous not to share right away. The tumblog is a simple repository of, you guessed it, awkward stock videos. They range from the baffling to the truly creepy to best thing ever. Hopefully new stuff is continually added but even if it stops at the limited amount that's up there now, I'd be fully amused.

Brought to you by Casey and KK.

August 15th, 2012 marked the 33rd anniversary of the debut of Apocalypse Now, Francis Ford Coppola's epic tale of the descent into madness. In tribute to that milestone, watch Heart of Coppola - a mashup of the film, the Hearts of Darkness documentary and other various media surrounding the film. It's great.

When referring to the XOXO Festival you no longer need to point people towards the Kickstarter campaign but, rather, their shiny new Official Site. I don't even have a ticket to the damn thing and I'm considering flying to Portland just to be around it. Don't miss the Schedule page - super purty.

I dunno what it is but I've been on a real GIF / Videogame kick lately. The works of Noirlac fit right in to that unquenchable thirst. I'm assuming that the images adorning his site all stem from actual games but they're, mostly, ambiguous enough to stand on their own. I love the spazzing animations almost as much as the landscapes.

via Sam.

• Responsive Javascript Helpers - check this article for some insight on using javascript to help augment the responsive experience.
• Angular JS - I've got some beef with the current state of javascript frameworks and the compatibility with proper SEO standards (for now) but, despite that, this does look interesting, useful and quite robust. And the fact that it's made by Google means that my hunch about scraping page content may be out the window.

Nashville's Smallest Art Gallery has a great new show up from Jeff Bertrand entitled The World and Its Music. The show features two different cassette tapes painted to honor a different impactful musician - Buddy Holly, Chuck Berry, Elvis Costello, Dolly Parton, Loretta Lynn, John Lennon, Robert Johnson and more. It looks great out in the actual gallery space but if you can't swing by please browse the online version.

I'm not going to lie; I don't play a ton of videogames anymore. I undertake an occasional adventure on my phone now and again but my Wii has laid dormant for months. However, I might just change my tune if Mercenary Kings gets its full funding. The game is being developed by Tribute Games, the folks that made the great Scott Pilgrim vs The World: The Game and the art is being done by Paul Robertson; of whom I could not be a bigger fan. It's a great combo and they are already well underway into development; which makes me feel even more confident about donating to the cause. Go read more about it here or watch the video here.

There are some absolutely unbelievably gorgeous photos from Junku Nishimura that you need to partake in right away. His official site leaves a little something to be desired so I'm recommending you stick with the Flickr photostream. I think we can all agree on the inherit allure of captures like White Shadow but be sure not to miss other great gems like Ticket Machine or Okinawa.

For whatever reason I went to go check for a new version of Perian last night - the Swiss-Army Knife of Quicktime codecs - and it turns out that they're putting the project to bed. I absolutely understand that sometimes projects consume too much time but it's a bummer that such a handy tool won't be actively developed anymore. RIP Perian!

Guess now I need to find a way to make VLC look as native to Quicktime X as possible...

Thank you Davis and Andy for the heads up on Staggering Beauty - an artful little undertaking with unexpected results when overly excited.

I'm absolutely smitten with this series of images from Olafur Eliasson - particularly these four colored goods. If video exists of this kind of thing, please point me in that direction because I'd love to see more.

Thank you Sam.

Great new limited edition offset book, Remain in Balance, from Steven Harrington and Nieves. I imagine encountering Harrington goods this affordable will become more and more of a rarity moving forward, so you may want to hop on it now.

Damon gave me the heads up on the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest that entices writers to submit their absolute worst opening line to a fictional novel. It'd be even funnier if the winner were culled from an actual published book but since all the submissions are user generated at least the spirit of the whole thing is positive - because the entries are hilarious atrocious. Have a look at the 2012 Contest Winners and marvel at how awful a sentence can truly be. I'm a big fan of the winner in the Crime category, so be sure not to miss that.

It's been awhile since I posted about the work of Skwirrol, aka Eva Galesloot. She's updated her blog - an excellent repository of original illustrations, updates from her world and random curiosities involving squirrels. I mean, she opened my eyes to this and this - so I don't think you need anymore convincing to follow along.

I think, typically, I'd suggest that you listen to Alec Baldwin's WNYC podcast Here's The Thing because he interviews entertainment celebrities like David Letterman, Herb Alpert or Lorne Michaels. However, I would be extremely remiss if I did not suggest you listen to his interview with Robert Lustig, a pediatric endocrinologist that speaks about the sugar addiction in the US. I realize that High Fructose Corn Syrup has, somehow, entered into the realm of Debatable Conspiracy Theories on if it's really as bad for you as some claim or if it's innocuous, as the food industry would have you believe. Hopefully you're on the side of the topic that believes we have a problem in our food production and it's actually causing some serious health issues across the country.

Go have a listen to Mr. Lustig, he speaks both intelligently and plainly on the subject - the best way to consume the information.

There is a stunning amount of great work to see from Noah Kalina. The official portfolio is an immersive collection of Photography, Ongoing Projects and Collaborations. If you manage to consume all that greatness you'll need to head over to the blog so you are sure not to miss these long form portraits. It's tough to tell you where to start because there's so much that should not be missed but, fortunately, you can't really go wrong anywhere you dive in.

My good pal Ross Wariner, aka Uncle Skeleton, is moving up to NYC in the next few weeks. I'll be bummed to not have him around Nashville anymore but I'm excited for what lies ahead in his musical endeavors once he departs from this region. He played his last show in town the other week and it was captured by the folks at Bucket City Mobile. So, head over to this video to see Uncle Skeleton (and a bunch of other Nashville area bands) perform. It's an excellent send off.

• Responsive Web Design in SASS - nice article about using variables and breakpoints for some responsive design via SASS.
• App.net - I may post more on this later but I'm just familiarizing myself with the ideas behind App.net - a "real time social service where users and developers come first, not advertisers." Sounds like it could be great or it could be total BS. The intro video is very emphatic!
• Qouch - apparently if you use Sabnzbd and Sickbeard you really must have Qouch installed as well. If all of that sounds like total nonsense to you, don't worry about it. Move along!

I had a helluva week up in NY with my new pals at VHX but, unfortunately, didn't have a ton of time to browse. So, this weeks playlist, while solid, may be a little on the light side. Let's get to it.

• First Hot Dog in Outer Space - Do yourself a favor, jump 48 seconds in and just enjoy the lift off and epic journey of meat in space.
• Lena Dunham, Jon Hamm and Alex Karpovsky Introduce the New Yorker iPhone App - it's not that funny but I find myself enjoying anything with Alex Karpovsky.
• 1981 Gymnastic Antics - I've seen this clip before but given that we're all overwhelmed with 2012 footage it's a nice revisit. I wish to see more of this sort of thing these days please.
• Internet Scam Alert: Most "Kickstarter" Projects Just Useless Crap - thank you Onion News Network. Nailed it.
• Meat Orgy on Turkish TV - this starts off very slow and quite weird. Then, a little over a minute in, it proceeds to get very VERY weird. What is happening here? I don't know and I'm fairly sure I don't want to.

Bonus

• Animatronic Hillbilly Band - aka Nightmare Fodder. Thanks a lot Paul.
• Just Some Turkeys - this should not be as funny as it is but it is.

Have a great weekend!