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Oh, the huge manatee!
More than you ever wanted to know about the worst part of the Internet
2010-01-21 - Brad Halasz, AP Editor and , Ændrew Rininsland, Production Editor

Super Combined Web/AP! - With very few exceptions, the anonymous imageboards known collectively as The Chans are quite possibly the worst part of the Internet. The idea is fairly simple: users can anonymously post to a variety of boards focused on different topics and are given the option to add an image. Each board has a different number of pages, with the most current posts being bumped to the front page and receiving the most visibility. Other, more current topics eventually get bumped to the front page and older topics fall back to high numbered pages, with posts on the last page eventually falling off the board and lost to history. The level of anonymity inherent on these boards and the speed at which they move result in an incredibly variable level of content, ranging from downright interesting to damn-near-horrifying. However, as stomach-churning as a jaunt through 4chan's /b/- or "random"- board can be, The Chans are also the place where a large portion of Internet culture originates. If you've been exposed to lolcats or linked to Rick Astley's "Never Gonna Give You Up," you've been touched by The Chans in some minor way.

This week, Gauntlet Web and AP are combining forces to offer an illustrated look into three of the more popular Chans. Be advised these sites are generally very unsafe to surf while working and especially in public locations. Also, understand that these sites are designed to be bewildering to casual observers- a good portion of what's posted is done so entirely with the intention of offending people. In short, if something on a Chan disgusts you, you've already let them win.4chan: i can has fail?More... (2 comments)

Editorial: Harvey's cash-laden cup runneth over
U of C gives Weingarten $4.75m goodbye handshake
2009-09-24 - Ændrew Rininsland, Production Editor

Editorial - Earlier this week, the amount of outgoing University of Calgary President Harvey Weingarten's retirement pension was revealed by the Calgary Herald to be $4.75 million.

On one hand, university presidents make considerably less than the Chief Executive Officers of most large corporations; compared to, say, TD Canada Trust CEO Ed Clark, Weingarten's nearly $450,000 per annum salary pales in comparison. To get Weingarten from McMaster, the U of C agreed to pay him for his time spent there. So, much of the 30 years he spent building towards this pension, 22 years in fact, weren't at the U of C. This is why the pension is so high. Further, it's not like the university is paying him the better part of $5 million in one lump sum -- it's a pension, not a retirement bonus or anything of that nature.
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this week on the internet 2.0:YouTube WTF Round-Up
2009-09-17 - Ændrew Rininsland, Production Editor

YouTube is a haven for some of the nuttiest videos on the planet, which makes for some entertaining viewing after a long day of classes or if you want to prove a social theory about how truly broken the Internet is. This Week On The Internet, I've solicited the Gauntlet office for their trippy online video picks and selected the best ones. Enjoy!Let's Paint TV!John Kilduff is a Los Angeles-area artist and television host who, unlike Bob Ross, is likely exhausted after painting all of his happy little trees. His first release to the Internet population, "Let's Paint and Exercise TV," is an episode of his public-access show, wherein he paints a model while running on a treadmill and answering seemingly-unscreened viewer phone calls. The results are mixed, to say the least. He's since gone on to produce such masterpieces as "Let's Paint and Play Baseball TV," "Let's Make a Tofu Drink, Exercise and Paint TV" and "Let's Cut Our Hair, Paint a Self-Portrait and Exercise TV." Yet less curious is the content of the shows and more how deadly seriously Kilduff takes his subject matter- you've never seen somebody eat watermelon, make sundaes and exercise while painting with so much gusto.
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Freedom Through Ad Hoc Networks
2009-09-10 - Ændrew Rininsland, Production Editor

Column - The University of Calgary's wireless networks are generally pretty fast, but there are often times when they are at peak capacity and everything's really very slow. If you're trying to transfer a large number of large files between computers or play networked videogames on the LAN, chances are you're not only giving yourself headaches, but your neighbours as well.

Another scenario occurs when you want to do something that lies outside the narrow confines of the university's definition of acceptable technology usage. Frankly, the university's network should be used for academic things- not transferring that 30 gb archive of sybian porn to a friend in your residence building. Even playing games using shared computing resources (like the network) could get you in trouble with IT. Why bother with all this hassle when the service often isn't even that great in the first place?
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Hipster King to fight for alderman throne
2009-09-03 - Ændrew Rininsland

Zak Pashak: owner of inner-city bar Broken City Social Club, founder and festival director of Sled Island music festival and . . . politician?

Pashak declared his candidacy in early August for Ward 8 alderman. While the municipal writ doesn't drop until October 2010, Pashak said in his Aug. 5 address that he intends to use social media to help build grassroots support against incumbent John Mar.
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Prince of Pot bids freedom, Calgary adieu
2009-07-16 - Ændrew Rininsland, Production Editor

Marc Emery -- best known to Canadians for smoking massive joints at pro-cannabis legalization rallies and taking bong hits before defending the plant at news conferences -- visited Calgary on Sun., July 5, as part of his farewell tour. Emery's visit marked what will likely be the last time he is here before being extradited to the United States on drug-related charges.

"I want to give out everybody's marching orders so that more are active and my time in jail is not so bad," said Emery. "One of the things I used to remember from being in Saskatoon Correctional -- three months for passing one joint -- was that you get a lot of 'Oh man, it must suck to be in prison.' You never need to write someone in prison and say that. So one of the things I like is when all the activists write me while I'm in prison and tell me 'I was doing this to make pot legal.'
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Researcher reacts to U.S. Arctic policy
2009-06-04 - Ændrew Rininsland, Production Editor

What was once merely a dream of nautical travellers attempting to get from Europe to Asia may now be a possibility, but who owns it is up for debate. The fabled Northwest Passage is an item of increasing concern to both Canadian and American interests as climate change has resulted in this being the fourth consecutive year it has opened.

"It's only open for a few weeks and there are still ice pieces, so it's not like it's open water, but there has always been a section that remains closed and all of a sudden, because of climate change, it has opened in the western Arctic," said University of Calgary School of Public Policy political scientist Dr. Rob Huebert, who released a paper earlier this week entitled "United States Arctic Policy: The Reluctant Arctic Power."
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Spun: Lady Sovereign
2009-05-28 - Ændrew Rininsland, Production Editor

Spun - British grime MC Lady Sovereign is back with her second album, Jigsaw. Much more melodic than 2006's Public Warning, Jigsaw lacks the clever-yet-abrasive vocals of Sovereign's prior effort, leaving what is in all respects a merely average hip-hop album.

That's not to say it's all bad. "Student Union" brings back some of what made her last album so good and the Cure-sampled "So Human" is pretty catchy. Opening track "Let's Be Mates" seems to be the album's most likely song to chart, while the hard electro backing of "Pennies" redeems what is otherwise a fairly boring song. "I Got You Dancing" just might do what its name implies.
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This Week On The Internet: Google Street View Scavenger Hunt
2009-04-16 - Ændrew Rininsland, Interim Production Editor

Column - Ladies and gents: Google Street View is straight-up the most badass thing Google has come up with so far.

For those unfamiliar- imagine if you could use Google Maps to explore your favourite cities from the ground level in a full, 360º field of view. You now can for most major world cities, from Tokyo to Washington D.C. to Amsterdam (my personal favourite), though they're taking their sweet time getting around to giving Canada coverage. Ignoring the obvious privacy implications of this, for those of us who are content to just aimlessly walk around new locations when vacationing, Google Street View is simultaneously the raddest invention ever and the worst possible thing to discover during the last week of school. See: maps.google.com/help/maps/streetview/ for more information or merely do a Google Maps search and click and drag the little yellow dude at the top of the zoom bar to
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Marijuana legalization at the public library
2009-03-05 - Ændrew Rininsland, Gauntlet News

Speakers and Lectures - Drug reform activists and members of the community discussed cannabis legalization at the Calgary Public Library theatre last Friday.

Sponsored by the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws Canada and Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, the event was part of a cross-Canada tour designed to build public awareness of drug law issues and construct a policy document to be presented to the federal government later this year.
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