guest post by Chuck Cirino

Before the quintessential quick-cutting and fast-paced techniques overused in television today Shadoe Steven’s Fred Rated television commercials broke this new stylistic ground back in the mid-1980s.  Smashing prices, and expensive audio and video gear was Shadoe’s trademark technique for driving media-crazy customers into the many Federated Group home entertainment stores scattered around Southern California at the time.

It was a race for pace by jam packing three minutes of mundane ad information into edgy, entertaining and explosive thirty second commercial spots.  My pleasure and honor was to have collaborated with Shadoe on these commercials as his director and editor.  Over a three-year period we made over 1000 television commercials together.

Cut to:  PRESENT DAY

A few weeks ago Shadoe approached me about a new advertising collaboration.  Shadoe’s task 25 years later was to sell a wheelchair.  What?  A wheelchair?

Oh, but this isn’t just a wheelchair, the Standing Powerchair is an affordable way to bring dignity to those of us who don’t have the full use of our bodies… and Shadoe’s good friend Mark Shedlin, a victim of MS is one such person.  Mark purchased this Powerchair only to discover it was not well-known by doctors and most insurance companies.  Marks mission soon became to get the word out so more people could benefit, and he enlisted Shadoe to help him.

This time for Shadoe the commercial was personal, and once he introduced me to Mark it became personal for me too.  So of course leave it to Shadoe to wildly entertain while getting his message across.  Once again he smashes the traditional and we created this ad…

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid, subscribe via RSS, Twitter, Facebook & FriendFeed.

guest post by mikl-em

photo by Geof Teague

For the second year in a row, a group of San Francisco theatrical mavericks are transposing a triumvirate of cinematic thrillers to a small San Francisco stage. Last year’s trio of B-beginning movies include The Blob and The Birds.

This year it’s Blue Velvet, Bride of Frankenstein, and Barbarella. A diverse set of B’s indeed. You can blame the fine folks at Foul Play Productions for that.

I have one piece of bad news and two bits of good: Blue Velvet has come and gone. But Bride of Frankenstein and Barbarella still await your attendance.

Bride is up right now (Thurs-Sat until October 17th) at StageWerx Theater, and it is quite an achievement. The play is presented in Black and White: costume, set, props, lighting, and skin tones are all painted, covered or otherwise adapted to a silver screen tone reminiscent of the 1935 original.

Featuring the original Franz Waxman score, and combining puppetry, shadowplay and myriad other theatricalities of a bygone era, Bride of Frankenstein is a perfect October offering, with showmanship and genuine thrills throughout!

With the dramatic lighting design and pointed use of shadows through the production, there’s a definite call-back to The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. While he’s technically filling Boris Karloff’s tremendous shoes as The Monster, the remarkably named Fennel Skellyman physically evokes the gangly, alien-headed horror of Nosferatu–the true O.G. of cinematic killer creatures.

Played for fun and style, not for horror, The Bride is a blast and the entire cast is wonderful including Jim Jeske, Gerri Lawlor, Jordan L. Moore, and director Flynn De Marco. I can’t do justice to the ingenuity of the props, lighting, and staging here, but suffice to say it’s great.

You can buy tickets online for the last two weekends of Bride of Frankenstein.

Barbarella will open on October 22 and run for 9 shows only. Starring the remarkable Khamara Pettus, in the role that Jane Fonda could no longer play, and with projections, animation, and puppetry, this show promises to make up for the color deprivation of the Bride’s run.

The film is a cult classic space romp from 1968, an outrageous one-of-a-kind, sexified carnival from the 40th Century. It was co-written by Terry Southern (Easy Rider, Dr Strangelove, Casino Royale) and features Marcel Marceau in a speaking role. It is the film from which the band Duran Duran took their name. I’m just saying.

photo by Geof Teague

Tickets are on sale now for all nine performances.

Five-Star Astro-Navigatrix Barbarella (Khamara Pettus) is on a mission to find and recover Duran Duran (Fennel Skellyman), creator of the abominable Positronic Ray. To track her quarry, she must penetrate the City of Night where the Great Black Queen (Gerri Lawlor) and her Leathermen hold power supreme.

Between the Bride of Frankenstein and Barbarella, you can bookend your Halloween appropriately between the scary and outrageous.

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid, subscribe via RSS, Twitter, Facebook & FriendFeed.

guest post by Josh Ellingson

Folks, the rumors are true. There’s a new gallery in San Francisco’s Mission District disguised as a comics shop. Mission: Comics and Art had their grand-opening party on Saturday night. And so, like a moth to a flame, I was drawn to the rock-and-roll sounds radiating from the corner of 20th and San Carlos.

It’s an understated and remarkably large space, offering plenty of room for the exhibited artwork and well-stocked selection of graphic novels. At the opening, all five members of Genevapop had ample room to rock while the crowd mingled and danced.

Mission: Comics and Art aspires to be a junction point for the worlds of fine art, comics, and popular culture. The artwork exhibited included new works from local artists like Audrey Welch, Betsy Lam, Chris Conroy, Matt Delight, Meredith Scheff-King, telephoneandsoup, and W.A.M. – Women’s Art Movement.

telephoneandsoup

Chris Conroy

Betsy Lam

There are more photos in my Flickr set.

photos by Josh Ellingson

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid, subscribe via RSS, Twitter, Facebook & FriendFeed.

guest post by mikl-em

A classic song from The Electric Company in the 1970s Morgan Freeman & Rita Moreno perform The Menu Song by Tom Lehrer. The song was arranged by Joe Raposo (a classmate of Lehrer’s at Harvard, who himself wrote the classics Bein’ Green and C is for Cookie).

While several of Lehrer’s children songs on the show have become classics, he is otherwise known for his often dark and always funny compositions that often appeared on the Dr. Demento radio show such as Poisoning Pigeons in the Park, The Old Dope Peddler, and The Masochism Tango…

Like few other performers, Lehrer had to make the difficult choice between being a full-time recording artist and teaching math. Until 2001, when he retired, he was on the faculty at UC-Santa Cruz.

Below Lehrer in action more recently (1997), as he revisits some of his more advanced math songs, Calculus specifically, written in the 1940’s. This and other videos are available on archive.org.

See also these lyrics for various Tom Lehrer songs including Silent E and L-Y from The Electric Company.

via Sherilyn Connelly

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid, subscribe via RSS, Twitter, Facebook & FriendFeed.

guest post by mikl-em

From the finishing what I started department…

The original “Chessboxing” is not the weird sport I posted about a few months back. Are you surprised that there’s more than one way to crossbreed Boxing and Chess?

Mystery of Chess Boxing is a Kung Fu film from 1979 (aka “Ninja Checkmate”) and it has everything you want in a 70’s Kung Fu flick, and nothing more. All the hallmarks of the genre are here: bad dubbing, slapping-tin-pan-fight-sounds, zooming closeups on the eyes of the villian, and some mad eyebrow hair in the bargain. It also features something called “double horse style”, which sounds smutty (though there’s also a hybrid astrological equivalent).

The movie is also an inspiration for the Wu-Tang Clan rap group (whose Da Mystery of Chessboxin’ on the album Enter the Wu-Tang features samples from the film). Wu-Tang member Ghostface Killer even took his name from the film’s villain.

Here’s the video for the Wu-tang tune:

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid, subscribe via RSS, Twitter, Facebook & FriendFeed.

guest post by Laszlo Thoth

There’s an unusual sign in the window of the former Nob Hill See’s Candies of 1519 Polk Street. Landlord, horse farmer, fountain parker, and “911 Bounty Hunter” John Jenkel explains that the San Francisco candy maker has been evicted due to their contribution to the “Enron-sponsored” 9/11 attacks. The eviction notice places the candy company in a plot involving Warren Buffet.

photo by Laszlo Thoth

Confused? I was too, but I think I’ve figured it out:

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid, subscribe via RSS, Twitter, Facebook & FriendFeed.

guest post by Doctor Popular

photos by Plug1 (WHAT IM SEEING DOT COM)

Pez Candy Inc. is suing the Burlingame Museum of Pez Memorabilia over copyright infringement. The suit, filed last week, claims that the museum deceives the public into believing they are operating under the authority of Pez and asks that the museum’s 7 foot tall replica of Pez dispenser be destroyed. The lawsuit also takes issue with the museum’s sales of toy truck Pez dispensers which had been modified with Obama and McCain logos during last years elections. The museum has been opened since 1995 and is said to be the only place in the world were you can see every Pez dispenser ever made.

WHAT IM SEEING DOT COM has a great write-up on the Burlingame Museum of Pez Memorabilia from last December.

via The San Mateo Times

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid, subscribe via RSS, Twitter, Facebook & FriendFeed.

guest post by Doctor Popular

John Campbell of Pictures For Sad Children, perfectly sums up the media frenzy surrounding the death of a pop culture icon in his most recent webcomic.

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid, subscribe via RSS, Twitter, Facebook & FriendFeed.

guest post by Al Ridenour

So the new Star Trek film made a good at drawing kids into their parent’s (or grandparent’s) sci-fi franchise, but it’s not like Roddenberry wasn’t trying to get with the kids back in 1969. What else would explain this exquisitely ham-fisted jam by the “Space Hippies” of episode #76, “The Way to Eden”, wherein Spock grudgingly breaks out his Vulcan harp for a bit of musical diplomacy.

Of course, the real-life Nimoy was anything but grudging in his pursuit of musical stardom, and these strivings — along with the occasional nod to the breathless rhapsodies of Shatner and other ST notables — are admirably documented at Maiden Wine, with troves of all-but-lost treasures including never-before-seen footage from Nimoy’s notorious “Ballad of Bilbo Baggins” music video.

Naturally, all of this has inspired fans to join the musical chorus in a variety of ways, whether it’s hand-carving “an exact working replica” the aforementioned Vulcan harp. (It’s tuned to a diatonic, dontcha know!), dressing up as the “Mugato” and moshing with Sacramento’s Trekker punks, The No Kill I or recording novelty rockers like “Jim Beam Me Up” with Sacramento’s OTHER rival Trekkie band Warp 11.

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid, subscribe via RSS, Twitter, Facebook & FriendFeed.

guest post by mikl-em

Rapper Eminem will release his first new album since 2004 on Tuesday, May 19th. There was speculation that his 3 years off might mean permanent retirement from recording, but recently Eminem said he plans to release two albums this year, the first being Relapse which comes out Tuesday.

The way Relapse is being marketed and distributed reflects some of the more innovative approaches to making money/adding value to music in the post-MP3 era. While the old model has been disrupted, new ideas that are starting to catch on have a lot of positive aspects, especially for fans who want (and are willing to pay) for more from their favorite artists.

In Brian Eno’s monthly column for Prospect Magazine, the veteran musician and producer notes that the evolution of the music industry is upon us. In addition to noting that more bands seem to be playing more concerts, also a great development for their fans, Eno observes:

The duplicability of recordings has had another unexpected effect. The pressure is on to develop content that isn’t easily copyable—so now everything other than the recorded music is becoming the valuable part of what artists sell. Of course they’ll still want to sell their music, but now they’ll embed that relatively valueless product within a matrix of hard-to-copy (and therefore valuable) artwork. People who won’t pay £15 for a CD will pay £150 for the limited edition version with additional artwork, photos, booklet and DVDs. They often already own the music, downloaded—but now they want the art. They’re buying art, and they’re buying it in a new way. That suggests to me the possibility of a refreshingly democratic art market: a new way for visual artists, designers, animators and film-makers to make a living. So, as one business folds, several others open up.

To his point, many mainstream artists are embracing novel approaches to releasing new music, these include “Deluxe Editions” with DVDs and other extras such as Bruce Springsteen and U2 have recently done. Bon Jovi has bundled iTunes downloads with concert tickets. Even Metallica, one of the most notoriously anti-MP3 performers in the industry, have embraced digital downloads and similar combo-offers that give fans exclusive and early access to their music.

Most bands haven’t gone as far as Nine Inch Nails who have released music under a creative commons license and directly uploaded high quality versions to bit torrent sites. Radiohead famously released an album with a limited-time, choose-your-own-price to pay download offer which seems to have been successful. All of these non-traditional moves from big rock stars, the bold and mild alike, show that the industry is finally coming to terms with a file-sharing world.

For Eminem’s album there are a host of special packages fans can pre-order the album in various digital formats with special exclusive extras available on Eminem.com. These include a limited run t-shirt, a print autographed by the rapper, and a special Relapse prescription pill bottle that you clasp in your sweaty hand, just like Marshall Mathers (used to?). There’s also a special interactive website (set at the “Popsomp Hills” asylum).

In terms of the music itself, if you pay for the basic package you can download in your choice of DRM-free 320kbps MP3, FLAC and Apple Lossless formats (starting the day of the album’s release). For more money, they will send you a CD or vinyl copy of the album, in addition to the digital. With all packages you get to download a video from the album immediately, even before the album release, and anyone can grab and embed the streaming widget above for free, which has samples from the songs and 2 full length videos plus some other extras.

If some of that seems similar to the type of promotion & packages that were offered a few months back for the release of the remastered 20th anniversary edition of The Beastie Boys’ album Paul’s Boutique, it’s not a coincidence. Both album releases were overseen by Topspin Media. Topspin does the widgets, like the one above, and other backend technology, and I assume plans and puts together the special packages.

Brian Eno has put his music where his column is: his collaboration with David Byrne, the album Everything That Happens Will Happen Today, was released in the fall of 2008 with a similar set of packages also through Topspin. Eno and Byrne released the album without any major record label being involved.

Ian Rogers, CEO of Topspin, has a deeper connection with the Beasties. He became an obsessed fan of the group starting with the release of Paul’s Boutique, went on to compile their discography and put it up on Usenet and ultimately the Web. Eventually his fan site came to the band’s attention, and the rest is history which he relates in detail on his blog. Rogers previously worked for a company called NullSoft which made a little program called WinAmp that kinda had something to do with that toothpaste situation as well. He went on to work for the Beasties’ Grand Royal record label and to head up Yahoo! Music.* Along the way he also produced a daughter named Zoe who gained some notoriety as a precocious online teenage DJ.

Full disclosure: my day job is at Yahoo!, where I met Ian Rogers exactly once. I don’t know him personally or have any association with Topspin. I do think what they are doing is cool (as you can tell). Mostly though I am a former college radio nerd and an insatiable music consumer (in every sense of the word), so I’m excited to see the industry finally embracing the inevitable digital revolution.

Below is the embeddable player widget for the Byrne / Eno album:

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid, subscribe via RSS, Twitter, Facebook & FriendFeed.

guest post by Al Ridenour

Time to rethink Bulgaria. Forget feta cheese, women’s choirs, and communist thuggery. Someone is rebooting  Bulgaria, and his name is Azis. At one level, you could simply describe him as a performer of chalga, a commercially streamlined fusion of traditional Romani (“gypsy,” ok?) folk-music and pop. But that would hardly do. In truth, Azis is Bulgaria’s answer to Madonna, Michael Jackson, Boy George, Liberace, and Marilyn Manson all rolled into one colossal glitter-dusted, KY-oozing jelly roll.

A Romani outsider by birth, this Balkan Bear’s star rose quickly with his first release in 2003, an unsuccessful bid for Parliament in 2005, an unofficial but highly publicized gay marriage in 2006, and the birth, in 2007, of a daughter via artificial insemination. But all this is nothing compared to the visual spectacle of his music videos. Whether playing Bollywood in an Erte-inspired Ice Queen get-up or playing nasty with Tom-of-Finland-inspired gangsters, the stylistic audacity of this hefty and uncompromising man-diva clearly demonstrates: it’s not your father’s Bulgaria anymore.

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid, subscribe via RSS, Twitter, Facebook & FriendFeed.

guest post by Burstein!

Secret Sauce TV presents the “My Little Pony: Reign of Buttercup Sprinkles” a live-action film. If only…. This epic parody of war between mankind and My Little Pony-kind, is that which fill my heart with joy and chocolate sprinkles. For those of you out there with a hankering for more pony-sparkle action, FanFiction Forums abound.

Forget the Fallen… Say No to Joe… This Summer Action Walks On All Fours – MY LITTLE PONY: Reign of Buttercup Sprinkles.

Here’s the making of video for “My Little Pony: Reign of Buttercup Sprinkles”.

And of course what blockbuster film would be complete without rock music video.

via Ed Hunsinger

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid, subscribe via RSS, Twitter, Facebook & FriendFeed.

guest post by Burstein!

Adrien Noterdaem created a really cool interactive map of The Simpsons’ hometown Springfield. Along with classics like Krusty Burger, this maps out the locations of places like Sprawlmart, U-Trawl Boat Rentals, Bob’s Big Poi, the nuclear power plant, and of course 742 Evergreen Terrace. Very neat.

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid, subscribe via RSS, Twitter, Facebook & FriendFeed.

guest post by Aaron Muszalski 

While there’s an ongoing debate over who actually created the character of Batman’s iconic nemesis The Joker (comic book artist Bob Kane, writer Bill Finger and artist Jerry Robinson have all variously claimed the idea) one aspect of his origin seems to be relatively free from dispute: that the creators drew their visual inspiration from German actor Conrad Veidt’s portrayal of the character Gwynplaine in the 1928 film The Man Who Laughs. An adaptation of a Victor Hugo novel, the film was directed by German expressionist filmmaker Paul Leni, with Veidt in the title role.

A well-known film actor with a long career, Veidt also appeared as Cesare the somnambulist in The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, Grand Vizier Jaffar in The Thief of Bagdad, and as Major Heinrich Strasser in Casablanca. The latter role being especially notable as Veidt himself was a fervent anti-Nazi, who emigrated from Germany to England in 1933, one week after marrying Illona Prager, a Jewish woman. Veidt also played what is likely the first homosexual character written for the screen, in Richard Oswald’s pioneering gay rights film, Anders als die Andern (”Different From The Others”).

Veidt died of a heart attack in 1943 while playing golf in Los Angeles.

The Joker is still at large.

UPDATE: Boing Boing just posted about the Inspiration for Super Friends’ Hall of Justice.

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid, subscribe via RSS, Twitter, Facebook & FriendFeed.

guest post by Burstein!

Hi-Fructose and publisher Last Gasp have just released a beautiful new hardbound collection of works “Hi Fructose Collected Edition: Under The Counter Culture” from their first four volumes.  Many magazines provide spotlights for underground artists, but none to my knowledge do it with more heart, skill, elegance and sheer beauty than Hi-Fructose. The issues in the hardbound are out of print, which has long driven me mad as I am missing the first three volumes myself.  If you love pop-surrealism and underground art, this is what you want.

Hi-Fructose magazine showcases an eclectic mix of underground artists, pop surrealists, emerging and rediscovered countercultures, and awe-inspiring spectacles from around the world. This box set compiles the best of the sought after, long-sold-out first four volumes. Featuring the art of Mark Ryden, Tim Biskup, Junko Mizuno, Dave Cooper, Craola (Greg Simkins), Gary Baseman, Alex Pardee, Gary Taxali, Scott Musgrove, Jeff Soto, Ray Ceasar, JennyBird, Joe Ledbetter, Longo Land, Michael Salter, Fawn Gehweiler and more. Includes expanded art spreads and interviews; five deluxe edition art prints from artists including Craola, MARS-1, Joe Ledbetter, Travis Louie, Dave Cooper; a DIY papercraft art toy; and a DIY plush sewing pattern housed in a candy-themed box. Hardcover, color.

On a personal note, while I was in Cambodia working on human rights issues in a very depressing and destructive environment, my friends mailed me out a care package with many things, including volumes four and five of Hi-Fructose.  They were my gateway back to San Francisco art culture and an escape from the horrors that I had to deal with regularly.  I ended up showing them to my friends and each loved it because it was pure joy and beauty in a very dark place. For this, Hi-Fructose will always have a special place in my heart.

The new Hi-Fructose book is available for pre-order though Last Gasp.

image via Hi-Fructose

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid, subscribe via RSS, Twitter, Facebook & FriendFeed.

guest post by Burstein

In response to the threatened crackdown on the Pillow Fight and other “flash mob”-esque events, The United Nations Commission on Costumes & Holidays (UNCCH) has issued a response: the San Francisco Protocol on Abnormal Public Events.  I for one welcome their intervention in returning San Francisco to a state of normalcy in which life occurs in a restrained, non-threatening fashion.

“The time has come to bring abnormal public events (commonly referred to as “Flash Mobs”) under the soothing blanket of global bureaucracy (sic).  The alarming rise in messy “Trash Mobs” such as pillow fight are a clear warning to the International Community.  The response: the San Francisco Protocol on Abnormal Public Events, a clear framework for regulation of these events through strong yet gentle local and international oversight.  The UNCCH asks you to imagine a world in which these chaotic events are tamed, packaged, and decaffeinated.  The San Francisco Protocol will finally make this possible.”

Yours in the service of Humanity,
Commander EDW Lynch
UNCCH

In all seriousness, much can and has been said on the cost to the city, ethics of personal responsibility, and the time, place and manner of such public actions. I admire and respect individuals who seeking to define and create the culture in which they live.  I also value consistency.  If you attend, organize or even merely appreciate these events my question to you is thus: what do you want the city to do for you?

I want the city to continue its unique and amazing tolerance for actions like Pillow Fight because that is what makes SF home to me and many other freaks like you. So, along with taking responsibility for your events, I would implore you to take responsibility for your culture as well and politely email the following people with your thoughts:

- Seth Rosenfeld – San Francisco Chronicle Staff Writer
- Lisa Seitz Gruwell – San Francisco Recreation and Park Department
- Denis Kern – San Francisco DPW

Here is a draft letter for you all to riff upon when composing your own:

Dear XXXXX,

I have found your comments in the San Francisco Chronicle on the recent Pillow Fight to be exceptionally concerning.  Part of what makes San Francisco unique and a magnet for so many brilliant and creative individuals from around the world are these very events that you are threatening.  These events exhibit some of the best aspects of our city: a culture of tolerance, public expressions of joy and spontaneity, and an urban space that truly belongs to its inhabitants and neighbors.  Your threatened crackdown is a challenge to that which makes our city special, that which draws the talent that fuels our economy, and that which improves our collective quality of life.  I strongly suggest significant reconsideration from you and your supervisors before taking any further action that might suppress San Francisco’s robust, magnetic and beautiful freak culture.

Sincerely,
Your Name Here

See Previously: San Francisco Might Try to Shut Down Pillow Fight & Other Events

photo by Dave Young

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid, subscribe via RSS, Twitter, Facebook & FriendFeed.

Last night Lori and I went to the restaurant Triptych in San Francisco to celebrate our 8 year wedding anniversary. Aside from serving excellent food, Triptych has one of most unique bathrooms around. First you walk down a hallway that is a mini art gallery and then once you step into the restroom and turn on the light, you are suddenly teleported to a Disco Inferno. The entire bathroom is full of 1970’s memorabilia, complete with a Disco soundtrack.

photos by Scott Beale

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid, subscribe via RSS, Twitter, Facebook & FriendFeed.

Dan Meth created a chart breaking down the orientation of Kitchens and Living Rooms in houses on popular TV sitcoms. It’s the second in his series of Pop-Cultural Charts.

image by Dan Meth

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid, subscribe via RSS, Twitter, Facebook & FriendFeed.

guest post by Simone Davalos

Many of the illustrious members of the Laughing Squid diaspora are familiar with the Snarky McF*ckbutton, a culturally indicative bit of personal accessory that saves the wearer the time and toil of actually verbalizing how much cooler they are than you (we have written about the illustrious McF*ckbutton in this space before, here).

CTP, the mover and shaker behind the Snarky McF*ckbutton, has been quietly supplying buttons for all occasions, often for free, at many exciting Bay Area events. He would like to continue snarking up the environment in a bigger way, and to this end he has a proposition for you:

The Snarky McF*ckbuttons Factory Improvement Campaign

So what’s this whole thing about? The popularity of our buttons has really taken off over the past couple of years, and it is time for us to take the next step and get a motorized button maker. This will allow us to not only be able to fill your orders more quickly, but will also allow us to finally accept large bulk orders that up until now we’ve had to refer to other companies. It will also allow us to give away even more buttons to even more fund raisers for good causes. Only trouble is the machine is pretty expensive. In order to help us get it we’ve put together a pretty simple and straightforward investment idea that we’re sure everyone will love. In order to help us get it we’ve put together a pretty simple and straightforward investment idea that we’re sure everyone will love.

We are asking for $100 from each supporter, limited to the first 70. We will collect the money over the month of February, 2009, and once we have reached the target of $7,000 we will get the button machine. What’s in it for you? In return for your $100 we will give you 100 snarky buttons of your choice (a $150 value), or a bulk order of 300 buttons of one design (that’s 33 cents each!!), plus you’ll get a 10% discount on all your orders for the coming year. We will fill the orders during March, 2009, in the order that people signed up.

Help Snarky McF get a primo button machine! Enable the advancement of technology that furthers the cause of sarcastic, pithily written button comments everywhere! Be able to say you were there back at the beginning, and whatever, it was way better then.

Details and ways to pay at The Snarky McF*ckbutton website.

See Previously: Snarky McF*ckButtons – Wear What You’re *Really* Thinking

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid, subscribe via RSS, Twitter, Facebook & FriendFeed.

guest post by mikl-em

Marvel Comics celebrates Presidents’ Day with a special 6-page digital comic featuring Abe Lincoln, Spider-Man & Captain America. For more POTUS / crime-fighter crossover action, they also include a digital version of Spidey Meets the President, the mini-adventure set at Barack Obama’s inauguration ceremony which was published in a recent Spider-Man issue.

The comics are viewable for free using the Marvel Digital Comics Reader, a web-based program that renders the PDF-y pages of the many digital comics that Marvel offers. Scott wrote about the launch of Marvel’s Digital Comics Unlimited back in November 2007.

A couple words of warning: there were some technical difficulties earlier today. They may be fine now, but if the comic seems incomplete try quitting and re-launching the reader. I suggest browsing the comic using the “Smart Panels” option for the best readability, though it was likewise buggy at times.

The Presidents’ Day comics are fun but simple things, not much room for a story arc in 4-6 pages. In fact they remind me of the old one-page Hostess snack cake ads from the 80’s–there’s even a fruit pie reference at the end of the Lincoln comic as a nod to those ads. Seanbaby.com has a fantastic site dedicated to the old Hostess ads.

You can read 4-page digital samples of other Marvel issues (several classic Spidey issues are featured on the PrezDay page, but you can browse to others) for free. Subscribing to their service gives you all-you-can-eat access to a chunk of the Marvel Catalog (“5000 issues and growing”). No need for the titles to be mailed flat anymore, I guess.

For more free comic goodness, put May 2, 2009 on your calendar. That will be the 8th annual Free Comics Day, where your local comic shop will have a pile of free issues from numerous publishers–the actual titles for this year’s giveaway have just been announced.

Finally for those of you who thought that Presidents’ Day itself was a straightforward proposition, well Snopes has some must-read background for you.

via Kelly Sue and Comic Riffs

images via Marvel

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid, subscribe via RSS, Twitter, Facebook & FriendFeed.