Infocult: Uncanny Informatics

This robot watches you with its eyes

Another creepy robot comes from Europe, and is all about watching humans very carefully.  With their eyeballs:

The "Lindas," as they've been dubbed, will soon work alongside humans in two complex environments: as monitors in an Austrian nursing home and security guards in an office.

Yes, the eye-bots will rove offices and a home for the elderly, watching everything and everybody.   

(Those two on the right look like skulls, don't they?)

See them in action, rolling along hallways, eyeballs rotating and blinking:

 

Transilvane: a small blast of Kirby horror

Here's a tiny bit of horror from Jack Kirby.  Well, horror and madness.  Madness!

Originally introduced in Jimmy Olsen #142, the miniature world of Transilvane was created as an experiment in learning how to terraform other planets, but for reasons known only to Kirby, the scientist in charge of the project decided instead to seed Transilvane with tiny artificial people and use orbital projectors to constantly play horror movies in the sky.

To continue:

So naturally, this led to the Transilvanian lifeforms evolving into Draculas, Frankensteins and Wolfmen who eventually started blasting off to the larger earth around them in coffin-shaped spaceships, which in turn caused the scientist to try to wipe everything out with a handy dose of Genocide Spray. [emphases in original]

Alas, the Gothic world gives way to a non-Gothic world, just like in the second Matrix movie.

Fortunately, Superman and Jimmy Olsen stopped all this, and switched out the horror movies for westerns, and now THERE IS AN ENTIRE MINIATURE PLANET OF TINY COWBOY DRACULAS THAT IS STRAIGHT UP A THING THAT EXISTS IN SUPERMAN’S HOMETOWN, AND NO ONE EVER TALKS ABOUT THIS. [emphases in original]

Fan fiction writers, go!

(thanks to Steven Burnett!)

Phone horror in "Valibation"

"Valibation" (2013) is a short film about mobile phones, horror, self-obsessesion, sketchy strip malls, and... well, watch it.

VALIBATION from ulteriorproductions.com on Vimeo.

The Cronenbergian aspects are well done. It's interesting to see them link up to the self-help finale. Or, it's a big ode to mastrubation.

(thanks to Charles "USB port" Cameron)

Invasion of the bloodworms

There's no drinking public water when bloodworms swim therein.

Blood worms -- small, red insect larvae -- have been appearing in water glasses and filters in the rural town.

Authorities have warned Colcord's 800 residents not to drink, cook with or brush their teeth with the worm-infested tap water.

(thanks to Ionna!)

Directly controlling the human brain

Two Seattle scientists realized a mad science dream when one successfully used his brain to control the other's mind and body.

Rajesh Rao, a UW computer science and engineering professor, used his thoughts to control the actions of Andrea Stucco, a research assistant professor in the school's psychology department.

We could ask "how doe this perfectly embody faculty politics?"  Or else wonder, how did it work?

Rao wore an EEG cap that read his brain's electrical activity, while Stucco had a transcranial magnetic stimulation coil, which can stimulate brain activity, placed over his left motor cortex, the region of the brain that controls hand movement. A code translated brain signals from the EEG into commands for the brain.

And then it looked like so:

Rao imagined moving his right hand (without actually moving it) to click the "fire" button that would shoot a cannon in a video game. Across campus, Stucco, who wasn't looking at the computer screen in his lab where the video game was unfolding, involuntarily moved his right hand and pushed the space bar on his keyboard to fire the cannon, as if experiencing a nervous tic.

You may now cheer maniacally, tremble in fear, or watch this video:

We are on the threshold of a new era for labor relations.

Pop Science concludes on an insanehopeful note:

no, you can't control someone's body against their will, Rao says. But maybe one day?

(thanks to Peter Rothman)

Eyeball horror in China

Chinese medical criminals apparently attacked a boy to steal his corneas.

The boy was playing outside his house Saturday evening in the northern province of Shanxi when he was taken, drugged and had his eyes removed, according to Chinese TV reports.

It's a horrific story, not least from the parents' perspective:

His parents noticed he was missing and organized a search for the boy. They found him hours after he had disappeared in a nearby field, with a bloody face.

His father told a Chinese news agency that at first, he thought the boy had fallen and hurt himself.

“He had blood all over his face. His eyelids were turned inside out. And inside, his eyeballs were not there...”

And:

The boy’s eyeballs were eventually found near the spot where he was discovered, but the corneas were gone, reports said Tuesday.

AFP suggests this was done for the black market organ trade.

(thanks to Randy McCall)

Dolls who take your face

This series of photos is based on swapping doll's faces with those of their child owners'.  Consider them postcards from the Uncanny Valley:

Isn't the girl's horrified expression terrific, especially when combined with those waving doll arms?

Boys can play, too:

Let Jonathan Coulton explain:

(thanks to Jesse walker)

Goth the fastball

Gothic terror invaded baseball this week, as a popular Asian horror figure took the pitcher's mound in KoreaJapan.

(thanks to Todd Bryant; thanks to Alex H. for the correction)

Puppets, cannibalism, murder, and Florida

Today's life-imitates-screaming-Gothic-nightmare comes from Florida.  The story begins with a man arrested for possession of child pornography.

But not just any kiddie porn:

[D]ocuments and pictures that were seized by Homeland Security investigators at Brown's home... contained images of naked, bound, and dead children...

Which is bad enough, adding torture and murder to the mix.  Until you see the man's motivation:

[T]ranscripts from chat lines that show Brown was planning to kidnap children for the purpose of eating them.

Yes, we can add cannibalism to the Gothic stew.  In sum,

WTSP also reports that Federal documents show Brown was "planning to kidnap children -- specifically toddlers -- torture them, rape them, murder them, then cook their body parts on a stove."

But wait! There's more.  It get worse.

Brown was best known for his appearances on the Christian Television Network kid's show, Joy Junction, where he and his equally creepy puppet, Marty, would warn children of the evils lurking in the world...

Brown ran a kiddie party business called Puppets Plus.

Puppets Plus indeed.

To sum up, a religious puppeteer who specialized in working with children fantasized about kidnapping, torturing, raping, murdering, then eating said children.  It's a nice package of nightmare fuel, ready to stalk your sleep.  Thank you, Florida.

(via Jesse Walker)

Hell in a handbag

Why not give your purse that Infocult flare?

It's from a German company called EMP.

(thanks to Charles Cameron)