Hey friends! Welcome to this weekās edition of The Land of Random.
Itās a crazy week at the Nichols household - school is starting this week for two of our children.
HOW has time flown so fast?
(I imagine the next 13 years are going to fly by even faster).
Our youngest son just turned one last week - it was pretty fun watching him eat cake for the first time.
Now September - and Fall is right around the corner . . .
and Fall drinks at Dutch Bros. On a random unrelated note - weāre getting a Raising Canes here too . . . and we already have buccees. Itās weird living through this insane growth period in Middle Tennessee where we get all these new franchises.
Similarly, itās weird going back to Maryland and finding out everyone lined up around the block for Steakān Shake.
Anyways . . . I want to go and see Alien: Romulus at some point soon. Iām starting over all the Alien movies before I go! (Yes - that includes Alien VS Predator).
I have a 3D-printed facehugger sitting on my desk. I need to print this LIFE SIZE one.
Letās dive in!
š„Anthologies
Did you hear about the Secret Level anthology that Amazon will be releasing?
A bunch of short stories from video game universes . . . basically Amazonās response to the popularity of the Love, Death, and Robots anthologies that CRUSH on Amazon.
Personally, I find anthologies one of the most interesting mediums for film - small glimpses into all sorts of universes . . .
Hereās a few worth checking out.
Love, Death, and Robots - The first and third seasons are my favorites. Watching too many can put you into some kind of depressive funk - how much dark science fiction can you handle at a time??
Personal Favorites: Sonnies Edge, Three Robots, Sucker of Souls, Bad Travelling, Kill Team Kill, Masonās Rats, In Vaulted Halls Entombed.
Oats Studio - Neill Blomkampās anthology actually predates Love Death and Robots by about 2 years. Though I find some of Love, Death, and Robots shorts outside my tastes - basically every single one of Blomkampās shorts are BANGERS.
Personal favorites: Rakka, Firebase, Zygote, Gdansk
V/H/S series - Though a horror series, V/H/S captures a lot of interesting glimpses into crazy worlds. As with Love, Death, and Robots - these movies are best consumed one at a time - spread out over a few weeks. Too many of these puts ya in a weird mood.
Personal Favorites: Tuesday the 17th, A Ride in the Park, The Empty Wake,
Honorable Mentions
Tales from the Loop is also quite fascinating. Itās quite slow-moving at times though.
Black Mirror must always be mentioned when it comes to anthologies.
American Horror Stories has some fun stuff. āFeralā is the best episode out of all of them.
š¤ļøSpace Sunbeams
We all love sunlight. We canāt live without it.
What if. . . we could have it . . . at nightā¦.???
Yeah. Sunlight. At Night - and not in Alaska either.
I watched this short video on Twitter the other day - and couldnāt believe my eyes.
And Iām glad I didnāt because this video is a simulation. (Itās not the real deal - but a simulation of what it could be like.
The idea is to use satellites to refract + beam sunlight down at Earth at any time - even during the night.
The company is called āReflect Orbitalā and its goal is to sell 4 minutes worth of Sunlight to anyone who wants it.
Thatās just nuts. The plan is to use satellites in space with giant mirrors to reflect sunlight to Earth.
(The long-term idea involves selling sunlight to solar farms from a constellation of satellites).
Can you imagine the craziness of getting a āblastā of sunlight at night? I have no idea how much itāll cost - but I bet the waiting list is pretty decent-sized.
Yo Jared ordered sunlight for New Yearās Eve tonight. Itās gonna be WILD.
Apparently - you can reserve a āspot of sunlightā and ādeliveryā will begin in Q4 of 2025.
Iām very curious to see how this all works in real life.
Keep an eye on Reflect Orbital!
šCreate Fun Apps
I got beta access to Webclips. Woohoo!
Webclips is a really cool and absolutely the future of AI.
Itās a TOP TIER AWESOME web APP.
Sorry . . . got a little carried away there.
Basically - you can create an app to do fun stuff.
Epic poem generator? check
Movie food generator? check
music recommendation machine? check
Single-purpose fun apps that make AI a lot more fun, palatable, and user-friendly.
How does it work?
In short - you mock up your UI, and tell AI via a chat what you want the app to do (and it will do it to the best of its ability).
You can use it on desktop, and it works great on the phone too! (the latter is a rarity these days).
I figured the BEST way to explain Webclips was to make a video, so here is my demo / walkthrough of Webclips
This thing is FUN and I honestly think this will be a game-changer in the app space. When this goes out for public consumption - I believe itāll go VIRAL.
If youād like to see what kind of stuff you can create - hereās two that I created.
Music Vibes Generator - Type in your vibe, and get back music you can listen to! Itās a pretty fun little tool.
Movie Food Recommender - Type in a movie, and get back thematic suggestions of what you should eat during the movie. This one is pretty fun!
Get on the Webclips waitlist. Do it. Do it nowwwww.
šThe Land of Random
Random stuff just for you!
RIP to the FLIP
Remember that ancient Flip video camcorder? The one that was CRAZY popular back in the early 2000ās? Take a trip down memory land with this deep-dive.
One Million Pokeballs
Just like One Million Checkboxes, but Pokeballs this time. They will likely all have been opened by the time you click this link.
Super Tiny Tiny Home
This super tiny tiny home makes pretty good use of space! I think itās too small for me, buttt itās pretty cool.
Play Diablo Online
For real! Play the original Diablo right in your browser.
Not A Website
Instead, itās some kind of game. hmmm. Type in the words, get songs . . . it feels like some kind of ARG.
Urban Twilight
This abandoned urban exploration website was still functional the last time I visited it. The last uploads were in 2020 - and now you can only find it on the Wayback machine.
MyPal68
Eyyy! Boot up the oleā windows XP computer and browse the internet with this brand new browser made for the AUNCIENT Windows XP.
The Shadowlorn
Put on the armor - itās time for some sidequests.
Thatās all for this week - unless you want to watch this random video about someone using Twitch to play Five Nights at Freddyās IRL.
See ya next time!