January 2, 2008
Whiz of the Web: Wednesday Whiz-Up
The best of the internet, squirted out in flavorful neon globules, just for you.

- We've still got quite a few year-end lists and awards to get through, so settle in, people! First The Movie Blog points out that a Moviefone poll has selected the worst performances of 2007, with Lindsay Lohan "winning" for her role in I Know Who Killed Me. Meanwhile, Slate has a different kind of top ten list for us: the Bush administration's dumbest legal arguments of the year (via Sarah). Joystiq picked an official, overall top 10 games of 2007, and then went ahead and posted a whole freaking lot of "best of the rest" lists. Similarly, Cinematical is still posting ten best films of 2007 lists, ten worst films of 2007 lists, a year in horror recap, and a general recap of the year in film.
- We've got a couple of stories for you today about the loss of virtual items in MMOs. The saga of a Halo 3 player who got his Recon Armor swiped by a hacker, and who can't get Microsoft to do anything about it, is playing out on the player's clan forum. Meanwhile, a Chinese gamer successfully sued publisher Shanda Interactive Entertainment for the loss of virtual items taken from him as part of a police investigation into the sale of stolen items. He got $680 for his trouble, but "plans to return to court to sue Shanda for the roughly $20,000 USD he has spent on the game over the previous five years."
- Nerd World asked a bunch of monsters and villains what they thought of the 2008 presidential candidates. Their responses are funny, though nearly impossible to read in IE.
- Heh. Kevin Smith has his own custom Wii.
- Download Squad picks the 5 most annoying programs on your PC, and holy crap do we agree with them about Acrobat Reader. We hate that piece of crap application.
- As we all know, the internet is for porn. And it looks like Download Squad has found a way make downloading porn (and other stuff, too, we guess - like illegal music, for example) easier: Retriever.
- J.K. Rowling admitted in a recent interview that she's thought about writing an eighth novel set in Harry Potter's universe, but says if she did, Harry would probably not be the central character.
- Beware, Wii owners! The Psyclone Wii Recharge Station might just fry your Wii Remotes!
- If you're willing to pay $4,000, you can get a copy of Grand Theft Auto III signed by Jack Thompson. Thompson signed the game for a fan after his debate with Lorne Lanning at the VGXPO right here in Philadelphia. (Via)
- The Wii has apparently officially been hacked such that hackers were able to run software of their own design natively on the system.
- Ah, another awesome stop-motion, people-animated simulation of a classic video game from the Game Over Project. This time, it's Tetris.
Image Credit: Flickr user Michael T. Gilbert









Harry Potter!!!! WOO!!!
Haha. Why am I not surprised the one comment is about Harry Potter? I think she should do it. The Harry Potter universe is a good setting for a variety of stories, just don't have Harry as a main character.