geekosystem

A new study from the University of South Wales confirms what plenty of us have known for years -- everything is better with a beard. At least, ladies seem to think so, as the study showed that women see bearded men as more attractive partners in both the short and long term. 

Are you an Orthoptera enthusiast? Have you got an itch that only constant footage of roaches can scratch? Well, Animal Planet's got you covered with their new Cockroach Cam, which delivers all the twitchy, chitinous streaming action you could ever want, 24/7. They've even placed the roaches in a tiny little kitchen, making them seem oversize. How charming!

This week brought us the strangest CDC report we've read in some time when a man who received a shot of smallpox vaccine passed along a related virus to another man as an STD, which was then passed to a third man. If we were talking about anything but smallpox here, this bizarre scenario would be a case where the cure is worse than the disease, but since the disease is smallpox, that's not true. Because nothing is worse than smallpox. Nothing.

Disappointed that your Roomba can't clean your house while also telling you that you that shirt your girlfriend hates looks great on you? Researchers at Georgia Tech are working hard to solve that problem by teaching robots to lie, and they're taking lessons in lying from some of nature's most deceptive animals -- squirrels. Because hey, what could possibly go wrong with that plan, which you can see in action below?

Does the picture above make your skin crawl? You're not alone. A recent study conducted by the University of Manchester found that visual cues -- such as being shown an image of an ant or a bug bite -- can provoke an itch response in people, even if they haven't felt a thing. In fact, you may not even need to see the itch inducing stimulus, as the same study found that just seeing another person scratch can make viewers feel that they also have an itch to scratch, suggesting that itching, like yawning, may be a socially contagious response.

Researchers at the Free University of Belgium have unveiled what could be the new cool thing in the growing field of regenerative medicine -- an implantable thyroid gland grown from stem cells. The thyroid, implanted in a mouse test subject for trials, even produced hormones as it was meant to, which is important because, well, it's most of what the thyroid does, and if a replacement doesn't do that, it's not a very good replacement. But this one does, and may be, respectively, which is super cool in an abstract sense and even more so if you're a family member of on of the millions of people affected by poorly functioning thyroid gland.

If anyone was wondering how seriously South Koreans take their rappers educational backgrounds, the answer is: very. A judge in South Korea has upheld the jail sentences of eight people for attempting to defame rapper Tablo on the internet by claiming he did not, as he claimed, have Bachelor's and Master's Degrees from Stanford University.

You've maybe heard a story going around that Newegg effectively classifies Linux installation as improper use. A story on The Consumerist details the story of "Norma," who was shocked when Newegg refused to accept the return of her defective E525 Thinkpad because she'd installed Linux on it. The conclusion that Newegg's problem with Linux installation isn't exactly accurate. That said, their return policy is still a little lame. Let's get to the bottom of this, shall we?

To celebrate today, Friday the 13th, unluckiest of days, children's horror writer R. L. Stine has taken to Twitter to write a Goosebumps horror story over the span of a handful of tweets. He wrote the story for fans of The Hub, but that doesn't mean you can't enjoy the short story yourselves. Head on past the break to check out the story in full, where we've carefully put it all together so you don't have to read a bunch of separate tweets.

Portal 2 wins big at BAFTA (Eurogamer) 48 minutes of Itchy and Scratchy, you're welcome (BuzzFeed) Right now, the iTunes and Zune websites have the same tag lines (Techie Buzz) Google goes after over-optimized websites (Search Engine Land) Scientists still can't find proof of psychic powers (/.) Facebook's "Hacker's Cup" is in full swing (TNW) Fear of Facebook keeps spring break tame (NYTimes) (Happy St. Patrick's Day via Bits and Pieces)

Every Sunday night at 9:00 PM I turn on AMC. From 9:01 PM to 9:03 PM, I watch the opening scene of The Walking Dead. It's usually fantastic. The producers know they have a tight window in which to film a scene and start the opening credits. The producers also know that they have to hook you at this point, so they give you what you came for: Zombies. Brains. People in cars stabbing zombies in the eye with screwdrivers because zombies want their brains.

Glitch went live today at 1pm EST, and having played the beta, I'm going to say that you should check it out. What is Glitch you ask? Well, if you're asking that, you must have missed out on this lovely little trailer (which you should watch immediately and then walk around singing for the rest of the day) so I'll give you the skinny as best I can. Glitch is a lot of things.

First of all, Glitch is a browser-centric, Flash-based, social MMORPG developed by Tiny Speck (aka those guys from Flickr) and Keita Takahashi (aka that dude from Katamari Damacy). Weird combination, I know. Glitch has a strong social gaming influence. You can taste the FarmVille if you're trying to, but there's also considerably more depth. Learning skills involves the standard "click the learn button, wait X hours" behavior common to browser-based games, but there is also a strong avatar-based world. In the world, you run around doing bizarre things like nibbling piggies (both of those words are specific, technical terms; I'm not trying to be cute) milking butterflies, playing music for crabs, and squeezing chickens as well as more conventional things like making food, earning money, mining minerals, and saving up for a house.

The tricky business of being a woman on Ventrilo, or really any online gaming voice chat (The Mary Sue) When patents attack Android (Official Google Blog) 7 questions you didn't know could be answered by math (Cracked) Cheezburger, Inc. CEO Ben Huh challenges GQ to a fashion battle (Styleite) Verizon Wireless' year-end roadmap leaked. Want to be a spy? (Engadget) Fiberglass laptops sound itchy (TechCrunch) Sadly (not for our wallets), the next PSP won't be launching in the US or Europe in 2011 (GamesRadar) (title pic via The High Definite)

 

Scottish band FOUND has released their song "Anti Climb Paint" on an edible chocolate record. Created by baker Ben Milne of Fisher & Donaldson, the idea for the 7" record came out of wanting to collaborate with the band.

Milne is friends with the members of FOUND, who filmed the video for the song in the bakery’s kitchen. The band includes Ziggy Campbell (lead vocals, guitar), Tommy Perman (bass guitar, synth) and Kev Sim (electronics, percussion) who describe their sound as an unusual mix of garage rock, melodic pop and glitchy electronica. While the chocolate record will be released for only a very limited run, this is one sweet idea that will certainly attract attention. But what we really want to know is what happens to the sound when it starts to melt?

Aside from being terrifying, the reason why these frog legs twitch and jiggle when salt is added is because they're fresh, which means the cells inside them are still intact and store ATP molecules that can be manipulated until the energy is expended. In this case, they are being manipulated by the salt because salt contains sodium ions that create voltage differences, which helps trigger the twitching. Read more about why salt makes frog legs freaky over at HowStuffWorks.

(via Bits & Pieces)