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How long would it take to point out all the stupid things in Michael Bay's Transformers? My initial guess would be about the lifetime of a star, because there's is an awful lot of dumb crap in that movie. The folks over at CinemaSins have this sort of thing down to a science, though, and they've managed to highlight every misstep in the movie -- and there are more than a few -- in seven minutes or less.

Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University have given robotic life to every child's dream, building a rescue robot that can take on both humanoid and tank forms as the situation demands. The real life Transformer known as CHIMP (CMU Highly Intelligent Mobile Platform) can work like a human when it needs to climb a ladder or operate a valve. But when terrain gets rough, it can drop onto it's four treads, entering a tank-like mode that makes it easier to maneuver and seek out survivors disaster survivors.

When they're not ripping out each other's circuits or trading histrionic catchphrases back and forth, even the mightiest of Autobot and Decepticon warriors enjoys kicking back and letting all their troubles and PTSD melt away on the comfort of their living room couch. Sadly, never has this piece of home furnishing been made in the same scale as Transformers figures of our youth, forced to remain standing and never experience the simple pleasure of reclining back or laying their metallic heads on an armrest -- until now! Takara Tomy, the Japanese manufacturer of Transformers toys, has finally heard our incessant pleas for a practical, yet stylish, couch fit for Optimus Prime and is currently offering printable papercraft furniture on the their official website. So if you're handy with a pair of scissors and tape, this is something you owe it to yourself to check out.

Godfather of the computer age, Alan Turing, will be getting his face on some currency -- just not, y'know, real money. Turing's face will grace each and every bank note in the newly announced Monopoly: Alan Turing Edition. Based on a design that Turing played with friend Max Newman, the game, released by Bletchley Park Code Centre, where Turing did the codebreaking work that was instrumental to an Allied victory in WWII, is designed to teach players facts about Turing's life. Believe it or not, this Google-funded endeavor is just the latest of hundreds of bizarrely branded takes on Monopoly that are things that exist in the real world. You can get a look at some of out other favorites after the jump.

Transformers of all varieties have always been awesome toys, but the bummer is that most of them require you to transform them. They're less "Transformers" and more "things that you can Transform if you want to, I guess." The remote-controlled transformers YouTuber kenjiishida011 makes, on the other hand, do the transforming all on their own. Good thing, because you'll be too busy slack-jawed and drooling to do anything yourself. Above is his latest project which he refers to as "Version 8" and it's incredible. Version 7 is no less impressive. Check it out after the jump.

The history of beer is almost as old as human history, and it would be quite true to say that our love affair with the stuff has only grown with modern brewing practices. Given beer's pervasive place in human history, it's not surprising that the geeky pastimes of drinkers would eventually rub off on the beers themselves. The result is a veritable cornucopia of nerdy beers, from Star Trek, Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, and a few others that fit in quite nicely with your nerdy lifestyle. Like Pizza Beer -- it's more efficient than eating both separately! So sit back, crack open a cold one, and enjoy this astounding and some times mouthwatering collection.

Serving both the transforming robot fan and delicate flower fan in us all, this Tomoo Yamaji sculpture begins life as a blue dragon 1,630 millimeters in length, and transforms to become a wreath of blue flowers, measuring in with a width and height 750 millimeters. Check out the transformation steps after the break.

GoBots Transformers, everyone's favorite robots in disguise, have found a new way to become even more unsuspecting. Made out of plastic canvas, magnets, cross-stitching yarn (or whatever it is you make cross-stitching things out of) this Optimus Prime can not only masquerade as a truck but also chill with all your other knickknacks. That's right, this guy can still transform.

This awesome interpretation of Optimus Prime comes from Lord Libidan who's fondness for Transformers and cross-stitch could not have found a cooler point of intersection. If that weren't enough, Lord Libidan has also designed patterns for Jetfire, Starscream, Skywarp, and Thundercracker, with Soundwave and Blaster coming soon. Now just the patterns are for sale on Etsy, so if you want these, you'll have to learn cross-stitch. But seriously, what better reason could you possibly find?

Check out longjie0723's amazing wii-mote operated beer-can robot. This little guy can skitter around and roll away like any good beer that's got a mind for self-preservation. Probably not the most functional transformer you can imagine, but I'm sure it does a great job startling dinner guests and really, what's more important than that? Aside from teaching your son that beer cans are actually robots that are trying to escape.

(via LaughingSquid)

The above video depicts a hauntingly beautiful scene over in Forth Worth, Texas Tuesday night when lightning struck several transformers and caused a chain reaction of transformer explosions. The National Weather Service reports that between 8 p.m. and 10 p.m. Tuesday night, around 330 cloud-to-ground lightning strikes took place. Though they aren't sure if any of the bolts directly hit a transformer, they state that a bolt of lightning can carry enough electrical charge to blow a transformer if it strikes nearby ground. Police received reports of a transformer on fire, and as one can see from the video, the reports were most likely legitimate.

(via reddit)

The first official trailer for Transformers 3, a.k.a. Transformers: Dark of the Moon, has just hit the Internet. As Rob Bricken points out, it contains a grand total of one Transformer very far in, and an obscure, mustachioed one at that. There's a lot of Neil Armstrong, and apparently some sort of Transformers-on-the-moon conspiracy. Transformers 3 is due to hit theaters on July 1, 2011. (via Topless Robot)

"It was a miracle of rare device / a 26-foot tall statue of Optimus Prime made of ice." --Samuel Taylor Coleridge, slightly edited Artists Antti Pedrozo and Michel de Kok created this giant ice Optimus Prime; more pics here. [Warning: autoplay dub music.] (Antti Pedrozo via TDW)

Based on some clever sleuthwork, some Transformers fans may have uncovered the full title of the third movie in Michael Bay's big-robots, bigger-budget trilogy: Transformers: The Dark of the Moon. Amazon.com has listed three books for release in May of 2011, presumably to tie in with movie; moreover, TransformersTheDarkoftheMoonMovie.com was registered by an proxy registrant on September 13. Nothing has been confirmed, however. The Dark of the Moon is the title of a Howard Richardson stage play about "a witch boy who seeks to become human after falling in love with a human girl." Could this be a movie about an Autobot falling in love with Megan Fox Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, or something like that? That would be dumb.

Alexander Vladimirovich Semenov shot this Transformers-inspired short film in two hours; the editing took a month, though, and you'll see why. Come for the battling, rocket-launching cell phones, stay for the epic car transformation at 2:05. (TDW via Laughing Squid)

Between Two Ferns. Steve Carrell. Watch. (FoD)

Why do people want the Kindle to be the iPad? They're different for a reason. (TechCrunch)

Toast defibrillator (Geekologie)

How Apple maintains its divinity (The Atlantic)

KITT as Transformer (Toycutter)

These talking GlaDOS Curiosity Spheres probably want to kill you (Joystiq)

"We Have Learned Nothing from the Genome" (Spiegel)

(title image via Reddit)