More Wiki?
After Wikipedia, wikispaces and other wiki things, here is wikigender!
Wikigender is a online platform created by the OECD in order to promote gender equality all over the world. Designed on Wikipedia model, it’s a participative encyclopedia which bring together articles linked with gender equality. For the moment, must articles have been writen by OECD members or collaborators but the platform just begin and is wide open to public participations. As Wikipedia, it controls the publications, in order to conserv their initial aim: promoting gender equality.
Random articles? Feminism, Gender Equality in Lebanon, or Access to bank loans.
Let’s hope it works! http://www.wikigender.org
Can you live without speaking English?
Pierre Desproges shows us how it’s still possible to live without speaking English. Etonning non?
Paper Chase in Paris
I organise a paper chase in Paris! It’s funny way to discover Paris … have a look!
Further information in my French blog: http://celluleculture.wordpress.com/jeu-de-piste/
Emma je t’aime
A real Paul (millionnary) looking for Emma? The beginning of a advertising campaign?
Anyway the phenomenon “Emma Je t’aime” is everywhere.
On TV, on the web, blogs and website, on radio, on Paris’ s streets…
This “Paul” has obviously a lot of means!
But who is he?
Have a look at one of his video
Emma je t’aime TV
Envoyé par Paul222 dans Street sur wat.tv
more information on the “blog”: www.emmajetaime.com
Latest news: it seems a buzz from the Lagardere group:
http://tf1.lci.fr/infos/high-tech/0,,3634900,00-emma-est-demasqueey-.html
Darwin Awards for stupid deaths
I was in the train reading my newspaper, when a strange discussion drew my attention.
A girl was speaking about special prices to reward the most stupid deaths. I made a research and discovered the existence of the Darwin Awards. The Darwin Awards were created in 1993 by Wendy Northcutt when she was student at the university of Standford. A Darwin Award is delivered to someone who has killed or sterilized himself accidentally by a really stupid behavior. This people are rewarded to thank them for having removing themselves from the Gene pool by losing the ability to reproduce. That is considered as a great gift to Humanity.
These rewards are named Darwin Awards in reference to Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection.
There are five requirements for a Darwin Award:
- Inability to reproduce : Nominee must be dead or rendered sterile.
- “Excellence” : Astoundingly stupid judgment.
- Self-selection”: Cause of one’s own demise.
- “Maturity” : Capable of sound judgment.
- “Veracity” : The event must be verified.
Here are examples of winners :
- juggling active hand grenades (Croatia, 2001)
- jumping out of a plane to film skydivers without wearing a parachute (U.S., 1987)
- attempting to play Russian roulette with a semi-automatic pistol that automatically reloads the next round into the chamber
- crashing through a window and falling to your death in trying to demonstrate that the window is unbreakable
There are also special mention for people who are not dead or sterilized but who were not so far like this amazing old man, Larry. He was very old and wanted to fly before his death, so he attached a lot of balloons filled with helium to his lawn chair and managed to gain height. He « flew» quite far before being spotted by American radars. He finally lost height and slowly landed in California without being hurt.
Let’s go out for a cultural walk!
On this Saturday night of heroic victory, the occasion was so good to go out for a walk in the enlighten city of Paris … The interesting places were numerous: for example the “jardin des Tuileries” was full of people, illuminations, fires and artistic creations in steel or something like metal. In front of the Louvre, 3 squares of luminous screen, moving with people movements, created a link between music, people from the public and coloured light. Not far from there, 3 poets were relaying on stage, reading poems or ‘slams’ under public lights, disguised in purple for the occasion…
Streets were incredibly full of people, rugby supporters, families and art lovers mixed up for a same night, full of emotions!
The “White Night” helps contemporary artists being known and better understood by the general public and its success shows how the public is asking for this kind of cultural events! or maybe he’s just in love with Paris by night…
How can people eat organic food and hold it in a plastic bag?
In the supermarket last week, I met somebody quite weird. He was just before me at the checkout, his bag full with organic products. As a Agro student, working on environmental, agriculture and agribusiness, I was very interested in trying to understand what kind of people he was, how he has started buying organic food. So I paid attention to him and his bag. Once he had paid, he began wrapping carefully each of his organic products in a plastic bag, and then put them in his backpack!! I was stunned! How can he buy organic food and hold it in a plastic bag?
It reminds me this article, seen on http://kootenaycoopradio.com/deconstructingdinner/
“Why does my tomato look so perfect, and how much fuel was required for it to travel here from Mexico? What about the truck my tomato hitched a ride on? How much energy was required to build that truck, and wait a minute, how much energy was required to make that fuel? I know a guy down the street who grows tomatoes. Why doesn’t the grocery store around the corner sell his tomatoes? What about the road my tomato travelled on. How many workers are required per year to maintain that road? And how much fuel do they use to get to the highway that they’re paid to maintain? Didn’t I buy this tomato like a month ago? Why does it still look so perfect? And why did that girl at the checkout counter assume I needed a plastic bag for my tomato? She even gave me a puzzled look when I told her I didn’t need one! Did I mention the guy down the street grows tomatoes?
Everyone’s telling me to “go organic”. What’s the difference between organic and non-organic? And why is it that the organic produce at the grocery store is always wrapped in more packaging and stamped with more labels than the non-organic produce? Isn’t organic produce supposed to represent a more ecologically friendly alternative? Why does the same company make both a fair-trade coffee and an unfair-trade coffee? How does that company justify selling an unfairly traded product? Was the truck that was transporting the coffee using organic fuel? If not, is the coffee still organic? Whew!”
