Obama Streaker Update

So apparently the Obama streaking does not count. WHAT? According to SiFy news, Alki David does not want to pay unless the White House acknowledges that Obama saw Mr. Rodriquez's nasty bits. Really? REALLY? You want the WHITE HOUSE to acknowledge that the PRESIDENT saw a naked man? First and foremost, the White House is not going to comment, and good for them for not descending to your asinine level Mr. David; second - pay the man the million dollars, he was naked within 10 ft of the president.

Apparently instead, in exchange for an undisclosed sum, Juan Rodriguez has agreed with Alki David to try to streak again, in front of another undisclosed head of state. David apparently spoke with Rodriguez directly, and told the NY Post "Mr. Rodriguez agreed that he was not able to complete all the criteria of the challenge. But he came so very close, and his personal story about why he decided to take such a risk for his family, moved me to provide him with a generous consolation prize."

My thoughts are - you're settling with him Mr. David, you're settling with him so he doesn't sue for the promised $1 million AND damages. However, David has said that despite the "failed attempt," (his words) he has agreed to pay all Rodriguez's sister's hospital bills, Rodriguez's rent for the next year and will provide him with an additional undisclosed amount of cash. This is not too bad, because the rent is supposedly $1,600 a month, and medical bills can get quite, quite costly, so hopefully Rodriguez recovers a couple hundred thousand. It's the least, the very least, Mr. David can do.

Additionally I think Mr. David should pay all of Rodriguez's legal bills. But that may just be me, the rest of you may feel that Rodriguez should pay for his own stupidity.

Obama Streaker Shouldn't Be the One to Pay!

So as most of you probably know, President Obama got to see a naked man the other day. Not that its likely that he had any desire to see Juan James Rodriguez's manly bits, nor is it likely he had to see them long before Rodriguez was hauled off by the cops, but still nudity occurred.

And Mr. Rodriguez got certainly more than he himself bargained for. Roidriguez was egged on by a website, which stipulated it would pay US $1,000,000 to anyone who streaked in front of the president, with the website name written on his or her chest and shouted the website's name 6 times.

However, instead of an easy million, Rodriguez was arrested, charged with indecent exposure, public lewdness, and disorderly conduct and only released on $10,000 bail. He also claims he spent $1,300 of his own money for the prank, some of it on the specially designed tear-away T-shirt and shorts he wore. Now, regardless of the validity of his own spending on his pre-nudity costume, it is likely that he will have to shell out quite a bit in legal fees and court fees in order to keep himself out of serious trouble.

However, the internet mogul Alki David, who's promoted this insane act, is now saying he's not sure Rodriguez met the terms of the wager. "It's a lot of money," David is quoted as saying. "We're not going to give the money away lightly." WHAT?!? You'll advertise that you give away this money lightly, and it didn't strike you as a lot of money when you put the offer up on your website. And seeing all of the stupid things people are willing to do on TV for far less money, you HAD to have a reasonable suspicion that someone would follow through on this nonsense.

Not only do I believe that David should have to pay up, and soon, I also believe he should share in the legal repercussions. He knows that being fully nude is pretty much illegal in all of the States, and he knows that conducting nonsense around and near the President of the US is also pretty much always illegal. He point blank incited illegal activities, and I don't think that Rodriguez should be the only one to suffer. You shouldn't be allowed to pull ridiculous pranks just because you are rich and escape scott-free.

A car that drives me? Sign me up!

Google CEO Eric Schmidt recently announced that the search engine giant is actively testing autonomous cars and has already logged 140,000 miles with its test autos.

The way these cars work is through the use of sensors, video cameras and laser range finders in tandem with info collected by manually driven vehicles that Google has sent out to various map routes. The automated cars is then relayed the info gathered by the other cars after it is processed at Google’s data centers.

One of the primary goals of these cars is to, not only, cut energy consumption but to also cut the amount of deaths currently caused by traffic accidents (roughly 1.2 million people per year). Google hopes that with these cars, traffic accidents can mostly be avoided; because even when a human doesn’t see something coming, the car will and will then act accordingly.

Although these vehicles are self-driving, none of them have yet to make a journey without a driver present to take over and additionally, police officers have always been told as to what is going on when tests have been conducted.

If you're interested in more info, you can read more about it here - LINK! And although skeptics think that a fully automated car is a long way off, I'm still hopeful, I would love to be able to sleep my way through my commute.

This week in stupid lawsuits: Paris Hilton vs Hallmark

This just in, Paris Hilton and Hallmark have finally settled their lawsuit over the use of the catchphrase "that's hot."

Hilton recently sued the Kansas City greeting card maker for portraying her as a waitress in a diner handing a patron a plate and using her "trademark" "that's hot" line. I find the lawsuit completely ridiculous in that Hilton is far from the first person to ever utter the phrase, which she unsuccessfully tried to claim as a tradmark in 2007.

Hallmark argued the card was in the "public interest," which is laughable since Hilton hasn't been of public interest (minus recently being declared persona non grata in Japan) since before her suit was filed in 2007.

The terms of the settlement are unknown and not released by either party, but Hilton had been demanding $500,000. The only word out of Hallmark is the settlement was from the Judge, in that it was a "mutually acceptable conclusion," which hopefully means Hallmark won't be producing any more Hilton cards. And hopefully no one else will for that matter.