Megan Van Groll Artwork

Megan Van Groll is an artist specializing in realistic portraits and narrative figure paintings that explore themes of identity construction in modern women. (Nude Figure Paintings).

Webdriver Torso: YouTube mystery

quote [On 23 September 2013 at 14:45, YouTube user Webdriver Torso quietly uploaded a video.
The mysterious 11-second sequence of red and blue rectangles could easily have been lost, unexplained and unappreciated among YouTube's plethora of kittens and music videos. But 28 minutes later Webdriver uploaded an almost identical video, and another an hour after that, and another, until eight months later - apparently happy with nearly 80,000 clips - they fell silent, with 236 hours of video to their name.
Almost all of the uploads follow the same pattern - 10 slides, each with a red rectangle, a blue rectangle and a computer-generated tone.
The shapes change size and the notes change pitch. Each video appears to be unique, but the format stays the same].

Spy messages?



Wired magazine first stumbled on the clips in February as part of a feature on obscure YouTube uploads.

A Google search for “Webdriver Torso” only turns up results related to the YouTube channel. (We reached out to Webdriver Torso via the YouTube messenger, but have not heard back.)

A search for “Webdriver” alone, however, is somewhat more fruitful.

On the blog BoingBoing, user Enkidu speculated that the videos might be a digital version of spies' "numbers stations". These cold war relics are radio stations that broadcast seemingly random numbers at periodic intervals.

The very first video uploaded to the channel, over a month before the first rectangle classic, reveals a completely different side to Webdriver.
Locked behind a 1.99 euro ($2.76; £1.63) paywall and only accessible if you're in France, is a clip from the cartoon series Aqua Teen Hunger Force, in which the show's three anthropomorphic fast-food items - Frylock, Meatwad and Master Shake - fail to win a pub quiz.

The second anomalous clip only raises more questions.
In video 1,182 we have what could be our first sighting of Webdriver.
Filmed from a Parisian balcony, the six-second clip shows an Eiffel Tower lightshow followed by a fleeting glimpse of a face.


Below the video, Webdriver has left a comment, their only known communication with the world: "Matei is highly intelligent."

(via BBC)

quote [Selenium is a set of tools that help you automate Web-based tasks. According to its site, “it is for automating Web applications for testing purposes, but it is certainly not limited to just that.” One of the tools Selenium offers is something called WebDriver.
“WebDriver is a tool for writing automated tests of websites,” reads the WebDriver FAQ. “It aims to mimic the behavior of a real user, and as such interacts with the HTML of the application.” So we reached out to the owners of Selenium WebDriver identified in this list of developers. It looked likely that “Webdriver torso” was part of this project, not only because of the shared neologism but also because automation seemed like the only plausible explanation for uploading this quantity of video.
But Patrick Lightbody, who has been involved with Selenium since 2005, denied that there was any connection between their WebDriver and Webdriver Torso. “Those videos look like they are trying to make contact with aliens,” he wrote].
(via The Daily Dot)

[Previously: The mistery of Numbers station ]

Richard Bernardin Updated

Richard Bernardin was born in Chicago but now lives between Paris and Montreal. After studying film and photography, he embarked on a successful career in fashion photography.
[Thumbnail: Simone Doreleijers by Richard Bernardin for Please Magazine]
[Previously: Richard Bernardin Photography]

Ashkan Honarvar Portfolio

Ashkan Honarvar depicts an undeniable, unavoidable beauty by accepting the darker sides of human ‘nature’. The body, torn by acts of war, exploited by the sex industry or used as a tool for seeking identity, is the focal point of his work.This constitutes a search for a universal representation of the evil latent in every human, providing an opportunity for reflection. His aesthetic dissection has an intriguing macabre nature, which opens the images to interpretation.
[Thumbnail: Negative space, pornographic images were the starting point for this series. Removing faces and genitals strips the naked bodies of their identity enabling an exploration of sexuality.]

The LIX 3D printing pen

Wow! now we can start "to draw" in the air ... The LIX 3D printing pen does not require paper as it enables you to doodle in the air. The pen functions similarly to 3D printers. It quickly melts and cools coloured plastic, letting you create rigid and freestanding structures.

Vincent Peters Photography

Vincent Peters began his career taking pictures while traveling through Thailand in the 1980's. In 1990, Vincent rededicated himself to the world of fashion and celebrity photography. Since there he is based in between Paris and New York.

[Thumbnail (...and photos): Candice Swanepoel from GQ BRITISH Victoria's Secret by Vincent Peters with Candice Swanepoel, Lily Aldridge, Erin Heatherton & Lindsay Ellingson].

Live Sex on the PS4

quote [Provided you're not "lucky" enough to catch them live, YouTube and Reddit are the new homes for clips of people doin' it live on their PlayStation 4. No "game shows", no pretence, just couples filming themselves hard at it. On Reddit - I'm not going to link it because even the banner image of the subreddit is super-NSFW - the vids roam free, but even on YouTube, some escape Google's army of robot censors].
Read more: Kotaku.