Catspaw's Guide to the Inevitably Insane

Yesterday I organized the First Annual Google Strange Beverage Tasteoff. The idea came from a number of sources, such as being forced to drink Boss coffee two months ago, and Peter's great drink tasting event.

We had 17 people join in on the "fun", and by "fun", I mean "nausea-inducing agony". But nothing like a little trauma and dry heaving brings people closer together! The results of the tasteoff are below.

Best overall quotes:

"Why can't our masochism be sexy masochism?"
"I can feel them all churning together in my stomach."
"If you drink more of the alcohol one, it might kill the fish eggs one."
"Why do you hate us?"
"This is the worst event ever."

Name/nickname	Description	Quotes
Wax Gourd Drink	Looks like diluted tea. Ingredients: water, wax gourd.	"It tastes like 3 month old glazed caramel corn from a barrel that's gone kinda bad." "Not as bad as it could be." "Really funky Pepsi."
Owl Drink	Can't read ingredients label. It has an owl on it.	"Yeah, that's cat urine." "I'm getting a headache from smelling it." "Oh god this is bad."
Pocari Sweat	A Japanese clear water-like beverage that contains electrolytes. Called "sweat". Great marketing.	"It does taste like sweat. They really nailed it. That's impressive."
Lychee Drink	Tasty lychee juice.	"Okay, that one wins. ... Actually, I'm not sure if that's winning or losing. What's the goal?"
Tomato soft drink	Thick red goop. No English on the bottle except the word "soda".	"How did you get gym socks into a bottle?" "It's more like a sauce than a beverage" "It tastes like spaghetti-o sauce" "This is by far the worst one yet."
Lebanese alcohol	Alcohol that warns on the bottle that it contains over 50% alcohol.	"It's nice!" "It burns, oh god it burns!" (One member ran out of the room, returned later with five bottles of water.)
Mystery fruity drink	Clear greenish liquid.	"I'm scared." "I think my stomach is starting to feel queasy."
Coconut juice with pulp	Odorless clear liquid with big chunks	"That's not 'pulp'! It's like paint chips or something. "Oh no! I got chunks! I didn't want chunks." "It's like drinking a snowglobe." "This is pretty bad." "This is why you can't have liquids on planes, people."
Go Girl	Bright pink.	"Wow, that's really pink." "Smells like Big Red." "Not bad."
Amino Collagen	Collagen. Yes, the stuff you inject into lips. First ingredient: fish collagen. Ewwww.	"Ahh! That's not liquid!" "The first ingredient in beverages should never contain the word 'fish'." "It's like if gummi bears were in the matrix and they were compiled down and reprocessed and fed to the other gummi bears"
Boss Coffee	Typical Boss coffee, just like the kind from Japan.	"Surprisingly good." "Not so bad."
Romulan Ale	Bright blue beer.	"Wow, it's actually blue." "Am I going to have to have my teeth bleached after this?" "All of us now have permanently stained smiles." "I know beer, and this does not taste like beer."
Fish egg drink	This is an actual photo of the inside of my glass. Need I say more?	"Ewwww there was a clump of them. Not only are there little fish eggs, but they clump up too." "I wouldn't mind the eggs but they're fuzzy!" "Oh god!" "Now I'm gonna hurl."
Can of soup?	As far as we can tell, this was a can of soup, despite the insistence that they got it in the beverage section.	"Oh dude." "Wait a minute." "That's soup." "Why do you think that's a drink?" "There's vegetables in the bottom." "If I had a fork..."

We all survived, despite looking a little queasy even into the next day. In hindsight, this was a stupid idea for an event. Next time I'm organizing something, it's going to be something fun, instead of traumatic.

This morning Randall Munroe, the creator of xkcd, visited Google. The room was absolutely stuffed with people to hear him tell tales of escaping from Raptors and planning elaborate battles in his head.

We had our own set of surprises in store for Randall.

First, we'd baked a cake for him, based on our favourite comic.

The cake was large enough to feed hundreds of fan-Googlers who were wearing xkcd shirts, wielding stuffed raptors and clutching comics for him to sign.

Next, Guido, Python's inventor, got up and asked if Randall thought he should be able to fly.

And finally, we brought in Donald Knuth who got up and asked him what his O(n log(log n)) time searching algorithm was. Randall blushed -- "It's an honour to meet you!" -- and, glancing around the room, rapidly suggested that we move away from the topic of search algorithms. Everyone laughed.

Finally, we had Randall draw for us his own xkcdesque version of the Google logo, shown for the first time below.

Thanks very much to Randall for coming. We all loved finally getting to meet the man behind the stickpeople.

Remember Testing on the Toilet? Google's initiative to flyer our restroom stalls with useful testing advice.

Well Anais and I decided to author our first episode this week with a slightly different theme than usual. Presenting Relationship Advice on the Toilet:

What do you get paid to do at your job?

Rogers hi-speed, my old Canadian internet service provider, has started modifying the content that it sends to users. Instead of the normal google.ca homepage, Rogers users now see the page to the right, with Rogers' own advertisement inserted into the top of the page.

So what's wrong with this? There are lots of advertisements on the web, right? What's so special about this particular case?

The problem is that this advertisement wasn't on the original website. Instead, it was added to the website by Rogers before they delivered the content to you. Picture that your mailman was opening your mail and edited what Aunt Mabel said to you before putting the letter into your mailbox and you'll begin to understand what's happening here.

Nart points out that there are actually laws against this kind of tampering, specifically the Telecommunications Act which states: "Except where the Commission approves otherwise, a Canadian carrier shall not control the content or influence the meaning or purpose of telecommunications carried by it for the public."

This is particularly scary because it sets a bad precedent. If content carriers begin to modify the content, rather than just pass it along unaltered, then we can imagine an internet where you're unable to visit any content that your content carrier deems "inappropriate" -- for example competitors' websites, or blogs that speak negatively about them (maybe even this post one day). This isn't science-fiction, either. Two years ago at the Citizen Lab I reported that the Canadian ISP Telus was temporarily blocking its subscribers from accessing a union-run website during an escalating labour dispute. We're likely to start seeing more and more of this type of filtering and information modification at the internet service provider level if there's no public outcry.

So what can you do?

If you're a Rogers subscriber, contact them at 1-888-ROGERS1 (1-888-764-3771) or write to 855 York Mills Road / Don Mills, Ontario / M3B 1Z1 to let them know how you feel about this decision. Tell them that when you go to a webpage, you want to see the content of that webpage, not the content that Rogers wants you to see. Taanta Gupta, Rogers' vice president of communications, commented on these advertisements by saying: "We're trying different things, and we'll test customer response." Make sure that your consumer response is heard. If you're considering switching to another ISP, make sure you let Rogers know why.

Even if you're not a Rogers subscriber, take some time to learn about Net Neutrality, the principle that Internet users should be in control of what content they view and what applications they use on the Internet. Petition Congress if you're American, and Petition the House of Commons if you're Canadian. Stop this from happening at your own ISP before it starts, because it's rapidly becoming the industry standard.

Remember Baz Luhrman's song Everyone's Free (To Wear Sunscreen)? (Not to be confused with the song I have on repeat at work, Everybody's Free (To Feel Good) after that damn catchy Venture Bros intro).

The lyrics say: "Live in New York City once, but leave before it makes you hard. Live in Northern California once, but leave before it makes you soft."

This might beg the question: how long does it take living in Northern California before it makes you soft? I now present you with the answer to this previously only-hypothetical question...

Less than 19 months. That's right; just less than 19 months. Ladies and gentlemen, I am now a soft soft soft softy. How do I know?

Here's a picture that I drew for my Jan 24th, 2005 blog entry:

Notice how I look warm and tough and totally prepared to take on the blizzardy Canadian cold.

Here's what I now look like, when facing the blizzardy Canadian cold.

How do you people live in this frigid wasteland? I'm going back to my San Francisco paradise until Canada hits spring.

(Hahahaha. Spring. In Canada. That's a little joke for you Canadians. Enjoy your -20C until the sudden arrival of the next deathly 40C summer.)