Moneybird, Fly!

If you a little cynical (or rather more) about how the economic decline over the last few years seems to have least affected those who created it, then you will enjoy this immensely.

The song is entitled Moneybird, Fly! and it is a pastiche of Don McLean’s American Pie.  The lyrics are quite telling – and reflect the fact that a number of people are more than a little upset about having the economic rug pulled from under their feet.

This infographic style animation is done with panache and a rather dark sense of humor not to mention chagrin so it will not please everyone but hey.  You can’t please all of the people all of the time.

It made me smile at least.  The animation was created by Furryfish who are a creative studio founded in 2004.  Their remit, by their own admission is to engage fresh perspectives while delivering dynamic content in this era of visual communication.

Well, they get my vote.  As it were.

Star Trek: The Improvised Puppet Song

You have probably seen TV panel shows where stand up comedians stand up and improvise a song - and it's all completely unrehearsed and the audience clap and cheer and the comedian looks really smug and pleased with himself. You have probably, at this point, raised an eyebrow like a certain Vulcan gentleman of our acquaintance and wondered (non emotionally of course) about the vagaries of human behavior.

Well, sometimes it is unrehearsed - this looks to be very much the real deal. More proof (if we needed it) that quite often the best entertainment is to be found on the streets - whether or not it is always the intention is another issue altogether.

This is a street puppet show where the (brave? foolhardy?) puppeteer invites people to give him a subject and then the puppet will perform a song around that theme.  The focus for the song given on this particular street in Ontario, Canada was Star Trek.  If you are a fan, you will appreciate this! It may even give you a chuckle if you are not.

The puppeteer, however must be a diehard fan already - mentioning such things as dilithium crystals and the Borg in his ditty. I can only hope that he was given a small fortune for these few minutes of Star Trek muppet madness.

Many thanks to Flickr User Gruntzooki for uploading this vid!

The Apostrophe Song

Ah, the apostrophe, the single most used and abused punctuation mark in the history of the latin alphabet.  Perhaps people get confused with its use because in general terms (we will get on to its use as a diacritic mark later) it has not one but two.  Firstly, it is used when one (or more) letters are omitted, as in didn't for did not.  Next, it is also used to mark a possessive - such as the bee's knees.

Yet many people still make the fundamental error of using it to indicate plurals - such as I want to buy some cabbage's.  This is often known as the greengrocer's apostrophe in the UK as you often see it on shop notices or even - horror of horrors - their very signs.

All is not lost, however.  This song puts the rules across in a simple and very immediate way.  Plus, to make it even cooler, the song has a very 80s synth thing going on. 

As for the use of the apostrophe as a diacritic, that is when a glyph is added to a letter (sometimes above, sometimes below, sometimes within or even between two letters - grief).  It is used to modify how the letter is pronounced. A diacritic mark, in some of its forms is also known as an accent.  Just thought we would confuse the issue a little.

However, enjoy the song - it's a lot of fun!