News of the Tweet: Turn This Off, Twitter Is Unhealthy

Author:
Ryan "Squirrel" LaBar
Mar 5, 2012

By Seb Kemp

At a conference in Montreal last week, one of the founders of Twitter, Biz Stone, likened Twitter to Ice-Cream.

Let's look past his name - which is possibly the constituent parts of his first pet's name and the street he grew up on - and look at the other seemingly bonkers part of that #NOTT opener. What he was trying to say was that Twitter is unhealthy if overused and users should just pick at it, leave happy and move on. Mammoth weeklong Twitter sessions (like the ones required to bring you #NOTT each week) are very dangerous or stupid.

Lisa Richardson seems to know where to draw the line. Nonetheless, here is the weekly round-up of the, largely, mountain bike Twittersphere.

This week I found a whole new way to burn time on the internet, and this time it doesn't leave me with sticky mitts. I discovered the delights of Tumblr after being introduced to Daily-Movement.com by @adrianmarcoux. What caught my eye were the photos of beautiful women, grimy motorbikes and more beautiful women with their nipples out.

Next week I hope to do a round up of the best mountain bike Tumblrs so if anyone has any good ones they curate or know of then please hit me up at @2_FLAT.

From what I gather of Tumblr it is just a means for people to copy and paste their favorite images from around the web into one handy spot. It is sort of like a digital version of scrap booking for hipsters.

Talking of borrowing images, Nikon made a bit of an error this week when it was revealed that footage used in the promotional material for the new D800 camera was actually shot by a chap who used a Canon 5D Mark II.

Screen grab taken from F-Stoppers site.

Footage was also Command(CTRL)+C'd from Brain Farm's blockbuster The Art Of Flight--not exactly subtle. I once stole a Mars Bar from the corner shop when I was twelve. I made sure no one was looking and I covered my tracks. Sure, it was only a candy bar, but I was ten years old and I still had the presence of mind to make sure I couldn't be caught for stealing. Ten years old--I was still playing conkers, eating worms and running into walls, and I did a better job than this multi-national company of well paid experts. What were they thinking?

Talking of keeping your work and secrets away from being appropriated by sinister men in khaki jackets @svenmartinphoto was yet again being clawed at for Facebook profile pictures.

Sven is a bit of an iphoneography aficionado who can layer up his new age kicks with a vintage feel so I might have to get him this RangeFinder iPhone case I found via DesignTaxi.

As I get to grips with Tumblrizing, the Dirt Norco team seems to be getting used to Twitter--rather slowly.

Pumping up followers through fear of the Dark Lord is one thing, but trying to put the fear of God into someone is another....

What else has Lopes being up to this week? Well, he has been watching some clever television. I'm not sure that exactly qualifies at educational, but perhaps he learnt more than any would from reading his book.

It seems the winter TV bug is hitting and people aren't just watching supercross (Oh, how I love the blow by blow account of the supercross being broadcast via Twitter each weekend).

Hang on, is there something going on here with drugs and mountain bikers? Twice in one week there has been vaguely related references. What does it mean? Double Rainbow? What does it mean, damn it?

Ah, thank goodness for bicycle tech. The one thing that calms down the internet and restores rational thought.

UK test and review high priest Steve Worland was obviously looking at one of the bicycles that appeared at the NAHBS when he wrote this tweet.

At the opposite end of the technology scale but in the same rainbow as far as creativity goes, some very clever boffins have given birth to a swarm of miniature flying Stevie Wonders. It is terrifying and yet quite beautiful to watch. Right now they are controlled by computers, but what happens when the computers learn to control themselves? Will this spell the end of Coldplay's Chris Martin or Lady Gaga tinkering away on their ivories?

Talking of spelling (see what I did there?), someone at Trek World Racing must have had one thing on his (or her, but probably his) mind when he put in the work order for the new van wrap.