Sarcasm Abounds - Father Darth Emerges on Twitter, William Shatner Portrays Dad of Justin Halpern on CBS $#*! My Dad Says

I'm not sure if this is the same guy from @shitmydadsays. The humor is similar but decidedly much darker. True to the role of Darth as a suburban dad? You decide, I'm not so sure. Still -- a creative use of  Twitter. This tweeter consistently mentions current events, through a dark lens of course.

 If you don't know about @shitmydadsays, it's a Twitter account managed by Justin Halpern, a guy who has this to say in his bio: “ I'm 29. I live with my 74-year-old dad. He is awesome. I just write down shit that he says".  On August 25, 2009 Harry Kimball at Newser.com reported that the account had only be in existence for 3 weeks and already there were almost 70,000 followers.  These days Justin's account has 1,368,782 Followers  and is on 34,886 Lists on Twitter.

On March 4, 2010, Less than a year after the Twitterverse was blessed with the reality driven wisdom of Dr. Halpern via his grateful son, HarperCollins released the hardcover book "Sh*t My Dad Says".  Audible.com has also released the unabridged audio book narrated by Sean Schemmel.


Justin Halpern is the founding editor of the comedy website HolyTaco.com and  a senior editor at Maxim.com.  He is co-writing and co-producing a sitcom adaptation of his book on CBS for their new season.

"$#*! My dad Says" the new show starring William Shatner, is already set for the next television season in the CBS line up for Thursdays at 8:30 PM / 7:30 PM Central. The smash hit "Big Bang Theory" airs in the preceding spot, a cozy slot for a new show. In case you don't know, the show is officially pronounced "Bleep My Dad Says", though I'm sure there will be many who will just say it as it really is. Would "Dad" want it any other way?



William Shatner read off a few lines from @shitmydadsays Twitter stream at the Shorty Awards this year, which was broadcast live March 3, 2010.





I'm still not so sure his dad actually says all these things, though I've known cranky old men like him.

This is what I do know:

• I've followed @shitmydadsays for quite some time, sharing the nuggets of harsh enlightenment.
• I've recently stumbled upon @shitmydarthsays looking for the self-professed jedi on Twitter. Whether it is an homage or from the source, it's rich satire worthy of my attention.
• I've listened to the sample of the audio version of the book, which was better than my high expectations.
• The brief CBS preview prompted a few honest chuckles during the clips.
• There's no reason Justin Halpern should not be a sustainable source of quality comedic entertainment.  I could only imagine what "Dad" would have to say about the relative success of his son. I don't think this is a man who is impressed with the glitz.  

 

Justin had this to say in a blog posting referencing the booking of television shows with his dad: 

"So what ends up happening is the show that is considering booking me says "We'll have him on if he comes on with his dad." So then, even though I know my dad doesn't want to go on any shows, the people at Harper Collins have me ask him every time, just in case he changes his mind. That ends up in conversations like this: "Hey dad, would you be interested in going on the Jimmy Kimmel show?" Then my dad looks at me confused and says "Who the fuck is Jimmy Kimballs?" Then I explain and he says "No," and goes back to whatever he was doing."

Enjoy the Quantum Leap Justin et al.

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Rabbi Haim David Zukerwar: "Spiritual Structure of Reality"

 
Rabbi Haim David Zukerwar:  "Spiritual Structure of Reality" from Metanexus Institute on Vimeo.



Rabbi Haim David Zukerwar: "Spiritual Structure of Reality"

When we try to apprehend our essence, to come to our Self, we perceive that thought dilutes before the question "who am I?" This happens because our inner Self is in itself "part" of the essence of the whole of reality. In the same way as water held in a container melts and unifies with the sea when it is returned to the ocean, each soul is an immanent part of the Infinite Essence.

2008 July 14

Ban of Third Party Paid Tweets on Services that Leverage the Twitter API

Twitter is an open, real-time introduction and information service. On a daily basis we introduce millions to interesting people, trends, content, URLs, organizations, lists, companies, products and services. These introductions result in the formation of a dynamic real-time interest graph. At any given moment, the vast network of connections on Twitter paints a picture of a universe of interests. We follow those people, organizations, services, and other users that interest us, and in turn, others follow us.

- @dickc  Twitter Blog

Twitter announced Monday that there will be no more third party paid tweeting using the Twitter API.  This less than two weeks after Ad.ly completed 5 million dollars in equity funding. In October of 2009 Ad.ly received $500,000 in seed money.  As of yet there has been no blog postings on Ad.ly mentioning this move by Twitter. Twitter is in the process of updating their ToS to "articulate clearly what we mean by this statement, and we encourage you to read the updated API Terms of Service to be released shortly".

Twitter's blog post was made to explain what they are building and how they intend to "sustain the company and ecosystem".  Buried in paragraph eight is the potential killshot to third party applications that leverage the Twitter API to inject paid tweets into a timeline.

Taking Time Out for Gratitude

What's gonna set you free...
look inside and you'll see...



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