WTFRadio is our affiliated internet-based radio station, created by a multitude of WTF.com members with the intention of providing "something for everyone", and a few laughs along the way. They are an ever-growing station, legally able to play almost anything. They are not by any means censored by anyone. There is no FCC so listen as some of our beloved posters go crazy on the air, or simply crank up the tunes.
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Please give a nice steaming pile of greetings to our newest ranter, Pandablue2342
Published: Monday, 21 April, 2008, 01:31 AM Doha Time
By Nour Abuzant
SPEAKERS at a Doha conference on Mecca's importance said that the holy city, not Greenwich, should become the reference point for world time, reigniting an old controversy that started some four decades ago.
A group of Islamic scholars presented on Saturday “scientific evidence” to prove that Mecca was the core of that the zero longitude passes through the holy city and not through Greenwich in the UK.
Greenwich in England has been the home of Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) since 1884. GMT is sometimes called Greenwich Meridian Time because it is measured from the Greenwich Meridian Line at the Royal Observatory in Greenwich. Greenwich is the place from where... [Read More]
It's Apple Inc. versus the "Big Apple." - Erik Larson, Bloomberg News
Apple filed a federal challenge to New York's trademark application for a new "Big Apple" logo, saying it's too similar to the stylized emblem found on iPhones, iPods and iMac computers.
Cupertino, Calif.-based Apple said the symbol for New York's "GreeNYC" initiative promoting energy efficiency and recycling is confusingly similar to the logo used by the electronics maker since 1977.
NYC & Company Inc., the city's nonprofit tourism and marketing office, filed the trademark application in May, playing off of New York's "Big Apple" nickname.
New York already has begun using the logo, which morphs the symbol for infinity... [Read More]
DUESSELDORF, Germany (Reuters) - A 44-year-old woman has been taken into custody in Germany on suspicion of killing three of her babies and storing their corpses in the family freezer for up to two decades, authorities said on Monday.
Two of the woman's three grown children stumbled upon a plastic bag containing one of the bodies while searching for a pizza in the deep freezer on Saturday and confronted their parents, prompting the woman to turn herself in to police.
Investigators later searched the home in Wenden-Moellmicke, east of Cologne, and found two other bags containing the bodies of babies. A newspaper dated December 1988 was found with one, suggesting they may have sat in the freezer for almost 20 years, police said.
(AP) Steve Kreuscher wants a judge to allow him to legally change his name. He wants to be known as "In God We Trust."
Kreuscher (CROY'-shir) says the new name would symbolize the help God gave him through tough times.
The 57-year-old man also told the (Arlington Heights) Daily Herald he's worried that atheists may succeed in removing the phrase "In God We Trust" from U.S. currency.
He recalls that the phrase "God Reigns" was removed from the Zion city seal in 1992 after courts deemed it unconstitutional. Zion was founded as a theocracy by a sect that believed the Earth was flat.
The school bus driver and amateur artist in the northern Chicago suburb says he has filed a petition to change his name in... [Read More]
Charles Ray Fuller must have been planning one big record company. The 21-year-old North Texas man was arrested last week for trying to cash a $360 billion check, saying he wanted to start a record business. Tellers at the Fort Worth bank were immediately suspicious — perhaps the 10 zeros on a personal check tipped them off.
Fuller, of suburban Crowley, was arrested on a forgery charge. He was released after posting $3,750 bail.
Fuller said his girlfriend's mother gave him the check to start a record business. But bank employees who contacted the account's owner said the woman told them she did not give him permission to take or cash the check.
In addition to the forgery count, Fuller was charged with unlawfully carrying a weapon and possessing... [Read More]
April 30, 2008—A colossal squid floats in a tank at a museum in New Zealand on April 30, giving scientists their first close look at the rare and elusive sea creature.
The giant was caught by a fishing boat off the coast of Antarctica in February 20007. At 26 feet (8 meters) long, it is believed to be the largest squid ever captured.
Experts froze the animal, a female, soon after its capture to preserve it for study.
Biologists are now thawing the squid and have already begun analyzing its unique features, including swiveling hooks found on the ends of its tentacles and eyes as big as dinner plates.
Scientists believe colossal squid may grow as long as 46 feet (14 meters), but because the creatures live at such great depth—up... [Read More]
Supreme Court upholds photo ID voting law, Mon Apr 28, 2008 5:04pm EDT, By James Vicini
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Supreme Court on Monday upheld a tough state law requiring voters to show photo identification, a decision critics say could keep some blacks, poor people and other traditional Democratic supporters from voting in the November election.
Resolving a partisan political battle, the country's high court voted 6-3 to reject a legal challenge by Democrats that Indiana's toughest-in-the-nation voter identification law would deter minorities, the elderly and others from casting ballots.
The main opinion agreed with Republican supporters that the law was necessary to prevent voter fraud and safeguard public confidence in the... [Read More]
How does WTF.com feel about Medical Marijuana? Intelligent discussion only please - ALL STATISTICS MUST BE LINKED.
Although I won't deny its medical benefits, and I don't like the idea of supporting already-rich pharmaceuticals, I also know a lot of people that use medical marijuana but just like to get high.
Furthermore, I am astounded by the fact that the federal government allows states to continue to prescribe and distribute medical marijuana!
One of the biggest bones of contention between the RIAA and file-sharing lawsuit defendants has been whether making a file available to others constitutes distribution of the file.
In other words, if I drag a song about a tree falling in the woods into my Kazaa "shared files" folder but there's no proof that anyone downloaded it, have I committed copyright infringement?
In most cases, the answer has been yes. Judge Neil V. Wake, presiding over Atlantic vs. Pamela and Jeffrey Howell, bucked that trend by denying the RIAA's motion for summary judgment in that case.
According to him, just because the RIAA's investigative partner MediaSentry was able to download 12 copyrighted songs from the Howell's Kazaa account at two in the morning on... [Read More]
Since Jelsoft recently released a security update requiring us to update our software anyway (to 3.6.10), we've decided to instead go ahead and move to the latest vBulletin 3.7.0 tree.
While the site is now in 'default mode', we assure you we'll be putting things back to the way they were throughout the next day or two.
In the meantime, we'll open back up and give you a few tidbits on what's new.
Here's a few exciting changes:
1) New Profiles - You will notice that you now have a new profile layout. You may wish to take this opportunity to update it if you haven't in a while. You can even leave messages/greets inside others' profiles! One thing that is not yet installed is a favorite YouTube video.... [Read More]
TALLAHASSEE, Florida (Reuters) - Senate lawmakers in Florida have voted to ban the fake bull testicles that dangle from the trailer hitches of many trucks and cars throughout the state.
Republican Sen. Cary Baker, a gun shop owner from Eustis, Florida, called the adornments offensive and proposed the ban. Motorists would be fined $60 for displaying the novelty items, which are known by brand names like "Truck Nutz" and resemble the south end of a bull moving north.
The Florida Senate voted last week to add the measure to a broader transportation bill, but it is not included in the House version.
In a spirited debate laced with double entendre, Senate lawmakers questioned whether the state should curtail freedom of expression in vehicle... [Read More]
So I ran across a line in an opinion blog I was reading that said there were claims that planned parenthood was racist because they located clinics in poor neighborhoods... My initial reaction was...
Racism aside... it makes sense - put the clinics where they will get the most business, and statistically - income (not race) is the driving force behind the decision to terminate.
This is yet another "Sharpton-like crusade" that based on coincidence and bullshit.
AMSTETTEN, Austria (Reuters) - An Austrian man has been arrested after a woman said she was abused and kept prisoner by her father for 24 years, bearing him seven children, Austrian police said on Sunday.
Police, who were still trying to piece together details of the case, identified the woman as 42-year-old Elisabeth F.
They said she told authorities her father Josef, who had abused her since she was 11, had lured her into the basement of the block where the family lived in Amstetten in 1984, and drugged and handcuffed her before locking her up... [Read More]
So, I reported a drunk driver on the way home from work tonight. I felt pretty conflicted about it. How do you all feel about reporting drunk drivers?
I debated about it for a few minutes in my head - the guy was obviously wasted, though. He was swerving across three lanes (I was near him in the flow of traffic for a couple miles, and he kept swerving the whole time) and would use his blinker very poorly - signaling left or right for about a mile, while swerving with no relation to the blinker's direction. He had his window down (trying to get fresh air, something people do commonly while driving intoxicated). He was accelerating and slowing down repeatedly. I had no doubt in my mind he was under some influence.
However, I feel I should "live and let... [Read More]
I know this story is a little old, but I just wanted to see some people's reaction.
Internet griefers descended on an epilepsy support message board last weekend and used JavaScript code and flashing computer animation to trigger migraine headaches and seizures in some users.
The nonprofit Epilepsy Foundation, which runs the forum, briefly closed the site Sunday to purge the offending messages and to boost security.
"We are seeing people affected," says Ken Lowenberg, senior director of web and print publishing at the Epilepsy Foundation. "It's fortunately only a handful. It's possible that people are just not reporting yet -- people affected by it may not be coming back to the forum so fast."
... [Read More]
OCALA, Fla. — A federal judge on Thursday sentenced the actor Wesley Snipes to three years in prison for willfully failing to file tax returns.
Mr. Snipes, who was convicted in February, received one year for each count, to be served consecutively, and an additional year of probation. The sentence was handed down by Judge William Terrell Hodges of Federal District Court.
Mr. Snipes, who apologized for his actions before the sentence was announced, showed no immediate reaction to the verdict.
Judge Hodges allowed Mr. Snipes and a co-defendant, Douglas Rosile, to remain free on bond until they were summoned by either the United States Marshals Service or the Federal Bureau of Prisons.
The sentencing came at the end of a daylong... [Read More]
A Russian man got a nasty surprise when he returned home after a drunken night out - his wife found a knife in his back.
A friend of Yuri Laylin had thrust the blade into the 53-year-old after playing a variation of Russian roulette.
The game involved the players drinking vodka and dancing round a blindfolded man carrying a knife. Mr Laylin said he did not feel any pain until he went home.
He said: "We had a few vodkas and I remember playing some silly games and someone had a large knife. I came home, went to sleep as usual and woke up when my wife started screaming. Only then did I realize what had happened."
Doctors said the knife went four inches into his back but missed his vital organs.
KINSHASA (Reuters) - Police in Congo have arrested 13 suspected sorcerers accused of using black magic to steal or shrink men's penises after a wave of panic and attempted lynchings triggered by the alleged witchcraft.
Reports of so-called penis snatching are not uncommon in West Africa, where belief in traditional religions and witchcraft remains widespread, and where ritual killings to obtain blood or body parts still occur.
Rumors of penis theft began circulating last week in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo's sprawling capital of some 8 million inhabitants. They quickly dominated radio call-in shows, with listeners advised to beware of fellow passengers in communal taxis wearing gold rings.
Purported victims, 14 of whom were also detained... [Read More]
In a pair of videos posted within the last couple days, a child who appears to be about 8 years old makes death threats to George W. Bush, saying that he will have him killed by some means in April or May, and that he is not "bullshitting" us.
The videos have not made the news yet, although they have been the topic of many small-scale blogging websites.
Message Machine, Behind TV Analysts, Pentagon’s Hidden Hand, By David Barstow, New York Times, April 20th
In the summer of 2005, the Bush administration confronted a fresh wave of criticism over Guantánamo Bay. The detention center had just been branded “the gulag of our times” by Amnesty International, there were new allegations of abuse from United Nations human rights experts and calls were mounting for its closure.
The administration’s communications experts responded swiftly. Early one Friday morning, they put a group of retired military officers on one of the jets normally used by Vice President Dick Cheney and flew them to Cuba for a carefully orchestrated tour of Guantánamo.
To the public, these men are members of a familiar... [Read More]
From the NY Times, Clueless in America, By BOB HERBERT
We don’t hear a great deal about education in the presidential campaign. It’s much too serious a topic to compete with such fun stuff as Hillary tossing back a shot of whiskey, or Barack rolling a gutter ball.
Skip to next paragraph
The nation’s future may depend on how well we educate the current and future generations, but (like the renovation of the nation’s infrastructure, or a serious search for better sources of energy) that can wait. At the moment, no one seems to have the will to engage any of the most serious challenges facing the U.S.
An American kid drops out of high school every 26 seconds. That’s more than a million every year, a sign of big trouble for these largely... [Read More]
The US "war on terror" has backfired, strengthening extremists in Afghanistan and Somalia and turning them into legitimate political actors in the eyes of their local populations, a thinktank said today.
The Senlis Council, which has strongly criticised US policy in Afghanistan in the past, is particularly scathing of the Bush administration's "abject policy failures" in Somalia.
It said air strikes, support for Ethiopian troops that attacked Somalia last year and the ill-timed designation of a radical Islamist group, al-Shabab, as a terrorist group had been successfully exploited by the insurgency to boost recruitment.
Now why can't we have more priests like this who talk about issues that really matter instead of priests who put us to sleep with their boring sermons and ask us to put money in the collection boxes?
So I'm not trying to get into some "inconvient truth" battle here but it's Earth Day and I thought we needed a thread about it.
My work has been sending out some little fun fact emails on things that you can do to reduce, reuse, recycle and basically become a little more earth friendly.
I'm tried of the argument that recycling is a waste because "Pen and Teller said so" because all I hear is "here is my excuse for being lazy". If you don't agree with recycling then reduce your waste and reuse products when you can. And if you come up with an argument against that well then....eh it's wtf, I have come to expect it.
Fact: Each year some 1.5 million tons of plastic are used on the bottling of 23... [Read More]
