Tweet of the Day – 11 October 2013

I have been wondering whether to re-introduce this feature, and have missed several 'good 'uns' while making up my mind, so let's have a go and see what happens!

This was tweeted by Matk Wallace early this morning...

"149,632 out of 150,000 Royal Mail staff accepted shares. The Guardian reported this as 'hundreds of staff reject free allocation of shares' "

Now that's what I mean by slanted reporting, and it happens so often. Bearing in mind that it needed a conscious effort to misrepresent the real news, it just goes to show how corrupt (as in Pravda-in-the-eighties) The Guardian is.

I really hate this sort of thing: the paper's job is to report the story that is, not try to make one up to suit a warped and twisted agenda of their own. If they can't or won't do that, they shouldn't be in the business. Fortunately, they are so hugely and chronically loss-making that they might not survive much longer anyway.

UPDATE: Guido has this easily-disproven smear from the same paper.

No-one with any integrity would take that publication on trust, especially from today, and anything quoted or referenced from it needs to be second-sourced from a more honest source. We already know it is hypocritical: just one example shows this, where they hound Conservatives for having offshore repositories for their funds but the Guardian's own parent company does exactly the same. There are other examples...

GUMI Reception Mini-Concert

Just appeared at YouTube today! A few weeks ago, the ASEAN Conference had its dinner party, and Gumi performed (with live musicians) a short concert lasting just twenty minutes. Here it is, in full. It's actually very good and even features some English (Gumi is bilingual) and a couple of costume changes.

Although the projected image isn't quite as realistic as the SEGA/Crypton events achieve, it is certainly good enough. I think many visitors here should enjoy this.

There was an earlier version of the event on video, with just one camera position, which really wasn't good enough for posting here;but this is the multi-camera edited version and it's genuinely very good, with interesting accompaniment including Japanese traditional drums, unusually. The English songs are particularly well done. Tick ti-ti tick...

UPDATE: Here are the song titles...

1. Setsuna trip
2. Miraculous Encounter
3. Country Road
4. Maigo no boku ni (I've been lost)
5. Yume Chizu 

Fire! Endless Night

Anyone who has heard Samfree's Luka Luka Night Fever will immediately recognise this as a kind of partner to that, in exactly the same style and somewhat similar overall.

This one has several variations, depending on who is singing it, with Lily being the one I have most commonly encountered and the one cited at the usual lyrics websites. There is also a Shota variant, and no doubt others as well; but this one is Megpoid/GUMI's version, called (appropriately) Megu Megu Fire! Endless Night.

Here we have the five members of Danceroid performing the dance individually, at separate locations, shown here in collage format. It is very effective, especially when it comes to their obviously having worked out in advance who was going to do the individual bits when they came around.

It was (I gather) all choreographed by Coco (sometimes written 'Koko') who is at top left. The lovely Ikura is in the centre, and rightly so as the leader of the group and the only remaining original member.

It's a good demonstration of just how fine these dancers are (which regular visitors here will know by now, but newcomers might not), and – as with the previous video – although this is quite low resolution it is clear enough, even in full-screen view...

Ikura dances Hello Planet

This is a side-by-side comparison faeturing Danceroid's superb Ikura alongside Miku's original version of Sasakure.UK's Hello Planet. Notice that it isn't the same as the version that is performed at live concerts, which is more geared toward waving to the audience (and is brilliant for the stage).

Although the resolution here is quite low, this is clear enough – unlike some videos at the same number of pixels – and very enjoyable.

Ikura is about 96% accurate, I judge, which is very high indeed; and where there are minor variations (mainly in timings of what I call non-moment-specific moves) if anything the Ikura version tends, on the whole, to be the better one...

Ikura Solo Dance

I think it's time for another of my treats for cuteness fans.

Here's Danceroid's excellent Ikura performing alone for a change. As one might have come to expect by now, her performance is top-notch, even if the surroundings are less exciting than a stage. At least we know the time this was video-ed, from the (very visible) clock...