The show was trying to figure out how fast a cannonball could travel, when it misfired and shot hundreds of feet in the air, eventually going through someone’s home, hitting another roof and finally entering a minivan and hitting the dashboard.

When it hit the first home, it entered through the front door and bounced around, heading to the second floor before leaving through a back bedroom wall.

“This cannonball was supposed to go through several barrels of water and through a cinder block, and then ultimately into the side of the hill,” according to J.D. Nelson of the Alameda County Sheriff’s Department.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Jj-CErr0VOY

The team was at the Camp Parks Military Firing Reservation as usual and they must have fired this thing with enormous power to do so much devastation.

[via cbslocal]

Logitech’s CEO Guerrino De Luca has admitted that the Revue was a “mistake of implementation of a gigantic nature.” That is as close as we are likely to ever hear a CEO come to saying their product sucked. The Revue was part of the reason for a giant $100 million loss in operating profits for Logitech.

The Revue is being phased out and once the final stock of the device are sold this quarter, it will not be replaced. My favorite quote and perhaps the most honesty seen form a CEO in a while is De Luca saying, “To make the long story short, we thought we had invented [sliced] bread and we just made them. [We made a commitment to] just build a lot because we expected everybody to line up for Christmas and buy these boxes [at] $300 [...] that was a big mistake.”

[via The Verge]

I will admit that it is much more fun to watch when people aren’t wise about how they use the concoction. Take these two guys for example. I think when you watch the video you will agree that bad things were going to happen as soon as he put the Mentos in by hand, while holding the bottle of Diet Coke.

The bald dude shakes the 2-liter bottle up and throws it onto the grounds a few times. The last time as he walks to get it, the thing finally blows up. You will have to watch the video below to see what happens. I bet you jump.

Click to View Embedded Video Clip

I can’t imagine a bigger pile of fail than getting my iPhone all caked with chalk dust. This stuff makes you sneeze and is really annoying when it gets on your hands.

Click to View Embedded Video Clip

This thing even fails on its basic premise. What is the point of being able to write down notes on the back of your iPhone when you have an endless digital notepad inside the iPhone itself? That’s like carrying a paper day planner to hold your iPhone.

[via Gadget Review]

There were some undies obliterated in Springfield, Ohio this week. A demolition company had set up some charges around the base of a 275-foot tall smoke stack at the former Ohio Edison Mad River Power Plant. I’m no demolition expert, but everything I have seen of blowing stuff up the charged go off really quickly. It appears one in this case took longer than the others did and when it finally went off, the tower fell THE WRONG WAY.

If you have ever wondered what “screaming like a bunch of little girls” really sounds like, watch the video. The tower fell on the power station next to it and left some 8000 homes with no power. D’oh. At least no one was hurt.

The epic failure of the Kin family of mobile phones has directly cost Ballmer $670,000 in bonus money. The reason for losing the huge chunk of his bonus wasn’t only the Kin failure though. The failure of Microsoft to make headway in the tablet market in fiscal 2010 was also cited. A company filing gave the official reasons as “unsuccessful launch of the Kin phone, loss of market share in the company’s mobile phone business, and the need for the company to pursue innovations to take advantage of new form factors.”

Ballmer could have made a bonus of twice his annual salary, which is $670,000 yearly. He did land half the possible bonus thanks to steering Microsoft to its most profitable year. I know I’d be pissed if I lost a $670,000 bonus but that’s what you get for letting a turd like the Kin hit the market and the dude still made over a million this year and has $10 billion in stock. I don’t think he’ll be missing any house payments any time soon.

[via Reuters]

Or maybe the boss needs to have a talk with the editor and teach him how to use the “Delete” key in addition to “Cut” and “Paste.”

[via Neatorama]

Don’t bother squinting, there’s really nothing to see. This can be resolved in two ways: Either Apple starts supporting Flash, web developers stop being so overdependent on Flash, or at least offer an alternative version for devices like the iPad. Do you think the iPhone, iPad and similar devices will be popular enough to convince developers to ditch Flash? Or is really just a matter of time before Adobe’s software becomes extinct?

[via Daring Fireball]

You would think anyway. Apparently, the fact that as soon as the balloon was inflated the winds above the crane launch site were so strong that the balloon was a good distance from directly above the payload would have tipped someone off that there was an accident waiting to happen.

Click to View Embedded Video Clip

No one in this video seemed concerned until the balloon broke free of the crane holding it and proceeded to drag the payload in a hilarious and destructive path of doom across a parking lot obviously placed too damn close to the launch site. All the scientists are running about undoubtedly screaming like little girls and sh*tting themselves as the payload crashes into a vehicle and flips it over.

Luckily, no one was hurt but the two people who were sitting “feet” from where the car was smashed in frozen horror probably needed new undies. The funniest part of this video to me is that one dude in the background is just sort of walking leisurely and checking the whole thing out while everyone else runs for the hills. I bet the calm guy is the one dude who told them parking there was a bad idea. I bet if you turn up the volume really loud, you could just hear him mutter “see I f’in told you not to park there.”

And my personal favorite:

I know that fansubs are labors of love, done for free and for the good of millions of non-Japanese speaking anime fans, but come on. Seriously. Let’s have some standards here. Here are some more fails:

More at Sankaku Complex. Fansubbers, feel free to share your side of the story. How hard is it to sub? How long does it take? Have any of you been sued? And where’s the car?

This is a great win for Photoshop and an epic fail for the iPad. I know for a fact that maxi pad box comes from Canada, since it’s bilingual. Every time I see another maxi-pad joke, I still wonder what was going through the minds of the iPad naming team. Of course, there mustn’t have been a woman among them – and not one of them ever saw this sketch from Mad TV…

Click to View Embedded Video Clip

[via Mulaz via Fail Blog]

Basically the server(s) handling log ins for Assassin’s Creed 2 players crashed, and since the game is being constantly authenticated as it is played, it locked players out.  The official Assassin’s Creed forum is overflowing with hate, even from people who don’t actually own the game. I think the server is still down as of this writing. Someone is probably going to get fired for this, but if that happens the people who thought of this idea should get the boot as well. What now Ubisoft?

[via Joystiq]

Have the Power Rangers Dino Thunder disbanded? Because it seems that Red Dino Ranger has let go.

Awesome helmet though. Christian Bale’s take on the Dark Knight is almost as creepy as the Joker. But this dude’s take on the Dark Knight is ten times more creepy.

Can you imagine him popping out from the shadows? Or suddenly in your face, hanging upside down? *shivers* Check out O’Brien’s Flickr page for the rest of the pics; you have to have a Flickr or Yahoo account to view the photo set. If you don’t have either then sign up! This photoset alone is worth the effort.

[via Geek Orthodox via Great White Snark]

You can buy 5 stickers for $5 USD, 25 stickers for $15 USD, and 50 stickers for $25 USD. I’m expecting FAIL sticker fails to pop-up anytime soon.

[via uncrate]

That’s the VHS toaster in the background. In the foreground are a couple of sweet VHS-marked toasted bread. But where were they toasted?

See, lemonie did manage to mash the innards of an ordinary toaster into a VHS case, but then he found out that his design had a lot of flaws. For example, the case gets really hot, which is no surprise. Plus lemonie said that he couldn’t leave the damned thing on its own. I think it’s because his invention is quite grumpy, and unlike its parents it probably doesn’t want to be stuffed with anything, whether bread or tape.

Click to View Embedded Video Clip

The worst part about all of this is that the branded bread that you saw in the first picture was not toasted from the VHS toaster. Here’s lemonie’s confession: “I’d originally intended for the toaster to leave “VHS” on the toast. However, the top rack was too far away to be effective, and I knew that while it would work on the bottom rack the toast would stick to the VHS mask. I laid the mask on the bread and toasted it in the toaster, horizontally. Yes, I switched slices in the video, for artistic purposes.” At least he was honest enough to reveal that.

[Instructables via Retro Thing]

The chaos that ensues in ROM CHECK FAIL! is one that really needs to be seen to be understood, but basically, the virtual arcade machine starts out with a failed startup sequence, and proceeds to land you in a warped 8-bit game mashup, where worlds continuously collide.

One second, you’re controlling Mario as he navigates the Mushroom Kingdom, and the next minute Pac-Man is getting killed by tumbling Asteroids. To give you a better idea of the mayhem, here’s a video clip of the game in action:

Click to View Embedded Video Clip

This is truly a must-try for anyone who loves retro gaming. You can grab both Windows and Linux installers for ROM CHECK FAIL! over at Farbs.org. See if you can spot all of the different classic games that are packed into this crazy thing.

[thanks for the tip, John!]

The latest Xbox 360 System Update appears to be causing major problems for gamers today. Speaking from personal experience, the update appears to be completely breaking Xbox Live for some users.

The symptom is that your console will say that Xbox Live requires an update, then you’ll try to run the update and after several minutes, the update fails. It then provides advice that you need to test your connection, which eventually tells you that you need an Xbox Live update to complete the tests. I even went as far as reformatting the hard drive on my 360 to make sure there wasn’t some corrupted data on there.

A number of users over on Major Nelson’s site are also reporting similar problems this morning. Microsoft hasn’t provided any information yet on when a fix might be available. I even sat on the 1-800-4MY-XBOX line for about 90 minutes earlier this morning to see if they could provide any insight, but eventually got disconnected and gave up.

…and I thought I’d be checking out that new Stranglehold demo tonight. Oh well, hopefully someone in Redmond is listening.