San Francisco Music Blog

Motive Revealed? Syko Sam

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What made Richard McCroskey turn into Syko Sam? According to the Richmond Times-Dispatch, a text message McCroskey discovered on his girlfriend's cell phone may have triggered a fatal rampage, in which McCroskey is suspected of killing four people. McCroskey reportedly told the taxi driver who drove him to the airport following the murders he had gotten into an argument with 16 year-old Emma Niederbrock.

In an interview, taxi driver Curtis Gibson recalled his conversation with the suspected killer, who "spoke calmly and never raised Gibson's suspicion" despite having a foul odor (described by another witness as being consistent with rotting flesh).
"McCroskey told Gibson his girlfriend's parents had taken them to a music show in Michigan on Sept. 12 and that they had a good time. But McCroskey said he later saw a text message on her phone from a man she had talked to at the music show. The message said he loved her and wanted to be with her.
"McCroskey said his girlfriend got angry when he confronted her about the message, accusing him of invading her privacy. He told Gibson he didn't want to argue so he waited for her to go to sleep and left the house."
Although McCroskey's girlfriend had been dead for as long as 48 hours, he "spoke passionately" about Neiderbrock, whom he met in person for the first time after corresponding with her online for about a year, the cabbie said. He also waxed poetic about the horrorcore scene which had brought them together - and may have led directly to her death. According to Phil Chalmers, author of "Inside the Mind of a Teen Killer," at least 20 homicide cases have been directly linked to the horrorcore genre.

Beryl Fine

DJ Swayzee

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It's actually kinda cool that museums--normally a refuge for bratty kids on school trips, visiting tourists, and stodgy nerds--are making an attempt to be hip. If you haven't yet attended the Cal Academy of Science's 'Nightlife' event--in which the building "is transformed into a lively venue filled with music, provocative science, mingling, and cocktails, for visitors 21 and older"--this week (Thursday, Aug 20) might be a good bet. NoisePop curates, and they've lined up DJs Swayzee and Mr. Wrong, plus acoustic act Ryan Auffenberg. In addition, Science in Action Café will host "The Physics Circus," hosted by Zeke Kossover, which should provide an opportunity for would-be quantum mechanics to test their skills, relativistically-speaking. NoisePop is also giving away a pair of free tickets; (email here with the subject "NightLife" and your full name and phone number in the body of the email on or before 1pm on Tuesday, August 18, 2009 for your chance to win! Winners will be notified by email.)

Via Wikipedia Commons

Olivia Munn

​UPDATE: I have been contacted by Kristina Levsky Senior Publicist for G4 who says Olivia Munn is NOT leaving AOTS. Rumor Quelled.

A rumor* has been circulating on the interwind that Olivia Munn (recently written about here) was leaving or had left G4's Attack of the Show. I have found no evidence to corroborate this piece of gossip despite an exhaustive, minute long search on the Googles. I even looked at Wikipedia. I CARE THAT MUCH.

Anyway, Munn was on vacation in Europe the past two weeks (according to her blog) and while she was in Italy buying tiny bikinis and jumping into Italian pies (heh) or whatever, Playboy Playmate of the Year '07 Sara Jean Underwood co-hosted the show along with Web Soup's Chris Hardwick aka the Nerdist aka Mr. Kiala Kazebee. This, along with the prior appearance of guest bikini wearing host Carissa Walford, may have been the source of the gossip although I'm not so sure as the rumors have been flying around the nerd blogs for the better part of this year.

I will NOT get into another discussion about the qualifications of these people-women hosting this particular show. Instead, I present to you a choice bit of information found during my scientific and super-professional research process -  this tweet from Ms. Underwood...

Doze Green

"Kali Dwapar"

​Big tip o' the ASD hat--hey, do we have hats?--to SF Weekly Clubs Editor John Graham for passing along this tasty tidbit about what could be the Next Big Hip-Hop trend.

In JG's words:

"Now that MC Chris has agreed to appear at Insane Clown Posse's Gathering of the Juggalos meathead festival this summer, I guess nerdcore hip-hop is officially dead. That opens the door for Kirtan-core ... rapping about yoga!"

Funny thing is, I went to Point Reyes rapper MC Yogi's webpage, and the whole yoga-hop thing wasn't as ridiculous as JG--who said breakdancing Ganeshes should be banned from competitive B-boying because their multiple arms give them an advantage--makes it seem.

No, really. (Jump the break for the list.)

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Comic-Con is over and while some of us are content to weep silently into our Twilight Watchmen pillows, still others look back over the past weekend and think to themselves, "If only I could re-live the beauty and majesty of Comic-Con by reading some sort of interview with DC wunderkind/Blackest Night author Geoff Johns. IF ONLY."

Ta da! Your wish is granted, my geeky, melancholy, lemons-into-lemonade friends. A little over a week ago, SF Weekly had the supreme pleasure of meeting, interviewing, and touching Geoff Johns - and not just in a creepy way. Isotope Comics (326 Fell St San Francisco, CA 94102), James Sime's sweet comic shop in Hayes Valley, hosted a Blackest Night signing party on July 18th complete with Black Lantern Corps rings, specialty Green Lantern themed cocktails, and Geoff Johns himself. Oh, and about 300 of the nicest comic nerds ever. Prior to kicking off the signing, we sat down with Johns and asked him many, many questions about the DC universe, the Green Lantern series, and his feelings about fanboys. Enjoy this interview and never let it be said the SF Weekly doesn't care about you. In fact, consider this a nerdhug from the interwebz. You're welcome.

 Craigslist will get you killed, Ebay could rip you off, and estate sales require putting on pants and leaving the house. The horror.

So what is an internerd with too many USB cables and not enough, I don't know, other nerd junk to do? My advice is to beg, plead, and cajole your way into Steven Frank's Internet Garage Sale a "members-only, trust-based online auction site" created to help honest people buy and sell stuff on the web.

Frank is the co-founder of Panic- an insanely popular Portland, OR based Mac software company. On his blog Frank says  "as a gadget hound I accumulate tons of tech that I eventually need to get rid of to fund the purchase of newer tech. Tired of Craigslist and eBay, I put up a static HTML page with a few items, and asked people on Twitter to check it out and place bids if interested."

San Diego's Comic-Con has easily become the pop culture lodestar of this generation and 2009's panel line up will not disappoint the nerd pilgrims who've made the long journey to Southern California's geek mecca.

Below you'll find our list of 10 panels that should not be missed by any self-respecting  Comic-Con attendee. And no, Jerky McJerkpants, "self respecting Comic Con attendee" is not an oxymoron.

1. Meet the Cast of the Guild! 
Basically- just what the title says. Be sure to ask Guild creator Felicia Day to brush or stroke your hair. Trust us, this will go over well. 

2. Stargate Universe! 
Once you're done being groomed by Felicia Day, allow yourself to be escorted by security to the Stargate Universe panel going on across the hall. Another Stargate spin off, you say? SyFy, have you been reading our diary?

3. Geoff Johns!
The writer behind Flash: Rebirth and DC comics' most anticipated book of the year Green Lantern: Blackest Night. (Also, for the geeky gals out there, Geoff is REALLY HOT.)

4. Brian Herbert!
The son of science fiction God Frank Herbert (Dune), Brian Herbert, while not wholly embraced by the Dune fanbase, is still amazing because he basically IS Paul Atreides.

Before an angry mob of Snapes and Dementors attacks my apartment with giant goblets of fire (note to mob:I do NOT live in the Castro so you should probably mosey on down to the Mission or anywhere that is again, NOT THE CASTRO) I should say I really enjoyed myself at Azkatraz, this year's Harry Potter "Symposium" held in downtown SF. My expectations of costumed, lonely nerds with little to no social skills were, while not blown out of the water, diminished somewhat by the infectious and genuine enthusiasm of the participants. Read: kids in Hogwarts uniforms performing line dances.

This year marks the sixth incarnation of the Harry Potter Con. Each year the convention (and name) changes cities in order to allow fans from all over a chance to attend without paying too much in travel costs. The event is volunteer-run and totally internet-communicated. These guys tweet A LOT.

Welcome to week two of the Weekend Web Wroundup™ - our new Monday morning blog dedicated to catching you up on the weekend's most important* interweb shenanigans.

Without further ado, let's get to the wrounding.

Fifteen Year Old Morgan Stanley intern tells it like it is. And what "it is" apparently has nothing to do with iPhone apps. Steve Jobs weeps into his morning cup of diamonds.

Douchebags everywhere high five themselves as news of Calvin Klein sunglasses with a USB drive (you read that correctly) hit the fashion blogs. I wonder what that Morgan Stanley kid thinks about these?

 

Image via Tweetcraft

So you've recently defeated a horde of Orcs in the Outland but before catching the next Zeppelin back to Azeroth you'd like to tweet about your battle. Prior to yesterday, your victory tweet would've had to wait until you logged out of World of Warcraft and onto Twitter, thus leaving your elf mage (or whatever) vulnerable to attack.

Lucky for you (nerd) Tweetcraft, a new in-game Twitter client for WoW, is here to help you out in your time of need.

According to the Tweetcraft website, you'll be able to:

* Send/receive Tweets in-game (Immediate sending reloads your UI)
* Queue Tweets to send when it's more convenient for you
* Upload in-game screenshots using TwitPic
* AutoTweet when you log in, enter an instance or get an achievement
* Extensible so that Add On authors can register messages or events to AutoTweet

Imagine the possibilities! No, seriously, you nerds go ahead and imagine the possibilities. I'll be busy, oh I don't know, not living in my mom's basement and not having a virtual relationship with a warrior dwarf healer wizard thing.

Preview video of Tweetcraft behind the cut: