Geek Entertainment TV » violetblue

San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom Grows Geek Roots

ekai — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 11:14:38 +0000

San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom was a recent guest speaker at the Long Now Foundation’s SALT (Seminars About Long-term Thinking) monthly speaker series. Typically, SALT hosts big thinker uber geeks like Jimmy Wales, Clay Shirky and Neal Stephenson. San Francisco being the geek capital of the world, it’s no surprise that Newsom knows how to Twitter around on his iPhone and is savvy in the ways of the networked world. Violet Blue grabs the mayor for a few questions covering timely geek topics like tidal and wave energy systems, keeping up with constituents using Twitter and Facebook as well as YouTube distribution for his State of the City address.

Episode links: Gavin Newsom, San Francisco Mayor’s Office, Long Now Foundation, Gavin on Twitter, Gavin on YouTube, Sea Generation Ltd, WaveRoller, Wave Dragon, Greenpeace UK Efficiencity

Formats: iPod/iPhone (.m4v)

Brad Warner is Not Your Typical Zen Master

ekai — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 19:33:03 +0000

What do Zen Buddhism, hardcore punk and Japanese monster movies have in common? We don’t know either, but bass player turned Zen Master Brad Warner stitches it altogether for us. Violet Blue gets the skinny from Warner at Green Apple Books in San Francisco, after a signing for his most recent book, Zen Wrapped in Karma Dipped in Chocolate: A Trip Through Death, Sex, Divorce, and Spiritual Celebrity in Search of the True Dharma.

Episode links: Brad Warner, Zen Wrapped in Karma Dipped in Chocolate: A Trip Through Death, Sex, Divorce, and Spiritual Celebrity in Search of the True Dharma, Zero Defects, Green Apple Books, Violet Blue

Formats: iPhone/iPod (.m4v)

Cupcake Camp Isn’t Just for Sugar Lovers

ekai — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 12:34:41 +0000

What do bakers of cupcakes and geek unconferences have in common? A lot it turns out. Both spawn high amounts of sugary fueled goodness, encourage collaboration for common tasty goals and openly share the processes to reach them. CupcakeCamp, modeled after BarCamp, encourages campers to make, bake or just eat cupcakes. Tastings are self organized into time slots, thrown up on a wiki and judged for taste, style and originality.

In this episode, Violet Blue — GETV’s roving baked good’s correspondent — takes you deep into the yeasty wide world of cupcakes and CupcakeCamp, created by none-other than lovely Internet Femme Fatales Ariel Waldman, Lynn Poshy, Cindy Li, and Marianne Masculino. If you think cup cakes are just slutty muffins, get ready to have your paradigm shifted. You’ll then know not to miss the next CupcakeCamp coming up on December 7th at the Satisfactory in San Francisco.

Episode links: CupcakeCamp (site), CupcakeCamp (wiki), Upcoming CupcakeCamp, Ariel Waldman, Lynn Poshy, Cindy Li, Marianne Masculino, Violet Blue

Formats: iPhone/iPod (.m4v)

Escape from Berkeley

ekai — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 16:56:48 +0000

By any non-petroleum means necessary. That is the motto that propels a dozen vehicles of various design along the “Escape from Berkeley” road rally from Berkeley, California to Las Vegas, Nevada. Part Cannonball Run and part Mad Max, these NASA scientists and junkyard fabricators aim to complete the rally, win the $5000 prize and forever cement their place in history. All fuel has to harvested along the route, none of it can be purchased. GETV’s Roving RoboReporter Violet Blue chats up a few of the eclectic participants who run their vehicles on switchgrass, wood chips, veggie oil and even a tasty bio-salad. The brilliance of the event has even put Stephen Colbert on notice.

Episode links: Escape from Berkeley, The Shipyard, Michael Michael, The Green Team, Prisoners of Petroleum, All Power Labs, The Spooning Cruisers (music), Photos (Laughing Squid), Colbert Report clip, Violet Blue

Formats: iPod/iPhone (.m4v) | Quicktime (.mov)

A Day at the Cat Show

ekai — Tue, 08 Jan 2008 05:34:57 +0000

We all know that one crazy cat lady who puts her complete love, money and affection into her feline friends. Do you know what happens when crazy cat ladies come together and subject their little love muffins to the scrutiny of the harsh lights and exacting judges? Neither did we which is why Irina Slutsky and Violet Blue decided to visit the Fog City Cat Show in Alameda, California.

Episode links: Fog City Cat Club, lolcats, Doctor Popular, Drown Radio, Violet Blue

Formats available: iPod/iPhone (.m4v) | Quicktime (.mov)

Commodore 64 Turns 25

ekai — Mon, 24 Dec 2007 21:32:43 +0000

The Commodore 64 home computer celebrated its 25th birthday at the Computer History Museum with several luminaries of the 8-bit computing era present. We take a peek at this popular pesky piece of silicon and plastic and try to get an idea of why the Commodore 64 was the best selling personal computer in history at 30 million units moved. GETV’s Roving Retro Reporter Violet Blue puts the question to Jack Tramiel, founder and head of Commodore, as well as his son Leonard Tramiel. Violet gets a bit of insight from a couple of the C64’s competitors, Steve Wozniak, creator of the first Apple computer, and Bill Lowe, known as the father of the IBM PC.

Episode links: Commodore 64, Jack Tramiel, Leonard Tramiel, Steve Wozniak, William Lowe, The Commodore Billboard, C64 sounds [YouTube:Lavoraste], C64 games [YouTube:tr0d], C64 Turns 25 [news.com], Computer History Museum, Violet Blue
Full interviews: Jack Tramiel, Leonard Tramiel

Formats available: iPod/iPhone (.m4v) | Quicktime (.mov)

What is GETV?

ekai — Tue, 13 Nov 2007 05:41:25 +0000

Maybe this will help, maybe it won’t. Thanks to the ever prolific Doc Popular for the hook up with some custom intro and outro theme music, debuting for the first time in this little inspirational piece.

Formats available: Quicktime (.mov) | Portable (iPod)

Mechanical Amusements From the Past

ekai — Sun, 05 Aug 2007 22:31:35 +0000

Violet Blue visits the Musee Mecanique at Pier 45 in San Francisco for a refreshing, nostalgic trip through mechanical games of fun and fortune from the past. Some of these relics are downright morbid, others are delightfully funny. Violet takes us on a tour and relays a bit of the museum’s history.

Episode links: Violet Blue, Musee Mecanique

Formats available: Quicktime (.mov) | Portable (iPod)

Sex Blogger Audacia Ray Gets Naked

ekai — Mon, 16 Jul 2007 09:05:51 +0000

Violet Blue is back with an intimate interview with Audacia Ray, a sex blogger, virgin author and nerd of the highest order. Audacia just released her first book titled Naked on the Internet: Hookups, Downloads and Cashing in on Internet Sexploration.

Episode links: Violet Blue, Audacia Ray, Naked on the Internet, Center for Sex and Culture, Fleshbot

Formats available: Quicktime (.mov) | Portable (iPod) | Ogg Theora (.ogg)

More Maker Faire Madness

ekai — Sat, 02 Jun 2007 19:10:55 +0000

There was so much goodness at the Maker Faire this year, we couldn’t just do one episode. Violet Blue goes deep and talks to makers Kimric Smythe and Shannon O’Hare of the Neverwas Haul project, Katie London and Kate Hartman of Botanicalls and Ron Sears, who with his son Nick Sears, created the ultraORB.

Episode links: Maker Faire, Violet Blue, Neverwas Haul, Botanicalls, ultraORB, [full interviews: Kimric Smythe, Shannon O'Hare, Kati London and Kate Hartman, Ron Sears]

Formats available: Quicktime (.mov), Portable (iPod)

A Day at the Maker Faire

ekai — Wed, 23 May 2007 09:55:40 +0000

The Maker Faire came to town and it was chock full of brilliant, freaky gadget makers and inventors from around the world. GETV’s Roving RoboReporter Violet Blue wanders the fairgrounds to see how things are going in the Make Play Day room, explores vintage pinball machines and checks in with the Power Tool Drag Races.

Episode links: Violet Blue, Maker Faire, Michael Shiloh, Make Play Day (pix), Lucky Ju Ju Pinball, Power Tool Drag Races, Jeremy Boyle (Trio1), [full interviews: Michael Shiloh, Michael Schiess]

Formats available: Quicktime | iPod

Twitterdildonic Stimulation

ekai — Sat, 24 Mar 2007 21:35:34 +0000

While at SXSW Interactive in Austin, Texas, Roving RoboReporter Violet Blue caught up with a unique hacker by the name of Kyle Machulis. Kyle isn’t your ordinary teledildonic hardware hacker. No, Kyle created the ultimate real-time sex device mashup by linking public Twitter updates to a Rez Trance Vibrator allowing users to FEEL Twitter messages. Kyle demonstrates and explains how it all works. You will never regard Twitter the same way again. (This video is safe for work, no matter what your industry).

Episode links: Violet Blue, qDot (slashdong), MMOrgy, IGDA Sex, Twitter, Rez Trance Vibrator

Formats available: Quicktime | iPod

More Cocktail Robot Madness from Roboexotica 2006

ekai — Thu, 14 Dec 2006 03:55:37 +0000

GETV found its way to Vienna, Austria for the 8th annual Roboexotica cocktail robot festival, conference and awards show organized by the snarky drunkards at monochrom and SHIFZ. Violet Blue interviews some more creators of amazing cocktail bots.

Episode links: Roboexotica, Violet Blue, monochrom, SHIFZ, Jonathan Moore (External Combustion Engine), Gordan Savicic & Leo Peschta (WERP-Bot), Anika Kronberger & Daniel Fabry (Digit Colada & Cheers), David Calkins (Chapek & Tyler’s WaiterBot)

Formats available: Quicktime (.mov) | Ogg Theora (.ogg) | Stage6: DivX

Roboexotica 2006 in Vienna

ekai — Sun, 10 Dec 2006 19:25:00 +0000

GETV found its way to Vienna, Austria for the 8th annual Roboexotica cocktail robot festival, conference and awards show organized by the snarky drunkards at monochrom and SHIFZ. Here is a sampling of a few drink faciliating machines.

– Additional Roboexotica Video Footage –

Episode links: Roboexotica, Violet Blue, monochrom, SHIFZ, Bureau of Philosophy, Chris Veigl (CockBot1), Roswitha Weingrill (Eiswürfelmörder), Simone Davalos (El Espanol Buraccho), Team Katapult / Team Murmelbahn (Leichtbekömmlichvorgekaut / digestablepremasticated)

Formats available: Quicktime (.mov) | Ogg Theora (.ogg) | Stage6: DivX

RoboGames 2006 WrapUp

ekai — Tue, 27 Jun 2006 09:04:01 +0000

GETV RoboReporter Violet Blue found herself amidst deadly combat robots and their makers at RoboGames 2006 recently held in San Francisco. Violet talks to the creators behind competitors MegaByte, Pipe Wench, Snakebyte, Devil’s Plunger and SubZero. Episode links: Violet Blue, RoboGames 2006, Robotic Death Company, Team PlumbCrazy, Team Hammertime

QT (.mov) download link, innerTOOB version (comment in video)
Bonus video: RoboGames: Megabyte vs Devil’s Plunger (3 min)

RoboGames: Monty Reed Shall Walk

ekai — Mon, 19 Jun 2006 08:00:06 +0000

While at RoboGames 2006, GETV RoboReporter Violet Blue spoke with Monty Reed of They Shall Walk about the robotic exo-skeletal suit he developed to assist himself after being paralyzed in a parachute accident. Monty demonstrates prototype 13b for us. Episode links: Violet Blue, Monty Reed, They Shall Walk, Robert Heinlein, RoboGames 2006

download link

Nerd Salon and Roomba Cockfights

ekai — Thu, 18 May 2006 07:28:55 +0000

How can anyone say no to cockfighting Roombas? That’s right, it’s simply not possible. GETV Roving RoboReporter Violet Blue goes deep with Nerd Salon’s high priestesses Annalee Newitz and Jennifer Granick to discover geek polination games, fighting robots and other stickiness that brings out the nerdy geek. Violet then talks to Phil Torrone, master Roomba warrior from the land of MAKE, who describes the impossible mission that got the Roombas fighting.
Episode links: nerd salon, annalee newitz, jennifer granick, violet blue, roomba frogger (thx mark!), mad scientist, feline pollination, roomba pool, phil torrone, irobot roomba, geek american hero, 3 laws of robotics, make magazine

QT download link – YouTube version

Graham Leggat Talks Film & Citizen Media

ekai — Mon, 03 Apr 2006 20:00:51 +0000

This one is for the film geeks. The organizers of the 49th San Francisco International Film Festival are courting bloggers and videobloggers this year to help spread the love. We like love, so here we are. GETV Investigative Film Geek Violet Blue speaks with Graham Leggat, head of the SF Film Society which puts on the festival. He talks a bit about bloggers as media, couch surfing filmmakers, some favorite controversial films and militant lesbian kayakers of Afghanistan. Episode links: sffs, sf360, sfiff, tom cruise, couch surfing

downoad link

Teledildonicist Allen Stein nails it with his Thrillhammer

ekai — Wed, 04 Jan 2006 20:09:05 +0000

Allen Stein, inventor of the Thrillhammer, talks with GETV Sexpert Violet Blue about his Internet controlled, teledildonic pleasure machine. Work safe if you work in a sex shop, book store or the government. Episode links: the thrillhammer, violet blue, mapping lazy sunday, sex machines book, modern times bookstore

Watch GETV Episode 24 – 4 min 40 sec

Violet Blue probes Timothy Archibald over the sex machine

ekai — Fri, 16 Dec 2005 22:14:47 +0000

GETV Sexpert Violet Blue guest interviews Timothy Archibald, author and photographer of the beautiful Sex Machines book. Learn a little about these goofy inventors from the heartland. One might even be your mom. Don’t worry, it’s work safe (assuming dildos are ok). Episode links: Violet Blue, Sex Machines book, buy it, Thrillhammer, Bea Arthur, trunk, Process Media, wired news

Watch GETV Episode 17 – 3 min 55 sec

Violet Blue tells us what 2257 means to Tribe.net

ekai — Sat, 10 Dec 2005 00:30:07 +0000

Irina Slutsky corners Violet Blue at a sex machines book reading who breaks the news that Tribe.net is getting all PG over their interpretation of 2257 laws. GETV is there when you need us. Or by accident, whatever happens first. Episode links: tinynibbles, 2257 laws, tribe.net, smart girls porn club, traci lords, open source sex

Watch GETV Episode 14 – 5 min 21 sec