sigma7: Sims (vampire bee)
sigma7 ([personal profile] sigma7) wrote2005-10-23 05:30 pm
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Happy Hallomeme

Note: this is the product of my first pseudo-meme-generator, and I'd like any/all feedback you have, including content. Because my imagination's suffering after the Eagles/Bolts game today. Grr.

Hurrah. phpNonsense is finally working in pseudo-meme-generator mode. There's a few additions I want to do to the code so that it will actually function as a more LJ-friendly meme-r, but at the moment it's...mostly stable, if not particularly attractive. It'll do some information dumps if you rock it hard enough, but it seems to be holding up well to normal wear-and-tear. It's cacheing but not crashing, so it's a hell of a lot further than it was last week....

The gist: go here and give it a shot -- give it your LJ name, a color, and the number of people you want to invite to your "party." The script will abort with a terse message if the LJ user doesn't exist. The "color" is just to give you something to alter to get different results; the script randomizes on the three entered fields, so that changing any one of them gives a different set of results. If you have fewer friends than you "invited," they'll show up twice. *shrug* Not sure if I really want to debug *that* far; it's a very cosmetic issue, and I can always solve the problem by limiting the number of people invite-able.

I did a very half-assed job of throwing up some costume ideas. It's a pretty shallow pool of data for the costumes and it does err on the side of the nonsensical, occasionally veering into dada, much like I do. Here's the main data file (scroll down until you pass the HTML inserted by the Freestarthost people); it also uses data in the default, newspaper and missionwords data files, too. You should be able to get a decent idea how it works just by poking through the files. But note that the costume entries are disappointingly shallow. My bad. I just wanted to get this up and running tonight and hope to field some feedback.... What do you think? What does it need?

The following is my favorite result of the night. It's true on a variety of levels.

# bishop282 dressed as a mummy.
# brucha dressed as a quarterback for the Colts.
# butterbug dressed as a skeleton.
# charlieinmcr didn't even show up and doesn't get any candy.
# cptn_oblivious dressed as a quarterback for the Chargers.
# dexfarkin dressed as a cauldron.
# dvandom dressed as someone called "Fred Goforth", but you've never heard of them before.
# electricana dressed as a outfielder for the Brewers.
# eternalei dressed as Ted Williams.
# i_molt_a_lot dressed as a ferret.
# jim_smith dressed as Martin Van Buren.
# jkgriffin dressed as a disgruntled mummy.
# missmiah dressed as a B2B TechnologiesCooperative employee.
# paulobrien dressed as Ozzy Osbourne.
# querldox dressed as the Governor of Mississippi.
# reynardine dressed as Heidi Klum.
# robing didn't dress up, spoilsport.
# the_zaniak dressed as Tiger Woods.
# tiny_moo dressed as George Washington.
# tviokh dressed as the main character of "The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari".

Edit: I could also really use ideas for more costumes. It's a pretty sparse list at the moment:

a {animal}
a {baseballposition} for the {Baseballteam}
a {Company} employee (this may be an actual or randomly-created company)
a {footballposition} for the {Footballteam}
a {missionadjectives} {missionnouns} (random adjectives and random nouns -- here's where it gets surreal)
a {missionadjectives} {spookies} (spookies are thinks like ghost, vampire, etc)
a {missionnouns}
a {spookies}
someone called "{Person}", but you've never heard of them before
the Governor of {Usstate}
{[a diplomat from|the President of|the King of} {Nation}
{[the main character of|a character from} "{Movies}"
{Celebrity} (the celeb list that came with the original Nonsense templates)
{Celebs} (my own celeb list, culled from a "top 100" list I found online)
{InsipidCelebs} (only a few, but trust me, they are)
{USPresident}

Edit (10/19/06): and a year later, it's still going. Changed links to reflect the new hosting.

(frozen comment)

[identity profile] cptn-oblivious.livejournal.com 2005-10-23 11:40 pm (UTC)(link)
I'm not sure that the randomizer is working. I got this result for all of the colors.
alex_shultz dressed as Martha Stewart.
beeform dressed as a slippery eyebrow.
devsgma dressed as a outfielder for the Angels.
grandpoohbah dressed as a diplomat from New Caledonia.
hrhjahi didn't even show up and doesn't get any candy.
hrhjahi dressed as a fever.
missmiah dressed as a CEJU Publishing employee.
perkygothess dressed as a convenient witch.
rewil dressed as Warren G. Harding.
sigma7 didn't even show up and doesn't get any candy.


On another note I need more friends I get a repeat with the 10 setting.

(frozen comment)

[identity profile] sigma7.livejournal.com 2005-10-24 12:36 am (UTC)(link)
You're very right. That's due to the length of your username and my randomizer's inability to deal with such. Tweaking now....

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[identity profile] erica-roo.livejournal.com 2005-10-24 12:38 am (UTC)(link)
That's cute and I got different results with different colors. I really need to expand my friend list.

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[identity profile] missmiah.livejournal.com 2005-10-24 12:52 am (UTC)(link)
Let me skip to the parts that made me giggle the most:

  • cptn_oblivious didn't even show up and doesn't get any candy.
  • dazite dressed as a penguin.
  • hrhjahi dressed as a zombie.
  • perkygothess dressed as Milla Jovovich.
  • sigma7 dressed as the Governor of Alabama.

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[identity profile] sigma7.livejournal.com 2005-10-24 01:13 am (UTC)(link)
Okay, I've got a better random-seed generator, which only uses the first seven letters of any given string to randomize. But if the username is different, there's going to be a different friends list in any case....

At any rate, this buys me enough time to find a better way to do this, of which there must be dozens....

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[identity profile] opheliasclone.livejournal.com 2005-10-24 05:23 pm (UTC)(link)
In general, it works. However, four people on my list of 20 didn't show up for the party, and two others didn't dress up as anything. A bit disappointing.

Also, someone dressed up as a "tasty claim." Doesn't really make sense. And you dressed up as Yu-Go-Oh. The card deck or the cartoon? Hmm.

I would really like to see Tiny Moo in that George Washington costume!

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[identity profile] sigma7.livejournal.com 2005-10-24 06:12 pm (UTC)(link)
At the moment the odds are....

85% that someone puts on a costume
9% that they don't show up
5% that they don't dress up
1% that they don't put on clothes

...so my perspective is colored by theatre department Halloween parties....

One of the options for the costumes is a random adjective + a random word. It used to be a datafile from Harpoon II to create names for military missions; I fell in love with that idea and instead of reducing it to absurdity, extended it to absurdity. That's what the Mission template gives. Pro: randomized to the point of hysteria. Con: ...and to the point of occasional nonsensicalism. But I like the idea of a military mission called Operation Drowsy Holstein. Too surreal?

And I think, like the Poopsmith in Homestar Runner, I dressed as the idea of Yu-Gi-Oh, like he did the idea of Lazer Tag....

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[identity profile] opheliasclone.livejournal.com 2005-10-24 06:32 pm (UTC)(link)
Fair enough in every case. :-)

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[identity profile] jkgriffin.livejournal.com 2005-10-25 03:19 am (UTC)(link)
This rocks. Clearly you have too much time on your hands, but with you that's a good thing. :)

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[identity profile] jkgriffin.livejournal.com 2005-10-25 03:30 am (UTC)(link)
How about a {Lord/earl/duke/marquis/archbishop/vicount/cardinal} of {sillyname}

sillynames could be Python or Black Adderesque.

Little Wapping. Fluffybottom. Kitchenandbath. WallaceandGrommit.

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[identity profile] sigma7.livejournal.com 2005-10-25 12:54 pm (UTC)(link)
Brilliant! I'll give that a go here in a bit -- first I want to make sure I get started on repeating a section of HTML as specially-coded characters for inclusion into a textfield. More on that as it develops...!

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[identity profile] lord-dragonfang.livejournal.com 2005-10-26 01:50 am (UTC)(link)
I tried it out, heh, but it would probably work better for me if I had more people in my friends list. ^^;;

Also...how can someone come dressed as the equator? Oo

Let's see. Costume ideas...

-This person didn't dress up, but they have such obscure fashion taste it's hard to tell anyway.
-This person came drunk and was wearing nothing/someone else's costume by the end of the night.
-Perhaps some famous book characters? Although most of the popular ones would have been made into movies by now.

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[identity profile] sigma7.livejournal.com 2005-10-26 12:57 pm (UTC)(link)
Also...how can someone come dressed as the equator? Oo

Stole that bit from a Steven Wright bit a loooong time ago: "I went to a Halloween party dressed as the equator. As people approached me, they got warmer...." (Yeah, that's actually one of the costumes I coded in and wasn't the result of a randomadjective-randomnoun pairing....)

Obscure book characters is a good idea; I should've added Trek characters by now but they just slipped my mind. And I like the drunkenness-leads-to... idea; this'll be fun...!

(frozen comment) Might as well add to the surreality

[identity profile] vvvexation.livejournal.com 2005-10-27 10:01 pm (UTC)(link)
How about:

-the love child of {name} and {name}
-{name} riding a {animal}
-{name}'s {relative}
-{abstractconcept}

Also, how about adding occasional random phrases like "and it suited him/her disturbingly well" or "although he/she really looked more like a {noun}" to the ends of some of these?

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[identity profile] http://users.livejournal.com/_disi_/ 2005-10-29 03:57 pm (UTC)(link)
as skippy the bush kangaroo
as john howard
as mary-kate olsen with his/her very own siamese mary-kate
as the spirit of my dead grandmother, betty.
as captain jack sparrow
as oprah winfrey
as herbie the love bug
as Betty Boop
as Mary Poppins
as Catwoman/Batman/Superman etc (even any of the justice league characters???)
looney tunes and disney characters?


dunno if any of those would help ya out :P just a couple of suggestions. ;) Always willing to think up some more if you want some extra help.:)

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[identity profile] http://users.livejournal.com/_disi_/ 2005-10-29 04:01 pm (UTC)(link)
Oh and PS: I did this one randomly as a comment because a mate of mine didn't get included in the list

ahh boooo im not in it!!
(Reply to this)(Thread)

melb_angel82 dressed as a 1974 disco baby. Blue flares and a pink tie died top - Looking SUAVE`

lol..... randomness is good.

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[identity profile] sigma7.livejournal.com 2005-10-29 05:10 pm (UTC)(link)
Ha! The #1 comment people seem to make in the wake of the meme is "aww, I wasn't invited," which is pushing me strongly toward tweaking the engine so as to be able to do an entire f-list. It's a little more complicated than I'd like -- dependent on getting the f-list and returning its length and then inserting it into the page at the right time so it doesn't overwrite critical parts of the template and yet not too soon that it crashes the looping parts....

I've been at this too long.

And there is a Justice League contingent -- complete with Martian Manhunter -- but I'll add your suggestions, too; they're picturesque and potentially humiliating. Love it.

(frozen comment) Re: Might as well add to the surreality

[identity profile] sigma7.livejournal.com 2005-10-29 05:12 pm (UTC)(link)
Oh, I like. And I believe those datafields are already in the system, so that won't be too hard at all.... And the last bit amuses me deeply, too. It's on the list....

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[identity profile] marnanel.livejournal.com 2005-10-30 01:32 am (UTC)(link)
I really like this script. Good work.

I just wanted to point out that it's "viscount", not "vicount".

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(Anonymous) 2005-10-30 06:29 am (UTC)(link)
Yew have a birdey on yuer head..

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(Anonymous) 2005-10-30 06:32 am (UTC)(link)
giggle
I came dressed as Google

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[identity profile] obscurecorner.livejournal.com 2005-10-30 02:43 pm (UTC)(link)
heheh....heidi klum riding an eagle...

ei like it. but everytime i do it i get the same result...:(

(frozen comment)

[identity profile] sigma7.livejournal.com 2005-10-30 03:54 pm (UTC)(link)
Huh. Sorry about that. The "costume" that you pick at the beginning should randomize it, but right now it'll only randomize on the first eight letters of whatever you enter. I need to get around to fixing that. If it helps, the costume doesn't have to be in any sense of the word sensical.... Not that anything else in the whole thing makes any sense....

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[identity profile] obscurecorner.livejournal.com 2005-10-30 04:26 pm (UTC)(link)
oh...okay.

(frozen comment)

[identity profile] pinksmurf00.livejournal.com 2005-10-30 06:25 pm (UTC)(link)
Marilyn Manson

Spongebob

purple pixie

pink pixie

an orange

schoolteacher

cigarette box

bottle of lotion

peanut

cellphone

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