Many of us here at CNET harbor dreams of leading secret lives as masked superheroes, protecting the public from evildoers. A nagging feeling some would call "common sense" prevents us from living the dream. Luckily, we can all rest easy knowing that our streets are now protected by a motley crew of pseudo-heroes known as The Allegiance.
The team owes its Internet notoriety to a short profile that a Cincinnati local news station aired on one of its members, intimidatingly named Shadow Hare--check out his MySpace page. A 21-year-old man (I'll believe it when I see it) from Milford, Ohio, Shadow Hare claims his Allegiance of Heroes reaches all across the country, with masked vigilantes each protecting their respective cities. There's Aclyptico in Pennsylvania, Wall Creeper in Colorado, Master Legend in Florida, and Mr. Extreme in California.
Let's just pause for a second to marinate and comment on what's going on here. The first thing these guys need, judging from the video, is a super gym membership with a super personal trainer on the side. Plenty of comic book characters don't actually have super powers, Batman being the most popular, but the difference here is that he makes up for it with intense physical and psychological training and gadgets unobtainable by the public--therein lies the mystique, that not just anyone can be a superhero.
These guys, on the other hand, just look gross. Come on, guys! Your Spandex uniforms are loose in all the wrong places, you've reduced your handy gadgets down to Tasers and handcuffs, and dude, Shadow Hare: you don't even have a car? Good luck briskly strolling down the street, trying to look tough waiting for the bus.
And I heard that you got bopped in the shoulder while trying to stop a guy from beating up a woman? Something tells me the commissioner of the Cincinnati Police Department ain't rushing to Home Depot to build a Hare Signal. And what's with the name, guy? Out all of the menacing animals out there, you choose a cuddly bunny made famous for his arrogance in that fabled race...bummer that The Deadly Meerkat and The Flying Lemur were already taken by other heroes, huh?
Seriously, though, you have a lot of work to do before people take you seriously, Allegiance of Heroes. I respect your noble attempts at vigilant justice, but if you're gonna do it, do it right. Start by getting a police scanner, hit the free weights, and pound some steroids, then develop skills (nunchaku skills, bow-hunting skills, computer-hacking skills). Definitely fashion new outfits, and don't forget: extra padding is your best sidekick.
Until all of that happens, maybe just stick with being super funemployed.
Don't book just yet--soon you'll be able to take a space cruise and get a face lift at the same time.
This month, researchers from SRI International and the University of Cincinnati will conduct the first-ever robotic surgery in simulated zero-gravity aboard a NASA C-9 aircraft flying 34,000 feet over the Gulf of Mexico, it was announced yesterday.
(Credit:
SRI International)
The C-9, aka the "Weightless Wonder," will simulate the microgravity of space and variable gravity of military critical care air transports by performing 40 parabolas per flight, each 18 to 25 seconds long.
The experiment will compare the precision and speed with which both human and robot surgeons can cut and stitch an incision, among other things. The SRI-developed software will help robo-doc compensate for the "errors in movement" that could be expected whether flying through space or over a battlefield in a medivac flight.
The SRI telerobotics allow the robot surgery to be controlled from thousands of miles away. When perfected, this system would allow patient care to begin the minute they close the ambulance door, according to Silicon Valley-based SRI.
"In remote telesurgery, a surgeon controls a multi-armed robot located at the patient's bedside from a distant location using a telecommunications network," SRI's Thomas Low said. "This has the potential to provide emergency medical and surgical care to astronauts during space flights, soldiers injured in battle and patients living in remote regions on Earth where there are no physicians."
SRI has already demonstrated its remote robotic surgery capabilities as part of NASA's Extreme Environment Mission Operations on the Aquarius Underwater Laboratory, 60 feet below and off the coast of Key Largo.
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