“The coming election campaign will be, above all, a test of the maturity and realism of Italian voters. One could feel more confident if they had not on three occasions chosen Mr Berlusconi as their leader.”

by Awl Sponsors

As recordings of all kind — phonographs, photographs and film — proliferated throughout the 1930s, critics began to question the purpose of original art. Why go through all the trouble of visiting the Eiffel Tower when you could see it recreated on film? Yet, in rare instances, technology can give us reproductions that match, and sometimes even surpass, the original. Such is the achievement of THX, the audio and video-fidelity company born of George Lucas’s desire for movie theaters to better express the director’s creative intent. Now THX brings the same “no additives” approach to new sound systems available in Lincolns that they pioneered in theaters 30 years ago.

by Ana Marie Cox And Jason Linkins

With the election over, here are The Guardian’s Ana Marie Cox and Huffington Post political reporter Jason Linkins to sift through the latest photos from the White House’s Flickr feed and help us anticipate what the Obama second term might have in store (spoiler: great jackets, Joe Biden hugs).

Jason: I was gonna start by pointing out that if there’s one picture that encapsulates why we have gotten four more years of scrutinizing the Obama/Biden/Souza administration, it’s this one.

Ana Marie: Oh. My. God.

Jason: This is like, the purest distillation of the Romney campaign.

Ana Marie: Mitt waving at people through a chain-link fence.

Jason: It’s the last picture uploaded to the campaign tumblr. “There’s barbed wire between me and these ‘supporters,’ right?”

Ana Marie: “Thank you for self-deporting! Sure wish I was a Latino!”

Jason: “THIS IS WHEN YOU KNOW YOU ARE GOING TO WIN.”

Ana Marie: “Unskew this fence!”

Jason: I am sure that, in the Romney administration, during times of great distress, the people would be allowed inside the fence, temporarily, as with traditional medieval liege-serf arrangements. “These are the people that mill my wheat! We must protect them from the bears!”

Ana Marie:: Not factored into Nate Silver’s algorithms: Number of people gathered in parking garages. THEY WERE NOT POLLED. Largely because they were in parking garages, for some reason.

Ana Marie: I feel like we could spend all day on this photo and not exhaust the comic possibilities.

Jason: For real! I mean, it is reported here that Mitt Romney experienced “emotion.” The robot boy had finally learned to feel.

Jason: President Barack Obama hosts mendicant Mitt Romney in the Oval Office.

Ana Marie: The hand Obama has in his pocket is giving Romney the finger.

Jason: Did you see the lunch menu? It was, essentially, Thanksgiving leftovers.

Ana Marie: Oh, I think Romney approved of using leftovers. He’s notoriously thrifty! I bet he asked for a doggie bag.

Ana Marie: And then Obama was all, “Better not forget it on the roof of your car!”

[…]

Ana Marie: I wish there was anything I could read into Mitt Romney’s face in that picture besides {{subroutine HANDSHAKE}}

Jason: This is a scene from the Fiscal Cliff Speed Dating sessions, in this case, meeting with “business leaders.” “The group includes Frank Blake of The Home Depot, Lloyd Blankfein of Goldman Sachs Group, Joe Echeverria of Deloitte, Muhtar Kent of Coca-Cola and Marissa Mayer of Yahoo.”

Ana Marie: You know, regular folks.

Jason: Lloyd Blankfein is short for “middle class.”

Ana Marie: It’s just like actual speed dating — you feel awkward and lie about staying in touc — but there’s more casual sex.

Ana Marie: I think here’s a chance to peek inside the Mind of Joe Biden.

Jason: Yes, he seems to be distracted by something. Maybe he’s a bit adrift at the moment, because no one is hugging him?

Ana Marie: He’s plotting his next hug. “If I was president, shaking hands would just be for Bo. Hugs, man. Hugs are where it’s at.”

Jason: Best Vice President in the history of America.

Ana Marie: Obama already gave him that award. He changed the wording on a Microsoft Office template and added some smiley face stickers.

Ana Marie: Nothing really to say about this one except that is a super-fly leather jacket.

Jason: Oregon State gets to hang out with POTUS because his brother-in-law is their coach. All other college basketball teams have to win national championships.

Ana Marie: That’s good… but also that’s a dope jacket.

Jason: Yeah, that’s got swag. Maybe the “mom-jeans” presidency is over?

Ana Marie: Second-term Obama: Skinnier jeans, bigger balls.

Jason: It looks like we have a triptych of “Obama manages the Middle East crisis by phone: A study in body language.” “Mohammed. I know this running a whole country thing is hard. I know. Mohammed, stop panting.”

Ana Marie: “Calm the fuck down. Calm. The. Fuck. Down.”

Jason: “Mohammed, is it okay if I put you on speakerphone? And could you try not deflate everyone in the room?”

Ana Marie: “Use your ‘inside voice.’ We’re not in the middle of a public square.”

Jason: “No, no, no, Mohammed, I don’t want you calling Thomas Friedman for advice.”

Ana Marie: Covers mouthpiece with hand, whispers to the room: “I’m leader of the free world and I can’t get one lousy Times columnist fired. Jack, get on that! Ugh. Jesus.” Rolls eyes.

Jason: “Okay, guys, here’s the deal. We’re sending Hillary to the Middle East to get those assholes sorted. All I ask from the rest of you is that you get through the week without fucking your biographers. Christ.”

Ana Marie: For some reason, “You’re gonna get hop-ons” just popped into my head with that one. “Obama offers Clinton advice on her upcoming trip. ‘Watch out for hop-ons. You’re gonna get hop-ons.’”

Ana Marie: Ironically, this is also how Obama looked during most of the Middle East negotiations. “Everyone resisted the urge to talk about how Romney was a better flip-flopper than the whole team combined.”

Jason: Somewhere, someone is writing the dissertation about how Obama’s pop-cultural awareness was a tremendous asset to his campaign, right?

Ana Marie: Mr. President: All our meme belong to you.

Previously: Obama And Romney’s Flickr-War For Your Love (And Vote)

For an hour or two today, Gmail was down. The entire world basically screeched to a halt. The economy crashed. A monkey in a coat wandered around an Ikea, in Toronto. And in offices everywhere, people were forced to talk to each other. Why did we ever think it was a good idea to trust our entire life to an Internet text-ad company that thought “Google+” was a good idea?

What did you do during the Great Mayan Apocalypse of December 10, 2012? Was it “fun,” or did you keep trying to reload Gmail every thirty seconds, like a drug-addicted laboratory animal? Share your story of what it was like, a half hour ago, when the Earth stood still.

Australian police are warning the people down there to stop using Apple’s terrible maps program, because the app is so worthless that people could easily die if they believe the ridiculous maps have any connection to earthly reality. For example, Apple Maps is telling gullible Australians that an entire city, Mildura, is hidden within a vast and terrible wilderness 44 miles away from the actual city.

Police have received calls from motorists who have been stranded in the park without adequate food and water for as long as 24 hours. The park does not have a water supply, police said. Combined with the fact that temperatures in the park can reach up to 114.8 degrees Fahrenheit, the map error is “a potentially life threatening issue.”

Do people really do this? Follow a map on their iPhone into the middle of nowhere with the expectation that an entire city will suddenly appear if they just keep driving in the direction the phone tells them to go? In Australia, the answer is “of course.”

But how are the Apple Apps hurting Americans? According to the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, our nation’s precious children are being abused by apps that specifically trick dumb kids into giving up personal information. As every parent knows, the best way to keep a child from bothering you is to hand the child an iPad or iPhone. No more annoyance! But while the now-quiet moppet is happily playing Where’s My Perry, sinister corporations are taking whatever they want.

“Most apps failed to provide any information about the data collected through the app, let alone the type of data collected, the purpose of the collection, and who would obtain access to the data,” the F.T.C. report said. “Even more troubling, the results showed that many of the apps shared certain information” — like a device’s phone number, precise location or unique identification code — with third parties, according to the report. More than half of the apps studied were transmitting children’s data, often to marketers.

The lesson is clear: Don’t let kids ever touch your fancy phone or tablet. This is also a good way to keep your device free of the uncountable germs and snot streaks kids leave behind after a game of Tiny Wings, because children are nature’s worst disease vectors.

Poor lottery winners! And poor tennis players. They are the same in that you get a lot of money and then it all leaves you as promptly as possible, because you make a lot of terrible decisions really fast, including “buying up the world’s supply of an expensive cheese made from donkeys… which can cost over $500 per pound.” Congratulations Novak Djokovic, you have discovered, like so many before you, exactly what not to do.

If one of your resolutions for the coming year involves eating less red meat, you will find this quite helpful.

“When trendsetters speculated what would be the defining men’s fashion movement to sweep New York this winter, few opted for the male legging. But ‘Megging’, as the male legging is known, is now all the rage in sartorial circles.”

Are you up on Trinidad James? He’s a new rapper out of Atlanta that everyone’s talking about. Above, the charming video for his hit single, “All Gold Everything.” I like how he’s dressed up like Jimi Hendrix. (Between Wiz Khalifa, Andre 3000 and now Trinidad James, Hendrix’s rock-n-roll pirate style is enjoying a bigger moment in hip-hop than it ever has before, I think.) I also like how he’s holding a puppy. (“It’s a baby dog and we’re really just chilling,” he explained to Complex. “I want people to always feel like, ‘I can chill with this nigga. He cool. If he can chill with a dog, I can chill with him.’”) He has another song called “The Turn Up,” which I like to think was originally titled “The Turnip.” Which is a joke I heard first from Chairman Dntsqz on Twitter. And another Chairman, Mao of the ego trip collective, made a good one reflecting the attitude of quadragenerians who like rap: “All Old Everything,” he said. This got me to thinking (if you can call it that) of potential remixes for “All Gold Everything.” If you really have absolutely nothing better to do with your day today (which is likely, considering human existence, and the rain) you’re welcome to read them.

1) “All Mold Everything (Bachelor Pad Fridge Mix)”

2) “All Bold Everything (Page Six Mix)”

3) “Paul Told Everything (Christ’s Apostle Mix)”

4) “Sol Sold Everything (Lower East Side Optician Mix)”

5) “All Ye Old Everything (Brooklyn Artisanal Culture Mix)”

6) “I’ll Fold Everything (Marital Argument About Who’s Going To Do The Laundry Mix)”

7) “Fall Cold Everything (Chicken Soup-n-Nyquil Mix)”

8) “Tall Cold Everything (16-ounce Silver Bullet Mix)”

9) “Stall, Hold Everything (Procrastination Mix)”

10) “Y’all Poled Everything (Karl Rove Acceptance of Reality Mix)”

11) “Call Fooled Everything (Australian DJ Prank Call Remorse Mix)”

12) “Fail LOL’d Everything (Buzzfeed Tag Mix)”

“There’s never been a better time to make hard ­liquor in this town — or a better time to be a locavore boozehound.”