Our weekly YouTube roundup is usually a reprieve from your mentally stimulating (yeah, right) work day. Not today, folks. Today, you must think, as this week’s theme is: TEDTalks.

The 2011 Technology Entertainment Design conference will be kicking off next week in Long Beach, California, bringing the leading minds of many fields together to talk about innovation, change and the future.

What we dig most about the TED conference are the talks that it yields, videos of which are all archived on the organization’s website.

Keep an eye on Mashable in the coming week for our TED coverage, but, in the meantime, get some learnin’ below.

Dan Ariely Asks: Are We in Control of Our Decisions?

Zachary Sniderman: Making absurdity both hilarious and brilliant.

Thomas Thwaites: How I Built a Toaster — From Scratch

Josh Catone: Thomas Thwaites’s attempt to build a toaster from scratch — including collecting and refining all the raw materials — is an interesting commentary on our globalized society.

Brian Cox: What Really Goes on at the Large Hadron Collider

Amy-Mae Elliott: Here Brian Cox explains what happens at the LHC (and more importantly why it’s such a fascinating experiment) in his typically accessible and engaging style.

Madeleine Albright: On Being a Woman and a Diplomat

Stacy Green: Because everything that Madam Secretary says is awesome and hilarious.

Amber Case: We Are All Cyborgs Now

Emily Banks: Amber Case provides a fascinating anthropological perspective on our modern tools and tech.

David Blaine: How I Held My Breath For 17 Minutes

Christina Warren’s pick

Jacek Utko: Can design Save the Newspaper?

Meghan Peters: Can it?

Jake Shimabukuro Plays “Bohemian Rhapsody”

Brenna Ehrlich: I dig the uke.

Alexis Ohanian: How To Make a Splash in Social Media

Matt Silverman: Funny + Social + Good Cause + Reddit = YEAH

More About: favorite-youtube-videos, TED-2011

For more Video coverage:

• Follow Mashable Video on Twitter
• Become a Fan on Facebook
• Subscribe to the Video channel
• Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad

View full post on Mashable!

The cattier corners of the web have been tittering over a certain chiropractor’s website gone awry, courtesy of a disgruntled and allegedly unpaid web designer.

The designer in question, whose identity is currently (and fortunately for said designer) unknown, created a website for a chiropractic firm, Winona Chiropractic Center, provided hosting services the site. When the firm allegedly “failed to pay any of their total web design bill, despite repeated attempts by their web design agency to collect,” the designer, who claimed to have “a childish sense of humor,” hijacked the site as his or her own personal billboard of bitterness.

“Please note that I have waited years for this business to pay,” stated the “new and improved” version of the site. “I have hosted their site for free since about 2007. This is me giving up.”

The rant continued, “Personally, I wouldn’t trust a doctor of any kind who couldn’t pony up for what, in the grand scheme of things, is a small charge for their web design. Do what you will, though.”

The site gathered some attention starting with a Reddit thread or two; but apparently, the piqued digital creative responsible suffered from an acute fit of remorse late in the afternoon because the page has now been entirely removed.

The Internet being the slice of magic that it is, we’re able to reproduce the page here:

Click for large version.

We certainly do agree that the designer’s actions were childish, but the long-simmering rage that builds when deadbeat clients refuse to pay their bills can cause folks to go a little bonkers after a few months, to say nothing of a couple years.

Web devs and designers, we want to know, has a client ever refused to honor your invoice? Vote in the poll, and in the comments, let us know how you handled the situation — especially if your solution was particularly mature, effective or at least funny.


Image courtesy of iStockphoto, clintspencer

More About: clients, web design, winona chiropractic

For more Dev & Design coverage:

• Follow Mashable Dev & Design on Twitter
• Become a Fan on Facebook
• Subscribe to the Dev & Design channel
• Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad

View full post on Mashable!

ALLEN PARK, Mich. – Just a year ago, Joe Ciccone of Buffalo, N.Y., had lost his exemption to bowl on the Lumber Liquidators PBA Tour, and with his exemption gone, his dream of one day winning a PBA Tour title was severely limited.

Winning the 2009 PBA Regional Players Championship at Thunderbowl Lanes in suburban Detroit, however, became a life-changing experience. Along with the RPC title, Ciccone earned his first trip to the PBA Tournament of Champions, an $8,000 prize and a boost in confidence that helped him also regain his Tour exemption the following week in the PBA Tour Trials.

The PBA Regional Players Championship returns to Thunderbowl May 28-31 at Thunderbowl as a stand-alone event. There won’t be a PBA Tour Trials as a companion event this time around, but the ultimate prize at the end of the RPC rainbow is brighter than ever.

The RPC, a tournament open exclusively to non-exempt PBA members, is one of two PBA Regional majors, rewarding the winner a projected $8,000 prize, but even more valuable will be a paid entry into the $1 million PBA Tournament of Champions – the richest tournament in bowling history.

For a $295 entry fee, the RPC winner will get a shot at a record $250,000 first prize. A long shot for a bowler dreaming of one day becoming a PBA star? Certainly – but you can ask Tom Smallwood or Kelly Kulick about having big dreams. Smallwood, an out-of-work auto industry employee, won the 2009 PBA World Championship for his first title. Kulick, the first woman ever to get a chance to bowl in the Tournament of Champions, converted her opportunity into a historic victory for women bowlers in the 2010 Tournament of Champions.

The 2010 RPC will be a contest among the nation’s top non-exempt PBA players. For some, it will be a yardstick to measure their skills against the field, and figure out what they need to do to elevate their games to a higher plateau. For some, it’s just great competition. For others, it’s the first step in pursuit of a dream.

For bowlers who are not yet members of the PBA, but would like to become eligible for the RPC, click on any of the pba.com home page tabs (News, Bowlers, Schedule) and look for the “Join PBA” link in the upper right corner. For RPC entry information, visit pba.com and look for the “PBA Regional Players Championships” link under the Schedules tab.

For Xtra Frame subscribers, the final day of RPC competition on Monday, May 31, will be covered live on the PBA’s exclusive online video streaming service. If you are not a subscriber, visit pba.com and click on the Xtra Frame logo for more information.

PBA REGIONAL PLAYERS CHAMPIONSHIP SCHEDULE
Thunderbowl Lanes, Allen Park, Mich., May 28-31

FRIDAY, MAY 28
8 a.m. – Squad A practice
11:30 a.m. – Squad B practice
3 p.m. – Sweeper
7 p.m. – Pro-Am squad

SATURDAY, MAY 29
8 a.m. – Squad A, 8 qualifying games
3:30 p.m. – Squad B, 8 qualifying games

SUNDAY, MAY 30
8 a.m. – Squad B, 8 qualifying games
3:30 p.m. – Squad A 8 qualifying games
Top 64 advance to RPC Match Play Finals

MONDAY, MAY 31
8 a.m. – Round of 64 (best of 5 games)
Noon – Round of 32 (best of 5 games)
2 p.m. – Round of 16 (best of 3 games)
Immediately following – Round of 8 (best of 3 games)
Immediately following – Round of 4 (one game)
Immediately following – Championship (one game)

View full post on Professional Bowlers Association

It may be the end of an era for Twitter trends, as Justin Bieber is nowhere to be found on this week’s list. Instead, American Idol champions the chart as the show wrapped its ninth season and crowned some guy the winner of something.

Below that, international trends including Korean boy band Super Junior continue to dominate, while concerns over the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico mount.

Once again, our friends at What The Trend have provided the insightful list below. Because this is a topical list, hashtag memes and games have been omitted from the chart.

You can check past Twitter trends in our Top Twitter Topics section as well as read more about this past week’s trends on What The Trend.

Top Twitter Trends This Week: 5/22 – 5/28

---

Image courtesy of iStockphoto, ricardoinfante

Tags: gulf of mexico, gulf oil spill, Super Junior, Top Twitter Topics, trends, twitter, twitter trends

View full post on Mashable!