If you don’t take control of your culture, those who only care about the gold and platinum will. That’s the message of this video series called Instant Def, which is a Snickers viral marketing web site. The story line focuses on hip hop being taken over by money-hungry industry types. Ironically, they cast the Black Eyed Peas, a group that will whore itself out to anything from TV commercials to supermarket grand openings. The production design is sharp, but the story, music and most of the performances are weak. On the plus side, Bootsy Collins shows up in episode 2 and again in episode 5. Speaking of taking control of your culture, they use a dog on a flying skateboard and a couple evil midgets little persons, one of them on a skateboard too. Ahh, the delicious irony. Delicious? I love Snickers, but they sure wasted a bunch of money for something lame. I’m not sure about their connection with the hip hop community, but I’m sure the Peas massive street cred will help. Skip ahead to the finale, which has the skateboard action and is also the most entertaining. More screen caps after the jump. [Source: Media Mindfulness]

More overpriced skateboard based furniture, but don’t take our word for it: Skede-tuoli on saatavana nahkapäällysteisenä tai pelkistetyn teräksisenä. Tuolissa käytetään harjattua, ruostumatonta terästä. Se on saatavana yksivärisenä beigenä ja mustana. Tikkauksissa vaihtoehtoina ovat beige-beige, musta-musta, musta-beige ja musta-pink. Uh, yeah. Available from Tunto Designs for 800 – 1050 € which is about in the $1000-$1400 range according to GoCurrency. If that’s not already too expensive for you Mr Warbucks, don’t forget you’ve got to pay for shipping from Finland. You can get it in plain steel, leather upholstered or without the skateboard even. Although, if you are going to go to Finland to get a chair, you might as well get the deck from the Finnish company Control as well. Looks a little forced and not-so-elegant to me. A couple more pics after the jump. [Source: PadStyle ]

We’re getting wider here. Tweaking style sheets, prepping for a redesign. It might get a little mongo around here for every once and a while. There will be some rough edges in the next month or so, but bear with us please.

The last time I had to swing a skateboard in self-defense, it wasn’t against a rapist, murderer, pedophile and escaped convict like Theodore “T-Bag” Bagwell. It was against a group of asshole jocks that jumped me and a friend once while skating down a street. It was 6 on 2, and they ended up letting us be. I was in high school at the time. This young man looks like he’s junior high age at best. He clocks T-Bag pretty hard in the side of the head, but T-Bag is like pit bull, he just keeps coming. You have to kill him to stop him. Seriously, he’s not that big, and he’s had his hand cut off, sewn back on by a vet with no anesthesia, and then had to pull it off by hand again, all in the space of a couple of weeks. He should be dead or dying from gangrene by now. I don’t know, maybe my judgement is clouded since I should have better things to do than digitizing a 5 second clips of a guy getting hit on the head with a skateboard on the TV show Prison Break. Watch the video and and follow…

As you may have already noticed, we’re adding some new voices to Skate and Annoy, and Mark Conahan is the latest addition. You may know him from his

California Community Colleges Satellite Network (CCCSAT ) has some sort of series called Grant Britain Skateboarding Photographer that you can watch on satellite TV or view via webcast for free, provided you are a student of California Community Colleges. Education without boundaries, my ass! It aired already, but it airs again on 1/29 at 10:29am, 1/31 at 8:30pm, on 2/2 at 4:30pm, and on 2/3 at 8:32pm. See if you can figure it out. The CCCSAT web site is confusing as all heck. Supposedly this is Episode #124 – Typography. I find it hard to believe that Grant’s had 123 other episodes. Someone figure out how to watch this, then record it and post it on YouTube for the rest of us. Maybe Grant has more info in his blog over at the Skateboard Mag, which is where I poached that picture from, and where you’ll find recurring great shots he pulls from his extensive body of work.

Jürgen Horrwarth won the vert and was winning the mini-ramp-bowl portion of the European Skateboard Championships in Basle, Switzerland when it was rained out. There’s an interview with Jürgen on the Red Bull site. It’s supposed to be a direct link, but it’s wacky. Once the page loads you have to click on the “Visit Red Bull International” option and click the “interview” button. Another case of superfluous Flash Development gone awry…  The interview is really dry. Your time is better spent blowing it off and reading this excerpted  Claus  Grabke  interview from Juice Magazine. If you’re a die hard Jürgen Horrwarth fan, we’ve poached the whole thing after the link.

Australian man named Grant Hicks is challenging Tod Swank’s world’s largest skateboard record. Sure, there have been other contenders, and it’s not official yet, but Hick’s board is supposed to be 9 feet longer, and he’s documented the hell out of it with five of his own videos as well as an appearance on an Australian TV news program. If you’re only going to watch one of them, the TV one is your best bet. You’ll do a double-take when you hear how the anchorwoman’s thick Australian accent makes the word “deck” sound like a part of the male anatomy, leading to lots of juvenile fun with sentences like: “The father of three hopes the giant deck will help raise money for his local (unintelligible) saving club.” and “Seven month’s of hard work and Grant’s monster deck is around 9 feet longer than the current world record holders.” Wow! Dirk Diggler is rolling over in his grave. Catch all six videos after the jump.

I have a son who is nearing two years old. I hope that I will be the kind of dad who, like this one, decided that if he was going to go through the trouble of risking a divorce by making a rocket powered skateboard for his son, he would at least pad him up in a crash suit and a full face motorcycle helmet. I also hope my son won’t disappoint me like the kid in this video did. Check it out after the jump. That rocket packs more power than it looks like. Lighting it with a blow torch is a nice effect.

Coming in Spring of 2007 and promising an “instant change in skateboarding” the Port-a-Board skateboard not only breaks the deck down into three pieces, but the trucks are also on some sort of binding system that allows them to pop off for easy storage and transport. With a name like “Port-A-Board” you leave yourself open to the inevitable potty joke. I know I couldn’t resist, or maybe I’m just lazy. Portable skateboards are nothing new, but this one might have more of a chance than the Stowboard. At least the basic mechanics operate like a regular skateboard, rendering null and voiding any arguement against bringing a skateboard to school. Performance-wise, I’ll be a monkey’s uncle if this thing can actually stand up to some serious action, although that shouldn’t be a problem for most kids who usually just stand around at a skate park. Watch the video complete with dramatic soundtrack and more after the jump UPDATE: Fixed the link to the Port-a-board web site. Sorry.