World Korean Outdoor Championships, 2007

The second week of May means only one thing - the start of the new outdoor holding season.

Third to go in round four is the fancied Korean newcomer, attempting an MP3 player fan.



So here is Chun Wie-Pak, 19, performing the extremely difficult four-item single-handed hold. Perfect fanning, even distribution, nice blend of colours... and yes, devices all activated and set to different option screens.

This is a superb display of the 5.9 difficulty-rated hold. This will be hard to beat and could see her move into the bronze position, what with the Russian failing to...



But what's this? WHAT IS THIS NOW?! What is she doing? She's... she's looking away from the hold! She's LOOKING AWAY! My goodness! She's doing it! She's doing it without looking! This is... is... EXTRAORDINARY!



And now a smile! A SMILE! Good lord, she's won it AND SHE KNOWS IT! Sensational!

800 x 604

THE NET IS CLOSING IN.



From here. It's amazing how fast you can learn a foreign language when you really put your mind to it.

Sensational overnight developments

Someone mailed in 600 pixel wide versions of those photos.





Somewhere out there these pictures exists at 2594 x 1944. Not that we are in any way obsessed with touching the mouth on that one on the right.

FROM HERE:
Operation Ore HQ.

That photo again at a slightly higher resolution

Not that we've spent the last five hours feverishly searching the internet for this. The photo gets 20 pixels wider if you click on it.



Not obsessed with the blonde one in the slightest. But if you do happen to stumble across her MySpace profile while systematically looking through all 59 million female MySpace profiles for her MySpace profile, please forward the link.

FOLLOW THE TRAIL (TO JAIL):
Start here.

The Ledovskaja Fan

Always a pleasure to see this one performed.



A fitting tribute to the complex finger-hold's inventor Sonja Ledovskaja, who died at her home in the Ukraine last week, aged 41, of a heart attack. It's thought the heart attack was caused by her years as a thing holder, with ruthless coaches forcing young women to eat nothing but milk and cheese to keep their fingernails and hair shiny and strong.

PRODUCT RECALL NOTICE: Samsung Demonstration Humanoid SA-01/02 discovered to be defective

Samsung has recalled all 7,800 of its shipped Demonstration Humanoids, citing trouble with product recognition sensors:



Pictured here is the Samsung Demonstration Humanoid SA-02 - with additional third hand for enhanced product display. It has malfunctioned and mistaken a banana for a telephone. If it mistook the arm of a small child for a telephone the results could be fatal. This embarrassing failure will cost Samsung millions.

EMERGENCY IMAGE REQUEST

That amazing Japanese bread web site features the following piece of stock photography:



We MUST HAVE this photograph!



She REALLY LOVES BREAD!

It is by far the greatest piece of photography in the world. We must have it, or a close approximation of it. If you have access to a woman and some bread, please recreate it and send it in.

Panasonic Breadphone spotted in Japan

Panasonic, in association with Yamazakipan bakeries, has revealed the world's first bread-based telephone.

Technical details are scarce at the moment, but it would appear to come with a 6"x6" screen and is based on old white bread rather than the growing-in-popularity new granary format. It's available in Summer Rye (white), and will come in Standard (16 slices) and Family (32 slices).



The sender of this photograph suggested making the joke that young thing-holders are started out on soft things like bread. It's a good angle and better than our rubbish "Breadphone" idea, but we can't go using someone else's angle. So it's a Breadphone.

If you have any better 'angles' for using this photograph, whack them in the Comments bit and we'll do them.

Taping scandal rocks Shanghai Future ExpoWorld 2007

This amazing arm-hold looked too good to be true - and an examination of photographic evidence after the event proved it was a fraud. The lengths people will go to.



Good to see the Samsung Demonstration Humanoid out in the wild, though.

Nokia 5700 - innovating lifestyle photography

The Nokia 5700 lifestyle photography has been Photoshopped onto the screen of the actual phone. This is the sort of genius innovation that has kept Nokia at the top of the phone/lifestyle photography scene for a decade.



Those people aren't even holding a phone. That's because Nokia KNEW the photo would be put on a phone screen! Nokia is clearly always thinking one step ahead, like we do when we buy enough milk to last for a week so we don't have to go out in the evenings.



Look at how much fun those girls are having. If you buy this phone you will have two days of minor/slight fun looking at all the new things it can do, then you will put it in your pocket until you need to know what the time is.



It's the same photo. The phone is also called the Nokia 5700 "XpressMusic" :(



Rubbish headphones. Looks like it's been designed in association with the experts at Fisher Price. 4/10.



Here they are in amazingly high resolution, for ironic desktop purposes, or for printing out and showing to people so it looks like you have pretty young friends from a variety of ethnic groups who go out instead of only bald men friends and old women friends who stay in building new Warcraft characters.

NOT TO BE CONFUSED WITH:

The NGC 5700 celestial object

The Trimble 5700 GPS system

The Liebherr WK5700 Wine Storage Cabinet

The Liebherr WK5700 Wine Storage Cabinet. 5700 brings up lots of good Google results. Give it a go for half an hour.

Women who lie to their parents about what they do

"I'm doing some modeling, mum. Yes, I've got some work with Samsung. Yes, it pays quite well. Yes, it is fun. Yes, I'm having a lovely time out here."



*Puts phone down*

*Starts sobbing*

ATi Avivo - proud to sponsor the Thai World Ladyboy Championships

Sadly we will not be attending :(



The first one's probably best, although that might just be because she's farthest away.

America crashes out in 2008 qualifiers

One point from six tournaments means the USA is bottom of the Americas qualifying group, and now definitely will not be holding in Beijing next September.



Her form's all wrong and a polo shirt? The arrival of new manager - former Ukrainian coach Vlad Dmortan - can't come soon enough for the crumbling USA team.

The Samsung SA-01 Demonstration Humanoid

Meet Lin-Yun, the Samsung SA-01 Demonstration Humanoid.

She is the world's first fully-automated thing-holder. Samsung will be rolling this model out to trade shows across Asia in 2008.



If you look closely you can just make out some sort of face beneath the realistic skin.

HUGE Sony Ericsson W660i lifestyle photography!

These are her fingernails!



We'd estimate the camera that took this photograph cost upwards of £200 and had at least 7.0 megapixels.



The original photo is 7216 x 5412. This sets a new record. This is the Bob Beamon of image resolutions. It's unlikely you'll ever see an image at a higher resolution than this in your lifetime.



This is her face!



This photo is also 7216 x 5412. If the internet is going slowly for you today, it's because of this.



We have something proper to say about this picture - the W660 still uses the STUPID headphone adapter thing which means you can't just plug in some normal headphones.

The only time we've ever used one of these it didn't work properly and was all crackly and wonky, which is all the evidence we need to make sweeping statements about none of them ever working.

290KG Clean & Jerk

It was an impressive hold to begin with, but when she waved to the crowd with her left hand the roof nearly came off the stadium!



Strength and control. Soon-Pak's face muscles are relaxed, her smile genuine - she is a true professional even at the tender age of 18. LG's investment in its youth system is really starting to produce the goods. The rumours of Samsung signing her for a world record $14.5m could be true, based on this peerless display.



Such strength in those tiny, delicate bones. She is like a tiny, delicate bird. We'd hold her so tight, so very tight. So tight that she feels very relaxed and eventually stops flapping around. Then we'd put her in our pocket where she'd be safe and no one could take her away.

SAGEM - HOLDING INNOVATION BEYOND BELIEF!

We cannot believe what we are seeing. This is giving us butterflies. It's like the first time we saw Lee-Yun Pak perform the double-index-finger twirl in the 1988 Asian Open!

Behold, the first performance of... the Inverted Foot Hold:



The little company has pulled it off! This is a staggering hold innovation and a rare new move debuted by a western holder. Could this lead to a renaissance in western holding? We can only hope! With the World Holding Championships coming to Manchester in 2011, this is a great boost to the dreams of young holders in the UK, Europe and US.

The Koreans must be wondering what they have to do. We wouldn't want to be in their shoes!