Leatherman: Sometimes the Japanese are just too wacky for their own good. Witness "Hard Gay," a character played by the equally improbably-named Razor Ramon, who looks like a buff Asian Rob Halford in his studded patent leather singlet with matching cuffs. He invades Yahoo! Japan's office because the "hoo!" in their name sounds like his catchphrase - and he wants it back. In the process he rhythmically rubs his package on the head of marketing and gets a male masseur in a leg-lock butt-rub in a seven-minute QuickTime file all to a Ricky Martin soundtrack at http://blog.kung-foo.tv/archives/001535.php/.

Eight bits: Just slightly down the wacky scale, another Japanese guy created a Super Mario Bros. clone for, wait for it, JavaScript. Called Super Maryo World, the mustachioed plumber is replaced by a little cat thing, but otherwise this arrow-key-fest is faithful to the original, and playable on nearly any Web browser at http://janis.or.jp/users/segabito/JavaScriptMaryo.html.

Comments? Michael Citrome