You all listen to the Judge John Hodgman podcast, right? RIGHT? Good. In case you missed last week's episode, it featured one of the greatest moments in the show's history. The show is hosted by occasional Daily Show correspondent, professional PC, knower of all things, and eccentric millionaire John Hodgman with co-host "Bailiff" Jesse Thorn. Hodgman sang the cover of "Baby Got Back" featured in an episode of Glee that was stolen from Jonathan Coulton, who was in the audience. Hodgman and Coulton are friends, and unlike Glee, Hodgman at least gave Coulton implied credit.

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It's very likely that ASCAP and Time Warner are the only people who don't think it's stupid that the song "Happy Birthday to You" is copyrighted, and they only think that because they manage to squeeze two million dollars a year out of licensing the song. To combat this, radio station WFMU and the Free Music Archive teamed up to hold a contest for a replacement to the popular tune that we can all sing at parties, sing in public, and even sing in film and television without paying royalties as long as the artists are credited. The results are in, and here are your new go-to birthday jams.

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Please tell me I'm not the only one reminded of Rob Liefeld's bulbous-chested Captain America here. Just a little bit, for just a second. It's the angle! You can see two more pics—one of Jor-El, one of General Zod—at /Film.

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The saga that is musician Jonathan Coulton vs. FOX/Glee continues (read up if you're not familiar). Coulton has released his original cover version on iTunes, Google, and Amazon under the name, “Baby Got Back (In the Style of Glee).” He's going split the proceeds between The VH1 Save the Music Foundation and The It Gets Better Project and even joked Glee should do the same. As of publishing this post, Coulton's song has surpassed all the other songs from that episode of Glee on the charts. (via Geekosystem)

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Here's a quick recap for those who haven't been following this story: Indie musician Jonathan Coulton recorded a cover of Sir Mix-a-Lot's "Baby Got Back" back in 2005. This year, the television program Glee also did a cover of "Baby Got Back," but they didn't cover Sir Mix-a-Lot -- they covered Coulton's version of the song without crediting him. Then they aired it. Then they started selling it on iTunes, all the while refusing to acknowledge that it was Coulton's version. Now, Coulton has put his version up for sale as well, but unlike Glee, he's donating all the proceeds to charity after giving Sir Mix-a-Lot his cut.

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Step by step instructions on Instructables. (via LifeHacker)

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Ah, Glee. Can you get any worse? The answer to that question, for those playing along at home, is an unequivocal "yes, though not much." It came to light last week that an episode called "Sadie Hawkins" would use a version of Sir Mix-a-Lot's "Baby Got Back" song. That version, unfortunately, turned out to be Jonathan Coulton's specific arrangement and even lyrics. Well, now it's aired and, yup, it's basically JoCo's version. Even worse, Glee apparently thinks they did the man a favor by using it.

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Well, they aired it, seemingly unchanged. And it’s now for sale in the US iTunes store. They also got in touch with my peeps to basically say that they’re within their legal rights to do this, and that I should be happy for the exposure (even though they do not credit me, and have not even publicly acknowledged that it’s my version – so you know, it’s kind of SECRET exposure). While they appear not to be legally obligated to do any of these things, they did not apologize, offer to credit me, or offer to pay me, and indicated that this was their general policy in regards to covers of covers. It does not appear that I have a copyright claim, but I’m still investigating the possibility (which I consider likely) that they used some or all of my audio. I’ll write something longer and more detailed about this when I can get my head together about it probably in a couple of days. Thanks for your support, but please continue not to burn anything down. -- Jonathan Coulton, in a recent update to his blog. Last night Glee returned after a holiday hiatus with the episode "Sadie Hawkins" and a soft-rock version of "Baby Got Back," that is unmistakably nerd-rocker Jonathan Coulton's soft-rock version of "Baby Got Back." The musician updated fans and readers of his blog this morning with this information on Fox and Glee's really absurd notion that "exposure" is his payment despite the fact that they have so far refused to publicly credit him with the arrangement. If Coulton hadn't already had a strong, connected fanbase, nobody might have noticed that he'd been ripped off.

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We think it's safe to say that Glee's propensity for taking classic songs and mutating them into teenybopper renditions that stab away at both our ear drums and patience knows absolutely no bounds, but it's still -- as much as we hate to say this -- 100% legit given that the original artists willingly sign away their souls to the show's executives for their thirty pieces of silver. Today, however, it was discovered by geek culture's favorite singer/songwriter, Jonathan Coulton, that what Glee wants, Glee will most certainly take without so much as permission and proper licensing. The show has apparently given a take on Coulton's cover version of Sir Mix-a-Lot's "Baby Got Back" practically verbatim, and the singer and his army of fans are up in arms over the show's apparent audacious and ill-conceived move.

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Though the story is still developing, there isn't really another way to put this: it looks an awful lot like one of the songs Glee is planning to include in its soon-to-be-returning fourth season is a soft-rock cover of Sir Mix-a-Lot's "Baby Got Back." In fact, it's a very specific soft rock cover of "Baby Got Back." Nerd singer-songwriter Jonathan Coulton's cover. Which wouldn't otherwise be a problem, except that Coulton himself was never actually contacted or asked about whether it could be used.

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We're not quite sure why singer-songwriter Jonathan Coulton performed the classic "Still Alive" from Portal on CBS. I mean sure, he wrote the song for the 2007 video game but why now? Why CBS? I can't tell when it was uploaded and I don't see any mention of it on his Twitter. Is someone at CBS a big Portal fan or is this the work of GLaDOS? We may never know... (via Kotaku) Are you following The Mary Sue on Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, Pinterest, & Google +?

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Swedish furniture giant IKEA is committing to energy independence in its stores worldwide, announcing today that it would strive to produce as much energy as it consumes as a corporation by 2020. Stores and warehouses will be outfitted with solar panels, while the company will also make new investments in wind farms that it hopes will make it an energy neutral enterprise.

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Due to the frequency of the various indie game bundles, as well as the recent 2012 Steam Summer Sale, you probably already own every single above average indie game on the market. Perhaps this is why Humble Bundle's new bundle doesn't contain indie games, but instead offers up a variety of geek-centric music.

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To commemorate the release of John Scalzi's book Redshirts, the author and Tor teamed up with geek musician Jonathan Coulton to write a song of the same name. And then, TrekPropGuy (on YouTube) threw together this delightfully homicidal tribute to all the redshirts who lost their lives in the name of the Enterprise and its five-year mission. It is truly touching. (via TrekMovie.com) Previously in Star Trek

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Though Portal 2 released quite a while ago with a couple of its own new, catchy songs, the original Portal's "Still Alive" by Jonathan Coulton is, ahem, still alive and kickin'. We've seen it played by a quartet of floppy drives, and while that was mightily impressive, this rendition by Chris DePrisco, played by a laser etching the Aperture logo into metal, is nothing short of incredible. Check out the video below.

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If you've always wanted to hear an orchestral take on "Still Alive," the song written by Jonathan Coulton and sung by Ellen McLain (voice of GLADoS and the turrets) that plays during the end credits of Portal, then you are in luck this morning. YouTube user Dummeh has provided this service for you, so now you have a lyric-free version of the song to use as a ringtone! You can download the song at SoundCloud. (via Geeks Are Sexy) Previously in Portal

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TV is coming back soon, but 30 Rock won't be returning until 2012 to accommodate Tina Fey's new baby. In the meantime, we can look forward to a fancy lady-oriented Thursday night lineup on NBC and check out this League of Extraordinary Gentlemen mashup by illustrator Alex Ross. (via Popped Culture)

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