Your Moment of Cat Zen

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House Follows Senate In Giving The President A Copyright Czar

From TechDirt: While failing to do much of anything (other than fingerpointing) to deal with the economic crisis we're facing, the folks in the House did spend some time easily passing the ProIP bill that the Senate passed last week. So, now we just have to wait for the President to sign it, and the entertainment industry gets their own person in the White House whose job it is to prop up their business model. Hell, if Wall St. gets one of those, why not the entertainment industry?

Vote Early - Vote Absentee

Already know who you're voting for in the upcoming U.S. election, and you don't want to spend Election Day standing in line at the polls? In many states you can send in an absentee ballot by mail, without having an official excuse for being absent. It's called "no excuse absentee voting," and it's allowed in 28 states. Laws around absentee voting vary from state to state—in some you need a notary or witness when you sign your ballot, for instance, and deadlines vary—but it can save you time come November if you want to get the deed done pre-Election Day. See the Early Voting Information Center's state-by-state reference chart to get the details of your home state. Florida makes it easy to register for absentee voting. You need to send an email (or snail mail) with some personally identifying information (such as driver license number and voter id number).

XBox Media Center (XBMC) Released For All Platforms

From LifeHacker:

The popular open-source media center application Xbox Media Center (XBMC) has rolled out the first beta release of XMBC Atlantis, which brings XBMC to all platforms. That means XBMC now runs on Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, the original Xbox, and even your thumb drive or live CD. Despite its beta status, this release brings XBMC even closer to cross-platform bliss—including iTunes and iPhoto integration for XBMC on your Mac. The new release also boasts a killer new HD skin, so keep reading for a closer look.

XBMC is free, works on all platforms. This release is currently in beta, so you may see some bugs. That said, so far it's been running like a champ on my machines. If you give the new XBMC beta a try, let's hear how you're liking it in the comments.

XBMC ‘Atlantis’ Beta 1 released - now serving all common platforms Download XBMC [XMBC.org]

Sad News - Glider Agrees to Pay Blizzard $6M in Bot Lawsuit

MDY, the makers of the World of Warcraft Bot Glider, has agreed to pay Blizzard $6M in the on going lawsuit brought by Blizzard. MDY realized it could owe more in damages following Janaury's (2009) trial, so it proposed this agreement. From Virtually Blind's article on the MDY v Blizzard Case:

This judgment does not entirely conclude the matter. Issues still slated for trial in January include whether MDY’s sales of Glider violated the Digital Millenium Copyright Act and whether MDY’s owner Michael Donnelly can be held personally liable for the $6,000,000 judgment.

Beyond trial, of course, there will almost certainly be an appeal to the 9th Circuit on the issue of liability, which would negate the stipulation, and thus the $6m damages judgment, if MDY prevails.

It's a sad day for us all when corporate interests override a person's fair use rights on his own computer.

Take A Deep Breath: Some Perspective On The Financial Crisis

TechDirt has a very long article on the current financial crisis, explaining how we got into this financial mess in the first place. The article is worth a read, and I encourage you to read the entire article on their site - TechDirt. First off: this situation is complicated. The deeper you dig into it, the more you can begin to sketch out a picture of what's really happening, but no one (no one!) can accurately understand all the different variables at play here. Anyone claiming to have all the answers is wrong. They're either ignorant or lying. Also, the blame game isn't just pointless, wrong and silly, it's dangerous. I've been seeing too many folks on both sides of the political aisle trying to use this crisis as a political football, and all that's doing is making it that much more difficult to come up with real solutions. If you see anyone focus on playing the "blame game," ignore them. They're not worth listening to and they'll only be misleading. Finally, any explanation you read that isn't multiple-book-length will probably be greatly simplified -- including this one. But I'm hoping that it at least kicks off an interesting discussion. So, what happened? The basic summary is that a chain of events all resulted in more and more money being put into riskier and riskier mortgages, where much of the risk was hidden away by computer models and the repackaging of those risky mortgages in bulk. Normally speaking, the idea of bundling up a bunch of risky projects into one actually does make some sense -- because you're figuring that while some will fail, the successes will greatly outweigh the failures. And, in many cases, that's true (it's basic diversification). But the problem was that very few, if any, of the models seemed to take into account the fact that these weren't independently risky items, but that many were very dependent on each other. Thus, rather than a small group of risky deals going south, outweighed by the success stories, people started to realize that you could have a domino effect, where a large portion of the risky stuff going bad could actually lead to even more of it going bad. That's just what you get for creating bad models that don't take dependencies into account. What made this even worse, however, is that a bunch of the risk was eventually pawned off to the least knowledgeable investor: the public markets. We had a long chain of players, who effectively kept "laundering" the risk through various ways until it ended up being held by people who simply had no clue how risky the products were that they owned. Then, once stuff started to go bad, the dependencies started to snowball and make everything worse -- and the confusion over how bad and how risky things were made those who actually had money on hand reasonably afraid to keep lending it to those who couldn't accurately express the risk. That resulted in a lack of liquidity -- effectively the oil in the economy's engine. Without liquidity, a lot of stuff freezes up pretty quickly and dangerously. That's what caused Treasury boss Paulson and Fed chair Bernanke to ask for the "bailout" plan. Why are we "bailing out" those who created this mess? Actually, while almost everyone is calling it a "bailout," it's not quite a true bailout, and it's not clear that it really "rewards" those who created the mess. Like everything else, it's quite complicated. Personally, I like Fred Wilson's use of the phrase "The Splurge" to describe it, because in many ways it's more accurate than a bailout. Basically, the government is asking for $700 billion to try to buy up distressed assets. The details suggest that it's starting out with $350 billion, with another $350 billion to be handed out later, if necessary. There are plenty who believe that $700 billion is just the tip of the iceberg, and eventually that number will grow to be much higher. So, why isn't this a full "bailout"? Well, because the government would be getting equity back as well, and there are plenty of smart folks who believe that this could lead to the government making a profit. Indeed, buying up distressed assets historically isn't a bad way to make a profit -- if you know what you're doing. Lots of folks tend to shy away from distressed assets, and a good fund manager can buy up distressed assets for pennies on the dollar and figure out ways to sell them down the road for nickels or dimes on the dollar. It's a perfectly reasonable business proposition, and historically, there are plenty of stories of folks who made out like bandits buying distressed assets following bursting bubbles. So, if the government can drive a hard bargain and buy up these assets at a reasonable price, it could work. So, the good news is that there's a chance that the "splurge" could result in a best case scenario: it pumps liquidity into the market, stabilizes things, gets the economy moving again and lets the government profit. But that's the best case scenario. Others are a lot less sure, noting that the upside pales compared to the downside risk, and even if an upside scenario may seem a lot more likely, the cost of the downside is much, much bigger (at least $700 billion at this point, and perhaps more). In fact, there are those who suggest that a poorly done splurge will almost certainly make things even worse. And, plenty are pointing out that the smart money seems to be betting that the government is entering the game as the "last sucker" we were discussing earlier. Given that there's still confusion over how the gov't will value these assets, it seems reasonable to worry. But isn't this just about Wall Street? There's a common refrain among many, many people, that this is just the result of greedy Wall Street bankers, and the proper thing to do here is to just let them all fail. It's not that easy. The ripple effects here would be pretty serious -- and while I don't think the economy would fully seize up, it would be really painful across the board. The lack of liquidity in the commercial paper world (short term lending, mostly) would impact a lot of businesses that you might not think have such exposure to Wall Street. And that, in turn, could create an ongoing spiral. It would stop somewhere, but where is anybody's guess at this point, and it may be pretty far down a hole, with a pretty massive destruction of wealth in the meantime. Some may believe this is the best way to get through things (the rip the band-aid off quickly belief), but the overall damage could be significant, and not so easy to come back from. Ripping the band-aid off quickly doesn't always yield the best result if it rips the scab with it, causing more damage. So, simply letting everything fail, while an option, could have serious long term consequences. To sum it all up It is a huge mess, no doubt. The splurge is quite risky -- and while I can appreciate the upside potential, if done right, that "if" scares me a lot. I'd be much more comfortable with it if it wasn't being pushed through in its entirely in such a quick manner, with partisan players on both sides going on the news yelling at the other side each night. Instead, focus on a smaller initial package and spend a bit more time working out the bigger deal later, with a lot more input. In the short term, there's still going to be a fair amount of bloodshed, and the downside will impact companies outside of the financial sector, but for those in tech, the good news is that we're probably more isolated than other industries, though certainly not completely isolated. And, since everything is changing so rapidly, you never know what shoe might drop next.

Splicd Skips To a Video Point in YouTube

Web site Splicd creates custom links to embedded YouTube videos that start and stop at any time you define, allowing you to skip straight to the good part and avoid the rest. Let's say, for example, you've stumbled onto a gem on YouTube but had to suffer through 10 minutes of complete boredom to get there. You want to share the video with a friend, but you don't want her to have to sit through the whole mess for 20 seconds of pure gold. Just paste the URL of the video into Splicd, give it your desired start and end time, and it generates a custom link that starts and stops the video where you told it to.

World of Warcraft Credit Card

The World of Warcraft Blog brings news of a Visa credit for World of Warcraft players. First National Bank of Omaha is offering a Visa credit with a World of Warcraft background. Using the card will earn you extra game time in WoW.

The World of Warcraft Visa card is available to U.S. residents with a World of Warcraft game account, putting one percent of every dollar spent on “qualifying purchases” toward time in the game and giving cardholders a free month of play the first time they use the card. The cards are available in 13 different and very sexy designs, with detailed artwork featuring the game’s various races, including Night Elves, Tauren, Dwarves, Trolls and of course, Orcs and Humans.

It may seem like kind of a weird rewards program, but with 11 million subscribers, many of whom would leap at the chance to publicly declare their WoW allegiance - not to mention the potential for free play time - I think it’s a brilliant move. Even more importantly, it’s yet another sign that gamers are being recognized as adults, and taken seriously for the “cultural demographic” they represent. Of course, laying down your World of Warcraft Forsaken Visa may not get you taken seriously by the maître d’, but sometimes legitimacy has to come one step at a time.

Quick Joke of the Day

Two men are approaching each other on a sidewalk. Both are dragging their right foot as they walk. As they meet, one man looks at the other knowingly, points to his foot and says, Vietnam, 1969." The other points his thumb behind him and says, "Dog crap, 20 feet back." Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

Visual Studio 2010 to Come with 'Black Box' for Testers

Airplanes are equipped with recorders that capture both cockpit audio and flight data, so in the event that something goes wrong, investigators can try to determine the source of the problem. And Microsoft wants to give that capability to developers and testers. In the next version of its developer tool suite, to be known as Visual Studio 2010, Microsoft plans to include the ability to record the full screens of what testers are seeing, as well as data about their machine. When a test application crashes, the technology will enable developers to see the bug as it occurred. In an interview last week, Microsoft Developer Division Director Dave Mendlen said the feature is designed to avoid the all-to-frequent conflict that occurs when a software tester finds a bug that the developer says it can't reproduce. Internally, the feature has been called "TiVo for debuggers." Microsoft is also talking about new modeling tools it says will make it easier for programmers new to a team to get a sense of how earlier versions of the software work. One of the other goals is to add more business intelligence tools--things like dashboards and cockpits--that enable the project managers to assess whether a development project is on track. Now that I'm finally settled into Visual Studio 2008 and LINQ, I'm ready for 2010! I really like the TiVo for debuggers option. I can see this be very helpful for game developers, who have an even more difficult task of reproducing a state that caused a crash. We've had all sorts of workarounds in the past, including creating our own "Tivo for debuggers" (which basically records the value of all variables, and let's us load the game at any given state). I'm also excited to see what other new tools will be in Visual Studio 2010 and the .NET Framework 4.0. I've seen hints that cloud computing classes will be included, for example. Visual Studio Team System 2010 will offer tools for managing test cases and execution, and will boost support for filing actionable bugs. (Credit: Microsoft)

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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Quick Joke of the Day

In a murder trial, the defense attorney was cross-examining the coroner: Attorney: Before you signed the death certificate, had you taken the pulse? Coroner: No. Attorney: Did you listen to the heart? Coroner: No. Attorney: Did you check for breathing? Coroner: No. Attorney: So, when you signed the death certificate, you weren''t sure the man was dead, were you? Coroner: Well, let me put it this way. The man's brain was sitting in a jar on my desk. But I guess it's possible he could be out there practicing law somewhere. Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

Nodevice Hordes Missing Drivers, Manuals

From LifeHacker:

If you're stumped trying to find a Windows driver for your hardware (and you didn't back it up when it last worked), try Nodevice has a database of more than 30,000 drivers, and roughly 20,000 each of manual files and DLL files. Looking for something Vista-specific? Check out RadarSync. [via]

TIVO new User Interface in testing, features Picture in Guide at last!

The DVD Rental Video Blog brings news that TiVo will soon feature some changes to its user interface, including Picture In Guide.

If I were to list one basic feature I’ve always wanted for my TIVO is an integrate User Interface with Picture in Guide (PIG). Little has changed with its interface over the years, picture is obstructed by grid-style onscreen guide while navigating though user menu to retrieve list of recording show or change settings. Competitors such as DirectTV, Dish Network and Cable service carriers have long offering DVR with PIG. That soon to change; Tivo is cooking up a user interface with a complete new look- Featuring PIG with ability to display picture while peruse user guide.

Read the full article at the DVD Rental Video Blog.

Write Your Novel at WEbook

For those writers hoping to hit the big-time with their book ideas, new social publishing company WEbook wants to recreate for books what Digg did for internet articles. Submit your work to WEbook and collaborate and vote on which writing is the best.

Shelve the notion of a solitary writer toiling alone for years in a dimly lit attic. WEbook.com is a place for lively writing groups, groundbreaking titles, and a chance for an engaged and creative community to find unrecognized talent and select the very best written works for publication as books, eBooks, and Audiobooks.

At WEbook, writers can get immediate feedback on their work. Reviewers can tear apart bad writing and make it better and everyone gets a chance to vote. If WEbook users vote your project as one of the best, WEbook will publish it, in print or electronic form, too.

WEbook

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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VOTE FOR MARTY

I generally shun musical videos on YouTube, but this one was too funny to pass up. I kinda wanna vote for him, now :)

Man In The Box - Union Gary

Something a little fun for ya'll:

Homeland Security Gets Closer To Minority Report-Style Crime Predictor

TechDirt reports:

Ever since the film Minority Report came out, we've seen a series of stories about efforts to predict future crimes before they happen. Most of these are more about data mining to predict high crime areas and times -- but some are going much further. Slashdot points us to a story about Homeland Security apparently making progress on a "pre-crime detector." It was originally called "Project Hostile Intent," but after some folks figured that the name was a bit... ominous, it seems to have been renamed as "Future Attribute Screening Technologies" (FAST). Basically the system is designed to spot "shifty" people who may be getting ready to commit a crime of some sort. The researchers behind it say that the early tests are incredibly effective: "We are running at about 78% accuracy on mal-intent detection, and 80% on deception." Of course, there are tons of questions about privacy violations and how long it will take criminals to figure out ways to "beat the system."

What Happens When Cesium (or Caesium) Contacts Water?

How violent is the reaction between Cesium (or Caesium) and water? Why is it so violent? Because Cesium has large atoms, so it requires less energy for the water to remove an electron from the Cesium atom, which allow more energy to be used to generate heat from the reaction. Please vote on this at YouTube if you learned something: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zCARhVfeX5U

How to Delete a Windows Service in Vista or XP

If you are a fan of tweaking your system and disabling services, you might find that over time your Windows Services list becomes huge and unwieldy with a large number of services in the list that will never be enabled.

Instead of just disabling a service, you can alternatively completely delete the service. This technique can be especially helpful if you've installed some piece of software that doesn't uninstall correctly, and leaves an item in the service list.

Important Note: Once you delete a service, it's gone, and it's going to be a pain to add it back. Use with caution.

Deleting a Service

The first thing you'll need to do is identify the name of the service, so open up Services through the start menu or control panel, and then find the service in the list that you want to delete.

You'll want to open up the properties by double-clicking on the service name, and then highlight the "Service name" value and copy it to the clipboard. This is what we'll need to disable it.

You'll need to open up a command prompt, and if you are using Windows Vista you'll need to right-click the command prompt and choose Run as Administrator. We'll use the sc command to actually do the work.

The syntax used to delete a service is this:

sc delete ServiceName

If your service name has spaces in it, you'll need to wrap the service name in quotes, like this:

sc delete "Adobe LM Service"

Note that I'm not recommending deleting this particular service, it's just an example.

Now if you use the F5 key to refresh your Services list, you'll see that the service is gone.

I've found that using this technique (carefully) can make your Services list a lot more useful, since you don't have to weed through dozens of items you will never have enabled.

Source: The How-To Geek

Why Do They Use Helium at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC)?

Quick Joke of the Day

There once was a lady who was very concerned about her missing parrot. Not knowing what to do, she called 911. "You gotta help me find my parrot!" The operator patiently replied, "We can't help you with that, ma'am. This number only deals with emergencies." But the lady persisted, and then the operator told her not to be concerned, that the parrot should fly back in a few days. Then, out of desperation, the lady begged, "But you don't understand! The only thing he knows how to say is, "Here, kitty, kitty!!!" Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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The Best of Late Night

Yesterday at a big campaign rally, Sarah Palin drew a crowd of 60,000 people. After hearing about it, Joe Biden got new glasses and a boob job. -Conan O'Brien John McCain wants to postpone Friday’s presidential debate. And, he has temporarily suspended his campaign . . . until he’s ahead in the polls. Right after he announced that, Sarah Palin said, "That’s OK - I don’t really need him, anyway." -Jay Leno Yesterday, President Bush gave a speech on the economic crisis. The title of Bush's speech: "Two More Months and It Ain't My Problem." -Conan O'Brien Clay Aiken is on the cover of People magazine announcing that he’s gay. This on the heels of last week’s People shocking cover: Ruben Studdard announced he’s black. -Jimmy Kimmel More bad news today, from President Bush: Remember those rebate checks from a few months ago? He wants them back. -Jay Leno Don Rickles and Kathy Griffin presented an award last night. It’s great to see that grizzled old timer still get the laughs. And Rickles is funny, too. -Craig Ferguson Barack Obama said today that the $700 billion bailout should not be a blank check. He said that $700 billion is a lot of money. In fact, it would take him at least 10 Hollywood fundraisers to come up with that kind of money. -Jay Leno The past several days, President Bush has been speaking out about the Wall Street bailout, and today a reporter asked him what he planned to do about AIG. Bush got upset and said, "Why does everyone always spell in front of me?" -Conan O'Brien Autumn arrived on schedule . . . at least there’s one thing Bush hasn’t screwed up. -David Letterman Sarah Palin was in New York meeting foreign leaders at the U.N. Assembly. She was very impressed with all the landmarks in New York City. As she was driving over the Hudson River, she said, "Wow - your bridges actually go somewhere." -Jay Leno All these world leaders, while they are in New York City attending the General Assembly, are doing some shopping. The Japanese premier, for example, got a great deal on Morgan Stanley. -David Letterman Bill Clinton was on "The View" yesterday. It was a frustrating appearance for Clinton - it turns out the pretty one is a conservative. -Jay Leno

Quick Joke of the Day

Q: What do you call an empty jar of Cheeze Whiz? A: Cheeze Whuz. Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

PETA proposes that Ben & Jerry's use breast milk in its ice cream

How's this for a disturbing thought - if PETA has it way, your next scoop of ice cream could be made with human breast milk. PETA is asking the Ben & Jerry's to begin using breast milk in its products instead of cow's milk, saying it would reduce the suffering of cows and calves and give ice cream lovers a healthier product. PETA wrote a letter to company founders Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield on Tuesday, telling them cow's milk is hazardous and that milking them is cruel.

"If Ben and Jerry's replaced the cow's milk in its ice cream with breast milk, your customers — and cows — would reap the benefits," wrote Tracy Reiman, executive vice president of the animal rights advocacy group. "We're aware this idea is somewhat absurd, and that putting it into practice is a stretch. At the same time, it's pretty absurd for us to be drinking the milk of cows," she said.

It takes about 12 pounds — or 1 1/2 gallons of milk — to make a gallon of ice cream. As a standardized product under federal regulations, ice cream must be made with milk from healthy cows. Ice cream made from goat's milk, for example, would have to be labeled as such. Presumably, so would mother's milk ice cream. Ben & Jerry's responded to the open letter:

"We applaud PETA's novel approach to bringing attention to an issue, but we believe a mother's milk is best used for her child," spokesman Sean Greenwood said in an e-mail. He didn't respond to requests for an interview.

After I thought about this for a bit, I can kinda see PETA's point. It's true that we are taking milk from an animal and consuming it on a daily basis, yet we get grossed at the thought of using human milk. Personally, I can't get over the grossness of using human milk. Secondly, you would need a lot women just to produce one gallon of ice cream. How much milk can a nursing mother make in one day? Aside from that is the cost. How much do you pay a woman for her milk? Does she need to stay in the factory/milking facility all day? Can she pump it from home? And finally, cow's milk and mother's milk aren't interchangeable, according to La Leche spokeswoman Jane Crouse, who says breast milk is a dynamic substance that's different with each woman and each child and might have difficulty being processed into ice cream. I don't think we'll be seeing this come to pass anytime soon, thankfully. At the Ben & Jerry's factory in Waterbury, consumers gave a collective "Eww" to the idea:

"It's kind of creepy," said Jeff Waugh, 42, of Dayton, Ohio.

"I think it's a little nutty," said the Rev. Roger Wooton, 83, of Malden, Mass., finishing up a cup of Heath Bar Crunch.

"How would they get all that milk?" said his wife, Jane Wooton, 77.

Jen Wahlbrink, 34, of Phoenix, who breast-fed her 11-month-old son, Cameron, said she wouldn't touch ice cream made from mother's milk. She remembers her nursing days — and not that fondly.

"The (breast) pumps just weren't that much fun. You really do feel like a cow," she said, cradling her son in her hands.

Image courtesy of MSNBC.

On Fire In the Operating Room

MSNBC brings to our attention the latest under-reported operating room "accident" - surgical fires! I, for one, never thought that I might actually catch on fire while being operated on. It turns out, however, that surgical fires are at least five times as common as once thought, affecting between 550 and 650 patients a year, including 20 to 30 who suffer serious, disfiguring burns. Every year, one or two people die this way. In Pennsylvania, a state in which hospitals are required to report medical errors, fires occur in one in every 87,646 operations, according to the latest 2007 data. That amounts to 28 fires a year in Pennsylvania alone and allows researchers to estimate with greater certainty the incidents in the rest of the country. Surgical fires are still a tiny fraction of the 50 million surgeries performed each year. An excerpt of one patients horrifying tale (emphasis mine):

Rita Talbert's operation was supposed to be a simple thyroid surgery, three hours, in and out, in the spring of 2005. Instead, the Stafford, Va., woman woke up a week later in intensive care, in agonizing pain and horrified at the face she saw in the mirror. “I didn’t know it was me,” said Talbert, now 62. Her chin was gone; her nose was deformed. Her mouth was virtually melted, so damaged that after a dozen reconstructive operations, she still has trouble eating, drinking and breathing. There’d been an accident, the doctors explained. An electrosurgical tool had ignited oxygen inside a mask under surgery drapes during the operation, sparking flames that left second- and third-degree burns from Talbert’s chest to the top of her head. "It just caught fire," she said, still incredulous at the idea. "They didn't even know it had caught on fire."

The root problem seems to be one of communication between the surgeon and the anesthesiologist. In most incidents, the surgeon was not informed that oxygen (O2) was flowing under the surgical drapes. The problem is exacerbated when the surgeon does not inform the anesthesiologist he is going to power on a electrical device in the surgical area. Oxygen concentrations of 50 percent and higher will create a flash fire. About 65 percent of surgical fires occur on the upper body or inside a patient's airway, another quarter occur elsewhere on the body and less than 10 percent actually occur inside the body cavity. Whatever the source, the head and neck region is grimly suited to hosting fires, especially in a high-oxygen atmosphere. There’s the vellus, the peach fuzz on your face and head - each tiny hair burns like a tiny sparkler and propagates a ripple of flame across the face.

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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Quick Joke of the Day

At a pharmacy, a blonde asked to use the infant scale to weigh the baby she held in her arms. The clerk explained that the device was out for repairs, but said that she would figure the infant's weight by weighing the woman and baby together on the adult scale, then weighing the mother alone and subtracting the second amount from the first. "That won't work," countered the woman. "I'm not the mother, I'm the aunt." Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

Will Spore DRM Become EA's Rootkit Moment?

With the news coming out that some purchasers of the video game Spore have filed a class action lawsuit against EA for its inclusion of SecuROM DRM, it's reaching the point where you have to wonder if this is becoming EA's "rootkit" moment. The parallels are there. Both involved an overly draconian form of DRM that severely limited how a "purchased" product could be used. Both involved hidden files installed on a computer -- and both resulted in massive backlash from consumers, and a very slow response from the company. And, of course, the rootkit resulted in class action lawsuits as well. At some point, perhaps, companies will start to realize that treating your customers as criminals is probably a bad idea.

Apple Stifles Developer's Free Speech By Imposing NDA on Rejections

I've signed many NDA's (non-disclosure agreements) in my career as a software developer. It's a common practice for many companies, especially those dealing with new technology. However, I've never been asked to sign an NDA for being rejected for a job. If you're a developer and Apple rejects your iPhone application from its App Store, the company wants you to shut up and get over it.

Apple's serious about it: The company has extended the iPhone non-disclosure agreement, which prohibits application developers from discussing programming tips, to include rejection letters as well. Some developers in the past have shared their rejection letters on the web, but now, according to MacRumors, rejection letters include a clause that reads, "THE INFORMATION CONTAINED IN THIS MESSAGE IS UNDER NON-DISCLOSURE."

Score one for Android.

Quick Joke of the Day

Learn to speak Chinese

This is a tow away zone. - No Pah King You are not very bright - Yu So Dum I got this for free - Ai No Pei I am not guilty - Wai Hang Mi? Please, stay a while longer - Wai Go Nao? Our meeting was scheduled for next week - Wai Yu Kum Nao Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

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Find Out Where a Username is Already Registered

When you think up that perfect new handle for storming social networks and other registration-only sites across the web, run it through UserNameCheck.com first. This webapp's purpose is simple: to tell you whether or not that name is already in use at a pretty impressive list of sites, from Delicious and Digg to eBay and Xbox Live. The developer explains:

This site is a quick and dirty solution to a question that I often lay awake at night worrying about. Do I have my username registered across every site that I should? What if the next internet humiliation meme just happens to share the username I've been using for years, and suddenly people are emailing me asking "hey, is this you ???". The site is simple. I have a stack of webapp urls, the application pings the site using the username you want to check, if it returns a "no user name" error we return that.

The list of checks can take some time, so grab a cup of coffee or browse the news in another tab while UserNameCheck does its thing.

Where is Your Username Registered?

Source: LifeHacker

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Quick Joke of the Day

Two blondes lock thier keys in the car. One of the blondes tries to break into the car while the the other one watches. Finally the first blonde says "Darn, I can't get in the car!" The other blond replies, "keep trying, it looks like it is going to rain and the top is down". Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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Quick Joke of the Day

The Pope dies and, naturally, goes to heaven where he's met by a reception committee of angels. After a whirlwind tour, The Pope is told that he can enjoy any of the myriad recreations available. He decides that he wants to read all of the ancient original text of the Holy Scriptures, so he spends the next eon or so learning the languages. After becoming a linguistic master, he sits down in the library and begins to pour over every version of the Bible, working back from the most recent "Easy Reading" to the original handwritten script. The angel librarian hears a loud scream, and goes running toward its source only to find the Pope huddled in a chair, shaking and crying. "The R! They left out the R!" "What do you mean?" the angel librarian asks. After collecting his wits, the Pope sobs again, "The word was supposed to be CELEBRATE!" Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

Comcast Claims No One Has Complained About Its New Traffic Slowing Efforts

From TechDirt: Last month, Comcast, in addition to finally revealing the broadband caps it had always had, admitted that it was going to test a system where it slowed down traffic for heavy users in congested areas -- effectively, sending their internet traffic to the back of the line. The company is now claiming that this plan is a success because in five trials there were no complaints about slower traffic. Of course, what the company means is that there were no direct complaints to the company. They don't know if people were pissed off and shopping for competitive services (if any actually exist), or were complaining to friends or in online forums. Having dealt with Comcast customer service, and after seeing how Comcast (falsely) denied its traffic shaping efforts for months, perhaps customers impacted by this new system simply realized that it wasn't worth the hassle of complaining directly to Comcast.

EA Loosens DRM on Spore

The LA Times reports EA has decided to loosen the DRM restrictions for Spore after being stung by a siege of criticism from gamers who took issue with the copyright restrictions the company placed on its Spore game. EA agreed to up the install limit from 3 times to 5, claiming they may also make exceptions in some cases, and also released a patch allowing for multiple user names. While it's nice that the company finally responded, this is still a pretty weak response and doesn't address the core issues. The real problem here is the use of DRM in the first place. Companies should not be treating their customers as thieves and pirates - it only makes the customer want to be a thief or pirate. Cliff Harris conducted an interesting experiment, where he posted an open forum asking why people pirate games. The response? Purchase cost of the game is the first reason, followed by the quality of the game (the less quality, the more likely it is to be pirated instaed of being bought), and third was because of DRM. People don't like DRM, we know that, but the extent to which DRM is turning away people who have no other complaints is possibly misunderstood. If you wanted to change ONE thing to get more pirates to buy games, scrapping DRM is it. These gamers are the low hanging fruit of this whole debate.

Spore - Day Two

As promised, I played Spore again, yesterday. I played for about six hours total, taking a 5-10 minute break every hour (gotta stretch). Reviewing my first impressions of Spore, I have some updated observations: Cellular - I still enjoyed this level quite a lot, mostly because the game play is different from the other levels. I can understand, though, why they limited the time on this level. However, I still think you should be able to earn some extra DNA after you beat all your goals. Creature - I went the herbivore route today. It's definitely easier to make friends when you are a herbivore. I could have written the Spore equivalent of "How to Win Friends and Influence People". This level was definitely more fun for me the second time through. Tribal - I started right off making friends with the new tribes. I still ended up destroying two tribes, though (they smelled funny :P ). My strategy improved for picking off the opposing tribe. I had improved my stealth rating in the Creature level, and it paid off. You need stealth for food raids. I decided to raid all the food of a tribe, then kill it's gatherers - it was a resounding success. To me, this is still the most difficult level, but I think the funness improved the second time through. Civilization - Because of my previous actions, I started the civ level as a religious city. I found out that religious vehicles can indeed attack military vehicles (but economic vehicles apparently cannot). Because I was social this time through, I made treaties with three other cities. At one point, I had two cities helping me capture a third city. I did find a small bug, though. I had asked Yellow to help me attack the Blue city. Yellow and I both bombarded the city, with my military winning and seizing control of the city. After the cut video, I become the owner of the city. However, Yellow is still attacking the city! I had to install all the gun turrets in the city for defense (I didn't want to directly attack Yellow, yet). My turrets killed the Yellow tanks, and everything went back to normal. Galaxy - I played galaxy for about 90 minutes. This level is very different, but fun all the same. I know understand why you control the spaceship the way you do (using the scroll wheel to ascend/descend). After playing the galaxy level, it makes sense. It's not cumbersome, like I thought yesterday. I didn't finish galaxy. I accomplished 2 of the 10(?) goals. This level definitely needs more time than the other levels. Maybe I still don't quite understand it, but I found making money to be much more difficult in this level. Overall, Spore is a great game. I'm going to raise my rating to a 4.5 out of 5, now that I understand the reason for the decisions the developers made. One final note, about the DRM. I haven't tried to make a backup of the game, yet (I make a backup of every game, in case the disc breaks - I've had several break or become too scratched to use). One thing I did like, though, is that I don't need to have the disc in the CD-ROM drive to play the game. I HATE when the company requires that.

Spore - First Impressions

Yesterday, I played Spore for about seven hours total, mostly straight through. I took an hour break about four hours into play to eat and do some household chores. Spore has five levels of evolution: Cellular, Creature, Tribal, Civilization, and Galaxy. Each level has a series of goals you must accomplish to reach the next level. I completed the first four levels, and played about five minutes in the Galaxy level before I had to quit. Spore is definitely a different game. I found it to be quite fun, and think this is one of those rare games that would interest both boys and girls. I especially enjoyed the creature creator, and having the ability to design and modify my creature. Below are my impressions of each level: Cellular - For me, this was one of the funnest levels, but also the shortest. I completed the cellular stage after about 25-30 minutes, and now that I know how to do it, could complete this much sooner, I think. This is unfortunate, because I thought the cellular level was very enjoyable. My only other complaint is that once you reach your evolutionary goal, you stop being able to collect DNA points. You can still hunt/eat and you can mate, but anything you kill or eat does not go to your DNA bank. However, this appears to only be true on the cellular level. Creature - Once I understood what needed to be done, this was fun, also. I spent about 10-15 minutes trying to understand how to make friends with other creatures. In this level, you either need to make friends with creatures or make them go extinct. As you progress in this stage, you gain intelligence. That increased intelligence allows you add one or more creatures to your party. These can be creatures from your nest or from the befriended creatures. My creatures were more specialized for combat, which made befriending other creatures a little difficult. I made a few friends early on, but afterwards my dancing/posing/charming skills weren't high enough. When you try to make friends, you have to repeat what the other creatures does. For example, the other creature might do a little dance, so you push the dance button. Each creature in your group does the dance, and the more who dance the better you impress the new creature. However, I noticed that as I progressed, the new creatures would call his nest-mates over to dance with him. This makes it more difficult to impress them, because you need a higher skill of dancing to impress 2, 3, or 4 creatures. Don't get me wrong, this level was a lot of fun. You definitely should explore the map, as I picked up a LOT of body parts. I played this level for about thirty minutes more after I reached my goals, just so I could find new body parts (and earn more DNA points). This is the last level you can modify the base creature, so you want to find everything you can to make him the best. Tribal - This is definitely the most difficult stage. You start with a tribe of five creatures. You must make peace with or exterminate five other tribes. You must also assign food gathering tasks to some of your tribesmen. Finally, you must construct buildings so your tribesmen can use weapons, musical instruments (for making peace), and fishing tools. The first time I tried to make peace with another tribe, I found the instructions VERY confusing. The in-game instructions really did not explain to me what I needed to do. To make peace, you need to construct buildings that make musical instruments (horns, marachas, and pipes). You bring the chief and at least one tribesman with an instrument (best to bring all three types) to the new tribe. The new tribe will tell you (with pictographs) what they want to hear. Once you understand how to do this, it's very easy - much easier than making friends at the creature stage. I befriended three tribes, but two tribes tried to steal my food, so I decided to wipe them out. This is a LOT more difficult than you think. Each tribe has basically the same number of people. When I started my war campaign, we all had 12 people. The problem for the warrior is that you must leave at least one person (two is best) to do fishing and food gathering, and at least one more to protect your food from wild creatures. So, now you are invasion of 9 (at best) against 12. I found two strategies that seem to work for this. The first one is send people, one at a time to raid the food of the rival tribe. You want to send a stream (like five), one after another (not all together). Expect the first one or two to die - they are the diversion anyway. Tribes need food to create new people and to buy/repair buildings. I also found that during combat, you can send someone to raid the food, and the raider will be successful 90% of the time. The second strategy is one of attrition. I created two groups of warriors. The first group being the largest (five or six). Send the first group to the edge of the tribe. When a tribesman comes near, begin the combat. You want your five or six to distract the tribe, so let them fight all the people. Next, send your remaining soldiers to attack a building (or raid the food). The goal is to destroy the chief's hut, but the hut is very strong. One tribe I fought, I had to destroy the secondary buildings first to wear down the tribe's food supply. When they were finally broke, I was able to destroy the chief's hut. Civilization - Once you get use to the camera controls, this stage is more like an RTS (real time strategy) game. I found this level to be very fun. I played it for quite a while, mostly to experience the different methods of taking over the other cities. For this stage, you must unite the planet, which is covered by your race. You can convert the city by religious, military, or economic means. Economic takes the most time, but works best because there is no damage done to the new city (and you earn more money in the process). Religious works second best (and was a lot of fun to watch in progress). Religious takes the same time (or maybe faster) than military. However, a religious vehicle cannot fight a military vehicle. So, if you keep military vehicles around your cities, you can ward off a religious attack. Also, religious attacks don't harm buildings, except for the entertainment structures. The military attack is your standard military campaign. Build five or six tanks, send them to bombard the next city. However, you destroy all the buildings in the city. Sometimes, you even destroy city land, which means less space available for your structures, when you take over the city. Once you take over all the cities on the planet, you advance to... Galaxy - I only had a few minutes on this level, so not many thoughts. I went through the ship flying tutorial and started on the tractor beam mission before I had to stop. Flying the ship is not as easy as it could be. You control the ship with the mouse, but to ascend/descend, you use either the scroll wheel or the +/- buttons (btw, + goes down, - goes up). Maybe I will understand the reasons for this as I progress into Galaxy, but for now I'm wondering why the ship can't be controlled like the flying mounts of WoW - mouse point up to ascend (or press jump). Overall, Spore is a great game and a lot of fun to play. I'm giving it a 4, out of 5. I'm wondering how re-playable this is (for adults) once you complete the galaxy stage. I may amend my score based on what I find. Read my follow up post - Spore: Day Two

Birth of the Smiley

I didn't have a chance to post this yesterday, so I'm a day late. Yesterday (Sep 19) is the birthdate of the smiley and frowny, specifically :-) and :-(. Born Sep 19, 1982, by Scott Fahlman at Carnegie Mellon University. He had posted a suggestion on the science department's computer bulletin that users should use :-) and :-( to differentiate between a joke and non-joke message.

19-Sep-82 11:44 Scott E Fahlman :-) From: Scott E Fahlman

I propose that the following character sequence for joke markers:

:-)

Read it sideways. Actually, it is probably more economical to mark things that are NOT jokes, given current trends. For this, use:

:-(

It seems that a lot of people had been posting jokes on the bulletin, but other readers didn't understand they were jokes. Scott says there were "lenghthy diatribes" from people on the message board who failed to get the joke or the sarcasm in a particular post -- which is probably what "given current trends" refers to in his own, now-famous missive. To remedy this, Fahlman suggested using :-) and :-( to distinguish between posts that should be taken humorously and those of a more serious nature. Fahlman's original post was lost for a couple of decades and believed gone for good, until it was retrieved from an old backup tape, thus cementing his claim of priority.

Light Posting Weekend

If you haven't heard already, I've claimed this weekend to be a Spore weekend. I probably won't be posting much this weekend. I haven't played the game, yet, but I do have everything installed, setup, and ready to go. Wish me fun :D

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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Quick Joke of the Day

A cop pulls over a drunk driver. The drunk driver says, "Ossssifer, you need to get your records straight. You just asked me for my license, but you took it away yesterday!" Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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Quick Joke of the Day

There was once a young man who, in his youth, professed his desire to become a great writer. When asked to define "great" he said, "I want to write stuff that the whole world will read, stuff that people will react to on a truly emotional level, stuff that will make them scream, cry, howl in pain and anger!" He now works for Microsoft, writing error messages. Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

Spore

Woot! Spore finally arrived! I'm driving my wife crazy talking about how I'm going to spend the weekend playing Spore. I installed Spore, this morning. Installation went very smooth. Took about twenty minutes. I did notice after the install that I had an icon on my desktop for the EA Downloader, but the icon for Spore was missing. Huh? I actually had to browse to the install folder and manually add the Spore icon to my desktop. Maybe it's just a problem in Vista? I know a lot of people have rated this 1 star on Amazon. If you read the posts, you'll find the reason is because of the draconian DRM. I agree that EA should never have DRM'd Spore. In doing so, they are actually inviting crackers to circumvent the DRM. I've heard that the DRM crack for Spore is now the #1 download on the Pirate Bay. Maybe other companies will take notice.

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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Cat Boxing with Casper and Toby

Casper and Toby putting on a little boxing show. Toby always cracks me up how he puts his paw on Casper's head to keep him at bay.

Congrats to EA...

Source: UserFriendly.org

Will Central Africa's Forest Wildlife Be Eaten into Extinction?

According to Scientific American, elephants, gorillas and other large forest mammals may become extinct in central Africa within 50 years if hunting meat to feed starving populations continues at the current pace. Each year, rural peoples consume some 2.2 billion pounds of so-called bushmeat from wildlife, the equivalent of four million cattle. Nathalie Van Vliet, a researcher at the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR) based in Indonesia says the problem is "if the people that currently rely on bushmeat as a source of protein in central Africa had to rely on livestock, we would see the same catastrophe that is destroying the Amazon Basin: deforestation for pasture land and livestock raising." Because of the failure of antipoaching programs, CIFOR argues that a hunting ban would not work. But it also says that forest species such as elephants, buffalo and apes that are slow to reproduce need to be protected or they will disappear entirely. CIFOR recommends local agreements that allow hunting of species that can rebound quickly (such as various species of duikers, a type of forest antelope) while not allowing kills of species with long gestation periods (such as elephants who give birth after 22 months). Granting local peoples a limited right to hunt while working actively to manage specific populations of animals in the jungle, may prove the only way to truly conserve, according to CIFOR and experts from the United Nations Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity. "The question is conserving for whom?" Van Vliet asks. "For rural people that need to survive as well as for urban people that would love to see our fauna in the future—or just conserving for the sake of it?"

Quick Joke of the Day

A blonde was playing Trivial Pursuit one night. It was her turn. She rolled the dice and she landed on Science and Nature. Her question was, "If you are in a vacuum and someone calls your name, can you hear it?" She thought for a time and then asked, "Is it on or off? Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

Netflix Origami

Netflix Origami shows origami patterns for those Netflix tear off pages.

NetFlix tear-off flaps are sturdy, colorful, and perfect for origami and paper airplanes, so don't just toss those wrappers into the recycling bin. Although most origami requires special paper squares, we have adapted these designs so you can use NetFlix flaps without alteration. Just tear them off carefully at the perforated line and follow our step-by-step instructions for making paper-folding magic.

Examples:

Ranting About PayPal

One of the software products I sell requires the user to pay by subscription (they are charge per month for use of the software). Generally all goes well with the users. Very few have any issues, although occasionally someone will not understand how to use something (which is to be expected). I have a low turn over rate. Generally, someone uses the product for two to six months. But sometimes I get those people who try to cheat the system, and these people really piss me off. The problem really lies with PayPal. See, PayPal always favors the buyer. It's how they are able to convince you to let them hold your money. The problem comes from dishonest buyers. The other problem with PayPal is that unless you ship a physical product (with tracking code), PayPal does not give the seller a chance to dispute the buyer. Here's how a dishonest buyer can profit: 1) Buy a software package (anything virtual, that does not have shipping). 2) Wait a day or two, then file an "Unauthorized Claim" on PayPal for the item purchased. This claim type basically says either someone stole your PayPal login or your product was not as described. 3) Wait for your full refund. Why a full refund? Because PayPal favors the buyer, and whenever a virtual good (PayPal considers software to be a virtual good) is sold, the ONLY option for a seller is to give a full refund (or risk losing their PayPal account). That's just fucked up! I get about two people a month who pull this shit on me. Now they've used the product, gotten the use they want from (or, in the case of non-secured software, made copies), and they got their money back. Come on, PayPal! This is the 21st century. Let's find a better way to handle disputes like this. I have logs of every instance someone uses my product, their IP, time logged in, time logged out, what they did in the program. I (and many other software sellers) can provide this information as proof the buyer used the product. At worst, give us the option to provide only a partial refund, since the buyer did use the product.

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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Quick Joke of the Day

Two blondes lock thier keys in the car. One of the blondes tries to break into the car while the the other one watches. Finally the first blonde says "Darn, I can't get in the car!" The other blonde replies, "Keep trying, it looks like its going to rain and the top is down". Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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Why Tea Is Healthier Than Water

While nobody is running around extolling the virtues of cola as a replacement for water for daily hydration, researchers at Kings College London want to make sure you don't think every non-water drink is a poor substitute for water. After reviewing numerous studies on the benefits of drinking tea, they've concluded that tea is a superior drink.

Dr Ruxton said: "Drinking tea is actually better for you than drinking water. Water is essentially replacing fluid. Tea replaces fluids and contains antioxidants so it's got two things going for it."

Many people have lumped tea in with other caffeine containing drinks such as coffee and colas, as a dehydrating drink. Not a concern, the research team says:

"Studies on caffeine have found very high doses dehydrate and everyone assumes that caffeine-containing beverages dehydrate. But even if you had a really, really strong cup of tea or coffee, which is quite hard to make, you would still have a net gain of fluid."

If you're interested in drinking more tea check out the health benefits of green tea and tips for properly steeping tea.

Weird News

According to police in Bethlehem, Pa., four kids (ages 9 to 14) grabbed a donation box in August at RiverPlace park (contributions to an organization that maintains the park's portable toilets) and ran for nearby woods, with several police officers in pursuit. Three boys were caught, but the other made it a little ways into the woods before falling into a manure pit built by homeless people at their encampment. [The Morning Call (Allentown), 8-5-08] Kevin Hansen filed a lawsuit in West Bend, Wis., in August, claiming that spotting a clump of hair in a steak he sliced into from a Texas Roadhouse restaurant caused "severe and permanent injuries," pain, suffering and "disability," requiring "extensive medical treatment." In fact, said his lawyer Ryan Hetzel to Milwaukee's Journal Sentinel, "It's bothered the heck out of him." (The employee who prepared the steak was fired and later pleaded guilty to a felony, explaining that he was trying to retaliate because Hansen complained about a previous order.) [Journal Sentinel, 8-3-08] After failing the West Virginia Bar Exam for the second time (during which he was given an extra day to complete it), Shannon Kelly filed a lawsuit in July demanding even more concessions based on his unspecified cognitive disability. The second failure was also on a special version of the exam in large type, and Kelly had been permitted to work in a room by himself. He now believes he can earn his license if he is allowed four days instead of the normal two, to make up for (according to his lawyer) "severe deficits in processing speed, cognitive fluency and rapid naming" (though it is not clear how many attorney jobs are available for someone with such a skills set). [West Virginia Record (Charleston), 7-25-08] The Texas criminal justice system continues to astonish. In August, federal judge Orlando Garcia of San Antonio ordered a final-hours' stay of execution for Jeffrey Wood based on serious concerns about his sanity, that the Texas state courts had somehow summarily dismissed. Judge Garcia said substantial evidence supported at least holding a hearing on the issue but that state law seemed to require the inmate to prove his insanity first in order to obtain a hearing on whether he is insane. That, said Garcia, is "an insane system." [New York Times, 8-22-08] Adding to the list of stories that were formerly weird but which now occur with such frequency that they must be retired from circulation: (89) People who call the emergency-only 911 number for stupid reasons, such as Reginald Peterson, who called Jacksonville, Fla., police in August because Subway didn't make his sandwich correctly. Source: News of the Weird

Quick Joke of the Day

One day at a local buffet, a man suddenly called out, "My son is choking! He swallowed a quarter! Help! Please, anyone! Help!" A man from a nearby table stood up and announced that he was quite experienced at this sort of thing. He stepped over with almost no look of concern at all, wrapped his hands around the boy's balls and squeezed. Out popped the quarter. The man then went back to his table as though nothing had happened. "Thank you! Thank you!" the father cried. "Are you a paramedic?" "No," replied the man, "I work for the IRS." Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

DVD Rental Video Guide

I've been working on a DVD Rental Video Guide for the last few weeks. I finally finished it today, and thought I would share it, here. Or, view the full DVD Rental Video Guide. DVD Rental Videos Online Netflix # Titles: ***** Trial Offer: 2 Weeks Free Trial Blockbuster # Titles: ***** Trial Offer: 2 Weeks Free Trial Green Cine # Titles: **** Trial Offer: 3 Movies in 10 days Free DVD Avenue # Titles: **** Trial Offer: None DVD Planet # Titles: **** Trial Offer: 50% off first month Number Slate # Titles: *** Trial Offer: 4 movies in 6 weeks Hit Movies # Titles: *** Trial Offer: 1 movie in 10 days Free Cafe DVD # Titles: ** Trial Offer: None Intelliflix # Titles: ** Trial Offer: None
Video Downloads - Movie Downloading Services Amazon Video On Demand # Titles: ***** Trial Offer: Free Downloads Netflix # Titles: ***** Trial Offer: 2 Weeks Free Trial CinemaNow # Titles: **** Trial Offer: 3 Day Trial Disney Movie Club # Titles: **** Trial Offer: None iTunes # Titles: *** Trial Offer: None Video On Demand # Titles: *** Trial Offer: 7 Days Free Trial Movie Link # Titles: ** Trial Offer: first movie 99 cents Total Vid # Titles: ** Trial Offer: None
Specialty DVD Rentals Green Cine Specialty: Indies, Foriegn, Kids Trial Offer: 3 Movies in 10 days Free Disney Movie Club Specialty: Disney and Family Movies Trial Offer: None CinFlix Specialty: Asian Cinema Trial Offer: None Tiger Cinema Specialty: Asian Cinema Trial Offer: None Anime Lane Specialty: Anime Trial Offer: 10 - 20% Off Kinectic Fit Specialty: Fitness and Health Trial Offer: None HuntFlix Specialty: Hunting Trial Offer: None Pinoy Movies Specialty: Filipino Movies Trial Offer: None Video Library Specialty: Hard to Find Movies Trial Offer: None

 

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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A Lesson on Gaming With Kids From Wil Wheaton

Wil Wheaton (of Star Trek TNG fame), has an interesting idea for playing games with kids. The original idea is great when you're just learning a new game:

Rule 17a is a house rule we invoke when we're learning a new game. It basically states that, at any time, a player can say, "You know, I just realized that I did this stupid thing that I wouldn't have done if I had a little more experience in the game. I'd like a do-over." If the majority of the players agree (and we always do) then we just back up a little bit, and play on. It reduces the risk of doing something bone-headed that you can't ever recover from, and it keeps the game fun.

His new idea, termed Rule 17b, is a great one for kids, but I think can (and maybe should) be used by everyone:

Depending on your kid, the game, and some X factor that I leave to you as a parent, you could give your child up to three "roll again" markers, like poker chips or glass beads or whatever, that she can use at any time to re-roll a particularly bad dice roll. They can use it whenever they want to, but once the marker it used, it's gone for the rest of the game, so your child will have to choose very carefully about when she's going to use it. This would be especially great with a couple of smaller kids, because the parent isn't put in the position of awarding do overs and giving the appearance of favoritism (raise your hand if you've ever had to untangle that Gordian Knot.)

I'm thinking that this could be a great idea for computer and console games. Maybe I'll consider adding it as a feature in one the games I'm working on.

Let GoPlanIt Plan Your Vacation For You

Web-based travel planning service GoPlanit attempts to take the solo and tedious act of itinerary planning and inject it with a social element. Upon signing up for the service and selecting a destination city, GoPlanit can roll an itinerary for you. GoPlanIt provided me an instant itinerary for New York, which I was able to tweak based on how active or low-key I wanted to be and how much money I had. GoPlanit has a "fill in the gaps" function on its planner which will suggest fun and interesting things to do in between other commitments. GoPlanit also offers support for mobile devices (including an iPhone-optimized mobile site) and a microblogging tool to journal your trip adventures. GoPlanIt is still in beta. During the beta, GoPlanit offers planning for eight major US cities (San Francisco - Los Angeles - New York - Chicago - Las Vegas - Seattle - Boston - Honolulu)

How Much Energy Does Your PC Waste?

More than 30 billion kilowatt-hours of energy is wasted because many of us simply forget to shut down our computers when we aren’t using them. If we could just improve the efficiency of how we use our PCs, the savings in energy costs would be over $3 billion dollars! The CO2 emissions from just 15 computers are equivalent, in energy terms, to the gas consumption of one car. Download the 100% FREE LocalCooling power management tool to automatically optimize your PC's power consumption. Join today and start fighting global warming from your desktop. With LocalCooling you are directly presented with detailed information on how much power your PC is consuming, based on a large database of hardware and in-depth research. By adjusting the power mode settings our advanced algorithms will predict how much you will save based on past PC usage and statistical data. Every time LocalCooling saves power by either turning off your screen, putting your hard drive to sleep when not being used, or shutting down your PC when you are away, your savings stats will grow. Download LocalCooling today to start optimizing your PC's energy efficiency in minutes.

LocalCooling will:

• Cut your energy bills
• Reduce your greenhouse gas emissions by reducing your PC's power consumption
• Give you full control over any power mode settings
• Improve your overall computing experience and efficiency
• Show you, in detail, how much you have saved since installing the software.

Corporate users: apart from the big environmental savings you will be making, your energy bill will also be dramatically reduced. A company with 100 computers could save up to $2000 per year just by installing the FREE LocalCooling application. The fact that everyone in the company could use the same account or join the same team means you would have full control over the savings made from every single PC.

Obama's Magic

Jon Carroll recently wrote an interesting article about Obama and Palin. I couldn't agree more with what Jon has to say. I'm copy/pasting about half of the article here for ease of reading, but your can find the entire article at: Now the Fun Begins.

Yes, we're a polarized country. We're a bipolar country. Republicans seem bewildered by the appeal of Barack Obama. He has "some sort of magic," in the words of one local pundit. Well, yeah. Part of the magic is called oratory. It's been a known brain-clouder since at least ancient Greek times. Look, cadences and rhetorical devices designed to persuade the masses! What kind of witchcraft is this?

Republicans tend not to care about oratory - certainly their choices of presidential candidates indicate that. They seem to think it's cheating. I know it's a cheap shot, but let me mention the first Republican president of the United States, Abraham Lincoln. They've come a long way since then, and not in the right direction.

And the other part of the Barack Obama magic, and I know we're not supposed to say this out loud, but: He's African American. Actually, half African, half Scottish American, which makes him really, truly American, a land where increasingly people are a little bit of everything, and they identify themselves according to preference, not according to genetic markers.

I think it would be really good if the United States had an African American president. There, I said it; call me a racist. I think it would be good if he was an African American president who gave really good speeches and had sensible ideas and a commitment to social justice. Sure, I disagree with him about stuff - can we say FISA? But his candidacy is basically a great idea. You know that whole slavery thing? This might go a way toward mitigating that.

Not that this counts as an endorsement. I could still vote for Barney Frank. But everywhere I look in this race, I see coded racial statements, and I hear the whispers that a black man can never get elected president no way no how. And I want to think better of my country than that, no matter what the country thinks of itself.

Look at it this way. I actually don't care about Sarah Palin's private life, any of it. In fact, she sounds like the kind of woman I might meet when I'm traveling in the West: small-town gal; nutty political ideas, but hey, it's the West; kind of mixed-up family life but a nice six-point buck over the fireplace. And I don't think the fact that her daughter is pregnant and not married has anything to do with her qualifications for public office. She's plenty disqualified on other grounds.

(OK, a small part of me does want to say, "That abstinence education thing; how's it working out for you?")

And yet ... imagine if it had been one of Barack Obama's daughters who was pregnant out of wedlock. (Imagine them a lot older, too.) Imagine the pundits going nuts. Imagine talk of the crumbling of the black family, the absent father, the culture of irresponsibility, the role of the churches, blah blah blah. Endless. Oh, we'd have a conversation about race, all right, and it would be just like the previous 812 conversations.

But does Sarah Palin represent the crumbling of the white family? Was the father's constant absences at sporting events the reason her daughter didn't get the attention she needed? Where was the church? Where ... oh, no, we're not having that conversation, because Sarah Palin is white and white families are doing just fine. Thank you, pundits. Take another week off.

I understand the Republicans had a something. I'm sure they ate well and drank well and agreed with each other. I'm happy for them.

Amazon Deleted Spore Reviews?

A lot of people have noticed that Amazon appears to have deleted all of the reviews on the Spore page. This is only going to end badly. When you try to shut down a large group of people who feel wronged, you're not just whacking the bees' nest with a stick, you're setting it on fire with a flame thrower. The folks who were complaining are only going to complain louder, and louder. Remember what happened when Digg tried to takedown the AACS crack? Whoever was responsible for removing the comments -- whether it was Amazon or EA -- they may find that the reaction to trying to shut down the angry mob is only going to make folks that much angrier, and alert that many more people to the problems they have with EA's use of DRM.

Copy a Single File to Avoid Re-Activating Windows XP

Found this great tip on LifeHacker for anyone reinstalling XP off something other than their original CD—such as a slipstreamed and automated installation—or lacking a net connection to run the activation.

Before wiping your system clean, grab a file named WPA.DBL from the System32 directory and save it to a thumb drive or other external media. When you load up your new system, skip registration, enter "Safe Mode" from the boot menu, and drop it back into that System32 folder. Now you're re-activated and free of nagging. Hit the link below for detailed explanation of each step.

How to avoid having to reactivate Windows XP after fresh install [Online Tech Tips]

Quick Joke of the Day

Three blondes are in an elevator when the elevator suddenly stops and the lights go out. They try using their cell phones to get help, but have no luck. Even the phones are out. After a few hours of being stuck with no help in sight, one blonde says to the others "I think the best way to call for help is by yelling together." The others agree with the first, so they all inhale deeply and begin to yell loudly "Together, together, together." Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes