chadius

09:25 am: This had better not be true, Microsoft.
Rumors have it that News Corp and Microsoft are considering a deal to remove News Corp news links from Google but keep them on Bing, Microsoft's search engine.

Great, we're going to split up the internet again while two companies dickwave it out. Just like IE vs Netscape. If the rumors are true.

Then again, this could be our good old buddies at FOX trying to get a better bribe from Google by suggesting they would kill off their audience just to help Google's loudest competitor.

Why you gotta be like this, guys?

09:04 am: Moar DIY Madness! Also videogame orchestra!
Built a weekly planner. Wanted a digest sized planner that showed one week per two pages. Couldn't find any this weekend, so I did it myself.

Also, I bought tickets to the Video Game Orchestra, playing on December 5th. If you don't know my tastes in music, you'll be surprised this is the first concert I've ever been to.

Home page is at: http://www.vgo-online.org/

Tags: videogame orchestra, weekly planner

11:25 am: Stuff in news!
1) Culture diff: South Korea is trying to crack down on cash gifts at weddings and funerals. It is custom to lessen the costs by paying for your friends' ceremonies, but some people saw it as a form of bribery. Or an annoying IOU where someone you haven't seen in 10 years calls you over for their cash grab wedding.

2) What measure is a UI? Alabama is currently fighting Electronic Bingo, where slot-machine style electronic machines are connected to a central server. Basically there is a fine line between Pencil-and-paper Bingo halls donating to charity and casino bingo. Except, as the casinos point out, PnP Bingo also generates big money. When do you draw the line between pasttime and business?

3) Oprah has left the building. The queen of talk shows will have her last show on Sept 12th 2011 after 25 years. Many business analysts have pointed out how tightly she has controlled her image, and how much that has paid off for her. Compare her to Martha Stewart, for example. She knows when to quit while she's ahead and when to move on. Oprah is starting another TV Network, OWNed in a couple of years.

TV is trying to figure out how to deal with the vacuum she will leave behind. Some think Ellen, Dr. Phil and Dr. Oz could emerge Queen or King of talk shows. Some think the talk show genre will never recover, as sponsors will never pay anyone as much as they paid Oprah. And then there's the question of what Oprah will do on OWNed. If she simply moved her talkshow to cable, it would devour public daytime TV. No one knows what will be on it; she's staying tight lipped.

Trivia: Oprah apparently has $50 million dollars, in cash, to swim around in her money big use for emergencies.

Tags: bingo, oprah, south korea, wedding

11:07 am: DIY Madness!
1) My forearms are bigger now. Er, noticably thicker. Guess all of that rowing at the gym is paying off.

2) Two weeks ago I bought a new Netbook, an Acer Aspire One D250. Installing Windows 7 so I could play the one PC game I play went pretty easily (yaaay Subscriber accounts at work!) I finally managed to install Gentoo Linux on it as well without bugging Puppy incessantly. 'cept for the ethernet port, but that's because it doesn't work on Linux yet.

3) I tried making "Indian Pudding" last night to prepare for the pot luck at work. Very nummy, but you NEED ice cream.

Tags: cooking, excersice, gym, linux, netbook

09:57 am: Sheldon Dorf dead at 76
He founded Comic Con and stayed with it until 2006.

Diabetes complications.

Thank you Dorf. Thank you so much.

08:47 am: I have trouble emoting.
Figuring out the delicate balancing act of vulnerability vs showing that I care vs anti-buttinsky vs other people are better at this is long and difficult.

Just wanted to write this down for future reference.

08:49 am: Disney finally gets to erect a theme park in China
China gave its approval to build a theme park in Shanghai. This deal started in 1990, when five Chinese mayors visited Disneyland in California and decided they simply had to get one in China.

China is very fierce over protecting itself against cultural influence. Usually Disney would just spam the Disney channel, but that's been a no-go in China. China only lets 20 non-Chinese films in every year, heavily edited. Also, Euro-Disney's botched planning and launch taught Disney to Play Nice with the Locals. So this is a big deal for Disney as well as China.

Let's see if this pans out.

New York Times, Nov 4 2009

Tags: china, disney

09:02 am: The Hunt for Decent Wiki
I'm bad with memories. In particular, I'm terrible remembering how programs work. Also, I brainstorm a lot. It's nice to have a place to write it down. Finally, I will often find individual pictures and ideas that are cool, so I try to stuff it somewhere.

Running a small, private Wiki was the solution that came to mind. I had MediaWiki for a while, but that was overkill (I only expect 1 user to access it) and it wasn't very portable (I had to run a script to export the database, copy it to the new computer, import the database and manually copy the pictures over.) Last week, I finally looked for something new.

WikiMatrix helped me out a lot so I could filter out what features I want and what features I didn't want. Text-based file backup is paramount. I don't need the speed boost databases grant, but I need offline access so I can take a local copy onto my laptop, edit my laptop copy and upload it back to the desktop master copy. Some of you may recognize this as a Revision Control System or Code Management System. I call it git, but sure whatever. And finally, I need good documentation. I become extremely frustrated when setting stuff up and if I can't follow a simple howto to get things done I'm outta here. Once it's set up I start over engineering.

Things I tried but ultimately rejected include ikiwiki. It takes too much control and sets up its own code repository. Don't have time to figure out its configuration option to figure out how to trick it to do what I want it to. Also, very poor documentation. Forget it. phpWiki claims all you need to do is unzip the package to run it. They neglect to mention the gigantic option setting file you need to mess with; defaults do not work. Oh, and no documentation, of course.

I finally found BoltWire which uses plain-text files as backup, a self-contained options directory. And I can insert files outside of the web interface if I want to. (gotta remember to change ownership to apache though. Also, I can't revert to the manual changes.) Now my wiki is on my desktop, laptop, and work laptop. Whee.

Now, to find a decent way to import my old wiki to my new one...

Tags: notetaking, wiki

08:55 am: Attention Wii owners! Internet Channel is now free!
It costs 0 points to download the channel. If you paid 500 points for it you get a refund an NES game of your choice from the shopping channel catalog.

Really? You won't refund virtual money, even though I already spent real money to buy it? This is why I suck at economics.

If you don't own a Wii, it is finally $200, down from $250.

Tags: wii

09:20 am: What the New York Times has taught me about the Buffalo Wing
1) Its name comes from the town of Buffalo, New York where a restaurant owner thought up a quick way to use the remaining chicken wings by dipping them in hot sauce.

2) Boneless Buffalo Wings are simply chicken breast cut up and covered in hot sauce. I always wondered how they removed the bones from there.

3) Chicken breasts are usually more expensive than chicken wings, but not this year. Serious business for chicken meat salesmen; their business model has spun around. Sports bars have to cut down on free buffalo wings because of this and switch to "boneless" wings, which are actually breasts. Man I am so confused over this.

PS I won't make a Street Fighter Fei Long Chicken Wing joke. Too obscure.

Tags: buffalo wing, chicken wing, street fighter

06:01 pm: Hello rest of my bookmarks! I got paid!
I haven't checked any of my bookmarks besides my email since I started work. Good because I'm not distracted. Bad because I'm not up-to-date.

Still, my first paycheck is in. Good. Also, I have found many key ingredients for my Halloween costume. Great. Although I still need to find a shirt and dickey to wear under it. Men's Warehouse tomorrow, definitely.

Time to update my Christmas wishlists, too.

Just reminding the world I am still alive.

10:16 am: Driver Test: beaten.
Passed my road test this morning.

Woke up (for me) early at 7 AM. Need to get used to it. Driving school drove me and another student around for an hour to prepare. At 9 AM we met the tester and I went first.

Went smoothly except for parking. While parallel parking I left too much room off the curb. I was told to do it again. Luckily the instructor warned me about this beforehand so I remembered to reverse a little before retrying.

The real breaker was at the end, when I had to make a left turn into the road test parking curb. Y'see, there was a car in the perfect sweet spot, and they were telling me to aim wide. I should have tilted to the right more before turning, because I wound up aiming right for that car. The tester wound up braking before I did, gave me a blunt look and said "I should fail you that." Told me to back up and align the car before telling me to stop and put it in park. When he told me to stop, I told him it was still off alignment and he gave me a "You're skating on thin ice" look, so I entered Operation: Shut the Fuck Up and Let Him Direct.

Luckily that was the last thing we had to do. He was going to pass me, mostly because the rest of the test went so well (w00t.) Then he said "You know what?" A bit scary since that often means a turn around and I was close to pissing him off. "I'm going to get my stamp!" and he ran into the office to grab his signature stamp. PHEW

The other testee didn't fare as well; a combination of nervousness and failure to correct the parallel park sank him. I'm guess I ran the tester's parking patience thin >_>

The good news is that school parking lot will finally be of some use to me; I can spend the weekend parking "on target." In the meantime, I need to waaaaaaaaait at the DMV. Bye bye.

Tags: driving

09:19 am: That was a nice month of summer.
June- Extended May, except Rained out

July- What June should have been

August- 1 week wondering if the AC should be run, followed by 1 week running the AC. Followed by another week running the AC out of habit instead of need. Followed by 1 week of wondering why I didn't need the AC, followed by

September- Last night's low was 49 degrees. We fell below 50. This isn't supposed to happen until mid October.

Hope you Global Warming fans are happy.

Tags: weather

02:28 pm: Carbonite YES!
Carbonite www.carbonite.com just offered me a job. Oh yes, so accepting this.

02:20 pm: Disney bought Marvel on Monday.
I now expect Wolverine (or Logan for especially innocent shows) to wander into every Disney movie/cartoon/book/play and make a random cameo. On a motorcycle, budget permitting.

02:46 pm: Waiting for console price cuts?
The PS3 and XBox 360 Elite model now cost $300. Sony cut first on Tuesday, and Microsoft quickly caught up with a cut effective Friday (Today.)

Hopefully Sony will take this as a lesson to never charge $600 at launch. Microsoft already believes in this mantra and has sworn to staying below $300 for their consoles from now on. Heck, the 360's core(crap) model has been at $200 for a while.

Is Nintendo going to budge? Not likely, President Iwata thinks price drops are dumb, as the competition will just cut their prices (Sony had the advantage for 3 whole days.) I expect the Wii price to stick but instead we'll get bundles (WiiPlay or WiiSports Resort are my guesses, leaning towards WiiPlay.)

What about the XBox 360's Pro model, currently at $250? Everyone expects MS to phase it out. 20 GB storage isn't going to cut it anymore with 5-9 GB downloadable games on the market.

Tags: console wars, price cuts

11:57 am: Sports and Gender Questions
You know what really grinds my gears? Gender segregated sports.

Caster Semenya won the women's 800 meter run Wednesday and received her gold medal. Now she has to be subjected to sex tests to decide whether she actually is a woman, or a man posing as a woman to gain easy gold medals.

There are many assumptions in this that drive me bonkers.
-There are only two Sexes: There are many biological factors that easily blur the line between male and female. Some males don't generate enough testosterone. Some women generate too much. Crossdressing is pretty easy. The point is, where is the magical threshold that determines guy from gal? Is-is there a book on this?

-Gender vs Sex: To quibble a fine point, sex is biological, where females are the ones who create and bear children. Gender is a lot more complicated, relying on where you identify yourself, usually based on your upbringing (pink vs blue baby clothes, for example.) Caster was raised as a woman, so I have trouble...I guess caring about what is actually between her legs.

-Men vs Women sports: Another big reason I don't care about sports is the separation between men and women in sports. I'm too idealist to truly accept a difference between male and female physique when it comes to sports, hips, shoulders and breasts be damned. And as separate but equal is ultimately unequal (see: WNBA), I feel "a man participating in a women's sport" is inherently moot. Why did you separate them in the first place? Is she so good at it because no "real" woman could run that well? ARGH

-Embarrassment and rejection of victory. Caster has to put up with this nonsense. Do the IAAF really think they will change her mind if tests "conclude" she's a man? Her family has to put up with this, too. This trial is already a mark of shame, even if they find nothing wrong.

Totally ridiculous.

Tags: gender, olympics, sports

01:59 pm: Random New York Times Articles
Sunday (Business page 3) pointed out how the feeling of serendipity - the joy of stumbling upon something interesting by viewing someone's DVD or CD collection - has gone poof thanks to the internet and digital storage. This is an issue I've always wondered about, especially with digital games. I can't wander through a game isle, buy a game based on its ridiculous cover art and blatant lies on the back anymore. Yeah, this purchasing pattern is 90% fail and I tend to tell friends to read reviews or play a friend's copy first but hey.

Monday (B1) Man, Yahoo's stock is getting beaten up over the deal with Microsoft. I haven't considered Yahoo relevant since my first encounter with Google. MS understands something when they can throw money at a problem, and Yahoo's search was going to die within a year anyway. The trick for Yahoo is to find out what, exactly, do they offer besides a glorified redirect to Bing? Any Yahoo nuts out there?

Monday (B1) YouTube local news asks news stations to upload news reports so it can play them to people who live near the station. A good chance to force local stations to diversify reports. A chance for YT to make profit. And it raises a dilemna: Do you give your stuff away for free to increase branding, or do you keep it to yourself to sell it?

Monday (B6) Manga sales to cellphones are booming in Japan. All other formats have shrank so far. Most manga-on-cellphone deals have gone to middle aged women, who don't care about the quality or one-panel-at-a-time view but do enjoy the relative privacy (compared to a book, anyway.) It's a nice threat to the standard model. Maybe the Comics industry will take a look at this? (Probably not.)

Tags: new york times

07:22 pm: Dammit Warner Brothers.
I bought The Dark Knight off of Amazon a few months ago, as my effort not to download a torrent.

I decided to watch it on Thursday. Guess what? It didn't work!

Okay, I'll try my other dvd drive. Nope, not there either. Laptop? Nope. Either I have a bad disk, or I have a new copyright protection scheme. I call Amazon to see if I can get an exchange. It looks like I can. They even shipped the new copy overnight (+1,000 points for Amazon, as I was way past the return date.)

Oh right, people watch DVDs in DVD players.

NOPE. IT DOESN'T EVEN WORK IN MY STANDALONE DVD PLAYER.

Okay, new copy arrives. Sweet, I set up the old copy to be returned and pop the (presumable working) copy into my DVD player. NOPE.

What the heck Warner Brothers. Your stupid DRM has caused me to torrent 2 good-quality rips. And the internet has found a way around the magical copyright protection in the first place.

But really. It doesn't work in my standalone DVD player? The standard it's supposed to work on? Is this your plan to force everyone to switch to Blu-ray?

Bah.

Tags: batman, copyright, dvd, rants, wb

04:47 pm: Pigs flew. RIAA thinks DRM is dead.
RIAA thinks DRM is dead.

Whaaaaat? Well, I'm glad it only took them 20 years to realize it but...