SheevaPlug

This is a complete computer that runs at 1.2ghz just plugs into the wall.  Drawing very little power.  For $99, I need to find some uses for this.

A fun quote

Today I spent some working hours looking the perfect quote to sum up my days.  Replace Marine Corps with TheNameofYourWorkPlace:

All right people, what are you waiting for, breakfast in bed? Another glorious day in the corps. A day in the Marine Corps is like a day on the farm. Every meal's a banquet. Every paycheck a fortune. Every formation a parade. I love the corps!

~Sgt Apone, Aliens

Of course I also wasted about my half teams day as I was trying to remember this quote and could only remember half of it.  Really took some effort to track down.  Ah but so worthwhile.

TF2 Scout update live

Added The Force-A-Nature, The Sandman, and Bonk!  And much much more.

Maybe a couple hours for TF2 is in order here in a few weeks, when the Scout storm dies down.

Aliens RPG axed

Hope no one was looking forward to that.  It had been on the 'rumored to be demised' list for many months now.  Its no longer a rumor.

Orbiting Carbon Observatory takes a swim

NASA's 270 million dollar OCO failed to achieve orbit.  

Likely this is the result of some oil company's dollars at work...

Laid off workers asked to refund

I think I would photocopy my middle finger and send that back as a form of re-payment.

I guess I should also tell you this was some portion of the 1400 laid off Microsoft workers that were over compensated on there severances.  

My reply would be the same no matter who it was....

Mass Effect 2 suggestion

Bioware Devs have come out on the forums telling people to keep their Mass Effect 1 save games around as they will be of some use in the next edition of the game.  No further details as to what that use will be.

Its been a long time sense we have had a game that is an actual true sequel.  It used to be a common feature of RPGs to allow you to take your character to the next game in the series.  The problem was that that feature caused a lot of problems.  Some perceived (my character is less cool then your cause I didn't play the last game) and some real (changes to the game system become harder, balance issues, etc).

The old school DnD Gold Box games did this very well because the next box was always a higher level adventure in the series.  But that's about the only place that it worked out well.  Certainly will be interesting to see how that works out.

Geneva Conventions in games

This post is linked to a story about a guy that let his 13 year old son  play Call of Duty if he follows the Geneva Convention.  Pop requires him to learn all about it.... so its learning thing to get to play the game.  

What he should have required is the kid to drop 5 pounds before he let him play the game.  That would be a far better idea then learning the Geneva Convention and applying it to game play.

I guess I must be a really poor parent cause I let my 6 year old play this T for Teen title.  Although its COD2 that I let my kid play and just the demo.  I don't really mind the cartoon shooting and blowing up of people etc.  Pretty much a way of life and I think its more important to teach a kid reality vs. game play.  Isn't that the real life lesson to learn about every form of entertainment?  I do prevent him from playing any T titles with language or overly suggestive themes.  

New Battlestar movie talks underway

I'm totally against this. Its a remake of the 1978 version written and produced by the original guy, Glen Larson. The proposal is to target the big screen. It would not be connected to the SciFi channel's series. It would reinvent the '78 story but use the same signature staples of characters.

I don't see how that can be taken seriously. To soon, the remake was in 2003. It needs at least a good 8-10 years before thats an acceptable path. Timing it everything.

How about coming up with a new idea?

In game web browsers

While a few MMOs have already built these in or have added them in via 3rd party add-on.... the browsers in the title link are designed to be used in any PC game.

That way you can serf up some porn while you set the bomb off in Megaton. I'm sure some of you sick people will really enjoy that combo.

Guess I'm not alone

The NY Post has got some folk up in arms about this one...

Cause your racist if you say damn near anything these days. I don't know how a person is supposed to keep track of what is and isn't racist. Seems to me like this is a joke about a monkey at the controls and nothing more.

I truly believe that the world will be a better place when the Sharptons of the world are no more.

Ignorance is the best gift

I tell myself, "Everything will be just fine." or "It will all work out in the end." sometimes "Nothing to worry about here, just overactive news monkeys..." or my favorite "Whats the worst that could happen?" Then I turn the news off or stop reading what ever news I am reading. Ignore it and it will go away.

Ignorance is bliss.

...but every once in a while I peak and here is what I see:

The next 3 to 4 generations will pay for this (Indiana).  Here, let me help you cope with that by telling you that its not your problem, you'll be dead so why not sell the future to buy today.  The American way of the debtor nation.  Why do any different after so long?  Maybe I was confused by the supposed Change?

Even better is this housing stimulus "plan".  I could have thought of a dozen better ideas while I sat on the crapper.  To summarize my problem with it:  Its not enough.  Not nearly enough to stabilize the problem that everyone agrees is a key problem: The value of homes.

Today I found myself sitting in my shower (where I comtemplate the multiverse, every day) thinking through what this all really means.  How can I better prepare for what is to come?  The answers are not a comfort...  actually the best answer is to continue to ignore it.  Don't stop to think about it and continue on our marry way to our Thelma and Louise conclusion.

Diablo 3 shirts

$14.50 at the link above

The HD bet

A year ago (or was it two?) a drunken heated debate on the price of Blu-ray videos led me to put in my calender a reminder to prove this person wrong. Here we are a year later (maybe two) and you likely have forgotten.

My point, at that time, was that with out competitive factors like having to compete with HD the price of Blu-ray content would remain higher then it should. The other guy disagreed.

We defined clear parameters for this bet: "HD content will be $25 new release at Best Buy".

The result: New releases at Best Buy are $30(I didn't count anything $49.99 and higher or this number would have been much much higher).

The Winner: BK OF COURSE

I thought you might win this bet due to economic conditions and lack of demand would drive the price point down. I know at the time of the debate that wasn't even something considered (which is why I keep thinking it was two years ago).

Lucky for you, I failed to note in my calender what the bet was for and as I barely remember the conversation but I'm sure it was a BJ (what else could it be?).

Well kids, what have we learned today? "BK's always right." Very good but lets also add: competition in a free-market is always good for everyone but the people selling the product.

I can't imagine how heated that debate must have been for me to make a note in my calender like I did. Must have been a hum-dinger.

Kindle 2 details

The title link goes directly to Amazons order page for the product.

I love the improvements but I think that price point of $359 is needing to come down sharply. $200 is the magic number and even that seems a little high given that its a product that is designed to get to you buy books from them.... $359 for the honor of being able to buy books from one place only....

Ars bashes Slashdot

Ars Technica (which I freely admit I am a fan of) has some pretty target on commentary about Slashdot and how much of a cess pool it is. This particular publish is in reference to Windows 7 DRM. Which would press some major hot buttons over at Slashdot with a chance to be: Anti-Microsoft and anti-DRM all at the same time. That's like a god post over at Slashdot as it combines two of The Most Hated Things Ever.

And to top it all off, what started the Windows 7 DRM bashing ended up having nothing to do with Windows or Microsoft at all. The software the guy stole was to blame. Oh the irony.

Intel legals up on Nvidia

Stating that Nvidia no longer has license to produce chipsets for new CPU lines. If Intel wins this is going to hurt Nvidia bad. I believe Intel will win this because they are correct on the agreement.

Nvidia never should have openly made statements that aligned them selfs in the foe column against Intel. It was dumb as hell and they are going to pay for it.

I'm not saying that Nvidia shouldn't go the direction they are heading but they should have kept their mouth shut about their plans. Now they better hope all of plans actually work before they go out of business.

Gamerankings is no more

My favorite place to get a consolidated neutral view on a games overall review appears to be no more. As of a few hours ago I got redirected to Gamespot. So far there is no news items or further details on this event.

As the site was owned by CNET (also owners of Gamespot), I assume this was a business decision and will not be reversed.

Folded on stocks

Today I have closed all stock positions, finally tossing in the towel. From 206% up at its highest to -43% in the hole at the end. Epic in the rise and bloody in the fall. I just can't play in this market environment any longer.

I really wish Barrak Hussin would give us A Change that Business can believe in cause people need these jobs and largely that's all dependent on the market to provide.

60TB of EQ2 server logs

SOE just turned over 60TB of server logs for research on human behavior. Woah, thats some serious logging.

Unfair business practices

This is an odd business model when I stop to think about it. Everyone knows movies are released to theaters first, then DVD at some point later. Its how its always been done. Which works well for the studio as they get a cut of sales and it works out well for the theater as they get the sales. It doesn't work out well for the consumer. How can businesses exist that operates like this. Isn't this a practice akin to price fixing? They all got together and decided that this was best and no one does it any different. How is that free enterprise?

Don't take this as me having something against movies or movie theaters. I don't. I like to go to the theater like most people. But I do think this set up has ethical issues. The claim made is that if they didn't do releases this way then theaters would go out of business. That implies that no one wants that service and you are forcing your customer to do something they don't want to do. Good thing every shirt manufacture doesn't decide that you can only buy shirts in pairs... wouldn't it be one and the same? Would that be tolerated? Well people do need shirts, at some point, so I guess you would have to.

I don't believe that theaters would go out of business but there would be a clear drop in business as it resets to a natural level (opposed to the current forced level). I also believe that the studio could come out as good or better profit wise if they opened up some alternative channels. What if the first month the DVD was twice its normal price but released at the same time as theaters? Retail would certainly see a profit and sales increase out of that and it would be natural - the consumer decided to pay a premium. Everyone but the theaters wins and most certainly it put the choice back in the hands of the people its supposed to be in: the customers.

Rockstar cross the line that should not be crossed

The line: Full male frontal in a video game.
The product: GTA IV DLC Lost and the Damned.

Click the link above to watch the 3d penis in all of its glory. You know you want to see this piece of video game history.

Anno 1404 update

This is linked to a great interview on the upcoming econ game. The image in this post is of one of the new production chains that produces pearl necklaces. Try to remember its 1404 and they produced pearl necklaces much differently then today.

Let me pull out a couple of chose parts:

3dz: All three previous games have been released in German first and after six months or more have been translated to English. Is 27th March the release date of the English version of the game?
DG: The game will be released this year simultaneously in all countries.

W00t!

3dz: Can you please reveal the mystery behind the names of the Anno games? The first one was Anno 1602, the second Anno 1503, the third 1701, and now the fourth title from the franchise is Anno 1404?
DG: There is no real mystery to the names – all dates have the cross sum 9

1+4+0+4= 9
1+7+0+1= 9
1+5+0+3= 9
1+6+0+3= 9

That's funny but I would have gone the route of making it so people can tell which game is a successor. As it is its very confusing for a new player to know which was first and which was last.

I'm pretty dang excited about this game as this is one of my favorites of all times. The larger maps and more complex game play is just a plus.

Great Justice!

My wife has been ill all week and even gone so far as to take time off of work. Which doesn't happen, shes a dependable war horse that doesn't take time off - ever. So one would think she has to be near death.

Well today she ran off to the doctor and was told she has a sinus infection. I couldn't help but giggle. No one has any idea how many times she has told me to "suck it up" during my numerous sinus infections... or implied that I'm a big pussy. I couldn't bring myself to tell her to 'suck it up' but she could clearly see my satisfaction and she accepted it because she knew she earned it.

The good news, for her, is she has an experienced expert at dealing with such issues. I might even refrain from overdosing her ;p

IBM study ranks Mac as most vulernable OS

The title made me laugh. The second I saw I knew it was an X-Force study. Thats right, the IBM security fools call themselves X-FORCE. X-Force and BK-Force have had some tangles in the past. They have a fleet of people and I have just me... but I hold my own against them. Like most of IBM they are too worried proving how valuable and needed they are to the world to be overly concerned about me.

Of course IBMs AIX platform is the most secure. I smile at the creative use of statistical bending and ability to selectively ignore certain details aka The Truth. Yes Yes, I know you can't say "we suck" but I'd prefer they just not saying anything at all then doing these BS studies. At least they are entertaining.

I freely admit that I am jealous. I'm still looking for that golden ticket where people buy my products and services even if they suck. It takes so much work to get there that it seems like you would be better off just doing it right in the first place.

Blizzards new MMO

One of the central people for World of Warcraft has announced that he is moving to a new team working an unannounced MMO. I'm sure in 4 to 5 years we will learn the name of this MMO.

Console sales numbers 2008

PS3 203,200 (24.5% decline)

XB360 309,000 (25.5% increase)

Wii 676,000 (59.5% increase)

PSP 172,300 (25% decline)

PS2 101,200 (62% decline)

DS n/a(high increase)

Left4Dead: Free DLC Love'n coming

A new multi player mode called Survival and adding Versus modes to Death Toll and Dead Air.

For 360 and PC.  No date given beyond 'soon'.

EQ Online Adventures turns 6

This was one of the first console MMOs.  It was released only on the PS2.  It was pretty cool at the time.  Really cool with you consider the technical limitations they had to work with.  They didn't have anywhere to store game updates aside from the game memory card which didn't have much beyond a meg of working space on them.

Yet somehow this game is still going 6 years later.  Wow... I never would have guessed.

This was the first MMO I realized that I would never be able to live an MMO again.  Play them yes but live them no.  I vaguely recall some other player trying to get my play schedule out of me and turn me into his best online bud.  He wasn't happy when I told him that I couldn't play every day... it made me wonder, how was it possible that there was a time where I could completely understand where he was coming from?

And thats everything I remember about this game.  Happy Birthday!

FAA hacked

Federal Aviation Administration joins the ranks of government agencies to have exposed protected information  to the world.

HOT TIP FROM BK:  PHI data used on Test Servers is a no-no.  

But I'm sure you know that now.  Don't worry, I'm sure sorry will fix everything...

SanDisk begins production on 4X flash

These are SD flash chips that can store 64gb of data.  4x also features some new controller technology that improves read/write performance.

I suspect this is going to lead to some major unlocks on tech for Solid State Disk capacity in the near future.

AMD steps up to DDR3

It wasn't planned to happen till 2010 but now AMD is looking to pack Phenom 2's with DDR3 controllers. This will create a substantial performance improvement to greatly assist in narrowing the performance gap between AMD and Intel.

Glad to see someone is waking up over there. They are going to need to do better but its sure a step in the right direction.

Look for this change in the next few months.

Snoop Dogg coming to Rock Band

I don't think I can sum it up any better then Snoop does himself:

"So screw ya wigz on tight and tune in on Tuesday nights for the first step to the next level of Snoop D-O double G. "

I think this is going down next week.  Rap aside, I know I would be a lot happier if they wouldn't put new releases on this platform.

So who wants to play some Rock-Rap&Country Band?

The upside of a down economy

The cure for immigration is a bad economy. Wasn't that long ago we were building the great wall and the news was dominated by immigration related news. My how times change.

Makes a person dream of the good old days when that was about all we had to cry about. It was also a heck of a lot cheaper of a problem to have...

The business of Flash games

Take a look into the business of profiting from building Flash games.  I'm sure you have always wondered what all those little Flash games net, well here is your chance to get the full low down.

The quick answer:  $500 a game on average but the top earner making around $400,000 a year.

Eve Online ends Linux support

Stating that there isn't enough people to support the effort. See, all 5 of those Linux users are the loudest mouths on the planet. They make the noise of many thousand and disappear the second you ask them to pay for something.

2008 Mobile market stats

Market share/(change from 2007)
=========================
Symbian based phones 48% (24% decline)
Blackberry 15.5%(57% increase)
Windows Mobile based phones 13.3%(21% increase)
iPhone 9%(200% increase)

Obama's potty mouth

The one where he says "There are white folks and then there are ignorant motherfuckers like you." sent a chill down my spine. Maybe its just the delivery...

Firefox: How is the stoneage?

The other day I was downloading a 3-4 gig file off of somerandomsite.com on the page I was informed that my web browser doesn't work with file downloads of this size and I should get Firefox. Of course I didn't have any problems.

Out of curiosity I popped open a few other browsers and pointed them at that same page. What do you know? Same message. At least its equal in its sales pitch if sadly full of shit. Its like saying you get spyware if you don't use Foxfire... also a sadly misleading statement.

WTF is wrong with you people? I know the bible tells people to spread the word of the god err the browser in this case enough is enough. Take your religion elsewheres. Please and thank you - its a web browser. A simple application that allows one to view the web. You click on links...they go places. That's it. Get back in touch with reality. Maybe its time to build an open source Internet where just you chosen few live. We can call you Mozilla's People and your new Internet the Digital Holy Land.

So today I find myself in need of cross browser testing for a new release and I decide if for some reason its screwed up under Firefox I am not going to fix it. Matter-a-fact I am going to display a message: Your browser isn't supported by this site please upgrade your browser to any other browser. The uninstall is located in the control panel....

Great plan except when I run out to go get a copy of Firefox. There is no x64 release officially supported by Mozilla. What the hell? The super elite, the people that look down at all of the lesser lost folk....doesn't have a 64-bit release??? Didn't they just come out with a new browser over the summer???? Its like its 1999 over there in the new digital holy land.

Before one of you bomb strapped defenders of the faith run into my shop to defend the mother land...might I recommend a lovely browser called Lynx? Who really needs all those fancy graphics anyway? You certainly aren't going to be troubled by any advertisement in your text only browser.

Don't be shocked if the very mention of the word Firefox makes me snicker uncontrollably. At least you know why. Oh and I'm going to put that message on that site I'm finishing (with out actually testing with Firefox)...fuck you all and your sad little crusades.

Runes of Magic

This is a free MMO in open beta currently. It will be micro transaction based when ever its released. It actually looked like its worth checking out. Among its other features it has randomly generated dungeons.

Diablo purists get mocked

I always am pleased and surprised when I see a company poke fun at a segment of its customers.  Surprised because often time those little pokes get someone fired.  Pleased because I'm sick to death of how you can't have a little fun anymore with out someone getting fired.

Anyway....Blizzard poked a little fun at the Diablo purists with rainbow shitting unicorns and such.  Good stuff!  

I'm sure it dumped something like a tanker truck of gas on that forum...

Bioshock heading to the mobile market

There is even a video.  Pretty ugly but also pretty impressive given its running on a mobile phone.

Wall Street workers are scum

Can you imagine if you actually worked on Wall Street or one of the well known big investment banks?  Can you imagine the way people would look at you or treat your right now?  Social leper might be a good description.  The above linked article goes into depth on that very subject.

While I'm not crying a river for these folks (or anyone else for that matter) it does bother me that 99% of these people are just showing up to work like anyone else would and the media has painted this picture of people living high on the hog.  Worse, they have been marked the scape goat for all the ills of the world.

All of this comes back to the disgusting inability of people to stand up and take responsibility for wrong doing.  Its not always someone elses fault.  You do make mistakes.  Even Obama makes mistakes and also is good enough to own up to them.  If nothing else I'd hope that guy can lead us to a new era of people taking responsibility and less finger pointing.

Titanoboa

The discovery of fossilised remains belonging to the world's largest snake has been reported in Nature journal.

These things were the size of a large bus.  Damn.

Diablo 3 interview

Watch the video on the above link.  Site is German but the video is in the kings English.  

• Good stuff revealed about runes system and battlenet.  
  
• The person being interviewed says "I don't know if you played the demo yet..." at one point, to the person interviewing him.
  
• There is some new class footage for a caster towards the end.  
  

Wastelands

Wowzers, here I am with what appears to be another book recommendation but actually its not. I can't say I recommend this book as exceptional, though it is a good read. A very good read considering its all short stories which isn't something I normally do.

The cover attracted me, I didn't even notice who the writers were. I just thought stories of the apocalypse sounds different. I was pleasantly surprised when I started to read it and noticed who all wrote stores.

Its of course bleak as hell but interesting none the less. I don't think I read a single story that I struggled to get through...might say the reverse was true. Most stories left me wanting more which is why I often don't like short stories. To often they require or are purposely left with a foggy end.

But this post is really about one story in particular that was excellent: When Sysadmins Ruled the Earth. Excellent and quite free to read. The author (who is a co-editor over at Boing Boing) released it for free and only later was it published.

The story is about the world ending of course but sysadmins in major data centers survive due to the protected environments they live in and the Internet lives on, as designed to survive such events. These dedicated admins keep things running while they wait out what ever may come. Certainly more dedicated then I would be... my world ending agenda is quite particular and nothing related to computers is a part of it.

What I really thought was well done was how realistic the depiction is. There isn't any glamorous hacker drama that has been Hollywooded up to ultimately be nothing close real... which is something nearly every fictional work tends to do. Real technologies and real situations used correctly. A refreshing change. Clearly the author has had a lifetime of working the machine.

One thing I found humorous is how they talk to each other... made me think about how I don't live in anywhere near the level of geekdom that these people do, cause they use vernacular that I've not heard before. Perhaps only Canadian geeks speak to that level.

So really this post is to recommend reading that free short story. Its gripping. But if you want the whole collection, click the title link on this post.

Cash cow

Today I noticed that this blog has doubled in the number of people that read it in the last few months. Now it has more readers then more then half of my customers have visitors to there sites. This blog has really been handy for me to use as comparative stats of a social site vs. a business site. So it does pay in ways that can't quite be measured.

However that got me to thinking, I ought to be cash rich now from all that sweet sweet ad revenue. Right?

I'm sure $5.98 is rich somewhere.

Lets look at the growth here. July 2008 was the last time I looked at this when 1000 posts was celebrated. At that time there was $3.72 in the war chest. Now $5.98, that's roughly a 37% gain in six or so months. Someone put this blog out cause its on fire!

Don't be shocked if you see me on late night TV soon with my own patented get rich blogging infomercial. Me and Billy Mays (ShamWow fame) might start working together very soon.

Comcast watchers of the Super Bowl got some free porn

30 seconds of porn splashed by for Comcast subs.  Nothing to graphic just a chics hand doing some trouser snake hunting.  Interestingly enough, and I suspect the actual source of the disruption, local viewers saw the same thing.  Which makes me think Comcast was mirroring much of the local feed and had nothing to do with this occurring... they just happened to be the big news worthy name to put in the title.

I look forward to the whole of the story coming out.  And it will...very soon.  No one does something like that and not take credit.

I'm just surprised they didn't use something a bit more graphic... if your going to steal $5 of gas you may as well fill your tank cause its the same crime and penalties in most states.

Blagojevich iPhone game

Finally reason to buy an iPhone, a game described as:

"Illinois Governor trading game", Pay2Play give gamers 30 days to pay back the unions, make tons of cash and get out of town, all before getting impeached.

That's amusing.  

Blagojevich seems to not get that no one believes he's not 110% guilty.  He's got some sort of delusional unstoppable complex.

Junktown has a new governor coming to town...never mind...