King Kong Movie

I've stopped watching TV. I was TV shows, just not when their originally aired. This means that I don't really get a chance to see all the commercials and previews for the new movies that are coming out. I don't really miss this, and Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire is a great example. I knew nothing about the movie before I watched it. It worked out extremely well in that situation. So I was thinking about it the other day, and I figured that this was a great thing!

To make my point, I'll just say that I had no idea that Peter Jackson had remade King Kong until it came up in my Google Entertainment News RSS feed in FeedDemon. Well, I'm shocked. King Kong is a classic and I really think it shouldn't have been messed with. I say that, but at the same time I was fairly impressed with his adaptation of Lord of the Rings. For those movies I was very excited, and just as skeptical. Overall, I'd have to say I was impressed, but the movies were not without their problems.

So this Newsweek article on MSNBC comes through my aggregator and I'm shocked. Needless to say, I'm fairly excited about this King Kong movie. But, at the same time, I'm even more skeptical. Will this be even more of a Hollywoodized version of a movie? It might just be with information like this --

"Now is probably a good time to mention that Jackson's epic, $207 million remake of "King Kong," is a surprisingly tender, even heartbreaking, film. Like the original, it's a tragic tale of beauty and the beast. Unlike the original, which was 100 minutes long, Jackson's version is a Kong-size three hours."

$207 million is a lot of money. More than likely 75% of that was used for post-production work on special effects. And going from 100 minutes to 3 hours?! That's outrageous! Couldn't Jackson keep it to a length where you don't have to get up twice to go to the washroom after that monster Coke? And then you have to leave the theatre, after 3 hours, not being able to feel your butt or your legs. Are they going to have ushers to carry you to your car?

The big shock of this movie is this --

"Black, meanwhile, is the surprise pick. Jackson and Walsh first thought of him during the Christmas holiday of 2003, when their two young children watched "School of Rock" no fewer than 25 times. What caught their eye was Black's talent for playing "an obsessive, rascally character," says Jackson."

I can't believe they would pick Jack Black. I think Jack Black is great. I like all his movies. I've watched them all a bunch of times. But to cast Jack in an epic like this? That might just be suicide. He's not known for his range of characters, that's for sure. He is known as a zany, crazy, loveable goofball. I'm not sure if that role will fit into this movie. I hope it does.

I guess I'll have to wait to see how the movie turns out. I'm liking the idea, but dreading what might be poor execution. I think it might be time to kick Peter Jackson in the ass and get him making "The Hobbit". Now that's one movie I know will be good and can't wait for!

AMD's roadmaps have changed

digg story
On the same note as my post about the 3 core IBM chips for XBox I ran across this on Digg. AMD, which I've been buying, and a fan of, for many years, is showing off their three year plan for satisfying our future computing needs.

"AMD plans to offer processors with more than two cores in 2007."

By 2007 they'll be offering more than 2 cores per processor? Well, if IBM is doing it now with 3 cores, why is it going to take a few more years for AMD? With programs today taking more and more processing speed, it'd be nice if they could speed this up a bit.

"Future AMD mobile processors are expected to have technology to more efficiently and effectively sense and control processor temperature."

Are expected to? And...? Speculation is great, but when you're trying to sell a vision you should probably not used word like 'might' or 'expected to'. It doesn't show confidence. They say pretty much the same thing about the Advanced Thermal Management. Tell us what you're doing, not what might be done. You know that they're working on technologies far in advance of releasing them. These 8 core processors that they say will be here in 2008, they're working on them now! Overall, this 'roadmap' doesn't really tell us much. Speculation, and that's about it.

One thing I did find interesting is their outlook on memory in 2008.

"DDR3 is the next evolutionary step in DRAM technology. DDR3 is designed to offer users higher memory bandwidth compared to DDR2. Anticipated interface speeds are 1066MHz, 1333MHz and 1600MHz. DDR3 also operates at a lower voltage (1.5V) than DDR2 (1.8V), offering lower power. AMD, along with its infrastructure partners, plans to incorporate and support DDR3 technology in 2007."

Processing power is great, but it's not the be all end all. Take your 3.2GHz PC and try running it with 256MB PC2100 DDR266. Take that out and run 1GB or more of PC3200 DDR400. It makes a difference. Running your PC with RAM at speeds of 1600MHz will make a difference, and I can't wait.

Americas Most Unusual Inventions and Patents

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"A HUGE list of weird inventions and patents from the states."

This is a funny site with some funny inventions. I imagine that as absurd as the Back Buzzer is, my wife wouldn't mind grabbing one.

Oh! And Junior Jail would've come in handy a few years back. Hey, actually, I could use it now, couldn't I? They're never too old for the Junior Jail!

And who can live without the Smoker's Hat?

"...the battery powered Smokers Hat sucks up the cigarette's smoke and filters it, deodorizes it, ionizes it and spritzes a fresh scent near the exhaust fan before it spits it back out."

It's fashionable, it's environmentally friendly, why did it never take off? I'll never know.

VH1: This Day in Music

To follow up on the last Bob Dylan post... He might have been smart to warn the audience.

"Bob Dylan's all-gospel show gets an angry reaction in Tempe, Ariz. Dylan himself spends most of his time onstage berating the audience and then refuses to play an encore."

I don't know a lot on the history of Bob Dylan, but this intrigues me. What pushed Bob into chrisitianity? He must've done a lot of drugs in the 60's. Was this a part of turning his life around and coming clean? I'd be interested to find out.

300GB disc set to challenge DVD

Oh the joys of technology! A 300GB DVD? That's just what the world needs. I could store all of my MP3s on one disc. No more searching for that one song on one of those many CDs and DVDs lying around the house.

"The discs, holding 300GB each, use so-called Tapestry holographic memory technology to store data by interference of light. They are also able to read and write data at 10 times the speed of a normal DVD."

With 60 times the amount of data on one disc, 10 times the recording speed isn't that great. The average DVD takes about 6 minutes for me to burn, meaning one of these new Tapestry discs would take... yeah, that's just way too much to think about.

"Tapestry can store more than 26 hours of broadcast-quality high-definition video on a single 300GB disk, recorded at a data rate of 160Mbps. The discs are 13cm in diameter and a little wider and thicker than conventional DVDs."

I don't know if 26 hours of HD video is going to be enough. Sure, right now it sounds like a lot, but in a few years the quality of video may just be at the point where 1080i looks to people of that time like BetaMax and 8 tracks look to us now. Technology moves at such a rate these days that things that look like they came out of Star Trek now look ridiculous and pitiful tomorrow. Six gigabyte iPod mini? Great, but it's outdated the week after I buy it...

Costs Could Rise in Olympic Vancouver

Most of Canada was ecstatic when the 2010 Olympic Games were awarded to Vancouver. The potential for the region is exponential. For years afterwards, they say, the economic effects continue. Great!

Putting on a venue of this size is quite a task. The level of coordination by the Vancouver organizing committee is an astounding task that shouldn't be envied by any but the most stout. Well, we're only 4 or so years away and the problems have started already.

The head of the Vancouver 2010 Olympic organizing committee warns the region's building boom could escalate construction costs for Games venues between 40 per cent and 50 per cent.

With an original building budget of $470 million for construction alone, means that the capital costs have risen from $620 million to over $900 million. And that's now. By the time the games actually come to town, the costs will more than likely top a billion dollars. How many zeros is that? A lot!

Will the economic benefits of something so big be so big? It's hard to imagine. Even with increased tourism for the next decade, the cashflow through the coffers of the local working guy won't be seen. Will the games bring businesses to the province? Maybe, but not so many that it's worth the costs of bringing the games to our fair province. Whistler, I believe, will benefit from the exposure to the rest of the world as it's a resort town.

And why would you forecast costs in the future with today's dollar? Who's doing the financing on these projects? The team that has been assembled to do this are, from what I can tell, brilliant business people, so how could they screw up so bad?

I've seen the figures on how profitable the Olympics are to the hosting city, and they aren't good. How many games in the last 40 years have seen a profit? It's been a while since I read about it, but it's not many. The VANOC should've taken this into consideration when they were putting the package together for the Olympic Committee. Let's hope that we can go against the odds and make this the best, cheapest games to date.

Powerball winner found dead in home

"A woman who won a $65.4 million Powerball jackpot with her husband five years ago was found dead at her home overlooking the Ohio River, where she had apparently been for days before anyone found her, police said."

Do you see what money will do to you? Do you see how it ruins lives? Win $65 million and your life goes to hell. Money is the debil Bobby Boucher.

Okay, so I'm be facetious. The say money can't buy you happiness, but I strongly disagree with that. Maybe that's only because I don't have any. At least with 32.5 million dollars you'd think you could find some happiness. One body found in her house, apparent death from drugs? Yeah, she O.D.'d on something. I guess there's not much else to do with that much money. Throw Coke parties for the rest of your (soon to be short) life? It doesn't say why her husband died in 2003, but maybe he was just too happy with his money also. Stupid rich people.

IBM XBox 360 Chip

Wow. That's all I have to say. After hearing about the problems with overheating XBoxs since their release, I have been wondering, and half guessing, at why they would design them like that. This article shows exactly why. A Tri-Core chip from IBM. I'm a bit surprised that Microsoft didn't go with Intel on this one, since their relationship is so tight on many other levels, but they didn't.

Each core will also be able to act on two threads at once. Think of threads as customers at a grocery store waiting in a checkout line. Each core would be like a checkout clerk who can work with two customers are once, thus shortening the wait time. Each core's ability to handle two jobs simultaneously means the chip can act like it is in fact six chips. Each core will operate at 3.2 gigahertz, which is comparable to the processing speed of Intel's fastest Pentium processor.

A tri-core chip? Each core running at 3.2GHz? The speeds obtained should be phenomenal. It's no wonder the consoles are overheating. It would be nice if these kinds of chips were released for consumer use in the next few months. But, of course, it looks like Microsoft is keeping it all to themselves. I haven't been paying particular attention to the speeds of chips lately -- that's something I only really care about when it's about time for me to get a new processor, but as far as I know AMD and Intel have dualcore chips out. If IBM's PowerPC chips were more popular then we could potentially all reap the benefits of these chips.

The Xbox 360 is only one of three gaming systems for which IBM's microelectronics group has either fully or partially been involved in chip design and development. IBM collaborated with Sony and Toshiba (TOSBF) on the development of the Cell Processor in PlayStation 3, due for release in early 2006. It has also landed a chip in the forthcoming Nintendo Revolution.

IBM sweeps the competition with the Big 3. It's a wonder that Apple decided to go with Intel chips now because IBM couldn't keep up with their demand. Was this because IBM is concentrating on the console market? Would the numbers look better on paper if PS3, XBox360, and the Revolution were all under IBM's control? I'd say that's probably the case. I'm sure the three will outsell the Apple PCs 10:1.

Intel has cornered the PC market, until recently. Many people will argue, but millions are coming around to the fact that AMD chips are cheaper and run faster than Intel chips. So where does this leave Intel? IBM has their console market, AMD is winning the PC market... Could Intel be in real trouble?

Man steals woman's just-bought Xbox at gunpoint

digg story

I've been avoiding posting about anything XBox 360ish because there's just so much of it out there. I've also avoided posting anything about the violence that's been going on by people desperate for one of these consoles.

Bought after a nine-hour wait and for nearly $600, the new Xbox 360 videogame system wasn't a steal for a Jonesboro, Ga., woman.

Now, I know that there is a shortage of Microsoft XBox 360s. And I know everybody on your block wants one. I also know that you're broke and you can't afford one. So, why not bust out your gun and shoot somebody for one? Or, if you failed to go buy a gun because you're that broke, then why not just beat the shit out of somebody for one, sell it, buy a gun with that money, and then go and get another XBox?

It all seems so logical, doesn't it? Bah! Morons. I work hard for my money. I can't afford a new console (even after my XBox died last weekend). But if I was going to get one, I sure as hell wouldn't give it up to you. Stupid punks. Guns aren't so much a problem here in Canada, but knives, fists, and everything else are. So the violence over a stupid gaming system rages throughout North America.

Microsoft, in all their mightiness, secretly decided that it would be a good idea to purposefully have a shortage. They can say it wasn't planned all they want, we all know the truth. You know what? You may be creating hype by doing this, but you're also getting people beat up and potentially killed. And then there are the people like me. If I happened to have an extra $600 and couldn't get one that day because of your stupidity, well I'd just go to the next store and get myself a shiny new video card and a new game. Seems to work out in the end, doesn't it?read more

Could you survive without a cell phone?

digg story
This post reminds me of a conversation I had the other day with the last person on earth, that I know, who doesn't have a cell phone. I'm really hoping that they'll be able to hold out and not get one, but I fear that modern day just won't allow for it.

"Before cell phones people planned things in advance such as the location and time to meet now days it's all about texting when you are on the way and call me when you get there.

It's a sad fact of life that we can't survive without our phones. I have two. I'm not proud of it, but I just can't get by without at least the one!

I use a cell phone at least a dozen or more times a day at work. I have to, it's part of my job. So what am I going to do about that? Nothing. At least I look cool with it strapped to my waste, right? That's what I thought... No.

The other phone I need so that I can talk to my wife or anyone else that desperately needs to get ahold of me. You know, life or death, "Can you get milk on the way home," type phone calls. These are important. I know I could just use the other phone for things like this, but my boss wouldn't appreciate his bills at the end of the month if I did. So, I have two phones. A few people I know have two phones, in fact.

So what does this mean? Well, in Western Canada we're not as freaky about our technology like the Chinese in this story, but we're on our way. Asians have always been, and will always be, a few years ahead of us in their technology. So to see what's coming, just look to this story and others like it. Oh, and this story is humourous, if not exceedingly long. Give it a read though.

My cousin, the one without the cell phone. He says he's waiting until phones turn into phones / 20MP digital cameras / HD video recorders / dishwashers / whatever. I think he'll be surprised soon enough when that phone actually does come out... If he can last that long.

Microsoft Making Online Communication Tool

Those Microsoft fellas sure are leaps and bounds ahead of the rest of us. Why, they're planning on making a new search engine that actually works. They've just released a gaming console that crashes every 20 minutes, and now this.

"Microsoft has announced plans to make the popular RSS internet syndication more “multidirectional,” by extending it to synchronize contact and calendar information across multiple applications."

Can you imagine? Would've thunk? Huh? It's amazing the ideas these tech heads come up with. Next thing you know they'll come out with Mouse 2.0. Oh, wait, that was Apple. I take that back.

Hey, I know, maybe they'll make it, call it aRSServer, package it up with Windows Vista, inherintly forcing users to have it installed, if not use it, and claim themselves the victors because it's installed in every machine. Meanwhile, it will interfere with every other program, including the ones made by MS, and have so many security holes that it'll take a team of a thousand to plug them, which means the overhead of that product will have tripled, and the price for you and me just went up tenfold. Phew. That took the breath out of me.

At least I can sleep better knowing that Microsoft is going to come out with another winner.

Music: Nickelfeud

As if Mr. Kroeger doesn't have enough to worry about...

Nickelback frontman Chad Kroeger is suing former drummer Ryan Vikedal in a bid to stop him from collecting royalties on the hit songs of the rock band.

Kroeger and his production company, Arm Your Dillo Publishing Inc., are claiming damages against Vikedal for royalties received since he stopped being the band's drummer in January.

Maybe he should concentrate on writing... good songs instead of worrying about a few thousand dollars.

I know it's going to be hard for him to take, but I'm going to lay it all out on the line. Your music sucks. I know, I know. There are millions of people who like it, but they are all wrong. Bon Jovi asked, "Can 100,000,000 Fans be Wrong?" The simple answer is, yes, yes they can.

There are a million Canadians who acknowledge that this is how you remind us of how arragant you really are. Get your head out of your ass and realize that you're still Canadian, which in turn means being humble about your greatness. We're loved the world over, but only when we don't do stupid things. This, is a stupid thing.

I wouldn't be down on Nickelback if it wasn't for the fact that before you made it big, when I lived in Vancouver years and years ago, you guys were actually pretty good. I might've even seen one of your concerts, but I can't be sure. But, alas, you found your sound, your one song, and you stuck with it. Chad, experiment a little! Don't write the same song over and over and over and ov... You get it. It's annoying.

Engadget, which if you didn't know, is just about the quintessential new tech toys site, had this article posted today. It's great to know, now, that prices have been, and are continuing to fall on TVs... This information would have been good a little bit sooner. I guess it's only been 9 months or less with my 51" Toshiba Rear Projection TV, and I don't think waiting any longer would have been a good idea, but it's a tad disappointing to see this chart.


It's not that I'm not happy with my TV. It's great, it really is. It's that to get an even better one would have made me even happier... If the price was right.

When I was looking at the selection available to me, I noticed that the 'economy' TVs for ~1500 - 2000 dollars were fairly good. But, the next step up was even better. At that time, the LCD Rear Projections were more like $3000 for a 42", just a bit too much for me to dish out. So, I was stuck with the bottom of the barrel for $1550.

According to Displaysearch, the price of a 32-inch LCD TV will hit almost $1500 this quarter, down from $3000 a year ago, with the price of a 42-inch plasma sliding from just north of $4000 down to about $2500 over the same time period.

So how much further will prices drop in the next 12 months? Or is it going to be like computer parts? Prices stay the same, but you get more / better things for that amount.

I do have to say, though, that the Toshiba is by far superior to my other choices, A Sony, and a Panasonic. Both of the pictures on those were more pixelated than a SMR movie from a few years back.

With HDTV (which I haven't bothered with yet), and a HD upconverting DVD player to 1080i, it's not so bad to have a regular rear projection TV. But, man, would it have been nice to get a plasma. It still would. Maybe next year, hey?

Politics - 14 Years Old British Mayor

digg story

Oh, this is just wrong on so many levels. Is it really possible for a 14 year old to be trusted as Mayor of the Youth? The mayor of a town an hour away from where I live was kicked out of office because he was stealing money, and he was in his mid 30's.

Britain's youngest elected official has just been inaugurated. At just 14 years old, Wilf Petherbridge has taken office as the Young Mayor of Lewisham, a London suburb. "It's a great thing to get young people to tell the old people how to do things," says Wilf.

That quote makes me think of a kid off of "Kids Say the Darndest Things." The reason he's in office is so he can tell people how to do things? That's just not right. And either way, he's not in charge of adults, he's in charge of telling the adults how younger people see things, and then they decide. But, with a budget of $25,000, what's he going to do? Free bud for all his friends? The biggest kegger any one of the kids have ever seen? Bullocks.

Tech: Worlds first USB Beverage Chiller

digg story

The geek in me is screaming for one of these. In fact, I need a hot one and a cold one. I rarely don't have a drink beside me at the computer.

"Just seconds after plugging the chiller into your computer's USB port (no external outlet needed), the coldplate chills to 45 degrees Fahrenheit, the perfect temperature for keeping your beverage chilled."

45F? What's that in Celcius? Considering the company is from Alberta, you'd think they'd have both. Anyway, here's what the original poster had to say.

Not quite to the market yet, but I heard from one of the owners that the first run is coming and will available from Futureshop in Canada before the end of December.

At Futureshop? That's sweet! It's only 3 minutes from my house. I'll check it out in mid-December, and if it's reasonable I'll buy one and let you people know what it's like.

Tech - Nintendo not kiddy enough?

digg story

"After years of being called too kiddy for hardcore gamers, Nintendo is finally being rebuked for abandoning their kiddiness - shown in their 21% drop in profits. Seems like a bit of a stretch to me..."

This is so true. I know a few years ago I only thought of Nintendo as a console for kids, but these days it's getting out of hand with the rated "T" for teen games.

I think it was last month, or maybe the month before, that Karen and I went looking for a console for the kids. They're 5 and 6, and I know that at least one of them really likes to watch (and asks to play) when I'm playing games on my XBox. So, we went looking at consoles for them.

Well, the first thing I looked at was getting another XBox. I know, from my own experience, that there are a ton of games out there for the XBox, but after looking at shelves upon shelves of games, I quickly realized that maybe one or two were suitable for kids under the age of 12 or so.

So it was on to the next one. The PS2. Sony, they make things for everyone, right? Well, not really. The only kid-friendly games that I could find involved Barbie and Shrek. Well, the one game is fine, but the Barbie stuff? Who cares about her magic horse? So on to the third.

The Gamecube has to be the most kid-friendly. I think I spotted about 4 games without looking too hard that my kids could play. But that's still only 4, and they're kids. They have the attention span of a gnat. They'll be so bored of those games within days that it would be a waste of money without the opportunity to buy them different games.

The price for the Nintendo Gamecube is right, that's for sure. But really, why can't anyone make games for kids any more? Even the old consoles when I was a kid, Atari, Activision, all those, had games that kids could play. Now the companies are just making games that will attract the big bucks from the tweens. There's a market for kids under 12, and maybe the 3 Giants should realize this and start asking their developers to make something geared towards them. Oh, and don't get me started about the learning software that you can buy for the PC...

Misc - Bird Flu 101

digg story

"H5 influenza strains, H5N1 subtypes, high-pathogenic, low-pathogenic - it's getting so we all need biology degrees in order to digest the latest news reports about avian influenza. Let's start with a few basics about bird flu..."

I'd have to say that I know little, if anything, about the bird flu epidemic. One thing that I have heard, though, is that it's been around for years and years. Has it been killing people for years? Is it like Mad Cow Disease? Do we care about it? Should we care about it? Sure Mad Cow is horrible, but only because it drives the price of beef up and then I can't afford to eat steak any more. So does a pandemic like the Bird Flu affect the price of chicken? If so, I'm not happy about it. If not, then who cares?

A bunch of chickens are going to die. They were going to die anyway. I'll admit, I don't like the fact that a bunch of farmers are losing money because of it. And the two people that have died from it got the short end of the stick, but really... come on. There's bigger things to worry about if only a couple of people have died from it. Take, oh, for example, Cancer? Live strong, let the chickens die.

The Million Dollar Xbox 360

digg story

"Yes, someone actually paid $1,000,000 for an Xbox 360."

Can you imagine? It's obviously a stupid 12 year old who thinks it's funny to make fake bids on eBay, but if someone with excessive money did want to be 'the first' to have a classic windows crash box? People are stupid.

Tech - Sober worm infects one in eight e-mails

digg story

"As many as one in eight of all e-mails are now infected with the Sober worm, security experts have warned...SophosLabs said the worm was spreading at such a rate that it accounted for more than 81% of all reported viruses, making it the world's most widespread computer virus."

Okay, it's time for everyone to please update their anti-virus software. I don't feel like having my worm protection working overtime. I just know there are going to be a few people (read: millions) who just don't get that these days you have to be protected. Running a computer in 2005 is like having sex in 2005, if you're not protected you'll probably get a virus. Please, go update your software.

Full Size Replica of C-3PO

Ebay

"This item is a full size replica of C-3PO from Star Wars "A New Hope".

No home is complete without your very own protocol droid. He stands on his own, his eyes light up and there is a speaker in the head for a sound system that the winning bidder could add (sound system not included). The head is moveable from left to right (by hand, not motorized).

The torso, arms and head were scratch built by me. The Arms are PVC, everything else is fiberglass. Starting as clay sculpts and then plaster molds, I was able to make the torso up. The rear plate on the torso is hinged and opens for access to the eye lights and speaker wires.

The waist and legs are also fiberglass and made from Vacuumed formed parts (rumored to be from the Disney Star Tours walk around suit). The actual vac formed parts were not at a quality good enough to use as the droid so I used them as molds. This was much better in the end as the fiberglass is very strong and repairable. The feet and hands are some form of resin.

The detail "pistons" are all made from wood and I would suggest replacing them with resin details. I can give the winner a contact email to get the details as needed. The Pistons on the sides of the knees are the only detail I did not make and add to the prop.

The legs have a metal tube for support and are foam filled to keep the body parts in place. The torso and head are removable. The arms are attached to the torso and cannot be removed.

The finish is Gold Leafed and clear lacquered. I have weathered him for that "new hope look". Also the Black cloth section at the waist with the wires will need to be remade. I did not make it with a big enough waist size so it does not meet in the back.

This isn't really my thing as I'm not much of a Star Wars fan, but could you imagine how big of a conversation piece this would be if it were sitting in your living room? You're having people over for drinks one Friday night, and what stares blankly at you from the corner? C-3PO. Creepy! I think you'd probably lose some friends pretty fast. If you didn't lose them, they sure wouldn't be coming back to your house any time soon. My guess is this -- this guy built this, his wife realized they no longer had any friends, so now she's forcing him to sell it. As of right now the bid is $1,700US. I couldn't imagine.

Man accused in $200,000 Lego Internet scam

CNN

"Agents had to use a 20-foot truck to cart away the evidence from a suspect's house -- mountains of Lego bricks.

William Swanberg, 40, of Reno, Nevada, is accused of stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of the colorful plastic building blocks."

Sometimes the news is just weird. Grand Theft Lego? Uhhh... Okay. His scam was fairly brilliant, yet risky at the same time. An astute employee of these target stores might have noticed that the usual $99 lego set was coming up on the register as some much cheaper (it's not stated exactly what the price was).

They must think he's a huge threat holding him for 1/2 a million dollars in bail. If it were less, he might do something dangerous like go to the local Target and try to buy Lego at half price. Phew! I feel safe now.

"Records of the Lego collector's Web site, Bricklink.Com, show that Swanberg has sold nearly $600,000 worth of Legos since 2002, said Dolyniuk."

There's your mistake right there! If you're going to sell stolen property through your website, you're going to get caught. Just ask 0.00001% of ebay users. He did manage, though, to make $600,000 in three years, so I shouldn't make too much fun. Imagine, if you will, how much money he might have made if he would have sold his wares out of the back of a 1976 Cadillac somewhere in New York City. "Yo, yo, I gots some Lego here, man. I gots some Lego. Wanna buy some Lego? I'll give it to you cheap!"

Pat Morita, 'Karate Kid's' Mr. Miyagi, dies

CNN

Actor Pat Morita, whose portrayal of the wise and dry-witted Mr. Miyagi in "The Karate Kid" earned him an Oscar nomination, has died. He was 73.

Morita died Thursday at his home in Las Vegas of natural causes, said his wife of 12 years, Evelyn. She said in a statement that her husband, who first rose to fame with a role on "Happy Days," had "dedicated his entire life to acting and comedy."

I don't remember him from Happy Days, and I watched that show a lot. I have watched a few of those Karate Kid movies in the last year, and I have to say, he was definitely the best part of them. The cheeseball factor is now extremely high, but I remember in 1984 it was the coolest movie ever. I think even as a kid of 11 I liked Pat just as much as Ralph. I suppose he led a pretty good life and he was happy. So, that's good, isn't it?

Fantastic Four

Well... I wrote about Fantastic Four in July. I just went back and read what it had to say. It wasn't great. Well, guess what? It wasn't that great the second time either. Here's how bad it was -- I fell asleep after 20 minutes into the movie, woke up, tried to watch some more of it, got 20 more minutes in, and had to shut it off. The DVD shows just how bad the camera work is.

The really bad costumes add a little something to it, as seen below.





The only thing that is okay is the special effects.




Or, at least, some of them. The rest of them suck. It's not a great description of the movie, but it really did suck. Last time I gave it a 5/10. This time I really can't go higher than --3.5/10

1.5 Billion in Aid

National Post

The Liberal government, days away from a non-confidence vote in Parliament that will trigger an election campaign, announced Thursday a $1.5-billion forest industry aid package.

More than half the money will go to help lumber exporters caught in the softwood trade war with the United States.

It's about time the government did something good on this front. They've taken little jabs at the US over this lumber dispute, but nothing has really been done. NAFTA, which from what I can tell stands for The U.S. of A can take all your shit if they feel like it, subsidize the heck out of their own farmers and fruit growers, but if you try to help your own country out, then the U.S. will screw you over, seems like a complete waste of time for Canadians. I think Mexico made out quite well after signing the agreement, and the States made out even better, but I just can't see how Canadians are benefitting.

So the Liberal government, right before they're about to get kicked off their mantle, decides to announce an aid package. That's great! I can understand why they would do it right before the non-confidence vote. Good strategy if an early election is called. Hopefully that money will be used to help out the people who lost their jobs (in a roundabout way, through job creation). No, wait... There's more.

The U.S. turns around and says this:

The package drew quick criticism from the U.S. government.

Well of course it did!

"Today's announcement is disappointing," U.S. Trade Representative Rob Portman said in a statement. "Only days after we fully complied with a NAFTA decision, Canada responds by announcing huge new subsidies.

"Canada's actions illustrate what the United States has been saying all along: the Canadian industry is the beneficiary of subsidies that create an un-level playing field to the detriment of the U.S. industry."

So after finally listening to NAFTA and taking off most of the duties they illegally imposed, the United States is going to turn around and do it all over again. And they'll probably do just this:

"That is not a guarantee that American protectionists will not launch further countervail actions," he said. "We know that it doesn't take much for them to create often a fictitious case and drag it out for years."

Which would make sense, because the Americans are comparatively moronic in their ideals to the Mongols. And we all know what happened to them, right? Believing yourself to be superior to the rest of the world, pushing values on other countries, and all around bullying is only getting them further in the doghouse with the rest of the world. I have to say, "Hey George! --- You ever wonder why everybody hates you? It's because you piss off too many people. Stop messing with other countries."

If you're going to sign a North American Free Trade Agreement then stick with it! Don't sign a contract that you can't live up to.

Canada believed it won a decisive victory last summer when a top NAFTA panel ruled Canadian lumber posed no threat of injury to U.S. producers. But the U.S. government refused to return duties already collected, citing its compliance with a WTO ruling on the same issue.

Prime Minister Paul Martin has warned that stance undermines support for NAFTA and its rules.
"Canada will vigorously defend its efforts to help sustain an industry that is being unjustly persecuted while the U.S. continues to ignore NAFTA panel decisions," Trade Minister Jim Peterson said from Ottawa.

However, he suggested the aid could be reconsidered if Washington cancels the duties.

"If the U.S. actually does the right thing - that is, drop the duties and return our money - the support package can be reviewed," Peterson said. "Until then the government will stand behind our workers and we will keep reminding the U.S. of the need to respect the letter and spirit of the NAFTA."

It's sad, really. We don't have the balls to stand up to G.W. and his cronies. Their little boys club isn't doing anything for their reputation, either here, or in the rest of the world. What's a bit shocking to me is the reaction of the citizens of the U.S. that I have talked to. They don't seem to support George Bush or his administration in any sort of way, yet they allow him to continue running the country. What is his approval rating at right now? Next to nil? So why has a coup not occured?

When is enough, enough? The bullying and jockying for world domination must end. Who's going to stop it? One government or another, or even a few, must stand up and fight for their rights as citizens of the planet earth. I think it'll be the Chinese. With their economy booming and their population poised to buy out most of the world, we'll all be under their control in the next 10 years anyway. Ah well.

BBC Two 'first to go broadband'

news.bbc.co.uk

"Roly Keating revealed his vision of an online BBC Two mixing "simulcast programming" and "comprehensive catch-up" in a speech to TV executives."

This really ticks me off. BBC2 will go broadband, maybe BBC1, and then a few others in the UK. Oh, wait, the US then sees that it's a great idea and it's working out well for the UK, so they'll launch something similar (of course with way more bells and whistles because they have to be better), and then, possibly, 20 years from now Canada might just get the idea and do something similar.

I can just see how it's going to work too. The big stations in the US won't let you download any of their programs unless you're an American. That's how HBO does it now. Or was it Showtime? One of them. You can't even view their website if your IP address is out of the country. Technology today, hey?

"A pilot will be unveiled next year along with further trials of MyBBCPlayer, which will allow viewers to legally download BBC programmes."

I wonder if they think this will stop people from downloading their shows through the current channels. I bet they do. It's fine to stream these shows to your computer or media centre enabled TV, but it means that you have to watch commercials, and I know a lot of people don't like that. So, these people are going to continue to capture the feed from the satellites, or from their dish, and still post it on the internet. I suppose a lot of people, like me, will just be happy to watch the shows they want when they want. If I miss The Office, I don't have to worry about not seeing that specific episode sometime in the far future when it appears as a rerun. But, I have covered this all in previous posts, so I'll move on.

Also, I should add, that I really like the fact that you can "catch up" as Mr. Keating says in this interview. If I start to watch something and find that it's phenomenal and I have to watch all past episodes, I can. That's really rather nice, don't you think?

The one problem, that I can see, is the quality of the shows. What kind of quality do you think you can get on a 1Mbit line? Not a lot. Even watching really bad streaming quicktime movies on my 1.5Mbit ADSL I often have buffering issues and the quality of the sound and the picture is nothing to write home about. So, for this to be a viable option, ISPs around the world are going to have to stop being cheap (yes, this means you Telus), and they're going to have to upgrade their networks. I want 10Mbit lines for $29.99 a month. It's not impossible. It means that Mr. Shaw won't get his $4 million bonus at the end of this year... He'll have to settle for $2.5 million. Boo hoo. GIVE ME SPEED!

Catch up

I haven't really posted anything about movies lately, so I thought I could maybe play some catch up.
I watched Office Space: Collector's Edition the other day. I'm not too sure what to say about Office Space. It's just Office Space, you know? A classic is just a classic. It's funny to me that I call it a classic even though it was only made 6 years ago.



Each time I watch this movie there's something different I find hilarious about it... a new favourite part with each viewing. It's kind of nice in a way. The very first time I watched it the part that was funniest was the part that hit closest to home. In the beginning when the camera is on Michael Bolton and he's singing along to Tupac (it is Tupac, isn't it?) and the black guy walks by, so Michael lowers the volume and quickly locks his door. That was funny to me because I was listening to a lot of rap about then, so I could understand where he's coming from. :)

The second viewing I thought the best part was Milton and his mumbling. He's a hilarious character, unbelievable at times, yet we all probably know someone pretty close to his make up.

I don't remember exactly what my third-viewing favourite was, but I know that that time Milton drove me crazy and I wanted to hit him. I found it stupid and pointless. Well, subsequent viewings each had their best parts, and Milton didn't drive me crazy as much as he did that second time.

The last time I watched this movie, which was about 5 days ago or so, the best part had to be "The Bobs". It might just be that I am a huge John C. McGinley fan since he's been on Scrubs, or that it was actually funny the way the two Bobs went back and forth, talking about Michael Bolton, the real one, and their love for him. Funny stuff.

It must just be the mood that I'm in while watching this movie that makes me like a different certain part each time. One thing, though, that has remained constant through each viewing, is my dislike for Joanna. I don't know what it is, but I really can't stand Jennifer Aniston. Every movie that she does is terrible. The funny part about that is that I loved her in Friends as the character Rachel. She was funny, witty, and she played the role well. It might just be that I can't seperate her from that role. I'm probably expecting her to be that character no matter what I see her in. It's really too bad.

So, overall, I'd have to give this movie a --8.5/10. It would have scored higher if the role of Joanna had gone to someone else.

Movies: Goblet of Money

From VH1: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire ended its first weekend with a bang.

"Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire" hit #1 on the box-office top 10, earning more than $101.4 million. That opening weekend beats the three previous "Potter" films and follows just behind "Spider-Man," "Revenge of the Sith" and "Shrek 2."

I saw this on the weekend. It was good. No, scratch that... It was really good. I think I've progressively liked each of these movies as they're released. I have watched the last ones over and over on DVD because I think they're just that good. I highly recommend this to anyone with even an inkling of curiousity. It's well worth it. --9/10

Music: Nick and Boobs

It's official!

"After a highly publicized romance and reality-series marriage, the couple officially announced their split on Wednesday to Us Weekly. "After three years of marriage ... we have decided to part ways," read a joint statement."

They are, of course, speaking of Nick Lachey and Jessica Simpson. Here's the thing I don't understand about this relationship. Okay, I need to emphasize that this is just one thing I don't understand. There are many aspects of their marriage that don't make sense. The thing for me is, didn't Nick know that she was a complete moron? You could tell by watching their show that he's not a patient person, and her stupidity ran rampant all over the house. I'm just surprised he made it this long. To all you single men out there, the blonde bimbo is free if you can stand anything that comes out of her mouth!

Today in Music: 1978

Funny that I mentioned Bob Dylan just a bit ago. Here's an interesting tidbit from VH1's Today in Music site.

"Bob Dylan fans start wondering if their hero is changing his religious direction when he plays a show in Fort Worth, Texas, wearing a large cross around his neck."

This also reinforces my belief in my brother's unusual ability to know mundane facts. He told me this exact thing tonight on the phone.

Music: Tegan and Jack?

I read on Jeffery Simpson's blog that the White Stripes have put out a cover of Tegan and Sara's, "Walking with the Ghost." When this album came out I was totally digging it! It's a complete 180 degrees from what I usually listen to, but there's something about those twins that just sucks you in and gets you wound up. This song, in particular, was one of my favourites. I haven't heard the single, but as Jeff (does he prefer Jeffery?) stated, it's being played on the radio in Vancouver, so some of you must have heard it. Let me know what you think. I'm almost tempted to open an iTunes account just so I can get this song!

I've done it!

I've gone ahead and done it. I wanted some input, but it just made sense to me to add the "Read More" hack. As you can see it actually works quite nicely. I don't think I'll go back and edit any of the posts so that they have the Read More functionality, but all past posts will have "Read More" at the bottom of them, even if the whole article is posted. Maybe I'll just go back and edit November, or however many are listed on this first page.

Hidden, Read More, or Normal?

I'm wondering about the style of posts that are on this page. As you might have noticed, I like to post about things in the news that interest me. It's mostly Tech, because I'm a tech-head, but some other things too. Anway, what I would like to know is what people think of the Blogger hacks that I have tried in the past. The first is the "[+/-] show/hide this post" hack which is useful, but I believe it really screws up the UI when viewed in Internet Explorer. The second is the "Read More" hack, which is the one I really like. It allows for the title of the post to be displayed and a bit of what's inside, and then if you find it interesting enough you can read on.

Another thing I wanted to implement was the use of tags and categories. It turns out, there's really not a clean, easy way to do this. It a bit of a bummer, seeing as this blog would be much easier to navigate if you were able to click on the topic that interests you and leave everything else in the dust.

Well, there is one way that uses Technorati and del.icio.us, but each post you do is a pain as you have to mess with these tags. Also, the problem with it is that when you do want to sort the posts, you click on the category and it brings you to Technorati, which, I have to say, is about the ugliest, most annoying webpage I've viewed in a long time. Let's just hope that the Blogger people are working on tags and categories.

Dylan's poetry auctioned for $106,079AUS

Now, I know Bob Dylan's an icon of sorts. Brilliant to some, a genius to others, and even a rock god to those who can actually understand him, but $78,000US? C'mon! To those hippies too high to realize what was going on his music was revolutionary, but his iconic status in today's world? Possibly non-existant? I think so.

"A collection of poems written by legendary rock poet Bob Dylan as a student at the University of Minnesota in 1960..."

So he was even a freshman in college when he wrote these? I'm not up to speed on my 'best of' Bob Dylan trivia, so I can't actually claim to know, but was 1960 the year his work was at its most profound point?

I wrote some poems in my first year of University... Anyone want them? I'm selling them cheap, too! Only $77,999US.

Check out the original article here.

Podcasting: All you need is a script, a PC, and a short list of gear

If you've ever wanted to get into Podcasting, I'd say this article is a good start. It shows you the steps to take to get there, what to do once you are there, and what to do when you're done.

businessweek.com article

A total misconception that a few people have said to me before is this --

There's no mystery about why podcasting is hot. The technology allows anyone to produce a radio-style program that an audience can find, download, and listen to anytime. Podcasts aren't just for iPods; they can be heard on any computer or portable audio player.

No, you don't need an iPod. I suppose the name Podcasting is a bit misleading, but it would be even stranger to call it something like 'personal portable audio amateur broadcasting', or 'PePo Au AmBer' for short. That just doesn't flow as nicely, does it?

So, what do you need to get started? Well, I like the idea of 'kits' that you can buy to get started, but I think you should try it out before you go and spend $150US on something you might not like very much. Do you have a headset mic? Write down some ideas on paper, your script, and then record yourself for 15 - 60 minutes. Was it easy? Probably not, so you might want to think about getting a partner and making your podcast a duo.

I find that of the Podcasts that I listen to, about 20, only 2 of them are a one person show. Those two would be Corby from The Twisted Pickle, and Tim Hensen from Distorted View. Each manages to pull off a one man show for completely different reasons. Tim's Distorted News (he was calling it News of the Weird until the copyright holder to that came after him) would work with two people, but Tim is such a caricature that he doesn't need anyone else. Corby, on the other hand, is equally as funny to those of us with a wife and kids, that his personal stories just wouldn't go over well if it came from more than just himself. So, after that long-winded thought, go ahead and decide if you're a solo artist, or part of a duet (or more).

That Podcasting topic was the only one not really covered in the Businessweek article. Read along as you set yourself up, get started, and then send me the RSS feed so that I can have a listen. I'm always looking for some good Podcasts to listen to.

Women Get All the Breaks!

You know, why is it that women get all the breaks?

"Breastfeeding may cut a mother's risk of type 2 diabetes, research suggests. "

A team from Harvard Medical School found one year of breastfeeding was associated with a 15% drop in a woman's risk of developing type 2 diabetes.

_{Yes, this is sarcasm taken to a new low.}

Albert Hubo Update

Original Yahoo News post here.
Oh, I know what you want me to say, but I don't think I will. It's all too easy to come up with about 50 different smart, sarcastic things to say about this picture, but I really can't drag myself to state the oh, so, obvious. What I do really like about this picture is the caption.

"U.S. President George W. Bush shakes hands with 'Albert Hubo,' a 54-inch-tall, two-legged robot topped with a head modeled after Albert Einstein as leaders of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum toured South Korea's hi-tech exhibition in Busan, South Korea, Friday, Nov. 18, 2005"

If the robot is only 54", how big is the little guy standing next to it? 4'8"? He's amazingly small. You just know G.W. is probably thinking, "I am the mostest giantest man on the world!"

IE part deux

Okay, after going through all the code for the site I can't, for the life of me, figure out what's wrong with the page in IE. It's like it's completely different code! The CSS used, and not by me, makes a shadow around the inner edges, but in IE there's nothing there. I can't explain it. If you are using Internet Explorer, don't. Go and get firefox, it's much better.

IE

I just noticed that IE does not like what I've done with the site. I also noticed that using the span tags from within w.bloggar gives unexpected results. Work! I command you to work! Time to pour through the code and see if I can't find the problem. I hate IE :(

Google Analytics Update

After being extremely frustrated with Google Analytics for the past few days, and then realizing that I was mad at a service that is completely free, and I'm lucky to have it, I checked today after work and it's now working. Here's what I have to say about it. It's excellent. For something free it gives you a ton of information. I don't know if a lot of that information is useful to everybody, but to me it is. Take this graph right here, it shows me that out of all the people that visit my site ten of them have visited 9 - 14 times, eleven have visited 15 - 25 times, and seven of you have stopped by 26 - 50 times. Well, to each one of you in each category, thank you for coming back. I know it's been a bit awkward in the last while, with me changing things around, sending all of my personal stuff to a new blog, and then drastically changing the look of this blog (which I'm totally unhappy with, by the way, and will be changing again soon).

I think what I'm getting at with this post is reflected in my post from last night on my personal blog, here. I'm trying to make this experience better for myself and for people who visit, and hopefully more will visit in the future. If they don't, I'm okay with that, too. So, I'm going to ask a favour. I'd like some feedback on the site. What do you like, if anything, and what don't you like? Is there something to add? Is there something that really bugs you that needs to go? Lay it on me. I'm a big boy, I can take it. You can either leave a comment on this post, or email me at kaievan@gmail.com. People say constructive criticism is helpful. Well, I think even if it isn't constructive, it still gives me insight into what's going on.




This next graph tells me that of the 100 or so unique visitors to / <BEGIN EDIT> sorry, I just realized that not everyone would know that / meant 'root' or the homepage <END EDIT> since installing Analytics, about half were returning visitors, and the other half were new. Now, the keywords used through Google to get to my site, and the entrance and exit points, both tell me that about 30 of those visitors were searching for a specific topic (the Einstein Robot was popular), but the others have been coming back. Each one of the people that do come back view about 1.67 pages. I know that's because the new material is on the front page, and the other 0.67 pages are comments.

So what does all this mean? Well, it means that I can monitor the activity on my blog, fine tune it when I see spikes in readership, and rip out the stuff that's not interesting to people. I like it. If you haven't signed up for Google Analytics, do so now. It's interesting to see what goes on behind the scenes.

OPEC tells European countries to cut oil taxes

The world's top energy producers, under pressure to meet global demand, have called instead on leading consumer states, mainly in Europe, to cut taxes on oil to alleviate hikes in prices.

OPEC, which supplies about 40 pct of world oil, and heavyweight member Saudi Arabia, made the call at the opening of the permanent seat of the International Energy Forum (IEF) in Riyadh Saturday.

As a driver of a car in North America, I have to completely agree with this. Have you ever seen the stickers on the pumps that show where each percentage of each dollar goes? I know I have. I also know that it's just a sticker, and maybe it can't be trusted, but it shows an interesting bit of information.

Most of your dollar that's flowing into your tank goes to one form of government or another through taxes. I drive a small car, so a fluctuation of a few cents really doesn't make a difference. Two cents more per litre means I pay 60 cents more per tank. Not that big of a deal. It's when the consumer drives a big SUV or a van like the one I use at work. It also makes a difference when the price of gas jumps from 89.9 cpl (cents per litre) to 139.9 cpl. That recent jump left most of us with a really bad taste in our mouths.

Sure, a hurricane in the southern U.S. is horrible, but should it affect the price of gas in Canada? I don't think so. With the amount of oil extracted each day out of Alberta, we could easily survive without OPEC. Of course, the better option would be if the prices for hybrid cars would come down, and possibly more government money could be invested in new clean technology. Maybe then the price of gas wouldn't matter so much.


Original article here