Monthly Archives: June 2005

There’s only one thing more fun than the reaction that your coworker has when they return from a trip to see their desk, and that’s taking pictures of your hard work. Gizmodo took note and allowed me to discover this great display of bored and creative coworkers. My favorite is the Aluminum Foil, I’d keep it if that was my desk. I may need to get a NASA coffee mug to feel like I’m in a real space station.

At my old work we’d change desktop wall papers, screen savers, or my signature move: put a piece of tape over the eye of the optical mouse and lie in wait for your victim to return.

When you get that email from “Bill” that promises naked photos of Britney Spears or a huge sum of money form Bill Gates, I urge you not to open it. Panda Software (anti-virus) states that celebs are often used to fool computer users into opening malicious email attachments or visit pages with mal intentions. This isn’t new news to anyone who has owned or operated a PC (since Macs are immune to such nonsense) for more than 10 consecutive minutes. But Panda has created a list that I find quite interesting.

The top 10 “Celebrities are frequently used to distribute mails which either contain [attached] malware (often camouflaged as an image), or which contain a URL where the malware is accessed”

When I’m unemployed it’s so hard to find a job. Not due to my lack of experience, but the fact that I miss all my daytime TV shows –like soap operas. DVRs aren’t the answer to this problem because when I get home from work there’s only so much time to watch recorded programs, and weekends full of soap opera recaps would be a waste. Singapore has the remedy to my unemployment issues, soap operas on cell phones.

The kickoff will be 3-minute episodes of a 90 minute story. The 30 episodes will pioneer more than 10 other soaps totaling around 200 episodes for next year. I confess, I’m not that into soaps. I do suppose I could join in the drama with three minute bites while waiting for the bus or sitting in the waiting room.

Sony Ericsson released what I have personally renamed “the wireless card”. Why do I call it this? Let’s list off it’s wireless repertoire:
802.11g, 802.11a, 3G, GSM, and GPRS

Looks like 3G and WiFi can work together in harmony. Let’s put this marriage into a mobile phone then magically provide it to the US market. Am I dreaming or is this still considered wishful thinking?

When Top Gun came out I was 6 years old. I had to be Maverick, and watched the movie approximately 2.3 times a day for the entire summer vacation. I distinctly recall riding my bike in the street one summer day when suddenly I heard “Highway To The Danger Zone” on a neighbor’s boombox radio. He was washing the car in the driveway. I darted over to my house, ditched my bike in the grass, ran to the TV, and frantically pushed channel up until I was at MTV. To my disappointment “Highway To The Danger Zone” wasn’t on MTV, it was that damn Madonna girl again. I didn’t really like the Top Gun song, but I yearned to see Tom Cruise’s F-14 Tomcat fly the skies and shoot missles.

Flash forward 20 years, I can watch that music video with the help of the internet anytime or place that I desire. Screw the music video, I can take the movie with me anywhere. The idea of Tom Cruise in your pocket was absurd in the mid 80’s (yet every woman pondered the fantasy).

Where will it go from here? What dreams that I can’t fathom possible are being made possible? The Cable-Tec Expo 2005 will give you a hint of what’s to come in the near future. VoIP, H.264/MPEG 4 Part 10, Everything on Demand, DVR + DVDRW, Wireless MetroMesh Networking, and the list goes on. Highway To The Digital Zone I say!

I always try to watch TV when I’m on the freeway, thing is, I don’t have a TV in my car. Following a SUV on the highway at night almost guarantees a TV with The Little Mermaid playing for a car seat or two in the back seat. I like the Disney collection as much as any seven year old, but I can’t handle the same the heavy rotation that they consume most animated features. My tiny collection of DVDs coupled with the poor reception for broadcast TV stations on the road would provide a very repetitious viewing repertoire.

Sirius sees this problem and plans to tackle it just as they did with top 40 radio stations that include 24 minutes of commercials in each 30 minute segment of heavy rotation pop songs. Sirius Satellite Radio (whom I did a review on earlier) is planning to release stock quotes, sports scores, music videos, and cartoons via their service in the end of ’06. With content like this I just may validate spending four digits on a video/audio system in my car. As of now I just don’t see spending $1000.00 or so in order to watch my 7 DVDs in the car on 5” monitors. Let’s see if Sirius will add channels like Food Network and G4TV, I may not leave my car.

Found via wired.com

Historically, I have never met a gadget I didn’t like, and within, say, an hour or two it’s usually sitting up, rolling over and eating out of my hand. Forget about RTFM, I’ve become a power user over night.

Until now.

I’ve met my match, Cisco’s VoIP communication systems. Day 1 of a new job, I couldn’t answer the phone at all. Day 2, I was able to answer it and check my voicemail, but I deleted a message I meant to forward. Day 3, an additional added line was accidentally set to call forward into oblivion, but I did manage to plug in a headset. Today, Day 4, I finally solved the mystery of saved receipts in my voicemail box; They were email return receipts, able to be deleted as either text or messages.

I’m not sure if it’s technically progress when it takes me four days to gain telephone competency.

FAB (Foundation for Accuracy in Blogs) has conducted a precise survey about the real numbers of blogs and bloggers on the net today. I read this article and realized that one had to read in between the lines on this one. At first one would think that this organization, FAB, didn’t know their math or have a rough idea of the global population. In fact FAB is so advanced that most readers fail to see that they are not limiting this report to humans or the planet earth. There are planets far far away in galaxies far far away blogging far far away.

How else could you explain the fact that there are 32 Billion blogs to date? Their numbers show that the average blogger holds 3 blogs. I don’t know very many humans with 3 blogs so that means extraterrestrial life forms are keeping roughly 6 blogs each! Boy, are us humans behind on the blogging scheme of things. 27% of the current bloggers blog each day, and 82% of the bloggers don’t blog daily. At first glance one would think that 27% + 82% = 109% and you can’t have 109%, but I see this as 9% of the bloggers blog daily and then don’t blog daily, then jump back to blogging daily. It’s an overlap of percents that is taught as basic math in the intergalactic gradeschools.

In my childhood there was a song we’d sing every time we formed a ‘single file line’. “First the worst, second the best, and third the one with the hairiest chest! It was mostly sung by me, and only when I was second in line. Being first in line had an importance to it, a special place next to the teacher.

Google and I share so many things in common don’t we? Google wasn’t first in internet search, but they are definitely the best. Mapquest and Yahoo! Maps have been around for ages, and only 4 months ago Google joined in the online mapping world. If you haven’t used maps.google.com, then go there now and map something! Google has done it again, they’re the best. Different websites are incorporating their information into Google maps and creating quite a stir. Websites plot apartments for rent, crime locations, sex offender’s residencies, gas stations with the cheapest gas, and many other map-able entities. I can’t wait till can see this incorporation heading towards the online dating/matchmaking industry real soon.

From reading this site you most likely have assumed that I’m 6’4”, with a chiseled body, extremely popular with the ladies, played starting quarterback for the varsity football team, and straightened out the crooked administration that ran my H.S. Well I have something to confess, I was and am none of those. In high school, my mom was a teacher at my school and I turned all my homework in on time. Only a few school bullies picked on me and I only had my locker egged once in the four years I was there.

It’s payback time, and I’m not doing this the same way the Trench Coat Mafia did it. Us techy geeks are smart enough to know what’s fun, what’s real, and what’s not. We also know what’s real fun, beating up bullies, school principals, and getting the head cheerleader to plant a wet one on you 100% qualifies for that. Rockstar plans to release this procrastination-helping bit of software in Oct of 2005.