Author: blueZhift

Categories
General

Protected Buffer

In software circles, you hear a lot about buffer overflows and protecting against them. Depending on what tools you use, protecting the buffer from overflows could be like trying to stamp out ants. It’s funny how some of these structures seem to be replicated in real life. For years now, it seems that my household has a well protected craziness buffer. There’s only room enough for one person to be in the craziness buffer at a time and it is very rarely violated. One day I’ll be the crazy person and my wife the sane one and on other days this will be reversed. But in recent memory, only one person at a time has been able to be crazy. And since our craziness amplitude can be pretty big, I shudder to think what could happen to the fabric of spacetime if the craziness buffer somehow overflowed.

Categories
General

desu desu desu

Now I’m in an even more dreadful mood as my first attempt to post about being in a dreadful mood, crashed! desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu

Categories
General

Mooninites Conquer Boston

Of late, stories of civic idiocy usually come out of Florida (sorry Florida…), but I guess Boston’s officials wanted a piece of that action when they totally over reacted to a publicity campaign promoting Adult Swim’s Aqua Teen Hunger Force. I guess no one on the public payroll in Boston has ever seen a Mooninite. Well here’s a picture of one using a common Mooninite greeting gesture.

Mooninite Greets Boston
Categories
Games and Sports

Is The PS3 A Loss-Leader For Sony Bravia HDTVs?

Gamesindustry.biz reports that despite losses associated with the Playstation 3 launch, Sony profits not only beat estimates, but Sony was also able to raise its annual forecast. This all comes on the unexpected strength of sales of Sony Bravia HDTVs and Cybershot digital cameras. Did all of the media attention associated with the PS3 launch create a spike in sales of HDTVs? And did Sony rival, Microsoft, which recently did a head to head comparison of their Xbox 360 to the Playstation 3 using a 46″ Bravia HDTV, also help spark sales of the high definition flatscreens? Both the Playstation 3 and Xbox 360 tout enhanced graphics capabilities that are only realized when the consoles are connected to high definition televisions. The Sony brand still carries a lot of weight in the home electronics market, so anything that increases the likelihood of HDTV sales will likely benefit Sony ahead of many others.

It is estimated that Sony loses about $200 USD on every PS3 they sell, but if the Playstation 3 really is helping sell Bravia’s which may sell for as much as $4000 and are certainly being sold at a profit, then there may be some method to the madness after all. Normally, a console maker may take losses on the console to be made up in royalties paid to them on each game sold for that console. So far that hasn’t really kicked in for Sony which is seeing slow PS3 sales. But if PS3s can help HDTV sales in the short term while the game pipeline fills up, then Sony may not take as bad a hit on the high priced PS3 as some have feared. If any of this is true, then look for Sony to create some PS3-Bravia bundles in the near future, perhaps just in time for the Super Bowl.

Categories
Games and Sports Tech

Getting A Second Life

Keeping up with the latest in games and tech is not an easy task. After absorbing a lot of hype about Second Life (*cough*CNet*cough*), I finally decided to take a look for myself. So last night I created an account, chose an avatar and jumped into Second Life. Before doing this, I’d taken a look at various videos on YouTube depicting events in SL, but that did not prepare me for the generally surreal feeling of the environment. The resident composed background music plus various Linden Lab announcements added to this air of surreality. This could be a common reaction of SL newbs, or it could just be the reaction of someone who’s more used to jumping into a new online game and killing lots of rats in the first few minutes rather than what is essentially a giant sandbox. Actually, it felt a bit like being in an airport, which to a new arrival, is quite appropriate. Second Life is definitely not a computer game.

It was late, so I only had time to complete the orientation island activities before teleporting to some place whose name I forget right now. I also spent a fair amount of time altering my initial appearance, which still needs a lot of work. Right now I’m in full explorer mode. I want to see what SL has to offer and get some taste for its culture. And since I try to be frugal (that is, cheap) I’m just using a the basic free account.

On the technical side, Second Life feels a bit clunky. I know a good portion of this is due to server lag issues, so it’s no big deal right now, but jerky motions do detract a bit from the sense of immersion. The client interface is just a little clunky too, again not bad and perhaps unavoidable since it is cross platform meaning that the developers couldn’t make use of the usual Windows interface classes. Now that the client is open source, I expect that there will be some improved clients to choose from in the future. The developer side of me can’t wait to tear into this as well as the scripting system that allows SL residents to build things.

I’m not one who blindly follows trends, but I usually try to at least understand what all of the hubbub is about. I suppose that now I’ve become part of that hubbub and hype, but hey! It was late and I was bored…*sweatdrop*

Categories
Games and Sports

Vana’diel vs The World…of Warcraft

I’m not sure if it is just a coincidence or not, but since the World of Warcraft expansion pack, The Burning Crusade, came out, my Final Fantasy XI server, Shiva has been very quiet. The last couple of nights, during what is usually a fairly busy period of the night (after 9:30pm US Central Time), there have been well under a hundred players in the areas I’ve been in. Bastok, the Valkurm Dunes, and the Khonschtat Highlands have all been very quiet. The near desertion of these areas has made getting a party impossible. So I’ve been quietly soloing in the Highlands, completing some long overdue quests, and taking care of my Chocobo chick.

I can’t help but wonder if the WoW expansion has pulled away big chunk of FFXI’s population. I’m certainly tempted to give WoW another try just to see if it’s gotten any better than the last time I tried it out. In fairness though, last time I quit out of the frustration of never being able to get on a server without a long wait. It’s too early to count FFXI out, but in a game that demands party formation in order to advance, a sparsely populated server is not a good thing. Admittedly, I was in lowbie areas, perhaps it’s time for another trip to Jueno.

Categories
Games and Sports Tech

Get A First Life

Remember the William Shatner Saturday Night Live sketch in which as a guest at a Star Trek convention, he tells the very nerdy conventioneers to “Get a life!”? Now the media hyped (I’m talkin bout you Cnet!) online playlot that is Second Life is getting a bit of that in the form of parody site Get a First Life. The techie in me loves this quote from the site.

First Life is a 3D
Analog World
Where Server Lag
Does Not Exist

Categories
cosplay

Too Old To Cosplay?

Getting older cannot be avoided. It’s a universal law, the arrow of time points in one direction only. But does that mean that we have to give up all of the things that we have fun doing? Maybe not. An informal poll is being conducted on Cosplay.com in a thread entitled, “Average Cosplayer’s Age?“, and while it is no surprise that the bulk of responders are in their teen years, the majority are in their twenties or older. At the time of this writing, almost 13% of responders are in the 26 years and older bracket, number of whom have posted claiming to be in their 30’s and older. So it’s nice to see that I’m not the only one who feels that age has nothing to do with doing what you enjoy!

Categories
Anime, Manga, Etc

Free Manga Magazine Launches In Japan

I heard about this via the news box at mangaKabob. A free manga magazine is launching in Japan, Comic Gumbo, which will be entirely supported by ads. The only surprising thing here is that it had not happened already. The Japanese and US markets are different, but if an ad supported manga mag can make it in Japan, perhaps someone will try it here as well. Given the media hype about how manga in the US is attracting a lot of female readers (an attractive demographic), there could be a lot of advertiser interest in a free manga publication.

Categories
Tech

Fakin It Up: Making A Software Box With Photoshop

I have Photoshop envy. Yes, I admit it, but not because Photoshop is so much better than Fireworks MX, which BTW has served me very well, but only because it seems that everyone else uses Photoshop. Sadly, the high price of Photoshop is the main thing that keeps me from making the move. And because of this, I constantly have to do just a bit more work to take advantage of the sea of Photoshop oriented tutorials on the web.

I found an interesting Photoshop tutorial via Digg this morning, Create A Software Box, which fortunately I should be able to apply to Fireworks without too much trouble. It’s funny that even in this time of digital software delivery, that shrink wrapped box still carries enough weight to give an air of professionalism to products that will never see the inside of a physical box. Nice tutorial, definitely worth checking out no matter what graphics tool you use.

Categories
Tech

Windows Vista Pricing Ensures Piracy

Back in the day, I used to be an OS Cowboy. I loved loading up new operating systems when they came out with their promises of improved this and improved that. I even installed the betas, months before the release to get a sneak peak and to help sniff out bugs. I am a veteran of the great OS/2 vs Windows war, on the losing side…sigh. These days I run Windows XP and Ubuntu Linux. I’ve retired from the OS battles for the most part, choosing to use what works in a generally agnostic fashion. Still, I’d love to get my hands on Windows Vista, except for one little problem… It’s too f***ckin g*damn expensive! The family pack discount is a good idea, but the upfront cost is still too darn high!

If Microsoft wants to spread Vista far and wide, they have a strange way of doing it with what they’re going to charge for it. At $399 for a full copy of Windows Vista Ultimate (the only one worth having IMHO), it’s way out of reach for me and probably a lot of other like minded people out there. Such a high price virtually guarantees that Vista will not only be cracked, but that cracked copies may be the preferred method of upgrading to Windows Vista. C’mon Microsoft, give us a break!

Categories
Anime, Manga, Etc

Manga-ka Korner: Ken Akamatsu

Just a little something I put together for mangakabob this month.

Manga artist Ken Akamatsu is probably best known for the Love Hina manga series in which a loser guy is surrounded by a harem of beautiful young women who have a habit of somehow ending up naked. His current series, Negima, is similar, being a something of a mashup of Love Hina and Harry Potter wherein a 10 year old wizard is the precocious teacher of a harem of young female students who also have a habit of ending up naked.

Clearly, if you like seeing naked girls, you’ll probably enjoy Akamatsu-san’s work a great deal. But the thing that makes him one of my favorite manga-ka is the unexpected depth of the numerous characters he creates. They’re a lot more than just pretty faces, and instances of nudity are used for comedic effect, never anything truly dirty, in my opinion. From his first manga, A.I. Love You, through the current Negima, Akamatsu’s story telling gets better and better. Ken Akamatsu is a manga-ka you don’t want to pass up.

A.I. Love You
Love Hina
Negima

Ken Akamatsu on Wikipedia

Categories
General

Anshe Chung Video: How To Make Sure Everyone Sees It

Once again another lesson has been given on what to do in order to make sure that even more people see a video on the internet that you do not want them to see. This all started with CNet doing an interview of Second Life land mogul Anshe Chung in a continuation of the strange infatuation CNet has developed for Second Life. The interview taking place within the virtual world of Second Life was attacked by a griefer who hacked the area with a barrage of flying penises. Someone created a video of the flying penis attack and uploaded it to YouTube.

At this point, I had only heard of the interview and the griefing, not the video. And I had no real desire to see what had happened for myself. It is possible that it all would have ended there, except that people never learn. Chung’s husband filed a DMCA complaint against YouTube to get them to take down the video, which they did. But, as most people on the internet know, once something gets on the net, there’s no going back. The take down notice generated a big outcry against censorship and an attack on fair use rights. And the video was subsequently uploaded to Google Video and probably other similar sites. It was at this point that I learned about the video and took a look at it on Google Video to see what all of the fuss was about. IMHO, it was no big deal. These flying cartoonish penises were more the internet equivalent of schoolboy underarm farting sounds. Annoying, but not really worth calling too much attention to.

Perhaps the realization of this helped Chung’s husband make the decision to withdraw the complaint. Of course it’s a little late now that perhaps millions more have seen the video than might have if the complaint had not been filed in the first place. One can only wonder if all of this publicity was what they really wanted in the first place.

Categories
Tech

Google Patent Search

In a sign of the times, Google has just rolled out Google Patents, a patent search service, in beta, of course. Now perhaps it will be easier for us little guys to avoid being trampled by bottom feeding patent holding companies! If only reform of the generally messed up patent system (in the U.S. at least) was as simple.

Categories
General

Blog Marketing Tips

I started this blog mostly to learn about blogging, the software involved, etc.. I also thought it would be an easy way to add some dynamic content to other sites of mine via the rss feed. I’ve learned a lot and have had a lot of fun with it, and honestly haven’t thought much about marketing the blog better. It just is what it is. Despite all of that, I found Tony Hung’s article, How To Market Your Blog in 2007 (found via digg), very interesting because the marketing tips therein should be useful for any web based enterprise, of which I have a growing number. In my mind the real trick to this, is finding marketing techniques that don’t annoy one’s potential readers/customers. So any good advice in that department is always welcome.