Rokr Subterfuge?

First of all, I'm sorry about this, I really am. In my defense, I voted in the only county that voted against it and I encouraged all my friends to vote. Everything things that Austin is a weird city, but I think it's normal and the rest of Texas is nuts. Enough politics though, I encountered an extremely provocative blog post at the Apple Blog. The big red light is that Apple forced Motorola to impose a 100 song cap on the phone's capacity while subsequently releasing the iPod Nano holding approximately 1,000 songs. Phrasing it that way makes it look very bad for Apple. Were they really trying to upstage the mp3 cell phone market to ensure that they hold onto their chokehold of the mp3 player market? They had to have helped with iTunes software for the phone, so they clearly threw some money in the hat at this project, but could they really have done that just to earn more cash for themselves? If they weren't the ones who mandated the artificial cap I would say, "no," but it just doesn't make sense otherwise. However, I think the failure of the Rokr is more on the fault of Motorola. It's up to them to put it in an appealing package, and it didn't look all that good to me because I thought the price was a little high for what you're getting. It's really a toss-up, and I'm a little undecided myself so I'll let you form your own opinion.

And that's not all about Apple today, Macsimum has discovered that they've filed a patent for a tamper-proof code technique through obfuscation. I don't understand exactly how it works, but I suppose that it only took losing their ideas to Microsoft once to keep them careful forever and ever. Speaking of Microsoft, if you're curious what prototypes they went through before arriving at the Xbox 360 design you can see pictures of them over here. Though they all have the same shape, none of them look as good as the final design so they made the right choice. MGM has decided to go with Blu-ray for the next-generation of DVDs, which I thought was a little surprising, but more power to Sony I guess. Lastly, IBM has been developing a web application that analyzes blogs to provide helpful information for consumers about products and I'm sure also for companies to see how people perceive them and their business moves. I'm not a big fan of IBM, but I've got to admit that I'm impressed by this.

Some of you may be wondering about why I haven't mentioned my Batman Begins DVD, and that's because it was backordered and has just shipped today! I've been waiting almost 3 weeks, but I'll be sure to tell you all about it when I get it. This image to the right is one of a few new ones from A Scanner Darkly, which we haven't heard much about in a while but I still have some hopes for despite mixed reviews thus far. I know that we also haven't heard much about a Batman Begins sequel for a while, but now we know that Two Face will most likely be an ally of Batman's in the movie and then turn into a villain at a later time, which makes a lot of sense given the origins of the character. There are a few rumors on the actor, but nothing substantial. I don't know why, but Hollywood has decided that there aren't enough remakes out there so they're going to do a redux of Robocop, which is disheartening to me because I loved that movie as a kid. There's also word that the writer of Bend it Like Beckham has decided to make a sequel to the cult comedy hit, but no other details as of yet. I'll leave you with a couple of videos. There's an awesome new teaser up for The Fountain, and it's looking really good so far. The other video is a behind-the-scenes featurette for Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, as if you need more to keep you salivating.

Bend over and get ready for the Wednesday Mind Hump ;) :

1. What does your personal neon sign say to the world?
"You Know You Want Me"

2. Ever seen a neon sign with certain letters burned out so that it said something unintended?
Not really, but now I'll keep an eye out for one.

3. What gives you a headache? Could be a scent, a sound, someone's actions - anything.
The sun being in sight for too long will do it, and so will writing while on the bus. I can read on the bus alright, but the writing is what causes issues. Luckily, I don't get headaches very easily.

4. What song, artist or album in your music collection would you pull out and play if you wanted to give your roommate/neighbors a huge, head-splitting headache?
I'm not really sure, actually. Maybe Rage Against the Machine?