Of YouTube and Cell Phones

Sorry about yesterday guys. I'm feeling much better today though, and I even decided to start taking a boxing class at the gym on Tuesdays and Thursdays starting next week, so that should be fun. Anyhow, anyone get the lame reference to the John Steinbeck classic? No? Yeah, I know I'm sad; deal with it. The first thing I wanted to discuss was this business with Helio and charging $6 a month to go to YouTube. There are two ways I see this. On one hand, they're providing the Internet service and can show you or not show you whatever they want, per their user agreement. On the other hand, it's outrageous, and the fact that they promise unfettered web access in their advertising leaves them vulnerable to a class action lawsuit. Hear that Helio users? It's not legal if they promised that to you! Under standard contract law, they'd have to let you back out of your contract should you choose to. The bigger issue is the moral issue of charging for a free service that is free on any other mobile phone or web browser. In fact, it's even free on the bloody iPhone! They have ads out for it and everything, and it looks better on the iPhone since it fits it to the screen. Of course, the lack of Flash support is disappointing on the iPhone, but that's aside from the point. YouTube on cell phones is about the cheapest way to get some form of television on your mobile phone, an idea that I think is kind of a big step in digital media, and they're trying to stifle it, the very thing that's meant to help them already! The very idea is baffling to me. Just wanted to rant a bit about it.

Back to YouTube real quick: the five Apple TV owners out there will be able to watch YouTube videos on their set top box via a free update that plays videos re-encoded to H.264. This is what the iPhone is doing as well. Why? The iPhone has hardware dedicated to displaying H.264 content, whereas Flash would take valuable CPU clock cycles, hence, hurting battery life on the iPhone. That's a really stupid reason to tell users they can't see Flash content on their iPhone, why not just warn them about that? There had better be a better reason for them not including it at launch than that. Oh, by the way, YouTube will get the beloved 12th spot. Isn't that a bit much for one website?

As most of you should already know, Dell has begun selling computers loaded with Linux rather than Windows at a reduced price. However, they're refusing to sell these machines to business customers. Why? I don't really know. I have a suspicion that it involves some deal they've made with Microsoft though since I can't imagine them making much more money off of Wintel boxes, but it's more likely a liability issue with support and such.

This is really interesting: Google filed an antitrust complaint against Microsoft regarding the desktop searching in Windows Vista, and Microsoft budged. The complaint isn't being disclosed, but it's most likely the difficulty of changing the default desktop search application in Vista and, apparently, using another vendor's program was actually slower (presumably, from how it sounds, artificially so). No details as to what changes are being made, but whatever they are, they've kept Google quiet, who's still facing an FTC investigation regarding their planned purchase of DoubleClick.

Speaking of Google, did you know you could Google search terms from Docs and Spreadsheets from within the document? I also didn't know how many regressive copies of your documents they keep. It's slightly creepy, but more impressive than anything else (like most of what Google does).

Being a college student, I couldn't help but plug these cool bottle openers. I personally like the ring one best (my stupid keychain ones broke off).

Ok, so this news is huge! I've literally been waiting over two years for this. My bread and butter, Amazon, has listed Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair for a November 7 release date. It's a 4-disc set putting together both volumes in a nice, NC-17 package. Rest assured, I will be pre-ordering this as soon as humanly possibly; my first DVD pre-order ever.



There you have it folks! Our first look at Harrison Ford back in his fedora for Indiana Jones 4. It's nothing special, but still may send chills up the spines of true action junkies to see this classic character again.

Despite previous reports, it turns out that Cillian Murphy will actually be reprising his role for The Dark Knight according to tipsters who saw him on set filming a scene involving some sort of gang fight. Not sure why they'd want to keep this a secret, because they really have bigger secrets to keep for this one.

We've got a couple of new trailers today. One is for The Simpsons Movie, and it's better than what we last saw, but that's not saying much. I really hope that this movie is funnier than the show has been these last few seasons. The other is for Into the Wild, which I only bring up because I haven't seen Emilie Hirsch much in a while and he's a pretty decent actor. Plus, it has Jena Malone. Anyway, sounds interesting, though I just feel like it'll end up being boring.

This actually leaked a couple of days ago, but I didn't see it before it got taken down, and now it's on Yahoo Movies: the first 8 minutes of Live Free or Die Hard. To be honest, it looks pretty neat. Then again, it is dense in action, so they're catering it to look cool.

Now for a Wednesday Mind Hump:

1. Who?
My beautiful girlfriend
2. What?
She's freaking amazing
3. Where?
In Austin, far far away =(
4. Song
"Hey there, Delilah" - The White T's
5. Food
Pizza
6. Animal
Tiger =)

I'm going to Vancouver tomorrow for the weekend, so I don't imagine that I'll be able to post for a couple of days. Have a good weekend everyone!

The Case Against a Startup

Today was a very full news day, and so I actually had my pick of what to start out with here. I decided to go with this provocative blog post from Pmarca, a well-respected tech blogger, about why to not start your own startup. I wanted to talk about it because the startup route is one that I've considered for a while, and I only thought about a subset of the disadvantages he brings up. This is probably one of the best breakdowns of the situation that you'll find out there. The pros are what have always stood out to me: the chance to directly make a difference, not having to take nonsensical orders, being your own boss, the shot at a lot of fun, and an overall fulfilling career, on top of the power rush. I always knew there was great risk and lots of work, but I didn't think about the massive rejection you face (something I'm personally tired of), the difficulty of getting enough good talent, or the extent of the emotional rollercoaster, or the amount of time it'd take away from being with family. Still, I think I'd someday be interested in joining a well-calculated startup. If the people running the thing did their research, had their stuff together, had done enough research to know that it'll be profit, and all that jazz, I feel like I'd definitely be willing to take that sort of a jump. Of course, this is no indication of what I'll do after I graduate, because even I don't know quite yet. At least now I know I don't want to start a startup! I just don't think I'm built to be that kind of a leader, though I do want to rise to leadership positions in my career.

AMD is an underdog who I've been rooting for since I took Computer Architecture and learned the ills of the Intel-created x85 design. Unfortunately, they're in deep financial trouble and are looking at the very real possibility of contracting out most, if not all, of their chip fabrication and just focusing on chip design. That really complicates the decisions they have to make, and it's quite risky. I wish them 'good luck', because they're going to need it.

Remember how Blockbuster decided to only rent out Blu-ray in the vast majority of their stores? Well, an anonymous worker at a large retailer claims that many people have been canceling their HD-DVD player orders based solely off of this. That must be pretty scary for the folks at Toshiba who had already been seeing slow sales of HD-DVD players. Well, at least someone is on the verge of finally losing this insipid format war (where the consumers are the real losers).

Also, remember YouTube's little video editor? I had no idea that there are already several web applications out there that will do even more with your videos for free. Check them out here. I know I'm tagging it for future usage. Personally, I think that eyespot looks the cleanest.

Speaking of video online, it turns out that Google Video is no longer a repository for videos and is now just a search engine for videos on the Internet as a whole. Well, actually, you can right now, but supposedly that will be changing very very soon, and the searching itself has already been ugpraded. This definitely makes sense given that they already have YouTube, I just wonder how they'll handle the content that they've already accumulated. By the way, Google Blogscoped has a full report of their press day if you're interested, but it doesn't sound like anything useful was revealed.

Microsoft is rebranding their IPTV platform as Microsoft Mediroom and including richer PC-to-TV capabilities. If it's anything like Windows Media Center, then I hope that we start to see a lot more of it.

A new web 2.0 application based out of Austin (*sniff* home) called Thoof aims to bring forth yet another nonsensical name but incorporate fancy algorithms to provide users with personalized news content as determined by the community at large. It's going to face the infamous bias that Digg has though, in my opinion, in that it'll get overrun by young geeks (high schoolers to guys in their early 20s) and not provide the intelligent news that they intend on. More power to them if it does work, because it sounds cool, but I just think they're being a bit too idealistic.

Lastly, Yahoo CEO and co-fouder Terry Semel has stepped down as CEO and given full control to Jeffrey Yang, which has to make you wonder what exactly is going on at Yahoo that he feels he can no longer effectively lead it. Their stock only took a slight tumble today though, we'll see what happens tomorrow.

Massawyrm over at AICN has seen Evan Almighty and, true to his style, totally ripped it a new one. It killed a lot of my interest, but if you still want to see it then Yahoo has the 8 minutes of it for your viewing displeasure.

We actually have a couple of better shots of the Batpod now, but since I already showed you guys a picture of it yesterday (and a video), I thought I'd put up a new picture of the Mach 5 instead. I like it! It's very true to the series.


I didn't report on this because I didn't think that it was important at the time, but the controversial Michael Moore film Sicko (this time controversial for illegal footage shot in Cuba), was leaked to online movie pirates, and so Lionsgate and Weinstein Co. have decided to move up the movie's release in Manhattan one week to this weekend. A mildly smart and risky move since a flood of bad reviews could mean disaster, but I guess they figure that's better than people getting it online? People are going to get it online anyway though, so I really wonder how much this will help them.

The director of Bond 22 (only a codename, don't worry) has been decided: it's Marc Forster of Monster's Ball and Stranger Than Fiction fame. He's definitely a diverse director, so I look forward to seeing what he does with 007.

Indiana Jones 4 has begun shooting! Nothing else to say, it's just very exciting.

Legendary Pictures has picked up the rights to make a movie out of famed Blizzard third-person action franchise Diablo. I used to play the game so I know that it's not exactly heavy on plot, which makes me wonder what the Hell (no pun intended) they're going to do with this one. It's a battle between Heaven and Hell with nondescript characters. Then again, they were behind 300.

FilmForce has some great brand new clips (new as far as I know) from Transformers over here. I personally like the "Ladies Man" clip. Optimus is so cool! IGN also has a 3-D view of a set from Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix if anyone is interested.

Lastly, I have a couple of trailers. One is for Michael Clayton, but I don't understand what's going on in the trailer at all. It's definitely a drama, and it involves lawyers, but that's about it. The other trailer is more my style and is for The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters. It's a documentary about a guy who always loses but is trying to beat the reigning champion of the original Donkey Kong. It may sound stupid, but I've heard good things from SXSW.

I'm going for the TMI Tuesday this week since it's less racy than usual:

1. If you were to face the Wizard of Oz, would you want more courage, more brains, or more heart?
Definitely courage. I'm not concerned with the other two, but I do wish I was braver.
2. Have you ever gone to court for anything? What for?
Nope!
3. What was the last thing you did that you previously told yourself you wouldn't do?
Have extended fantasies about my girlfriend while at work.
4. Did you ever have a summer fling while on vacation?
NO!
5. Have you ever done anything sexual with someone who's name you never knew?
Ummm, ew. No.

Google Gears in Motion

I wonder if there's a reason why news has been so slow. Meanwhile, work for me has been getting pretty involved, and a little more fun, too. Still, I miss Austin and my friends there, and a big part of why I miss home is my girlfriend, who I really miss dearly. No good geek is complete without his girl, and yet the show must go on here! Apparently, Google pushed out a service called Google Gears that allows you to run web applications offline by storing data locally on your hard drive and then synching with the web application whenever you return online. Google Reader works with it, and so does Remember the Milk, among others, but it works because these services don't really require downloading a whole lot of data to your computer. If they did, then they'd probably be wasteful and piss off the users. It's a cool idea, and it will work in a subset of the web applications out there (including Google Docs, I'd imagine), but it's not enough quite yet to make an web-based operating system a reality. They're still not going to be able to give Microsoft a run for their money, but they are making the online experience a whole lot richer. I think that one facet of the online experience that pundits who scoff at these being threats to Microsoft are missing is that it eliminates the process of having to ship a product since you can immediately put updates out there without any cost to the user, and easily pull them back if they don't work out. In fact, Amazon tests their UI changes on a subset of their actual traffic to see how they affect shopping trends before implementing them, so that's just one small sample of the power of the web. So don't underestimate it, just don't be overzealous about it either.

We have a couple of updated details on the iPhone. Apparently, it's talk time is 8 hours, its idle lifetime is 250 hours, it can handle 24 hours of music, and it can handle 7 hours of video. That sounds pretty promising to me, I just wonder how much a battery you can't interchange will frustrate users. After all, there's always a decent percentage of cell phone batteries that go bad abnormally quickly, and I think cell phone users would be less forgiving of such an issue than an mp3 player user since a phone is a necessity of life nowadays. Oh, and things are looking good for not needing that 2 year contract agreement.

Also on the iPhone front, one blogger has a good, hacky solution to Apple's stupid 3rd party development solution of running things within Safari: add an icon that just goes to a place with favicon-accompanied bookmarks that open in Safari minus the chrome so it looks like an application rather than a webpage. It's a minimal solution, but it's better than their half-assed one.

Another item from Apple: they're probably going to be putting out the heavy hitting 20 and 24 inch iMacs by mid to late summer, which is the first upgrade for this line of computers since last fall. It's long overdue, I'm sure, and I hope it's better than just beefier processors.

Here's a one-liner: check out this list of great amateur photography tips. I live by many of these things, especially Canons being the best quality and megapixels being bullshit marketing.


How cool is that? It is being referred to as the Batpod, and is kind of like the motorcycle offspring of the Tumbler from Batman Begins. You can get a better look at it over here. There are also some delicious rumors out there. If you want to find out more about The Joker's plans, listen to this fun video. If you really want to have the movie spoiled for you though and find out who Anthony Michael Hall is playing, click here. The Joker thing, I'd say, is a fairly minor spoiler, assuming it's actually true, but the other is pretty big.

Lastly, AICN has a slew of amazing reviews for Ratatouille, and so now I have to see this movie as soon as possible. AICN never tries to stack good reviews for a film and often tries to be pessimistic, so this speaks volumes, in my opinion.

Now for some Monday Madness:

1. In your opinion, what is the perfect summer daytime temperature?
70 degrees Fahrenheit
2. What is the perfect nighttime temperature?
60 degrees Fahrenheit
3. Do you plant many flowers around your yard?
I don't have a yard, yet =P Someday though I will, and I'll have my wife decide that ;)
4. How much lawn do you have to mow? Do you enjoy mowing lawn?
Again, none. But my parents have a pretty big lawn (takes no less than an hour to mow).
5. Of the summer months, which is your favorite?
Probably May, because the break from school is most welcome then. By July, you've typically had your fill. As for me, I'm just waiting for August so I can see my girl again.
6. Do you take a long vacation each summer?
Not in a long time, though I am in Seattle right now so I'll be doing things here and there. Once again though, would be better with a certain someone, so it's not a true vacation without her.
7. Is summer your favorite season? If so, why? If not, why not?
No, winter is because I'm so used to the heat in Texas. Still, this is the best weather I think I've ever experienced on a consistent basis.

Blockbuster Boosts Blu-ray

How's that for an alliteration? I know, it's kind of wimpy, but I tried! Anyhow, Blockbuster has decided that the vast majority of their rental stores will only carry the Blu-ray format out of the next-generation DVD formats given that Blu-ray rentals covered 70% of the high-definition format rentals. What I'm curious about is why there's so much consumer support for Blu-ray. It seems like Internet geeks prefer HD-DVD, and it sounds like it has better video quality also, so why the huge disparity between HD-DVD and Blu-ray rentals? I guess the more important question is whether or not HD-DVD stands a chance. Given that these movies aren't going to have big price drops for a while, unlike current-gen DVDs, I'd estimate that more people would invest in rentals than in purchases. I don't know if I'd declare Blu-ray a winner quite yet though, because people have turned more to online rentals nowadays like Netflix and Blockbuster's online thing, which will have both HD-DVD and Blu-ray unlike the majority of their stores. This is a pretty big blow, but it ain't over by a long shot.

YouTube has added a new feature to their site: you can now edit your videos right from the comfort of your very own browser. It's not very fleshed out, or very pretty, but it gets the job done. I'd like to see them do a lot more with it, because it's not going to appeal to anyone who knows what they're doing with video editing.

In Apple land, geeks are planning to unite in a voluntary conference to discuss how to develop software for the iPhone without an SDK. These guys must be really obsessed, but I guess it's a good idea. Oh, and Apple is helping along the marketing with a little Flash movie on their iPhone home page showing how the multi-touch technology works on a very high level. I'm curious as to how the hardware works on the low-level though.

If you're a programmer who appreciates dry humor, you may like this look at Abject Oriented Programming.

The box office this weekend wasn't too surprising with the Fantastic Four sequel coming out on top at over $57 million dollars despite the less than favorable reviews. I guess that the well-cut trailers brought in enough people. It was followed as expected: Ocean's 13 and Knocked Up, with only a few million bucks between the two of them. What was kind of funny was how steeply Hostel 2 dropped, but I'm more surprised that Spider-man 3 is clinging to the #10 spot. Oh, and the DOA re-release was horribly conceived bringing in not even half a million dollars. I wonder if 1408 will be good? It is based on a Stephen King book, and I love his stuff.

A trailer has popped up for a movie called There Will Be Blood, and it features a cool, gritty monologue. It's another Western movie, but I suppose that we're about due for a sprint of Western flicks anyway.

AICN has gotten more reviews for Transformers, and they pretty much confirm what one would expect: it's great eye candy and a fun summer flick, but it's not without its share of flaws. Still, it sounds quite worthwhile. Do you really expect a heavy plot from a Transformers movie anyway? Come on, it's alien robots that transform into American cars.

Lastly, it sounds like Indiana Jones 4 will have an atomic explosion in it. Hmmm, interesting.

Now for some Unconscious Mutterings:

I say ... and you think ... ?

1. Riding :: Tractors


2. Actress :: Julia Roberts


3. Flowers :: Lilies


4. Making :: the Band


5. Robot :: Chicken


6. Enjoy :: Coke (stupid ads)


7. Identify :: Object


8. 22 :: 44


9. Busy :: Work


10. Forward :: E-mail

Bush vs. The Bloggers

Sorry, I started this post last night and finished most of it, but a personal issue came up and then I was busy until tonight.

Once again, it's a slow news day. I'll admit, my topic exaggerates a bit, but the crux of what I'm going to be talking about here are bloggers. There's a little thing called the Free Flow of Information Act that aims to act as a shield for journalists so that they don't have to reveal confidential sources unless it's a matter of national security. What's controversial is that its definition of journalism covers anyone who publishes stories appealing to the public interest. The Bush administration believes that it's inclusive enough that terrorists could hide information under it, which I don't quite understand since it specifically has an exception for national security. So what's the real bone they have to pick here? I think you're reaching for straws when you're dissenting argument is that someone could just put up a blog if they were being challenged and claim protection. I don't think any court would hold up the law retroactively like that, and it's not like someone's going to find out about a murder from the killer, report on it, and then not reveal to the police who it is. I don't see what the connection between journalistic sources and terrorism is either. The only point I do agree on though is that it should not cover slanderous journalism. Purposely falsified stories should not be protected. Other than that though, it sounds like a pretty solid act, to me.

It's no secret that the Facebook platform is out in the open now, but what is interesting is the frenzy it has created. Applications have gained several hundreds of thousands of users within a couple of days, and the suite of applications has passed 1,500. Also, all these web 2.0 startups are itching to jump on board before it reaches saturation. I wonder how long this little craze will last. Facebook has had sustained popularity for quite a while now, after all, but apparently still not surpassed MySpace.

If I was in Austin using my desktop computer, I'd be all over this program right now. It allows you to sync from your iTunes library directly to a non-iPod mp3 player, and it's appropriately called iTunes Sync. I don't have iTunes installed on this laptop though, nor can I, so I guess it'll have to wait, but feel free to try it out!

How will laptops look in the future? Ok, so no one really knows, but Sci Fi Tech put up a neat concept art of a laptop that would be OLED based (so it can be a screen and have a keyboard) and very versatile. It would be modular enough to function differently on the run, at home, or at the office, and you could additionally use a stylus pen with it.

Lastly, check out Ars Technica's latest computer-building guide. It's comprehensive, as always, for the budget, middle range, and filthy rich kid computer purchasers. That budget computer actually looks pretty sweet though at under $800.

There's a new poster out for The Bourne Ultimatum, but I feel like it's actually rather drab. The movie is more important the the poster though, so it had better at least be a fun action flick. If it was a B- movie, I'd be happy.

All I have now are trailers, which are always fun to watch. Apple has the high-definition teaser trailer for the upcoming Pixar original movie (so nice to hear about an original movie) called Wall-E. If we're to believe the teaser, it was conceived long ago and has finally come to conception. Given the caliber of ideas Pixar has put out there, I'm sure that this will be something to keep your eye on.

I was also pleasantly surprised by the trailer for August Rush. It didn't look that great, but it sounds like an interesting story about how music brought an orphaned boy back to his also musically-inclined parents (Keri Russell and Jonathan Rhys Meyers). I guess I'm just a sucker for music, but I like the idea of music being deep enough to bring families back together.

Yahoo has the stunning trailer for the Western flick 3:10 to Yuma featuring Russell Crowe, Christian Bale, and Gretchen Mol. The trailer was a bit too complicated to follow, but it looks like Crowe is an outlaw in a rather lawless town brought to justice by Bale among others, and crazy drama and shoot-outs seem to ensue. I'd love to see it just to see those two actors facing off against each other.

Lastly, but not least, there's the trailer for the romantic comedy Rocket Science. It's a love story for the nerd in all of us, and it looks really cute and funny, I must say. It's particularly relevant for me given that I've been cluttering since before the age of 15, and it was definitely socially alienating for me (still is, but when you have the girl and friends and family that I have in my life, it makes it much more bearable).

Now, for an even more relevant Saturday-8:

1. do you have an exercise routine currently?
Yep. 6 days a week!

2. what's the most amount of money per month that you would pay for a gym?
That's hard to say, but probably $60 since I'm paying like $55 right now. It's astronomical, but that's because it's Seattle and it's only a 3 month thing. I'll probably get a membership at a big chain like 24 hour fitness next year when I graduate. Too used to the free gym at UT right now.

3. have you ever been unable to exercise, for instance, due to an injury, lack of funds or time, etc.?
Yeah, last week! I was way too sick to work out. I only ever skip working out if I'm out of town or if I'm really ill. I haven't been injured in a very long time. I definitely will lose sleep to work out.

4. have you ever had a friend or family member that exercised TOO much, to the point that they were anorexic (or very, very close)?
Not that I can think of.

5. have you ever exercised too much, to the point where it was unhealthy?
Well, when I first lost all my weight back in 2002, I probably was underweight, but that was totally on accident. My metabolism was really high, and so I stopped jogging but I kept losing weight anyway, and that was unhealthy. I evened out after a few months though.

6. have you ever had a negative experience at a gym (with other patrons, equipment, trainer) or with the gym themselves (billing, closings, etc.)?
Yeah, it's called the bench press =P I've probably almost killed myself with that thing several times. Fortunately, I have enough adrenaline to finish the rep or someone nearby comes to my aid. I think it's cool how guys at the gym watch out for each other instinctively.

7. one form of exercise that seems bizarre to me is spinning as i cannot understand sitting on a stationary bike for an hour with some little skinny bitch screaming at you from HER stationary bike. what form of exercise do you not 'get' or would never try because it seems too weird to you?
The sex machine. You know what I'm talking about! My brother and I decided to start calling it the sex machine. It's always a girl on it, voluntarily opening and closing her legs while seated. I also don't get lat pulldown behind your head or the guys who bend and straighten their knees while doing side raises. Oh, by the way, it's not a bench press rep if you don't touch your chest with the bar.

8. if you had two free, dedicated hours each day to do something athletic that would NOT take away from work, friends, or family time, and the unlimited funds to do it, what type of exercise would you do daily? lipo, by the way, does not count... ;)
I'd spend one hour lifting weights, and I'd spend the other hour rotating between biking, kayaking, racquetball, football, swimming, and boxing probably.

Skitch is in Beta

I wish I could say that I've tried Skitch and I'm here to review it, but I'm afraid that I have to wait for a beta invitation just like everyone else. I wanted to talk about it anyway because, once again, it's a slow news day. Also though, I think it solves a problem I've always had and I'm sure is very common. So what is Skitch? I recommend watching their little 3 minute video. Granted, I haven't used it yet, but it looks so intuitive it makes my eyes want to pop out. It looks like everything a consumer level graphical application should be. It's drag-and-drop, and it saves without you having to tell it to, and resizing and cropping doesn't requiring finding some menu item somewhere, and all that good stuff. Even better: you can create an image based on what's on your screen right now rather than hit the "print screen" button and crop and all that jazz. And I do that quite a bit, which is why I say it's a problem I've wanted solved for a long time. Paint .NET is as close as I've come to a nice, free, lightweight image editor, but this one may take the cake. I guess I'm hyping it up, but I just love that it looks like it was totally designed with the user in mind.

In the past two days, there have been more than 1 million downloads of the Safari beta for Windows. Who are these people? They must be hardcore techies, or Mac users who have Windows dual booted. In any case, it looks like you can get all its special features via Firefox add-ons except for its improved search highlighting. I never knew it had a porn mode; I think that's pretty funny.

Kodak thinks that it may have dug up an old patent of theirs that would allow them to create cameras with better light sensitivity, which may eliminate the need for flash in their lower end cameras. This would mean no more red eye, if it was really possible. It doesn't look like it'll hit the mainstream any time soon, but will more likely see camera phones and scientific equipment much sooner. I don't understand how they're able to do this, but I'd love an ultracompact camera that didn't need flash, and would totally pay a premium for it.

This is kind of funny, eBay decided to stop using Google Checkout, so Google set up a party in Boston to coincide with this eBay seller conference to protest eBay's decision. Wow, what a childish move. I think that eBay was justified in subsequently pulling their ads from Google because I would not want to do business with someone who was being so unprofessional. It's like they were saying, "so you're not going to give us as much of your money anymore? Alright then, we're going to strongarm you into it!" Oh well, I guess companies have their stupid slip-ups every once in a while.


How cool does that Batsuit look?! That scan from EW highlights the updates to the Batsuit made for The Dark Knight, including the sharp things on his arms we're used to seeing in the comics, better material, and a movable neck. Rock on, Bruce Wayne. Rock on. We also have a shot of what we believe is the Joker car and pictures of the convoy that may be taking him to or from prison or something of that sort. Oh, guerrilla pictures; you gotta love them.

In further comic book movie news, Marvel's next project will be Captain America. Meanwhile, the Mulroneys have submitted their draft of the Justice League America script to the WB, and Zak Penn will soon start penning the script for The Avengers. And somewhere, a cash cow is being millked as we speak. Zak Penn had better not disappoint us! He negated X2 with that third abomination.

The newest Transformers poster looks really sweet, and there's a new clip online from The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. No action, but it's still kind of neat.

If you want to take a look at how Ratatouille was animated, there's a little decomposition over here. Animation never ceases to amaze me because I'm a horrible artist.

The trailer for No Country for Old Men has hit the Interweb, and it's confusing and obscure. However, it has a great cast and people who saw it at Cannes seemed to like it, so it's probably worth our attention. Man, I haven't seen Josh Brolin in a film in a really long time.

Now for the 3x Thursday meme:

1. Are you, or have you ever been in a managerial type position? Do you/did you like it? What about it did you like or not like? If not, would you ever *want* to be in that type of position? Why/why not?
Not really, except for being an officer in a school organization, which is not the same thing. I would want to be in that position, but as a technical manager. I'd still like to be connected to the code that I'm helping manage, even if not directly, kind of like how managers are at Amazon.

2. If you've ever been in a managerial position, have you ever had to fire someone? What was that like? If not, have you ever been fired? What was that like?
N/A

3. At the end of the day, we're all employees, but would you rather be the Boss or the Employee? Why?
That's hard to say, I don't know. Being THE boss is a lot of work and responsibility, but I don't want to necessarily be a sheep. I'd really place myself somewhere in the middle, because I'd prefer to manage a small group of people.

By the way, this is my 700th post! W00t!

Yahoo's Blue Bar

No single news item today really grabbed me, so I thought I'd just talk a bit about the new blue Yahoo search bar. What's so great about it? That's just the thing: nothing. Let's compare it to the Google search bar, shall we?


I could've sworn that there was a time when Yahoo was actually creative. Granted, this isn't quite as direct a knock off as their Yahoo Mail chat thing or their changes to Yahoo Maps, but when I saw it I immediately was reminded of the Google search bar. More importantly is that I don't know why they even care to make such a UI tweak. It just makes it look a little more like Launch, or Yahoo Music or whatever they want to call it nowadays. I really think that Yahoo needs to get its butt in gear. They're kind of just hanging out there as a minor competitor to Google, and they haven't been on the offensive in a long time. By being on the offensive, I mean that they don't have any application that makes them better than Google, they just minimally compete. Hell, maybe they are just coming up with the same ideas but taking longer on them. Still, that's a problem. This blue bar might as well just be a blue screen of death if they don't put forth a better effort.

On the iPhone front, Apple has announced that iPhone users will be required to have accounts with the iTunes music store. Why? No one really knows quite yet. Could it be for synching data to their servers or something? Because that would be interesting, but scary privacy-wise. Even then, why require it? You're just complicating the release process. Even more interesting is that cell phone retailer Pure Mobile is selling unlocked iPhones to work on any carrier. They're a legit service, so it doesn't seem like a con, but how is this possible? Maybe it's only for Canadians? It would have to be legal, or else Apple would've already sued them. It's especially fishy though because Apple said that only AT&T and Apple stores would sell the iPhone, or at least in America.

Something I didn't really mention about the WWDC keynote is that Steve Jobs pimped out EA as providing more games to Macs now that they're on Intel chips, but it turns out that they're really just EA PC games running in Cider. And what, pray tell, is Cider? It turns out that it's a portability engine that adds a layer to your Mac to allow you to run Windows games on it. Hence, these EA games aren't ports, and won't be running natively. I'm not even a Mac user and I think that's lame. What a total cop out from the largest video game studio in the world.

Sorry, there's just a lot of Apple news today. Ars Technica tried out the new 17" MacBook Pros featuring Santa Rosa chips, and it turns out that they're really not much of an improvement over the last iteration of the 17" MacBook Pro (Revision B). It still costs nearly 3 grand, and it's still a solid machine, but you just get a faster FSB, a slighter faster clockspeed, and a little bit more battery life. So much for the hype behind Santa Rosa. Ars Technica also tried out Safari for Windows, and they weren't impressed. I'm glad that I never got it.

In an effort to be more sexy, eBay has opened up its APIs in beta for eBay, PayPal, and Skype for third-party development. I wonder if uShip is using this? In any case, it's an interesting move from one of the few companies to survive the dot-com boom. At least they're making the effort to adapt, but it's still restricted, and one would hope that that changes once it's out of beta.

I think that the Business 2.0 list of who matters is kind of funny because it has Bill Gates at #41 but Digg creator Kevin Rose at #6, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg at #14, Engagdget founder Peter Rojas at #9. Yeah, that list isn't skewed at all.

It looks like Live Free or Die Hard isn't too hard for teenagers, because it has earned a PG-13 rating. There's no doubt that this will rake in more money for it, but it doesn't bode well for the quality of the movie. Not that PG-13 movies are usually bad, but this movie's action can't be too violent (it's an action movie, for Pete's sake!) and it can't be too dark of a plot either. Oh, and kiss sexual inuendo "goodbye" (except for a "brief sexual situation").

David Goyer has decided that his next project will be re-imagining The Invisible Man. Doesn't he have a better movie to do? Not to knock the original movie, but I'm just tired of re-makes and sequels.

AICN has a review of Transformers from someone whose background seems to match mine with the franchise, and I swear it sounds like they had an orgasm during the movie or something. So it would appear that the movie is more than just eye candy, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed!

Now for the Wednesday Mind Hump:

1. Have you ever cut or burned yourself while cooking?
Almost every time I cook, yeah! I just often cut my thumb a bit when I'm cutting onions.

2. Have you ever put in a wrong ingredient in a dish (sugar instead of salt, for example)?
I was boiling eggs once just to eat them like that, and I accidentally sprinkled MSG on one instead of salt because my room mate's mother had given him a shaker of MSG (they were Vietnamese). That was an interesting experience.

3. Have you ever dropped, or otherwise ruined, a dish just before serving it? Bonus points if you had a large number of people waiting to eat it.
Not that I can recall.

4. In case you aren't a cook - Have you ever had a restaurant make a klutzy move that affected your meal? Tell us about it!
Last Friday, I went to dinner with some other interns, and one of my friends ordered fish and chips, but the waitress dropped them on her way to him. Then, when she went to get a new plate, the cook dropped it. Third time was a charm though, and he got it free (plus a free pitcher of beer).

The Facebook Platform

There's really not a whole lot of interesting news today. The best thing for me to talk about is actually the Facebook API that was opened up in the middle of my little hiatus. Facebook applications, more like widgets, started popping up like mosquitoes on a humid Texas night based on this API. I never really said much about it, but I really like this blogger's analysis of the situation. I think he exaggerates in saying that it's a giant leap forward for the Internet industry, because I don't think that Facebook is that big of a deal, but fortunately he lists plenty of problems to compensate. I, for one, think that it's a double edged sword. On one hand, it's great that they've opened up and people can do almost whatever they want within the Facebook platform, including make money, and it's basically free labor to the Facebook team. They get all this extra functionality at no cost to them other than the processing power required as being a proxy. However, I think that this is just one more push that's making Facebook too complicated. True, it's a totally optional addition for you, but when it shows up on your friends' news feeds and then they invite you to install these things and all that crap, it becomes quite a bit. Plus, everyone's profiles are bound to get pretty cluttered very soon. And if an application breaks, it'll look bad on Facebook even though a third-party made it. Worse off yet are third-parties like iLike whose servers died because developers have to host their own code. Does all this mean that it was a bad move for Facebook? Not necessarily. It may need to be tweaked a bit, like they may want to support the ones that do really well, but I think it's better for them to be open than to be closed off.

There's plenty of Apple news hanging around in the aftermath of WWDC, and I'm going to shave it down to the things that you'll actually care about. The iPhone will not support the Adobe Flash Player, which I simply don't get. Is there some serious security hole that would kill the iPhone? Or did they just not have time to support it?

The bigger issue though is the issue I mentioned yesterday about not providing an SDK. You can see one example application over here that doesn't require an iPhone SDK to work, but it does need Safari. I don't have Safari so I can't use it, but maybe you can. If you're a stubborn Windows user like me, you can see what we're missing out on over here. They definitely strove to preserve that Mac look and feel, which is good and bad, but still doesn't attract me to download it. Anyway, if my little rant yesterday about the lacking SDK wasn't enough, then Gizmodo has even more to say about how it means that the iPhone is craptacular unless Apple does some really amazing stuff with it since the third party applications people were dreaming up can't happen, and that's sort of a buzzkill (but not totally, in my opinion).

Google has quietly rolled out a way to view PowerPoint presentations from within Gmail without having to have Microsoft Office installed. I don't really have any powerpoints in my Gmail to try it out on, but I'm sure that'll come in handy when school starts again.

If you want to see more pretty web pages, check out Zen Garden's top 15 CSS designs. Very worthwhile, and very cool, creative stuff out there. I wish I was that good at making nifty layouts!

That's the first look we have at Saw 4, which has started its marketing hot on the heels of the DVD release of Saw 3, apparently. That's probably better than our first look at the Hitman movie, which is just the back of Timothy Olyphant's head.

There are a number of reviews out there for Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer already, but it seems to be a mixed bag. Anyway, here are a couple more to whet your whistle.

I, personally, don't watch Battlestar Galactica, but I can appreciate that it's probably a phenomenal series. As such, I felt it was noteworthy that it may be getting a film. There seems to be interest for it, so we'll have to see what happens.

Lastly, a couple more of clips for Die Hard 4 went up on Yahoo Movies.

Now for the Tuesday Twosome:

Two Immediate Reactions

1. When you are lied to?
hurt and offended
2. When you make a mistake?
regretful and apologetic
3. When you embarrass yourself in public?
shame and to run away
4. When you see someone make a fool of themselves?
feel bad for them and look away
5. When you realize you have hurt someone (emotionally)?
apologetic and scared

The WWDC Keynote

There's really not a whole lot to talk about today besides the WWDC keynote from Apple, so I guess I'll just go right into that. Of course, if you're really hardcore then you can get the full video feed over here. I wouldn't bother watching it unless you're really excited about Leopard. The coolest additions to OS X were probably Stacks, the new menu bar thing that makes it easy to access your favorite programs quickly, and the quick look thing to preview files before you open them. His iChat demo looked pretty neat, too, where you can actually drag other movies onto your video chat and have a blue screen effect going on. Totally useless, mind you, but nifty. They rehashed old features of Leopard, too, like Spaces and Time Machine. Not a good sign for an exciting keynote, but the WWDC one rarely is. Leopard will sell for $129, and they rightfully took a jab at the many versions of Vista there are. I agree that that's a totally stupid idea. Anyhow, the next thing he menioned was that Safari would now be on Windows, which is totally meaningless to Windows users since we already use Firefox or the stupider ones use Internet Explorer. The thing he mentioned last was kind of interesting. He puts out this banner of a solution for developers to develop for the iPhone, but what he meant was web applications. If you create a cool site, that can run in Safari on the iPhone, but you can't use the touchscreen functionality to do anything cool, or anything else useful on the iPhone. Great. That's not much better than their no third party development stance from last keynote. All in all, a drab WWDC keynote, but at least he hit hard on the strengths of Leopard and I'm sure that Mac heads were happy about that.

By the way, Apple also revamped their site a bit. Same basic design theme, just rearranged a bit.

If you use Google Analytics, like me, then you probably enjoyed your recent, free upgrade to their fancy shmancy stuff. However, there is a lot to take in there, and this blog post offers a bit more guidance on how to use everything by adding stuff to your codebase here and there. I found it pretty educational and this is the kind of stuff that you usually have to employ some premium service to get.

Vitamin is running a wonderful article on the most prominent layout styles ever. I know I'm a sucker for the minimalist and the futurism. I know, they're kind of opposing concepts, but eye candy nonetheless. That whole article is actually eye candy in case you haven't seen anything pretty today (I know it's hard on college guys who can't scope out the number of foxy ladies they can during the long session in the summer; of course, I'm only missing one foxy lady).

In a very strange move, Weinstein Co. has decided to release Death Proof on DVD this September without its Planet Terror counterpart. Do they just like Tarantino better or something? My guess is that they're splitting up Grindhouse so that they can sell one in September, one a month later, and then a boxed set in time for Christmas. Supposedly, the 4-disc set Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair will also come out that month, but I just read that on a fan site and couldn't find any real evidence behind it other than my fingers being crossed.

In the world of animation, it looks like Toy Story 3 is on track for a 2010 release. They've only recently started on the script, but it's being penned by the writer of Little Miss Sunshine so I expect something worthwhile rather than a money grubbing sequel. Oh, and Quint at AICN has seen Ratatouille and really liked it. He praises the pacing and the animation, and I was always interested in it so now I'm actually looking forward to it.

Another movie getting underway is Indiana Jones 4 which is in the middle of an open casting call for extras willing to have their hair cut in true 50s style. That'd be a scary requirement for me, I think, but it'd be worth it to be in an Indiana Jones flick!

Lastly, Moviefone has a couple of decent clips from <Die Hard 4 (that's right, I said the proper title!).

Since we were a bit low on the tech news today, here's those pictures that I promised from yesterday from the recently opened Olympic Sculpture Park in Belltown:








Now for some Monday Madness:

1. Do you listen to the radio, or a CD, when you're driving in your car/truck/SUV?
I listen to the radio, but I switch to whatever is in the CD player if there's nothing good on, and then rinse and repeat when that track is over.
2. Do you have one of those GPS systems in your vehicle?
Nope. Too expensive! I'm a cheap Indian dude here!
3. About how many miles do you put on your vehicle in a month?
Not really sure about that. I'd guess about 400 miles if I make a trip to Houston each month (obviously not counting this summer).
4. Do you have your oil changed regularly?
Yeah, my dad is cool enough to handle that for me.
5. Do you take your vehicle to a car wash or do you wash it at home?
Wash it at home. I hate those automatic things because they leave spots and they're not thorough enough.
6. How often do you have the inside of your vehicle cleaned? Do you do it yourself or do you pay someone to do it?
I do it myself, once or twice a semester.
7. What is the color of your vehicle?
I'd say maroon, but it's generally referred to as red.

Ocean's 13

I saw Ocean's 13 today, so I figured that I'd talk about that before getting into a bit of news. Personally, I really liked it. It felt like a more complete movie than the second one, and it was truer to the original. The premise was that Reuben (Elliott Gould) got screwed out of a big deal by Willie Bank (Al Pacino) so bad that he went into medical shock, and so Danny (George Clooney) and his gang assemble once again to get revenge. The heist is to make Pacino loose enough money to run him out of business and force the deeds into Reuben's hands, and I thought that it was still quite clever and not nearly as convoluted as the second one. In fact, it was a simpler heist than even the first one, I thought. And it had some interesting twists, but nothing too unpredictable, I suppose. That didn't really bother me though. There's a difference between a movie being not unpredictable and just being obvious, and I think that Ocean's 13 strove to tell a story and did so very well. It was quite entertaining and funny, though it could've been funnier. Then again, I did just see Knocked Up so that puts my standards for comedy kind of high. In other words, it was a heist movie first and a comedy second, and I had no problem with that either. The acting and dialogue was nice and tight, and I felt that the pacing was great, too. It was a fun moviegoing experience overall, but I think the most it can be is a B+ because it didn't do anything different or exciting. It mostly just capitalized on the strengths of the first movie and did just the minimum to entertain us. Plus, it could've used another strong female actress amongst the sausage fest. I don't mean for eye candy, I just mean that I noticed that it was lacking in that aspect. And the ending could've come off cleaner and more satisfying. Overall, I was still pleased though and would recommend it.

While I was on my little hiatus, Google unleashed Google Street View to the world to alienate the mass pubic. I love the idea of being able to see buildings and stuff so you can try to recognize them rather than just street names, but when you can see a guy picking his nose, that's just too much. What if someone was having a fight on their front lawn when the trucks came by and now the world can see it? Anyway, I do still defend the idea against privacy concerns because I know it would be helpful in places like Austin where roads tend to do crazy things.

Rumors have started to sprout about Apple adding movie rentals to iTunes at a price point of $3 a month and to be transferred to at least one other device in the process. Personally, I like that price. I'd totally download a movie if I could watch it for 30 days. Unless that means I have 30 days to watch it once, which would kind of suck but still be something easily marketable if it's that cheap. The only question is, would it be in HD? By the way, tomorrow is WWDC and you can hear the Steve Jobs keynote live over here. This is the first time I'll be in the right time zone for an Apple keynote!

There are some big time ISPs charging companies to ensure that their e-mails go through, but I don't like this idea. It's ostensibly voluntary, but what's to stop them from manhandling people into paying them for their e-mails to get delivered to people at all? Why not just make a better spam filter? Isn't that what your customers pay you for already?

In the box office, Ocean's 13 ended up doing fairly well at the top with a cool $37.1 million. Granted, this is less than the predecessors, but still a respectable opener and should easily put them past $100 million. Pirates followed closely behind with about $16 million less, and Knocked Up came in very closely behind that. In fact, Knocked Up faced an impressive 35% drop. Next weekend we'll see big summer player: the Fantastic Four sequel. That ought to rake in the big bucks.

You can read the plot to Harold and Kumar 2 over here, and it just sounds awful to me. I'd rather see them screwing around in Amsterdam than in a jail. But maybe it'll have an awesome trailer and maybe they have some good ideas after all. The first was a classic, after all.

All I have for you now are trailers. The trailer for Vantage Point is actually packaged with Ocean's 13 and looks like a really involved drama. It has a really great cast, and I like the overall concept (granted, the trailer is just a tad hokey with the taglines). The red band trailer for The Brothers Solomon is definitely a step down, though I didn't have high hopes walking into that trailer anyway. I just don't see what's funny about it at all. The other trailers are for horror movies. The first is for The Invasion, featuring Nicole Kidman and Daniel Craig. It really just sounds like an alien twist on a zombie movie. The other is for 30 Days of Night, based on a graphic novel, and I really only like the color scheme in the trailer. It's just your standard vampire fare other than that.

I'll leave you with a pretty picture. I have some more from my jaunt today to the Olympic Sculpture Park that I'll probably put up later.



Now for some Unconscious Mutterings:

I say ... and you think ... ?

1. Acoustic :: Guitar


2. Sanity :: Old Age


3. Mambo :: New York Salsa


4. Session :: ID


5. Hound :: Release the


6. Cat :: Mouse


7. Coward :: Jerk


8. Trunk :: Elephant


9. Hold me :: Tight


10. Psychological :: Disease

Knocked Up

So I could do a real post today, but there's not really enough news for a real post so I figured that I could just do one tomorrow. Instead, I'm going to just review Knocked Up since I finally saw that today.

The trailer would not lead you to believe that this movie is actually funny, but it really is. I definitely thoroughly enjoyed watching it. In case the premise isn't fatally obvious to you, Katherine Heigl and Seth Rogen get sloshed and end up having sex without a condom, so she gets pregnant. It's not really humor based on solely the situation, there are just jokes coming from everywhere, and they usually work really well. There's a fair amount of guy humor in it, which usually ends up being a bit much for me, but I still thought that stuff was funny, too. There are also a lot of "it's so cruel it's funny" moments where I just think, "I can't believe they said that!" This movie really shines with its casting though. If I were to quote the movie, you would think I'm gross or stupid or something for thinking it's funny, but the delivery and the relationships between the characters is what makes them so funny. It's rare that directors of comedies these days put so much focus into the timing and delivery and pacing of jokes. It was just really refreshing to see.



However, the movie was definitely too long. About 90 minutes in, it got really serious, and the jokes came at a very slow pace from there on out. I don't think it's bad that the movie stretched to have heart and meaning, but I just think it stretched a little too far. The movie could've easily lost at least 20 minutes and been just as enjoyable. And, again, there were several vulgar jokes in the movie. I don't think they were particularly offensive or anything, but they were vulgar nonetheless. Still, I don't think they'll bother people all that much. The jokes in Clerks 2 were easily vulgar enough to be offensive, but not here. I highly recommend this movie with an A-. I don't think everyone will love it, but I think enough people will for me to quantify a high recommendation. It's not perfect, but it's definitely the funniest film I've seen in a long while (sorry, didn't see Hot Fuzz), and I wasn't even in the best mood today.

I will mention one news item today though: the campaign to save Veronica Mars. If you love the show, please contribute. There's only a couple of days left on this campaign, and this is undoubtedly one of the best shows on television right now. It'd be a travesty to lose it barely on the cusp of its third season. Even if it's in the form of a spinoff, I'd like at least a couple more seasons.

I think I'm going to go for the Saturday Six:

1. What do you consider more important to your long-term happiness: your relationships, your location, your career or your dreams?
That's so extremely difficult! I'm actually wrestling with that right now, to be honest. I'm going to be bold and say my dreams, because my dreams is to have the other three. I mean realistically, without a solid relationship, having a great job would leave me really lonely. However, without a solid career I'd just be waiting to go home all the time. Still, I think I could bear that more than I could bear being without my girl, no matter the location.

2. Other than a significant other, how many people do you feel you can truly turn to for advice?
Probably 3 people: a couple of friends and my sister-in-law.

3. Of the people you think know you best, how surprised would you think they would be if they knew “everything” there is to know about you?
Not totally shocked, but still probably fairly surprised.

4. Take the quiz: Are you living the wrong life?
I agree with what they said:

Your Life is 31% Off Track

In general, your life is going very well. You're quite happy with where you are and what you're doing. And even if you get a bit off course, you're usually able to get back on track easily.

Are You Living The Wrong Life?

5. What is the longest you’ve stayed in a job you weren’t happy in?
A couple of months. But then again, I'm not full-time yet ;)

6. What single factor made you stay the most?
Needing something to do.

Porn 2.0

I'm still sick, which is why I didn't post yesterday. My throat hurt so much that I went to bed an hour early to avoid the pain that I'd have to endure while blogging. I feel a little better today, and hope to be much better tomorrow for the weekend! Anyway, I know that my topic today is bit sketchy, but stay with me on this. The adult film industry claims that it's been losing a lot of money to so-called "Porn 2.0". As I'm sure you can imagine, this is basically just the socialization of porn. Is that not like one of the scariest concepts you've ever heard of? People joining a community to share and upload their own pornographic content. Whether or not the world has gone mad is not the issue here, the point is that multimedia as we know it is evolving at a pace faster than the big guys can keep up with. It's like when the television came around and bulldozed people sitting around their radios for their favorite programming. No one rushes to their televisions anymore for prime time content, they get it online. Similarly, people have skipped the incrimination of going to adult video stores or ordering such DVDs and have instead turned to the web to get their fix on demand. This whole concept of content being online and on demand is so pervasive that it's affecting the freaking porno industry! I think that's saying something.

Gizmodo apparently has impressions from an insider who has used the iPhone and claims that it supports multiple popular e-mail clients (Yahoo Mail, Gmail, etc), it does have a SIM card slot, and that the web browsing is pretty fast among other things. Apple put up some new iPhone ads, and I like them. They're genuine and informative and don't insult another brand.

If you tend to download stuff illegally using P2P or BitTorrent or what have you, then you may benefit from this list of tips on how to not get busted. It's a pretty worthwhile list, and kind of funny that someone had the balls to even compile a list like that and publish it.

In movie news, I just want to discuss a few trailers before I go to bed. I didn't really get the trailer for I Am Legend. It's pretty much a zombie movie, so why are they marketing it as some Will Smith action movie? Oh, and the trailer for Hot Rod was just plain stupid. The SNL team is really losing their touch. I think they're trying to copy Will Ferrell's style of comedies and it just doesn't look funny. The trailer for American Gangster looks interesting, and I want to like it, but it makes me afraid that they're going for some sort of cop mystery movie rather than a true mob film. It looks very Hollywood and stylized rather than being true.

Now for the 3x Thursday:

1. Do you pay much attention to your body? Do you know when you are doing too much of something, not getting enough of something, etc? How do you know/not know?
Yeah, I do. But I don't know when I'm not getting enough of something. I really just make sure I eat right and stay in shape.

2. Have you ever had a health issue that you couldn't solve yourself (other than a sinus infection or something like that)? If so, what steps did you take to resolve it? Did you resolve it?
One time I had a really bad stomach virus and had to go to ER. After some IV I was good to go though.

3. Have you ever had to hop from doctor to doctor to doctor to get a diagnosis? If so, how did you handle it? What are your thoughts about having to hop from doctor to doctor to get a diagnosis?
Nope.

The iPhone Release Date

I'm back! I hope. My room mate is jerk and despite my being really ill today (I believe it's a fever), he unpacked his clothes hangers rather than set up wireless Internet (which he has been hogging for a week) for me, so I'm still on low grade Internet. Hence, I'm probably going to keep this post short. Anyway, the big news today was that Apple has announced, by way of plain old advertising, that the iPhone will be released on May 29. Obviously, this is a pretty big deal. Apple geeks have awaited this day many moons while regular geeks have been writing cocky editorials about why it's going to fail miserably. Personally, I think people should wait until its release to start passing judgement, and I think it has a good chance of succeeding despite the astronomical price because their laptops are overpriced and yet sell like hotcakes. A few more tidbits have been discovered more recently, as well. Apparently, the device will not support iChat when it ships, nor will it come with a SIM card slot. I don't know how many people would be deterred by iChat not being included, but I'd imagine it to be fairly important since people love their instant messaging. Whether they release this as a free update is yet to be seen. Meanwhile, we're going to have to just wait on June 29!

That's definitely not all the Apple news though. It turns out that they're attaching some personal information of yours with your DRM-free music purchases, which could compromise your privacy if in the wrong hands, and the EFF is livid. Some people really aren't all that alarmed, but being as conservative about privacy as I am, I think that it may cross a certain line. First of all, they really should be disclosing this information, because I consider it fairly important. Of higher concern though is the issue of your iPod being stolen rather than you distributing the mp3s illicitly yourself. Is it really ok to just overlook this case for the sake of deterring users from promoting piracy? Tough call, but I personally don't believe you should be so distrustful of your audience.

While I'm on the issue of DRM, I think it's worth noting that the RIAA has lost a controversial case to a disabled single mother whom they accuse of distributing gangster rap music. Oh, and her child is a 9 year old daughter, so she really wouldn't care too much for such gems as "Hoes in My Room". I really just posted this because I like showing how evil and retarded the RIAA is for continuing with this campaign of fear and litigation against the very people they need to save their pathetic industry.

Big news from YouTube: they're partnering with a number of local stations to give them a slice of the advertising revenue in exchange for legal rights to show select programming from them. Not only that, but apparently I missed a huge deal with EMI in which they gained the rights to show music and music videos from their vast library of artists, and so they've now joined the trio of Warner Music, UMG, and Sony BMG in licensing their music to YouTube. Very nice, YouTube. Very nice. Now don't let us down!

I just have a couple of one-liners here. Coding Horror has an awesome blog post on the importance of reducing the complex of user interfaces that I really liked and meant to talk about last week but was held back by technical difficulties. Also, if you want to test your typing speed, this is a cool Flash application to do just that. I'd reveal my results if I was feeling well enough to test my typing optimally.

Speed Racer was one of my favorite cartoons the summer I spent in India (I was 12 years-old), and now we have a high-res shot of the Mach 5. I personally think it looks pretty sweet, and I'm still extremely curious to see what the Wachowskis come up with.

If you want to see Optimus Prime duke it out with Bonecrusher, then this clip is a must-see. Oh how I miss that animated series; it was so awesome and campy.

All I have left for you guys are trailers. The first trailer is for Heartbreak Kid, and I'm not impressed. I didn't even come close to laughing, the plot sounds like it's been done several times before. The trailer for the Fantastic Four 2 is much more impressive, and makes it out to be the movie that the first Fantastic Four movie should've been. W00t!

I'm going to try out the Monday's a Bitch meme:

1. Do you like Coldplay?
YES! I <3 Coldplay! They're definitely one of my favorite artists.
2. Were you jaundiced as a baby?
Nope.
3. Who's your favourite blond? Do blonds have more fun?
I supposed Elisha Cuthbert. I know one brunette who has a lot of fun, so I kind of doubt it ;)
4. Is this shit bananas? And is Gwen Stefani a talented artist?
No and she was back when she was with No Doubt. Go back to them, Gwen! PLEASE!
5. Have you ever been stung by a bee? If so, where?
Nope, thank God!