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Appleseed (Widescreen) (2004)

by Geneon [Pioneer]

There's an absurd amount of talking and explaining in the film, and I can't say I enjoyed it much visually. I'd say skip it unless you're a fan of Appleseed.

Posted by Michael Huang at 10:22 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In fact, evil will always be lurking at the edge of the village.
On the other hand, it will never invade.
There are no governments. Thus there are no laws. Instead, there are laws of physics.

I have my own list of laments about MMORPGs. They are in the extended. Creatures tend to look like other creatures in the world, only bigger and different colors.
You might not be able to kill something, but you can tame it, name it and stick it in a stable.
Even players deemed unkillable can drown in water and lava or be assasinated by a fire field.
Money is infinite, except when it is mimicing a real world economy, which doesn't work.
Weapons dropped by monsters are usually better than any weapon made by players or tradesmen.
Becoming better at something usually involves a dummy and clicking on it until it won't allow you to anymore.
Merchants and Guards are usually stronger than any player, but they stay in town defending the townspeople from the would-be heroes.
People look like other people. If you have the same job, you probably have several twins.
Death is embarassing if you get killed by something weaker than you or if you drown or if you fall off a ledge. Otherwise, death is expected.
People have to obey the laws of physics, but creatures are exempt. They don't drown or take falling damage, and they can appear right in front of you, even if they were previously 100 meters away.
There is always a vast shortage of healers and people who can resurrect the dead, but never a shortage of warriors and assassins.
Mining is an excellent profession, and there are no health risks associated with it.
Unless someone kills you and takes your ore and your pick.
You can only learn a specific number of skills outside your profession.
Getting better at one thing sometimes means getting worse in other things.
Sometimes your skills rise really quickly and then don't rise anymore. But the next day the same thing happens.
You can usually stay in the same area and kill the same things over and over. They always return. And they'll always be there unless someone else is killing them.
Extradimensional travel is possible, but it usually needs a spell and some reagents.
Creatures can hit, slash, punch and kick you, but they rarely ever physically attack any other way.
Even snakes can kick you.
People are always running, unless they are crouching, jumping or swimming.
Pets can be summoned and dismissed on their master's command.
A fisherman with a fishing pole can beat an adventurer armed with weapons to death.
There are a limited number of dances in the world.
Townspeople tend to greet you the same way.
Otherwise they just ignore you.
There are empty stores and shops without people in them, but the door is not locked, nor does it have a for rent sign.
People can cast certain spells standing still, while other spells can be cast while running.
Shouting carries really, really far. As does yelling. As does "Server Announcements".
Theater and plays do not exist.
People never feel cold from the rain or wind. They never feel hot from the heat of the sun, even if they are in a desert, although their water consumption rises. People can walk barefoot and halfnaked in the cold icy lands but not get frostbite.
Fire never rages out of control.
Line of sight only matters for people. Guards, townspeople and creatures can ignore it.
People make more friends in dungeons than in towns.
In town, people only talk about buying and selling things.
In dungeons, people only talk about killing things.
Creatures don't guard their loot. They carry it with them at all times.
Even animals carry money, armor and weapons.
Ships usually have no one at the helm steering it, but it manages to get where it's supposed to go anyway.
Ships never encounter bad weather.
Trees never bear fruit, although fruit exists in the world.
If you're too close to the creature, you are facing the wrong direction.
Flying creatures don't fly vertically to avoid your attacks.
Most creatures will choose to fight you to the death if attacked. Unless they run away.
If they run, you will rarely ever catch them.
There's a life meter for everything. If it doesn't have a life meter, it can't be killed.
People get hurt, but no one ever bleeds.
Death cures all ailments. Except ressurrection sickness.
Once you choose a hairstyle, you can't ever change it.
You never need a haircut.
There are beds, but no one ever sleeps in them.
There are chairs, but no one ever sits on them.
People of a certain race and gender are all the same height.
Your race determines your profession.
There is no advantage or disadvantage for choosing one gender over another.
Everyone starts with no money.
People never age.
Dragons and Gods always return.
Trains do not go "choo-choo", they go "Where the #$@! did that come from?"

Posted by Michael Huang at 07:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Last week, when I was hunting for screenshots for Everquest to use in a comparison against Kothuria, I was struck with the urge to play Everquest again. It wasn't so bad, i told myself, but that was before I remembered all the timesinks and all the various bits and pieces about the game that, quite frankly, sucked big time. There were a lot of EQ junkies who have now moved on to today's current MMOG of choice -- World of Warcraft. Jim Lee was always a big EQ junkie. I frequently heard grumblings from both the game world and the comic world that Jim Lee blew away another deadline because he had been playing EverQuest all week (or all month, or all quarter). To be fair, there were many addicts of EverQuest all over the world, and the design of the game actually encouraged compulsive playing. Because of Jim Lee's involvement I'm curious to how the design of the DC Universe MMO turns out.

JL: Imagine getting to create your own unique superhero, give it a name, choose a physique, a costume, a set of powers and then dive into the DC Universe where you get to meet and ally with Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman and the entire pantheon of heroes. Imagine getting to team up with friends and other players from around the world and take on the likes of the Joker, Lex Luthor and Deathstroke. Imagine getting to use your network of contacts to go on missions and adventures to incredibly diverse environments. Imagine gaining fame and notoriety, forming leagues of superheroes to battle one another or to take down Darkseid himself. It's not hard to see how awesome a game like this would be and it's really the chance to play around and do so many different things in the DCU that is the big draw to gamers and comic book fans alike. Metropolis and Gotham city for example are such diverse environments that really can't be replicated in any other online space. Our job is to make the game as immersive as possible so that you don't feel like you're playing a game...but in fact, that you are a superhero. It's taking on the biggest fantasy there is in the world of comics and making it happen. That's what this game is about and it will take years to create.

According the interview, Wildstorm is doing all the art assets related to the game -- clearly that's a misunderstanding on the interviewer's part. A game's art assets are tremendously complex and I can't imagine comic book artists creating 3d models or doing the textures on the characters. Nor can I imagine them designing such features without access to the 3d game engine.

The statician in me can't wait to see the projections of crime in Gotham and Metropolis -- there is no doubt that the crime rate in those cities will exceed everything possible in the real world, with probably hundreds of crimes being committed every second. That being said, it's easy to see how a MMOG set in this universe could be fun (much more so than a Star Trek MMO), but we talking about Sony Online Entertainment, which somehow managed to suck all the fun out of the Star Wars universe such that even a fanboy like me was deterred.

Posted by Michael Huang at 05:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

• iPod leather cases for 30GB/60GB and nano, $99 each
• mac mini w/ intel - 1.5Ghz Core Solo $599, 1.67 Core Duo $799
• iPod HiFi - $349

I'm relatively unexcited about these new products, if only because I was expecting something a little more different.

Of the three products, the $99 leather case is going to have wide ranging ramifications on the third-party market for cases. Right now, it's possible to get some relatively high quality cases for iPods under $50 (most are $30 or under). The $99 leather case for the iPod looks like crap, and you can't use the wheel or see the display -- which is interesting, given that video is the next market Apple is trying to break into. At least the iPod socks were cute. My worry, however, is that third parties will see the $99 price tag, release new products and adjust their prices to be more in line with Apple's. The $99 leather iPod case by Apple is the most expensive case being sold on the Apple store -- Monster has a case at $69, but its more like a backpack than a case, and kate spade's $65 case for the mini is the next highest.

The iPod HiFi is sure to upset all those manufacturers who have already integrated iPod docks into their products, such as JBL and Bose.

The Mac mini, fairly inoffensive, but not too exciting either. Is it just me or does it have a MagSafe connector on it as well?

Posted by Michael Huang at 11:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Posted by Michael Huang at 07:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Freakonomics : A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything

by Steven D. Levitt, Stephen J. Dubner

As with all library books, there is a due date upon which a book is to be returned. That day was yesterday, and with only 30 pages read and a long waiting list for the book, I decided to be late returning it. With the late fee being only 25 cents, I figured it was probably worth the quarter to take the time to finish reading the book rather than waiting for my turn to come up again on the hold.

In the first section of the book, the authors talk of a situation in which a childcare center often had a few kids that the parents were late to pickup, so it was decided that a late fee would be charged for parents who were late picking up their children. It was meant as a deterrent to parents, but it seemed that when this policy was implemented, the number of late parents actually increased, because now being late had a economic value to it, whereas before the parents were regulated by guilt.

The book is as much about social factors as it is about economics -- about gender and race issues, as well as larger issues such as crime, education and abortion. Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything
256 pp.
Available at Amazon

Posted by Michael Huang at 05:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

SEATTLE -- Octavia E. Butler, considered the first black woman to gain national prominence as a science fiction writer, died after falling and striking her head on the cobbled walkway outside her home, a close friend said. She was 58.

Wikipedia Entry

Posted by Michael Huang at 08:14 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Friday evening ota, littlestar and parakkum and I went to DeAnza to watch a presentation of the Oscar-nominated animated film The Mysterious Geographic Adventures of Jasper Morello, with a talk by the director Anthony Lucas.

My notes are in the extended entry.

Anthony Lucas

• He's been jetlagged doing the Jasper Morello tour - Australia - London - Cupertino - Hollywood.
• He's never been able to watch the easter eggs on the DVD, but he found them today, so he started with those first.
• a short explanation of the ads: the 5 canoes is the logo for the tv station he was doing the work for. Some are rather hard to see, some are obvious. The hardest one to see is the trees.
• he passed around one of the figures he made -- mostly just toiletpaper and wire
• did a short demonstration of how he did the silouettes and noted some production problems with working with silouettes. used the old man from his feature that showed a Cannes as well as a decapitated horse.
• when asked about the metropolis in his ads, he remarked: "I don't really know what i did for that, multiple layers maybe.

  After the screening:

• Jasper Morello wouldn't have been possible without the Sydney Film Commission giving him 1 million Australian Dollars.
• Did Jasper Morello as a trilogy, since he grew up as a Star Wars kid (11 when it came out).
• because he's a star wars kid, he has a stop motion rig.
• his stop motion rig is a cooper gathering dust in his shed.
• sees computer animation as the wave of the future. while doing it the old fashioned way is more fun, cg is more practical.
• on design: he mentions seeing the lord of the rings art of books and seeing designs for like 10 different concepts for a suit of armor, and says that "there's no reason to do that much concept. At most, all he wants is two designs.
• he does the design work -- "design's the fun part, why would I let anyone else do the fun part?"
• he has the toy rights, but most of the commercialized rights to Jasper belong to someone else.
• said having a live action version of Jasper with Tim Burton and Johnny Depp would be akin to having a stake in his heart.
• said most of the airship designs wouldn't work on a toy, most things really aren't connected.
• He originally had a much longer title, involving 1276 and "Navigator of the 3rd Royal Cartographers", but people said it was already too long, and felt it took place in 1876. He has the website though, so he was able to put 1276 on the Gothia Gazette.
• although it does have the elizabethan feel to it, it doesn't take place in the 19th century, nor does it take place in england or australia. it takes place in 1276 in Gothia.

  On his earlier material:

• it took about a day to produce 1 second of stop motion.
• likes the fact that with computers, you can set it up to work overnight.
• had to deal with heated expansion of surfaces on his old stop motion and silouette work.
• People in Germany hated "Slim Pickings".
• Originally Snort in "Slim Pickings" was supposed to have a nose that looked like the plant.
• He thought "Holding Your Breath" was supposed to be about him and the writer while they were in the sea scouts, but instead he got something about a girl.
• used toy trains for "Holding Your Breath". "A toy train set costs $500. It's worth it."

Posted by Michael Huang at 10:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

But companies that make and sell video games are suffering, caught up in an unusual set of circumstances that are cutting profits and jobs just when they should be in top form. Major game publishers Activision Inc., Atari Inc. and Electronic Arts Inc. all missed their most recent earnings expectations and each company has had layoffs in recent months. Retailers such as Electronics Boutique Holdings Corp. and GameStop Corp. have faced similar problems.

Layoffs at those major game publishers is nothing new. Here's the truth about the games industry -- the people who work in games (at least this generation) are really, really into games. We've gotten past the point in the industry where the football game was being written by a person who had never played a football game, and previously worked on an accounting software package. The current workforce making games is really passionate about these games, and they will put their heart and soul and their lives into it. And big companies like EA are going to take advantage of that enthusiasm.

While people do burn out, and the crunch is universally hated, it's a part of the industry. You've got to manage it all in moderation. Do we need to grind and crunch away? No, I don't think so. I think if anything, proper time management and communication between team members is what is necessary to make it work out.

Do I think it's a similar way to wash people out of the industry? No, the industry isn't that smart when it comes to formulating long-term plans. Personally, I think EA, Activision and Atari's economic problems have very little to do with the new consoles on the horizon, and more to do with the dinosaur business model they follow. EA has been burned by the MMOG model, but as I wrote years ago after seeing Everquest, MMOGs and other persistent state games will be where the truly hardcore players are headed.

Posted by Michael Huang at 04:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Personally I think the story is on the alarmist side of things.

We're at the cusp right now of having a whole generation of video gaming parents. I call them Generation Nintendo. When the NES arrived in North America in 1985, it recreated the video game market that had died with the Atari. My parents didn't really understand video games, but they knew about them, and just like any other form of activity, they kept it under moderation, which was fairly easy to do since I had a stay-at-home mom. However, modern families are ones in which both parents work, and children are left under no adult supervision. It was TV and video games that became the babysitters of the latchkey kids of my generation. Those latchkey kids have grown up into the modern video gamer. There's a reason why the game centers around the 18-35 year old target market. That's where the "hump" of the bell curve is -- as you approach the edges, the curve gets lower and flatter. That's where most parents with teenage children are going to be -- the flat part of the curve.

The Mom in this video seems to be in her late-forties to mid-fifties. Based on the video, I'm going to arbitrarily put her boys' ages at 13, 15 and 17. if she's 48 then Nintendo would have appeared when she was 30, and she likely wouldn't have really become exposed to it, and assuming her husband didn't play games, her children wouldn't have been exposed until elementary school. But honestly, this issue is nothing new. What makes this news?

In 10 - 20 years, when the people of Generation Nintendo start having teen-aged kids, it'll be interesting to see if we become our parents.

Posted by Michael Huang at 10:47 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Maybe I'm just turning into a crotchety old gamer.Maybe I've been reading too many design books, and maybe I'm getting tired of the whole MMOG marketspace.

Or maybe, just maybe, Kothuria is as unimpressive as it looks. I have to be honest, I haven't played the game. There's a lot that you can't tell from the screenshot, like how it plays. But there are other clues in the interface, and in the way that the actions are processed that give the game away as a circa-1999 Everquest 1 clone. I tried to find a better screenshot that would illustrate the similarities, but there just don't seem to be any on the net anymore.

Kothuria (2006):

Everquest (1999):

Posted by Michael Huang at 07:03 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

A little less than 36 hours I've had this computer:

1) the low electrical hum
2) screen flicker, like refresh rate set weird.
3) 'b' key doesn't spring up like other keys.

Now I know why everyone says skip revision A. Called Tech Support. Unit will be going in for repairs.

Posted by Michael Huang at 10:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

It's more of an annoyance, rather than a problem, but it's one I don't think Apple is capable of fixing (at least with this revision). Apple made the decision to make the new power connector have a magnetic attachment -- the magnet is on the side of the MacBook Pro where the headphone jack and the audio in is on. When the MacBook Pro is plugged in with the MagSafe connector attached, all you can hear is the quiet hum of the fans inside. However, if you detach the MagSafe connector, you will encounter a high pitched buzzing noise very similar to the noise found on the first generation iPod minis. Depending on how much ambient noise is in the area and how sensitive your ears are, you may not notice it.

Posted by Michael Huang at 11:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Flickr: MacBook Pro Opening Pictures

Today feels like Christmas. I was about ready to give up waiting for the delivery when the MacBook Pro arrived. The thing you notice right away is how thin and square the box is -- it's not more than a couple of inches thick. The MacBook inside is even thinner -- thinner than my old TiBook even.

One of the things that I've liked about this process so far is that Mac OS X makes it really easy to switch computers -- in the start up process, the Mac asks you if you want to move your old data to your new computer. Just plug in the Firewire cable, and you're done. All your applications, all your documents, all ready to go.

Update: Preliminary Photoshop CS1 tests: Liquify 8.2 Megapixel image. 800 mhz G4 TiBook: 3:29, 2.0 Ghz MBP: 0:57

The new screen is really bright, compared to my TiBook -- I run it at about 3 notches up, whereas on the TiBook, it is up to max all the time. The new built in camera is kind of surprising at first -- you see, the first time I remembered that a camera was there, was when I was asked to choose my user icon -- and one of the selections was to take a photograph, and there I was, on the screen of my computer.

I need a name for this new MacBook Pro...

Posted by Michael Huang at 12:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Here's an interesting story that I am putting in my Paradox of Choice file: Engadget is claiming that Windows Vista will have 8 choices.

In Paradox of Choice, one of the stories about people was when faced with a number of choices, people tened to choose the choice of not choosing.

Engadget breaks down the options as follows: "Windows Starter 2007 - Vista without Aero, probably meant for developing nations. Windows Vista Home Basic - Basic Windows Vista for your single PC fam, doesn't sound like much going on here. Analagous to XP Home. Windows Vista Home Basic N - European version of the same, but without Media Player (because of antitrust rulings against MS in the EU). Windows Vista Home Premium - This is the one we're all probably gonna own. It's got Media Center functionality, Cable Card support, the whole home-media shebang. Windows Vista Business - Think of it as XP Pro, but Vista. Windows Vista Business N - Think of it as XP Pro, but Vista, but Euro. Windows Vista Enterprise - Business version of Vista with numerous enterprise features, like Virtual PC, volume encryption, etc. Windows Vista Ultimate - Love that name. This one does all of the above (and more); what else do you need to know? It's ultimate Windows.."

Do we really need 8 versions? It used to be that there was Windows (for normal folk) and Windows NT (for businesses) and NT came in two flavors: Workstation and Server. Wasn't the whole point of Windows XP to combine NT and Windows together so there was a unified platform? Of course with Vista, we have even further segmentation (that I don't really understand) although I suppose those of us in the U.S.can throw out Starter, and the N varieties since they are region specific. What I don't understand is why bother with a Vista Home Basic and a Vista Home Premium or a Vista Business? The Ultimate seems like overkill.

Posted by Michael Huang at 01:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Parent: "Oh, look, it's a flounder! Jim's dad goes fishing for those every year."
Child: "Did he put it in his aquarium at home?"
Parent: "No, he cooked it and ate it."

This latest story has nothing to do with aquariums or fish, but rather, about a camera and a trip to Hawaii. Judith is a blogger who went on a trip to Hawaii and lost her digital camera, so she started a blog to recreate her photos from pictures of Hawaii taken by other people on Flickr. She wrote on Saturday:

"I hadn't posted here in a while, because just after the last post, I got a call from an excited park ranger in Hawaii that "a nice Canadian couple reported that they found your camera!" She gave me their name and number, and I eagerly called to reclaim my camera.
"Hello," I said, when I reached the woman who had reported the camera found, "I got your number from the park ranger, it seems you have my camera?"
We discussed the specifics of the camera, the brown pouch it was in, the spare battery and memory card, the yellow rubberband around the camera. It was clear it was my camera, and I was thrilled.
"Well," she said, "we have a bit of a situation. You see, my nine year old son found your camera, and we wanted to show him to do the right thing, so we called, but now he's been using it for a week and he really loves it and we can't bear to take it from him."
I listened, not sure where she was going with this.
"And he was recently diagnosed with diabetes, and he's now convinced he has bad luck, and finding the camera was good luck, and so we can't tell him that he has to give it up. Also we had to spend a lot of money to get a charger and a memory card."
It started to dawn on me that she had no intention of returning the camera.

Judith doesn't get her camera or her memory cards back from them. Instead she gets some CDs in the mail of her photos.

Contrast this with what I witnessed yesterday at the aquarium with an 8-year old boy at the aquarium gift shop, a boy finds a ten dollar bill and asks the people around him if they dropped it. Everyone says it's not theirs, and the Mom says "Let's take it to lost and found". It renewed my faith in humanity if only for a short while -- not just because the child "did the right thing" but everyone else around did as well.

And then I wake up, I find this story on the net, and I am cynical once again about the future of society.

Posted by Michael Huang at 07:38 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

• MIT OpenCourseWare | OCW Home
  (tags: MIT education free download opencourseware)

Posted by Michael Huang at 06:18 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I can't seem to get out of escaping the receipt checks at Costco because the other sheep are so slow that there's a big bottleneck at the exit. If anyone's got any tips for this, please share!

I don't purchase items anymore at Best Buy or Fry's. I used to think that Best Buy or Fry's discounted things down, and maybe they did at one time, but online is presently the cheapest option, particularly if you can get free shipping on your item. Sure, there's that sense of "But I want it now!" that's been lost, but after a while, you just become less of a consumer because the thought process changes from "I need to buy this now" to "I need to go home, look at the reviews and then decide if I want it". Too often we fall into the "sunk cost" habit of "what the heck, I'm here already, I may as well purchase it".

But also, I think it's the idea of being treated like a thief everytime I walk into their store. In Best Buy world, you are guilty until proven innocent.

A Best Buy Customer relates this story, at a Best Buy near my hometown:
Apparently the employees of my local Best Buy aren't very familiar with annoying pedantic individuals who will choose principals over convenience when walking out with a shopping cart full of expensive home entertainment gear. I manage to get about 5 steps out the door before the door guard catches up to me and grabs my cart, with the "sir" in his "I need to see your receipt, sir" somehow not very complimentary. This is apparently a stalling tactic, as shortly a few more blue-shirted employees make a move to block me from making any more progress toward my car.

He goes on to say that:
As I get in my car to leave, two Best Buy lackeys in a pickup truck decide its a good time to park behind me, blocking my path again. By this time, I've had just enough of this crap and not very politely or discreetly ask them to get out of the way. With only a little hesitation, the yellow-shirt nods in their direction and I'm soon free to leave.

More Tales of Customer Disservice Satifaction at: BestBuySux.com and comments to "Sir, present your reciept: Best Buy sucks for more reasons than that damned ad"

Posted by Michael Huang at 08:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

While this is currently making the rounds on the internet, I believe it's an old April Fool's Joke from 2004. Too bad, cooperative WoW character control would rock. And it's funny nevertheless.

Two Headed Ogre Race in WoW

Posted by Michael Huang at 07:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

• Ultima Online: Free Pizza and Soda
  (tags: ultimaonline qa ea redwoodcity)
• Taipei Game Show 2006現地レポート
  (tags: taipei game taipeigameshow)
• 塊魂2
  flash based katamari damacy
  (tags: flash katamari)
• minimiam
  the real culinary photographers who use toys - they aren't russian after all.
  (tags: toys photography food)

Posted by Michael Huang at 06:18 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Yeah, it's cold outside.

Posted by Michael Huang at 12:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

• Microsoft Windows XP - Command-line reference A-Z
  (tags: windows xp commandline shell reference)
• JGoodies :: Java User Interface Design
  (tags: java ui design)
• [adult swim]: "Fix" Goes 24/7
  Adult Swim Fix was an idea where you get to watch the Adult Swim shows 24 hours before they aired. Apparently, Cartoon Network likes the success of this, because they are going to go 24/7 with this on March 27th.
  (tags: cartoonnetwork adultswim animation cable)
• Technologist Manifesto..., or Things Everyone in IT Should Know
  (tags: IT design user hci)
• Newsletter #53 February 2006
  (tags: windows IT security troubleshooting network problems)
• New Scientist SPACE - Breaking News - Space-elevator tether climbs a mile high
  space elevator go up, space elevator go down.
  (tags: spacelevator nanotube carbon liftport)
• ScienceDaily: New Images Capture Virus In Extraordinary Detail
  (tags: biology bacteriophage image)
• Mario's Grown Up, You Ready To Play?
  (tags: mario nintendo games marketing videogames)
• Apple Matters | Lessons From The Past: Five Mistakes Apple Isn't Repeating With The iPod
  (tags: apple mac ipod)
• Linux Command Directory: Index
  (tags: linux commandline shell reference)
• The Older Gamers Paradise - 2old2play - Reinventing The Gaming Addiction with 360 Achievements
  (tags: videogames design ui goals gamedesign)
• NASA - Newly Forming Solar System Has Planets Running Backwards
  Bi-Directional Solar Systems.
  (tags: astronomy solarsystem rotation)
• Vietnam latest news - Thanh Nien Daily
  Man handles 3 decades without sleep
  (tags: biology news sleep deprivation insomnia)
• Russian toys working with food
  This photographer uses tiny russian miniatures to show russians working in a food setting.
  (tags: photographer toys russian creative art)
• textually.org: Your Old Cell Phone Could Help Save a Gorilla
  (tags: gorilla cellphones conservation smithsonian zoo)

Posted by Michael Huang at 06:17 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Flickr: Japan 2002 (132 photos)

Posted by Michael Huang at 11:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The most popular deal seems to be the $1 'bag of crap', (which sold out in 42 seconds) which appears to be random stuff they shove in a box and mail to your door. Today they've gone through a number of deals already (although the woot-off was temporarily paused for 3 hours by 1000 units of EA '95 sports.

I've noticed that things seem to be slow out there on the blogosphere today, I wonder if people are just too preoccupied pressing F5 on the woot page.

Update: I think the toaster's going to end the woot-off. No one seems to want a toaster.

Posted by Michael Huang at 03:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Okay, that's probably not what happened, (The Brain would have a far more convoluted idea), but I don't really understand the logic of someone going to a shopping site, collecting personal info and then creating 13,500 3-day trial memberships. That's over 110 years worth of playtime.

According to The Korean Times:

From Monday to Wednesday evening, more than 13,500 cases of personal information theft were reported to NCSoft, the operator of Lineage. The company and police suspect that hacking groups in China acquired stolen data from one or more Internet shopping malls in December and January.

NCSoft said the victims suffered no financial damage as the hackers used the data only to create new accounts for a three-day free trial period for the game. But name theft can develop into more serious crimes, says Kwak Byung-chu of Egis.com, an Internet security company.

Korean Times: 'Lineage' Personal Info Theft Gets Serious

Posted by Michael Huang at 08:42 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

• Achieve-IT!: 6 Ways to Discover Your Perfect Career
  (tags: career jobhunt lists howto)
• Project Fast
  I love the way they spoof bioengineering in this flash site for the VW GTI Mark V.
  (tags: VW projectfast cars flash spoof)
• The Korea Times : LG to Market ‘Unproven’ Anti-Bird Flu Aircons
  Koreans Create an Air Conditioner to fight the Avian Flu Virus. Powered by Kimchee.
  (tags: avianflu virus lg airconditioner kimchee)

Posted by Michael Huang at 06:18 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Digital Art Photography For Dummies (For Dummies (Computer/Tech))

by Matthew Bamberg

Everyone probably has seen a "For Dummies" book at this point, with it's yellow cover, black and white text inside punctuated by cartoons, and the ocassional black and white copy of a diagram or a photograph. While it does have the yellow cover, Digital Art Photography For Dummies is produced in FULL-COLOR. Yes folks, full-color on nice paper for a Dummies book. What better way to teach photography than to have color photographs on every page showing the different examples?

Digital Art Photography for Dummies is broken down into 5 sections:

• The Art of a Digital Picture
  The first part of the book covers how to take a picture. It's useful for those who have never taken a photography class in their life, because it introduces the concepts important to photography like composition, like color, like the rule of thirds, and so forth. It's an excellent primer and should fill the reader's imagination with ideas. The next two chapters are devoted to digital matters such as using your digital camera, how to calibrate your workspace, how to hook up the devices and so forth. The fourth chapter covers something that I don't think any photography book I've read has detailed yet, and that's figuring out what kind of photographer you want to be.
• The Photo Shoot
  Basically, how to shoot indoors, how to shoot outdoors, how to control lighting, how to shoot black and white, how to shoot people and animals, and how to use filters. It's a really useful chapter to read.
• Photoshop Art: Using Software to Enhance or Create Art Photos
  What do you do with old photographs? How can you bring them back from the faded state you found them in the shoebox? This section shows you how to do that, as well as how to fix photographs with all the filters and tools found in Photoshop. I normally hate Photoshop tutorials within books, but within this book, because it's more of a general overview rather than giving detailed step by step instructions by example (he does do this, but it is in manageable amounts for things that matter). I wish other authors would follow this example of how to do a Photoshop chapter. Major kudos for finally getting a Photoshop chapter done right.
• The Final Output: Gallery-Worthy Prints
  This chapter lays out how to get your photographs into the condition where it can be published or hung on walls or sold. He also covers RAW and file organization as well.
  
• The Part of Tens
  In every "For Dummies" book, the author lists ten rules to follow, which summarize the subject matter. In this one, he also offers 10 digital tricks to create better photographs.

Posted by Michael Huang at 06:06 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Mazda showcased a Hydrogen powered version of the RX-8 back in October of 2003 at the Tokyo Motor Show, and just this past February, Mazda received permission from Japan’s Ministry of Land Infrastructure and Transport to begin leasing the RX-8 Hydrogen RE to two corporate customers. The RX-8 RE can run on either hydrogen or gasoline, and Mazda plans to have 10 lease contracts by the end of the year. When the RX-8 RE is running on hydrogen, it won't release carbon dioxide or nitrogen oxide, and runs at 107 horsepower. The monthly lease payments are 420,000 yen -- about $3600 a month.

We all knew saving the planet was expensive, but at that price, those corporations leasing the RX-8 RE are making a pretty loud statement.

Posted by Michael Huang at 09:17 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Posted by Michael Huang at 07:47 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

• Category | Easy on the Adverbs, Exclamation Points and Especially Hooptedoodle
  Elmore Leonard's 10 Rules of Writing
  (tags: writing elmoreleonard rules story)

Posted by Michael Huang at 06:19 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

At Safeway, I saw a Valentines display as soon as I walked in as well. Heart shaped chocolate containers and stuffed animals bearing exclamations of emotional attachment and sentimentality. Not too many looking at these things, but I turned the corner and lo and behold, it's a line. But not the line