Please note my Lockerz link is still down. Please email me directly at <deleted> AT gmail DOT com and I will get the email right away and will send you an invite. I am not sure if/when my Lockerz link will be up again since it is hosted elsewhere and I have no control over the hosting. I apologize for any inconvenience.
I am saving up my Lockerz points for a Mac Book Pro, but I don't think I will get it anytime soon, if at all. Lockerz needs to hurry the fuck up and launch because I am sick of competing for redemptions. I don't even try to redeem anymore because of it. But they will launch soon.
I am enjoying my new PS3. I got an HDMI cable and it didn't work. There was an extreme yellow tint to the image when using it, so I think that the HDMI port is fucked. I got a component cable and it worked, which made me happy. Now I have a beautiful picture and it's lovely. I got Burnout Paradise, which is a fucking awesome game. It is so fun and addictive. It goes far beyond the traditional racing/car game. I also got Fairytale Fights (which is okay but could be better), TV Show King (a quiz game that I got because my friend has it), LittleBigPlanet (which is just plain awesome, although severely frustrating sometimes), and the God of War Collection (which includes GoW 1 and 2). I got GoW Collection and LittleBigPlanet for $40. They are usually $30 each, so I got a nice deal (Best Buy had a sale this week).
Other than that, not much new technology wise. Might be switching internet providers since the one we have is using shitty Bell crap equipment and I am sick of being throttled between 4pm and 3am every day, especially since that's my main gaming time. We also only get 5 mbps (when it's not being throttled), which is super lame. The one I am looking at gives us 10 mbps and doesn't use Bell's equipment for more than the last mile of the connection. One of my friends says that they were told it is Bell's equipment, so I will have to ask about that again. We will see.
Saturday, May 8, 2010
Tuesday, April 13, 2010
Lockerz invite link down
If you are here for a Lockerz invite, or wish for one, my link is down for some reason. It is being fixed, but there is no way of knowing how long this will take. So, if you want a Lockerz invite, please email me at <deleted> AT gmail DOT com. Please email me from the email address you wish for your invite to be sent to. I receive email on my cell phone so it will get to you within a few minutes. If it doesn't, please be patient because it is likely Lockerz having the issue (it happens relatively often). I am sorry about this, there's a whole bunch of server bureaucracy bullshit behind it.
Monday, April 12, 2010
New PS3!
I had another one of my spontaneous urges to acquire something technological in nature, and this time it was a Playstation 3. I bought it off a guy for $200 (they're $300-350 new). The awesome part is that it is one of the original PS3s which include backward compatibility with PS2 games. This feature was removed in the newer consoles much to everyone's dismay. The old consoles also come with a smaller hard drive, only 40GB. But the guy who I bought mine off of upgraded his hard drive to 120GB! So I believe I have one of the ultimate machines available. The only downside is that it has been repaired before. Hopefully that means it's less likely to need it again, but we'll see. The guy said the problem was something common; some of the soldering or something in the machine melts and stuff comes loose. All it needs to be fixed is someone to open it and stick everything back together.
If anyone is interested, my Playstation Network name thing can be found to the right of this post in the sidebar. I don't currently have any games but plan on borrowing some from a friend this week. Hopefully I can get some trophies and make my trophy card look a bit better.
The only thing I am really not liking is the fact I cannot add my credit card to my PSN account. I think it might be the card or something since it hasn't been working with my cell phone bill either. Lets hope some stupid piece of shit technicality won't prevent me from paying my phone bill on time.
I am also trying to sell my Blackberry on Kijiji but no one is biting so far. I think my price is worth it, because I am including some accessories with it. But people are cheap and annoying. I might lower it like $20 or something. We'll see.
If anyone is interested, my Playstation Network name thing can be found to the right of this post in the sidebar. I don't currently have any games but plan on borrowing some from a friend this week. Hopefully I can get some trophies and make my trophy card look a bit better.
The only thing I am really not liking is the fact I cannot add my credit card to my PSN account. I think it might be the card or something since it hasn't been working with my cell phone bill either. Lets hope some stupid piece of shit technicality won't prevent me from paying my phone bill on time.
I am also trying to sell my Blackberry on Kijiji but no one is biting so far. I think my price is worth it, because I am including some accessories with it. But people are cheap and annoying. I might lower it like $20 or something. We'll see.
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
iPhone again, iPad wtf?
As I mentioned last entry a while ago, I got an iPhone. I was really sick of my Blackberry not being able to play music, which I was under the impression that it could. Everytime I'd go to change a song it would freeze or skip, or just crash in general. I got fed up and just went and got an iPhone on Telus. I was with Virgin before and decided that I would cancel my plan (I was paying too much anyway) and switch to Telus. So now I am paying $15 less a month for basically the same thing. I've got the favourite five plan. I had ten contacts before, so I have less free contacts, but it's made up for by included picture and video messaging. I didn't even use all ten contacts anyway, not enough people call me. I have unlimited texting anyways.
But I have to say the phone is wonderful. It can do everything and has become a super awesome entertainment device for me. It's great because it's an iPod and a cell phone in one, plus other things. The idea of getting the iPhone was because using a phone for voice calls for me is basically a secondary function. The primary functions are texting and data, so it works out great.
The only thing I wish I knew before I activated my iPhone and set it up was that installing the firmware upgrade was going to prevent me from jailbreaking it. I would have kept the old firmware that came on the phone so I could have jailbroken it. I now have 1.1.3, and only firmwares up to 1.1.2 can be jailbroken; as in they haven't figured out how to jailbreak this OS yet. I've read in places that people are saying it's "impossible", but nothing is impossible. I want to jailbreak it to be able to customize the icons on the home screen (which Apple doesn't let you do, you have to keep their apps on there even if you don't use them). I personally will never use the Stocks app, so I would like it gone to give me more space. Also, I use a different weather app than what comes with the phone. It's also taking up space. Not to mention the fact that jailbreaking allows you to install free apps that perform many of the same functions of the ones you have to pay for on iTunes. Obviously Apple doesn't want this because they think they will lose money from people who are installing these free versions of apps (I say "think" because likely these people won't pay for them anyway, whether or not they get free ones or not).
Despite all that, I am loving my iPhone. Although I really hate the hold Apple has on their market, I am still willing to use my iPhone proudly since they haven't done anything too atrocious yet. Hopefully Apple doesn't go that route, and if they do, I hope something as widespread and comparable to the iPhone comes out.
On that note, here is an article: the new version of iTunes what isn't mentioned in this article is that every update of iTunes does something to block jailbreaking further. Needless to say I will NOT be updating iTunes.
That brings me to my next point of wonder: what the fuck is the point of the iPad? Basically to me it's a giant iPod touch. Won't people look a little retarded walking around using that as their music player? It's not like it can be used as a phone or anything useful other than playing music and maybe some apps you can use over wifi. Not to mention that it's huge, but that goes without saying. Basically you have to lug around a laptop sized device without laptop capability.
There are other issues with the iPad, such as the actual software components themselves. Even though I would never buy one of these anyway, and hopefully no intelligent person would (they cost around $500 for something you could buy for $300 that does the same thing, which is an iPod touch), people have issue over what kind of hold Apple is seizing over the usage of their products. See this petition for an example. I really hope despite all of this digital restriction that the hackers figure out how to do what they want soon. Oh well, I know I won't ever be buying an iPad.
I've always been a fan of Apple's products, both genuinely and because they are the main opposition to Microshaft. I really hope they don't do anything to change that really soon. As easy as it is to hate money grabbing corporate pigs, I don't like doing it (although some might beg to differ) because it severely limits my options. But at the same time I am not going to knowingly give my money to companies that fuck their customers over and use any means to get people's money. I have a huge problem with companies who do that. As soon as the customer becomes less than first place in the hierarchy of priorities, that's when companies need to either change or quit.
But I have to say the phone is wonderful. It can do everything and has become a super awesome entertainment device for me. It's great because it's an iPod and a cell phone in one, plus other things. The idea of getting the iPhone was because using a phone for voice calls for me is basically a secondary function. The primary functions are texting and data, so it works out great.
The only thing I wish I knew before I activated my iPhone and set it up was that installing the firmware upgrade was going to prevent me from jailbreaking it. I would have kept the old firmware that came on the phone so I could have jailbroken it. I now have 1.1.3, and only firmwares up to 1.1.2 can be jailbroken; as in they haven't figured out how to jailbreak this OS yet. I've read in places that people are saying it's "impossible", but nothing is impossible. I want to jailbreak it to be able to customize the icons on the home screen (which Apple doesn't let you do, you have to keep their apps on there even if you don't use them). I personally will never use the Stocks app, so I would like it gone to give me more space. Also, I use a different weather app than what comes with the phone. It's also taking up space. Not to mention the fact that jailbreaking allows you to install free apps that perform many of the same functions of the ones you have to pay for on iTunes. Obviously Apple doesn't want this because they think they will lose money from people who are installing these free versions of apps (I say "think" because likely these people won't pay for them anyway, whether or not they get free ones or not).
Despite all that, I am loving my iPhone. Although I really hate the hold Apple has on their market, I am still willing to use my iPhone proudly since they haven't done anything too atrocious yet. Hopefully Apple doesn't go that route, and if they do, I hope something as widespread and comparable to the iPhone comes out.
On that note, here is an article: the new version of iTunes what isn't mentioned in this article is that every update of iTunes does something to block jailbreaking further. Needless to say I will NOT be updating iTunes.
That brings me to my next point of wonder: what the fuck is the point of the iPad? Basically to me it's a giant iPod touch. Won't people look a little retarded walking around using that as their music player? It's not like it can be used as a phone or anything useful other than playing music and maybe some apps you can use over wifi. Not to mention that it's huge, but that goes without saying. Basically you have to lug around a laptop sized device without laptop capability.
There are other issues with the iPad, such as the actual software components themselves. Even though I would never buy one of these anyway, and hopefully no intelligent person would (they cost around $500 for something you could buy for $300 that does the same thing, which is an iPod touch), people have issue over what kind of hold Apple is seizing over the usage of their products. See this petition for an example. I really hope despite all of this digital restriction that the hackers figure out how to do what they want soon. Oh well, I know I won't ever be buying an iPad.
I've always been a fan of Apple's products, both genuinely and because they are the main opposition to Microshaft. I really hope they don't do anything to change that really soon. As easy as it is to hate money grabbing corporate pigs, I don't like doing it (although some might beg to differ) because it severely limits my options. But at the same time I am not going to knowingly give my money to companies that fuck their customers over and use any means to get people's money. I have a huge problem with companies who do that. As soon as the customer becomes less than first place in the hierarchy of priorities, that's when companies need to either change or quit.
Saturday, February 27, 2010
iPhone
I broke down and got an iPhone. I am such a nerd. I have had the itch to get one for a while now and got pissed off that my Blackberry was fucking up when listening to music. I am now a Telus customer. More later.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
my non-digital hobby
Everyone in this world likely has more than one hobby. Some are related to each other, some are not. Along with computers, the internet, and technology in general, I have a more "classic" type of collection, a collection of something that is, in contrast to technology, very old. I like to collect playing cards. I have no idea why or how this hobby got started, but I have liked playing cards for a long time. Something about the fact that they have so much history behind them and have persevered through centuries, and still can be customized to modern times while maintaining their integrity. That's really the only analysis I can give. I also noticed that there were many varieties of playing cards, and I wished to own as many of them as possible. I found a local magic shop not too long ago, and in the magic world it seems this hobby is really quite common (the shop owner showed me some parts of his personal collection, including a deck that goes for around $300). So, to many people's surprise, I am not a magician. Nor am I excessively enthusiastic about card games, although I do enjoy them but don't play very often (mostly because of a lack of people who wish to play with me). My next step, other than spending money on more cards, is to find something nice and presentable to store my playing card collection in. Right now they're just sitting on the dresser which is rather unsightly and impractical. And it will be especially important now since I have more cards on the way. Much to my delight I found a magic website with an excellent selection. I also found out that I had some extra PayPal money sitting in my account... it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out the inevitable result :)
Thursday, January 28, 2010
random update while procrastinating
As the title says, I should be doing other things. I should have been doing other things for the past four hours, but my brain is set on playing computers. I installed Ubuntu Netbook Remix on my netbook (the netbook which I wrote about in a past entry). Ubuntu Netbook Remix is a version of Ubuntu that is optimized for netbooks, and has the priority of battery life and low CPU usage (since netbooks are typically not as powerful as regular computers). If you have a lovely netbook, you can go here and download UNR if you're curious. The best part is that it auto partitions. I wrote about my struggles with partitioning a while back when I first installed Ubuntu on a machine, so this is a nice breath of fresh air. There is also a Windows installer, but I tried it and it gave me some error that it couldn't obtain the ISO file. If you do decide to try Ubuntu, it's really easy to install, but despite that, if there are any problems (and this goes for anything post-installation as well) go to the Ubuntu Forums and make a post with your question. They are very good at answering questions, and can dumb it down if you're like me and are not a turbo computer user.
I am pleased with the progress of Ubuntu. I used it before, but stopped using it due to hardware problems (as in it wouldn't recognize my wireless device). This problem has been fixed, and the only problem I have is that the sound doesn't work on my desktop, but it sounds to be an easy fix. I am too lazy to do it now, but we will see in the future.
I really hope that someday Ubuntu, or Linux in general, kicks some Microshaft ass. The monopoly and money grabbing has to stop. Microshaft likes to rip people off every chance they get. Having to pay hundreds of dollars for an operating system that is inferior is retarded. Also for an office suite...although I use OpenOffice anyway, which can be downloaded for free here. OpenOffice is made by the people who made Java, and it's a totally free version of Microcrap Office. It is compatible with Office files, although there are occasional instances where things display strange, and it's more like pre-Office 2007 (which is better, in my opinion, since Office 2007 is something people should be wiping their asses with). The only reason I do/would willingly use a Microshit product is that there is no other acceptable alternative, I get it for free/can steal it, or other products are not compatible with Microshaft's products. The reason my stuff needs to be compatible is because I am in university and need to hand in digital documents. If they don't open on the teacher's computer, I am basically fucked. Most software is really good at compatibility (open source programmers are awesome for making things that are free and useful), but occasionally something doesn't work.
The main thing that is keeping Linux based operating systems from taking off is the fact that they take a lot to configure. I am not a power user and I still needed to take about two hours to configure my netbook to be usable to me. That is also a generous amount of time since I know what I am doing. Most average computer users don't know anything about the concept of a package manager, and the average computer user makes up the majority of the computer market (hence the term average). Ubuntu is slowly getting close enough to becoming an OS that is usable for the average person, but it still has a long way to go. I am in no way saying we should take away the customizability of Ubuntu, since that is part of what makes Linux great, but it should have more things that work out of the box (like hardware, basic plugins, etc.). That also doesn't mean that power users have to use Ubuntu, since other Linux distros might be more suited for heavy computer users who know a great deal about Linux and computers in general. Another reason why Linux isn't taking off, which I don't know about for sure but I am guessing, is that Microshaft doesn't want people knowing about it and what it can do, so they do things to prevent competition (why else would Microshaft have a near monopoly on the operating system market?). Some might think I am paranoid for thinking that, but I've been quite surprised by some of the things I've heard of large corporations doing.
Anyway, the world of Ubuntu will unfold before me (as I am typing this on my old desktop with Ubuntu on it), and I am enjoying almost every minute of it. If you have some kind of interest in computers, and computational diversity, try it, it's ridiculously easy to install. You don't even have to install over Windoze if you don't want to (I have a partition on my HDD just in case I absolutely need something from Microshaft). It is very rewarding for me so far :)
I am pleased with the progress of Ubuntu. I used it before, but stopped using it due to hardware problems (as in it wouldn't recognize my wireless device). This problem has been fixed, and the only problem I have is that the sound doesn't work on my desktop, but it sounds to be an easy fix. I am too lazy to do it now, but we will see in the future.
I really hope that someday Ubuntu, or Linux in general, kicks some Microshaft ass. The monopoly and money grabbing has to stop. Microshaft likes to rip people off every chance they get. Having to pay hundreds of dollars for an operating system that is inferior is retarded. Also for an office suite...although I use OpenOffice anyway, which can be downloaded for free here. OpenOffice is made by the people who made Java, and it's a totally free version of Microcrap Office. It is compatible with Office files, although there are occasional instances where things display strange, and it's more like pre-Office 2007 (which is better, in my opinion, since Office 2007 is something people should be wiping their asses with). The only reason I do/would willingly use a Microshit product is that there is no other acceptable alternative, I get it for free/can steal it, or other products are not compatible with Microshaft's products. The reason my stuff needs to be compatible is because I am in university and need to hand in digital documents. If they don't open on the teacher's computer, I am basically fucked. Most software is really good at compatibility (open source programmers are awesome for making things that are free and useful), but occasionally something doesn't work.
The main thing that is keeping Linux based operating systems from taking off is the fact that they take a lot to configure. I am not a power user and I still needed to take about two hours to configure my netbook to be usable to me. That is also a generous amount of time since I know what I am doing. Most average computer users don't know anything about the concept of a package manager, and the average computer user makes up the majority of the computer market (hence the term average). Ubuntu is slowly getting close enough to becoming an OS that is usable for the average person, but it still has a long way to go. I am in no way saying we should take away the customizability of Ubuntu, since that is part of what makes Linux great, but it should have more things that work out of the box (like hardware, basic plugins, etc.). That also doesn't mean that power users have to use Ubuntu, since other Linux distros might be more suited for heavy computer users who know a great deal about Linux and computers in general. Another reason why Linux isn't taking off, which I don't know about for sure but I am guessing, is that Microshaft doesn't want people knowing about it and what it can do, so they do things to prevent competition (why else would Microshaft have a near monopoly on the operating system market?). Some might think I am paranoid for thinking that, but I've been quite surprised by some of the things I've heard of large corporations doing.
Anyway, the world of Ubuntu will unfold before me (as I am typing this on my old desktop with Ubuntu on it), and I am enjoying almost every minute of it. If you have some kind of interest in computers, and computational diversity, try it, it's ridiculously easy to install. You don't even have to install over Windoze if you don't want to (I have a partition on my HDD just in case I absolutely need something from Microshaft). It is very rewarding for me so far :)
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