What the hell is wrong with us?
What the hell is wrong with people these days? In particular I'd like to highlight a particular facet of our current society: nerds. First the defenition of nerd and geek:
A nerd is "A person who is single-minded or accomplished in scientific or technical pursuits but is felt to be socially inept." A geek is defined by websters as the same thing but they are generally better looked upon than nerds due to a) a better sense of style; b) better grooming and personal health care habits; and c) they have better personalities and know how to interact with other generic carbon units!
Where's this all going? I was just on a site that is a commented techie blog. The problem with all of this? It gives space for the technically, though only sometimes sound, minded people to 'voice their opinion' on a particular news story. Only they aren't always the most intelligent people. One person, for instance, goes off on Sony's MiniDisc technology, stating "Here we go again, In the tradition of the Mini-Disc and other sony-only Proprietary formats, We are presented with yet another "this is the future" format that will flop within its first year..." Yeah, like that's even remotely true. MD is a very viable format. The problem is the i-Pod fever that's bitch-slapped the market-whores and teeny boppers of America. Do I hate i-Pod? Yes, but that's a personal thing. Am I a market whore? No. I'm a brand whore. Sony owns my soul and half of my body, but that's beside the point. I'm still objective.
The American marketing firms would have us believe that you have to have 250 GB on one device to be cool or have any kind of capability to carry music around. And then they put video on such devices. Is it so much to ask to have one fucking device do one fucking thing? And if hard drive type players are so fucking great then why doesn't everybody have a Kenwood Keg? Because it's not worth it. Back to the point...
MiniDisc: Generates shitloads of money for Sony and the other MD makers in the US. And God only knows how much money it makes in Japan. A couple of my friends recently came back from Japan and they made an interesting observation: there were more MD players walking around than there were mp3 players. Hell, even little grandmas were walking around with MD players.
According to them there were very few players on the market and in the shops there that weren't MD players. I've even read tales on the net of people being ostracized for having an mp3 player because the general opinion is that MD players are better. But it's the opposite in America. I have personally been made fun of for not carrying an mp3 player. Then people listen to me and the player for a few minutes. Here's my spiel (and do remember we're talking about Hi-MD players):
MD players cost about $100 - $200 less than the i-Pod. They come with a 1GB disc that is capable of holding (at max compression) approximately 45 hours of music. 1GB discs cost about $8 per. 80 minute discs cost about $10 for a pack of ten, or $1 per disc and hold about 13 1/2 hours of music max. i-Pods hold about 15,000 songs for a 60GB pod, 4 minute average at 128 kbps. The comparable MD format is Hi-LP, 64 k. How much for MD? Well, My player costs about $200. i-Pod 60GB costs about $400. That's about $200 worth of MDs.
Formula: (10.14 (hours approx) * 60 (minutes) / 4 (avg. song length in minutes)) * 200 discs = 30,420 songs. Run it yourself.
What does this have to do with BD?
Nothing. The point is that Sony has had the better tech for years and will continue to do so, considering market trends. The BD format has a higher bit compaction rate allowing for more storage. Better laser technology allows it to stay far ahead of the game. The number and size of studios already onboard, with lists of media ready to go, beats the hell out of HD-DVD.
The worry is that consumers won't buy either technology. Considering the format wars between plus and minus media over the past couple years gives them reason to do so. But that doesn't mean that adoption will be slow. The tech heads always lead the way and input from the geeks trickles down to the average consumer market area. Think people don't listen to guys like me? You're wrong. I spent 4 years in the tech-oriented sales field. I still have contacts within the consumer field who value my input. I see them in stores and they ask my advice. Now they trust me on blu-ray.
Look at the facts from both sides and the independant media and make the decision yourself. I'm just here to tell you that going with HD-DVD over BD is a bad choice. The more viable option, in this case it's honestly blu-ray, is the one that wins.
Enough of that tech stuff
So now it's time for the rant. Nerds. They're not all bad, just most of them. I'm a geek. The difference between myself and a nerd is that I have a sense of style and am good at, and actually enjoy on occasion, interacting with other Homosapiens Sapiens. Nerds on the other hand have poor hygeine, bad manners, and are 'wiring closet gnomes'. Don't get me wrong, I like the wiring closet. But I like to leave it and go enjoy the burning ball of death... on occasion.
The people I meet in message boards like the one above are spread in to these two categories. There's always a split when it comes to tech. xBox vs. PS (duh, PS is better. Fuck you if you don't think so you damn jock.) Jock vs. Nerd (I've been both and don't like either.) Gamer vs. Athelete (again, I've been both and gamers are a hell of a lot more intelligent. I've made my choice.) etc...
I'll not ask if we can all just get along. I'll just ask that the nerds shut the fuck up until they can articulate their thoughts better and the geeks to keep the bullshit down. We all love to do it, some of us are good at it and the rest are just dumb.
And the next person who calls me a biggot is going to get the tongue lashing of a lifetime. Not my fault that your world is black and white.
Believe it or not there is a grey area. That's where I live, I know it well and it gives me excellent perspective.
Links
Blu-ray official site
MiniDisc info site
The xBox deserves this. I'll watch later for the PlayStation 3 and Nintendo Revolution just for fun.
Beware what you do and watch what you say. I practice my thoughts carefully so as to offend completely.
20060330
20060329
Oh shit...
I just realized as I was reviewing my blog that I've gone and fucked up Baren's blog name. It's not actually "Darkness Bunnies" it's "Birdhouse In Your soul". I've made the requisite change to the original post.
Have you ever...
Have you ever...
Have you ever had a day that just seems to drag you through razors? How about a situation that acts like a black hole, sucking you in to a pit of torment that is inescapable? An occurence that you not only created but continued to foster until it reached the breaking point? You should try it. It's a very sobering experience to have.
Shall we try to make better reading?
Hey, what do you know? I actually have a decent life. I've spent the last couple of months amassing a collections of books. Now that the government has finally, after three and a half months, decided I can have my money back I've gone and made improvements to Motoko, my PC (it just seems wrong to call her a 'PC').
Her new upgrades consist of:
An Asus 6600LE video card;
A FujiPlus 19" LCD Monitor;
And a DVD burner with a free 25 pack of DVD-R media.
WARNING: Shameless plug alert! I got all of the parts from Newegg. I was fairly impressed with the service, though it did take some time to contact their billing department when there was a problem (about an hour). Not bad though.
I received the drive and media last night. For being refurbished equipment (the drive, not the media) I am fairly impressed. Nothing was scratched, the software bundle was intact and the drive is pretty freaking quiet. I burned my first DVD last night (yes, Motoko broke my cherry again ^_^) with the drive and it seemed to do okay. I still have a couple gripes about Nero but hey, who doesn't?
I haven't received the monitor or video card yet so keep watching for a review of the hardware.
What about that first thought?
Well... That thought at the top of the post is hard to explain. If you've read my previous posts (and damn you if you haven't!) then you'd know my life is usually sugarcoated shit. This this week, today in particular, has been the culmination of a storm front. Now that storm is threatening to tear down everything in my life. What a fun fucking day this has been.
But enough of that shit, let's get back to the good stuff, mwahaha...
Who's the dumbfuck today?
Let me give a quick shout out to Hellen Powers of KBER 101.1 radio in Salt Lake City, UT. You, my dear child, have the best theme song ever. What? You've never heard the song? I'll give you the lyrics. You can set them to pretty much any childs song and it will sound good.
"Dumbass roundup here to stay. Dumbass roundup... have a nice day!"
So it's only Wednesday night, not the end of the week yet, and I already know what the dumbest fucking question of the week is:
"Why is corn the second most evil vegetable?"
My answer:
"Because brussel sprouts are the absolute worst, therefore making them 'el numero uno'. But the reason it's on the list is there's no other edible substance on the planet that you can chew the hell out of and still shit whole kernels. It's the same way with creamed corn and tortilla chips." That's just vile.
But it is the truth.
The "piece de resistance": Links
The Prince of Nothing series by R. Scott Bakker
Megatokyo web/print comic by Fred Gallagher
Half Life site with all of the information you'll ever need about the greatest game series ever. Yes, I'm sorry to say that it really is better than Final Fantasy. (Now Baren's really going to kill me for making such a sacriligious comment.)
And last but not least my other best friend Squall's blog. Be gentle, he's just been let out of the cage and hasn't eaten for a while.
Final thought
Did I just taste purple for a second?
Have you ever had a day that just seems to drag you through razors? How about a situation that acts like a black hole, sucking you in to a pit of torment that is inescapable? An occurence that you not only created but continued to foster until it reached the breaking point? You should try it. It's a very sobering experience to have.
Shall we try to make better reading?
Hey, what do you know? I actually have a decent life. I've spent the last couple of months amassing a collections of books. Now that the government has finally, after three and a half months, decided I can have my money back I've gone and made improvements to Motoko, my PC (it just seems wrong to call her a 'PC').
Her new upgrades consist of:
An Asus 6600LE video card;
A FujiPlus 19" LCD Monitor;
And a DVD burner with a free 25 pack of DVD-R media.
WARNING: Shameless plug alert! I got all of the parts from Newegg. I was fairly impressed with the service, though it did take some time to contact their billing department when there was a problem (about an hour). Not bad though.
I received the drive and media last night. For being refurbished equipment (the drive, not the media) I am fairly impressed. Nothing was scratched, the software bundle was intact and the drive is pretty freaking quiet. I burned my first DVD last night (yes, Motoko broke my cherry again ^_^) with the drive and it seemed to do okay. I still have a couple gripes about Nero but hey, who doesn't?
I haven't received the monitor or video card yet so keep watching for a review of the hardware.
What about that first thought?
Well... That thought at the top of the post is hard to explain. If you've read my previous posts (and damn you if you haven't!) then you'd know my life is usually sugarcoated shit. This this week, today in particular, has been the culmination of a storm front. Now that storm is threatening to tear down everything in my life. What a fun fucking day this has been.
But enough of that shit, let's get back to the good stuff, mwahaha...
Who's the dumbfuck today?
Let me give a quick shout out to Hellen Powers of KBER 101.1 radio in Salt Lake City, UT. You, my dear child, have the best theme song ever. What? You've never heard the song? I'll give you the lyrics. You can set them to pretty much any childs song and it will sound good.
"Dumbass roundup here to stay. Dumbass roundup... have a nice day!"
So it's only Wednesday night, not the end of the week yet, and I already know what the dumbest fucking question of the week is:
"Why is corn the second most evil vegetable?"
My answer:
"Because brussel sprouts are the absolute worst, therefore making them 'el numero uno'. But the reason it's on the list is there's no other edible substance on the planet that you can chew the hell out of and still shit whole kernels. It's the same way with creamed corn and tortilla chips." That's just vile.
But it is the truth.
The "piece de resistance": Links
The Prince of Nothing series by R. Scott Bakker
Megatokyo web/print comic by Fred Gallagher
Half Life site with all of the information you'll ever need about the greatest game series ever. Yes, I'm sorry to say that it really is better than Final Fantasy. (Now Baren's really going to kill me for making such a sacriligious comment.)
And last but not least my other best friend Squall's blog. Be gentle, he's just been let out of the cage and hasn't eaten for a while.
Final thought
Did I just taste purple for a second?
20060321
20060315
Ah, the Unwashed Asses
I'd love to have something positive to write. But I don't. I just can't get over short sighted, small minded people that I am forced to interact with.
I took a vacation that ended yesterday and now I'm back into the swing. I've never had problems getting back in to the swing. So I decided to catch up with some people. Note to self: never do that again.
The first person I caught up with had nothing but a friendly jab at the ribs. Gotta love friends who you can make all kinds of fun of. The next person decided to be a colossal asshole. That I can do very well without. He decided that it was his job to probe my vacation for weaknesses and then pummel the thin walls of what should have been a very relaxed catch-up day. What a fuck. He proceded to tell me that he knew exactly what had happened, why it happened and that my whole reasoning about life for the past 9 weeks is fucked up and my conclusion was incorrect.
Why is it that there's always someone who thinks that it is their duty to attempt to make you feel like shit if only to prove the point that "you can take it, I know you can do better" when in all actuality you're doing things exactly how you want to? I propose a solution to the problem: stop taking shit. Just fucking tell people exactly what you think of them and the way the talk to you. Let them know that they have no control over what you do with your own life. And be sure to tell them that they have absolutely no right or reason to talk to adults barely six years younger than them like they're fucking preschoolers!
People have this innate, inane, insane fucking mindset that they have to completely dominate "their" world and all of the people who interact with it. They believe that it is their right, privelege or what the fuck ever to make sure that you keep your shit in one hand. Some people just don't understand that others are entirely capable of making their own decisions and fuck up their life in their own fashion.
And I've just been informed that my life is fucked up.
On a more positive note I've also just been informed that I need to escape my world and start a new one. Have you ever met one of those people who just seem to know how to cheer you up or know a solution to a problem that you know how to solve but you just weren't listening to little Jimeny Cricket screaming at the back of your eyes? That's another type of person I get to interact with. Someone who's been through most of it, if not almost all. A veritable Socrates of human study. An Archemides of life's problems. A person who has spent most of their life studying people in order to better understand the insane species of Homosapiens Sapiens that he belongs to and then pass that knowlege along. And now I've come up with a solution to this problem: I'm going to leave the so called college that I'm currently attending and go to a full time university.
I now realize that he school I'm at now is the source of most of my stress. It's not learning everything that's got me so stressed. It's fairly the opposite: I feel that I've been spending money I don't have on an education I can't get. The principle of equivalent exchange states that you must give something to get something in return. The thing you give should be of equal "mass" to the return that it garners. One can only put in so much without a return though and I've far exceeded that amount. I've surpassed the return with effort. Everything I've learned so far I could have learned by spending 1/10th the amount on books. And I would have been able to keep the books. I will admit that it would have been harder to find the drive to do so, and I wouldn't have had the interaction that I did, but I fully believe that my money would have been better spent.
So, where does all of this leave me? Well, I now have to pray that my current credits will transfer over to a full time university and that I'll be able to work my schedule for study time and still keep my job.
A word of advice for all of the college age students who haven't decided where to go yet: DO NOT ATTEND Stevens Henager College. Spend your money somewhere better, like a community college. At least the people there have a reason to act like assholes: they've spent their whole life working with assholes to dig the diamonds out of shit.
So, what type of person does this make me? I'd say a philosopher with a fucked up sense of smartass-ism who likes computers. I think that sums it up pretty well.
Thought of the day:
Make sure that your endeavors are pointed, concise and that you take shit from no one because once it gets to your neck it's hard to breathe.
I took a vacation that ended yesterday and now I'm back into the swing. I've never had problems getting back in to the swing. So I decided to catch up with some people. Note to self: never do that again.
The first person I caught up with had nothing but a friendly jab at the ribs. Gotta love friends who you can make all kinds of fun of. The next person decided to be a colossal asshole. That I can do very well without. He decided that it was his job to probe my vacation for weaknesses and then pummel the thin walls of what should have been a very relaxed catch-up day. What a fuck. He proceded to tell me that he knew exactly what had happened, why it happened and that my whole reasoning about life for the past 9 weeks is fucked up and my conclusion was incorrect.
Why is it that there's always someone who thinks that it is their duty to attempt to make you feel like shit if only to prove the point that "you can take it, I know you can do better" when in all actuality you're doing things exactly how you want to? I propose a solution to the problem: stop taking shit. Just fucking tell people exactly what you think of them and the way the talk to you. Let them know that they have no control over what you do with your own life. And be sure to tell them that they have absolutely no right or reason to talk to adults barely six years younger than them like they're fucking preschoolers!
People have this innate, inane, insane fucking mindset that they have to completely dominate "their" world and all of the people who interact with it. They believe that it is their right, privelege or what the fuck ever to make sure that you keep your shit in one hand. Some people just don't understand that others are entirely capable of making their own decisions and fuck up their life in their own fashion.
And I've just been informed that my life is fucked up.
On a more positive note I've also just been informed that I need to escape my world and start a new one. Have you ever met one of those people who just seem to know how to cheer you up or know a solution to a problem that you know how to solve but you just weren't listening to little Jimeny Cricket screaming at the back of your eyes? That's another type of person I get to interact with. Someone who's been through most of it, if not almost all. A veritable Socrates of human study. An Archemides of life's problems. A person who has spent most of their life studying people in order to better understand the insane species of Homosapiens Sapiens that he belongs to and then pass that knowlege along. And now I've come up with a solution to this problem: I'm going to leave the so called college that I'm currently attending and go to a full time university.
I now realize that he school I'm at now is the source of most of my stress. It's not learning everything that's got me so stressed. It's fairly the opposite: I feel that I've been spending money I don't have on an education I can't get. The principle of equivalent exchange states that you must give something to get something in return. The thing you give should be of equal "mass" to the return that it garners. One can only put in so much without a return though and I've far exceeded that amount. I've surpassed the return with effort. Everything I've learned so far I could have learned by spending 1/10th the amount on books. And I would have been able to keep the books. I will admit that it would have been harder to find the drive to do so, and I wouldn't have had the interaction that I did, but I fully believe that my money would have been better spent.
So, where does all of this leave me? Well, I now have to pray that my current credits will transfer over to a full time university and that I'll be able to work my schedule for study time and still keep my job.
A word of advice for all of the college age students who haven't decided where to go yet: DO NOT ATTEND Stevens Henager College. Spend your money somewhere better, like a community college. At least the people there have a reason to act like assholes: they've spent their whole life working with assholes to dig the diamonds out of shit.
So, what type of person does this make me? I'd say a philosopher with a fucked up sense of smartass-ism who likes computers. I think that sums it up pretty well.
Thought of the day:
Make sure that your endeavors are pointed, concise and that you take shit from no one because once it gets to your neck it's hard to breathe.
20060313
Terrible way to start a blog
Welcome to DFFAQ. Are you assailed by morons, idiots and generally stupid fuckers querying your database of useless and useful knowledge they'll never understand anyway? Welcome to my world. That's my life. Constantly receiving a barage of BS. Shit these people should have learned in fucking preschool. Feel free to now indulge yourself in tales of stupidity and fascinating idiocy. Welcome.
Formalities:
First, a heads up to my best friends blog:
Birdhouse In Your Soul
This is Baren's blog.
Let the fun begin.
Weather sucks. All weather. Good and bad it always fucks me up. I just bought a very nice Specialized Hardrock Comp Disc and it's now been snowing for since the day I got it. Nice joke ma Nature.
Then my computer, Motoko, decided to die. Horribly. Screams and all. Somehow or another I got a rootkit installed on to my MBR. Piece of shit. Lost almost 200 GB of data, most of which is irreplacable (downloads of TV series and anime that's not available on DVD or by download anymore). It's supposed to be my year!
Now, as you'll also see at Baren's blog, Dream Theater has had to cancel their SLC show. I blew all of my paid time off to go to this concert. I had been planning it for almost two months. I had dreams about it. God damn it. Don't get me wrong. I don't blame Dream Theater. If my calculations are correct they got caught in that shit-storm coming through Donners Pass in the Sierra Nevadas. I do hope they're okay. I just hate mother nature right now.
Now for some good news
Lacuna Coil is coming on April 18. I've been waiting to see them for two years. I own every album. I know the word to every song (that's been officially released anyway). I have seen every web and print-available picture of Cristina and the band. EmptySpiral has the best information available about what may be the best import band in history, bar none, including a countdown timer for KarmaCode on the main page. Yes, even better than The Beatles (gak) and, at the very least, right the hell up there with Motorhead (hi Lemmy).
Check them out if you don't know them. If you're a fan head over to EmptySpiral and show some love. If you don't like this type of music there's something wrong with you. Seriously wrong.
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