with great power comes great responsibility, Multiverse

Apparently... Multiverse is coming out with a new MMORPG.

This one is called Firefly. Yes, Joss Whedon's Firefly is being adapted to the PC by a company that isn't even a developer. But the company makes tools for creating games, and they'll be hiring a developer to do the work; Multiverse will take a cut of the developer's revenue.

Expect something tangible as early as 2008.

Fans around the world and I will probably be pretty passionate about this game and the developers will have to use bullet-proof cars to do their daily commuting if they mess this one up... ;)

If this is anything like Eve Online with ground characters, I'll play it, and if it's anything like WoW-style playability, I'll spit on it and grind it into dust with my heel, before apologizing profusely for the blasphemy.

higgledy-piggledy is a word ya know

This meteorite, approximately 4.5 billion years old (the age of our Sun and solar system), is not that important.

What IS important is the organic matter inside the meteorite, which is apparently older than the meteorite itself.

From the National Geographic article:
"What's really striking about this is that these globules clearly could not possibly have formed where [the meteorite] itself formed," Messenger said.

"Under those extreme conditions the air that you'd breathe would be solid ice. You would never find those conditions in the asteroid belt or anywhere close to the sun."

. . .

The meteorite likely formed in the outer reaches of the asteroid belt, but the organic material it contains probably had a far more distant origin.

Keep in mind that organic != life. But it's a possibility that could explain the origins of life on Earth. That, of course, or some sort of omnipotent being who looks like a ape and decided to create beings all higgledy-piggledy in His own image, because He's just that self-centered and confused.

"Will We Even Be Able To Play Half Life 2?"

Some people asked me to post a link to this, so here it is:

An entire thread devoted to figuring out whether monitors will be able to handle the latest games.

What more can I say?

another nd post

This was done in response to someone "beating" my record on Narbacular Drop:

Click here for hi-res version.

I say "beaten" in quotations because he basically cut off the first two seconds of his video to beat me. How much did he beat me by? Two seconds. That said, I had to make a new speed run because even then, this meant someone had matched me.

So ha.

...

Back to homework now, I guess.

glimpse

This isn't meant to be interesting for anyone but me, but hey, if you like it, that's good!

4457 pictures, 10 days.

Music: Blue Man Group - Drumbone

Tools used (freeware): Microsoft Webcam Timershot, Google Picasa2, VirtualDub

using Linux

Okay... Everyone knows about Linux. A lot of people even like Linux. But who in 7 hells actually uses it?

Well, I do, now. And I can literally uninstall it in 5 seconds if I wanted to. How?

Take a look:

As you can see, I'm running it from inside Windows. I've dual-booted Linux in the past, and you know what that entailed? Partitioning my hard drive. I don't know about you, but I hate segregating. It's virtually racism.

... Applause for the pun? No? Okay, I'll continue.

So who would want to use Xubuntu? Here's what Xubuntu is:

"Xubuntu is a complete GNU/Linux based system with an Ubuntu base. It's lighter, and more efficient than Ubuntu with GNOME or KDE, since it uses the Xfce Desktop environment, which makes it ideal for old or low-end machines, as well as thin-client networks."

No visual tricks or doohickeys or anything like that. I can even have Xubuntu running while I'm playing a game, while it only takes up 90 megabytes of RAM (not that I would, but I'm just saying...).

Here are the pros:

• No partitioning of disks!
• If you don't like it, delete it!
• Boot time is faster than if you installed in natively!
• You still have Windows!
• Making Virtual PC full screen makes it feel as if you are on a Xubuntu machine.
• If you aren't familiar with the benefits of the Ubuntu Linux, go here.
• Browsing the web can't possibly be safer:
  1. It's Firefox
  2. It's Linux
  3. Even if a virus manages to screw all that up, your Windows can NOT be affected outside the Virtual Machine. 1337.

And the cons:

• Does not include a source compiler unless you use alternate install CD.
• A few of the games that ship with Ubuntu need to be installed... which is a really easy thing to do in Linux.
• Takes up 128 MB of ram to run comfortably... OMGWTFBBQ!

If you've ever wanted to try Linux, but wanted to keep Windows, and didn't want to partition your disks (partitioning disks is potentially dangerous... it killed my sister), I definitely recommend Microsoft Virtual PC with Xubuntu. Both are free downloads. If you aren't that computer savvy, then this couldn't be any safer: You simply cannot mess up your computer while installing this. It's safe, secure, and fast.

Choosing amount of RAM for Xubuntu:


One way of deleting Xubuntu once you've screwed it up:


That, in the above picture, is a virtual hard drive, and I can install as many operating systems as I want to it. Buahaha.

Future post: Using Virtual PC with Ubuntu, since I haven't actually tried it yet (with Virtual PC) and probably should before I continue talking about how great Xubuntu runs on VPC.

this is like... asking for a celeron and getting a core 2 extreme...

For those Computer Science students who haven't checked this out... Let's just say you're missing out.

Hello, legal copy of Windows. I don't believe we've met?

second life

It is now possible to join Second Life without a credit card, so that is what I did recently.

My Satyr.

My first interaction happened to be with the SCP (the Second Life Police) while they were interrogating a girl named Aferdita:

[21:54] Billyjack Zuhal: Leave now Ridado.
[21:54] Momma Berjis: Hello Ridadao
[21:55] Momma Berjis: Ridado we told you to leave and you didn't
[21:55] Momma Berjis: You are interfering with SCP affairs.

Just because I didn't leave when they were interrogating this girl made them put a tube of metal around my guy and so that I couldn't escape. So I tried to run around inside the chamber, looking for a way out.

[21:56] Momma Berjis: Ridado plz calm yourself you are in a cleansing chamber.
[21:56] Me: I feel cleansed!
[21:56] Me: SAVE ME! SAVE ME~
[21:56] Momma Berjis: If you remain still you will be let out automatically.

Why would I stay still? I was stuck in a chamber for God's sake!

[21:56] Me: waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
[21:56] Momma Berjis: Aferdita you may go
[21:56] Momma Berjis: Ridado is the problem.
[21:57] Me: AAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
[21:57] Billyjack Zuhal: Ridado
[21:57] Billyjack Zuhal: Please, remain quiet or we will remove your ability to talk.
[21:57] Me: LMAO
[21:57] Momma Berjis: Okay thats it.
[21:58] Me: lol
[21:58] Momma Berjis: tsk tsk tsk
[21:58] Me: AHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!
[21:58] Momma Berjis: I am sending a report to SCP HQ.
[21:58] Momma Berjis: HMMM they are busy.
[21:58] Momma Berjis: I'm going to try Linden Affairs.
[21:58] Me: Who are you guys, anyway?
[21:58] Billyjack Zuhal: SCP
[21:58] Me: Who's that?
[21:58] Momma Berjis: Second Life Police
[21:58] Me: Ah.
[21:59] Momma Berjis: okay I sent a report in for a Mr.Ridado Serapis
[21:59] Me: For moving around in a chamber mathingy?
[22:00] Momma Berjis: No
[22:00] Me: I have no clue what's going on.
[22:00] Billyjack Zuhal: We asked you to leave becuase you were interfering with SCP affairs. You refused to and therefore you are now being contained.
[22:00] Me: I did? You did?
[22:00] Billyjack Zuhal: Yes, we did.

By now, I had found a way to break out of the metal chamber. Apparently I had already broken three different rules in the Second Life universe.

[22:00] Momma Berjis: 1.Violation of SCP affairs
[22:00] Me: I wasn't even paying attention
[22:00] Momma Berjis: 2.Leaving without permission
[22:00] You: I thought you guys let me out
[22:00] You: What if I had just flown away?
[22:00] Momma Berjis: 3.Unsuitable behaivor
[22:00] Me: Oh
[22:00] Me: How I'd do that
[22:00] Momma Berjis: If you read the Terms and Agreemetns you would have seen under section 3 all that I just said
[22:01] Me: Ah.
[22:01] Me: Mmkay.
[22:01] Billyjack Zuhal: We would have decativated your account immedietly.
[22:01] Me: For what?
[22:01] Billyjack Zuhal: Running away from us.
[22:01] Me: Ah... lol... I didn't even know
[22:01] Billyjack Zuhal: Ridado, I don't see you as registering a credit card with us, why?
[22:02] Me: I'm finding this hilarious, even if this is serious
[22:02] Billyjack Zuhal: This is serious.
[22:02] Momma Berjis: That is too bad.
[22:02] Me: Because I don't have a credit card
[22:02] Billyjack Zuhal: It is ok, I was just curious.
[22:02] Billyjack Zuhal: Ridado, we sent in a report of you to Linden Affairs.

*silence*

[22:02] Me: So... You guys like music?
[22:02] Billyjack Zuhal: Do not try and seduce us.
[22:02] Me: Ah. Cool.
[22:03] Momma Berjis: It should take about 3 mins to process.
[22:03] Me: I see.

*silence*

[22:03] Me: ... What am I being reported for again?
[22:03] Billyjack Zuhal: Excuse me.
[22:03] Billyjack Zuhal: I have to deal with something, Colonel Berjis, hold him.
[22:04] Me: Yes. Don't let me go. That would be most serious.

By this time I had escaped around 5 times, after which I would then calmly sit in front of them, and allow them to put me back in the jail thingy so that I could break out again.

[22:10] Me: So...
[22:10] Me: What's up, guys?
[22:10] Me: Am I allowed to leave?
[22:10] Me: Or should I just wait
[22:11] Me: Or have people forgotten about me?
[22:11] Me: Cuz that would make me sad.
[22:11] Me: *sips pop*
[22:11] Billyjack Zuhal: Ridado.
[22:12] Me: Billyjack.
[22:12] Billyjack Zuhal: If you are talking, we can not hear you because we have taken away your ability to speak.
[22:12] Billyjack Zuhal: Only you can see it.
[22:12] Billyjack Zuhal: Ridado
[22:12] Billyjack Zuhal: Stop trying to escape.
[22:12] Billyjack Zuhal: You will not receive your ability to talk.
[22:13] Billyjack Zuhal: Stop trying to escape.
[22:13] Billyjack Zuhal: It just makes things worse.
(I broke out again around here)
[22:14] You: SORRY
[22:15] Billyjack Zuhal: ...

At this point, I was laughing my ass off. Their little jail wasn't very effective. However, something told me that I should not break out again if I wanted to keep my account. So I tried to keep calm. And then I found out that I could wear pieces of furniture the same way I could wear clothing... So I dressed up as the Green Giant and attached furniture to my body. I think it was attaching a cabin to my elbow that made them go over the edge.

See that bit of green in the middle? That's me.

Keep in mind that these people are moderators.

[22:16] Billyjack Zuhal: ridado
[22:16] Billyjack Zuhal: you cunt fuck
[22:16] Billyjack Zuhal: you are such a dumbass
[22:16] Billyjack Zuhal: you dont understand shit
[22:16] Billyjack Zuhal: you must be like 10 or some shit
[22:16] Billyjack Zuhal: we say cooperate and your like OOO NOOO WTF LOL I CANT IM GREEN OMFG

Then Billyjack let me out of the jail and flew away. So I was left there with Momma Berjis, dressed as the Green Giant, with random household furniture attached to my body.

I looked at him. I wondered if Billyjack had also given back my ability to speak.

[22:17] You: Okay.
[22:17] You: Can you hear me?
[22:17] Momma Berjis: maybe
[22:18] You: Cool.
[22:18] You: I'm a house.
[22:18] Momma Berjis: ur a fag

And then Momma flew away as well.




Needless to say, I reported both of those moderators. They hurt my feelings.

oops

Afterwards, I realized I couldn't delete the aliases.

take back what you said about us being violent or we shall DESTROY YOU

On September 12, 2006, in a lecture on "Faith, Reason and the University", Pope Benedict quoted the opinion of Byzantine Emperor Manuel II Palaiologos: "Show me just what Muhammad brought that was new and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached."

In response, angered Islamic communities have responded by violence, attacking two Catholic churches, one Anglican church, and two Greek Orthodox churches in the West Bank and Gaza with "guns, firebombs and lighter fluid, leaving church doors charred and walls scorched by flames and pocked with bullet holes."

"Ha," say the Muslims. "We sure proved him wrong."

steam, circuits, and music

Steam-powered "Steampunk" robot by I-Wei Huang... Imagine this thing 1000 times larger, coming through the hills as they do in animes.

Also, check out this story on an artificial intelligence that creates complex and pleasing pieces of music.

sunday bloody sunday by George Bush

By "Dunno!"

He's actually pretty good.

for those who like to sing their sorrows

Courtesy of IFILM.com

"This real life choir from Finland harmonizes their complaints about life, love and everything in between."

this summer, a movie trailer, THIS SUMMER!!

From Something Awful

Originally recorded using posts from a thread that's about two years old.

top 10 best and worst shows on primetime network tv 2004-2005

Top 10 Best and Worst Shows on Primetime Network TV 2004-2005

Why is it I find so many of my favorite shows on the "WORST" list? :D

its amazing what you can learn when you look at it from "their" point of view

The truth about Jews and the American film industry.

My mom once forwarded to me a joke about a Jewish man reading an Arab newspaper. When asked why he was reading the newspaper by a Jewish friend, the first man replied that reading Jewish newspapers made him sad, because they were about the suffering and poverty that occurs in Israel. However, in the Arab newspapers, the Jewish people own Hollywood, the film industry, and the Western World's banks.

getting pregnant

From whitestkids.com

"I can't read it, what does it say?"

how a pc explains net neutrality.

From The Daily Show with Jon Stewart

"Oh, okay... Right... *sigh*... I'm a PC."

pervert reporter :D

By Colin Firth
Video courtesy of boreme.com

smothered

According to the BBC "the prisoner Hezbollah wants most" is Samir Qantar. On April 22, 1979, Qantar murdered 28-year-old Danny Haran and his 4-year-old daughter and caused the death of another Haran daughter, age 2. Haran's widow, Smadar Haran Kaiser, describes the crime (she transliterates the murderer's name as "Kuntar"):

It had been a peaceful Sabbath day. My husband, Danny, and I had picnicked with our little girls, Einat, 4, and Yael, 2, on the beach not far from our home in Nahariya, a city on the northern coast of Israel, about six miles south of the Lebanese border.

Around midnight, we were asleep in our apartment when four terrorists, sent by Abu Abbas from Lebanon, landed in a rubber boat on the beach two blocks away. Gunfire and exploding grenades awakened us as the terrorists burst into our building. They had already killed a police officer.

As they charged up to the floor above ours, I opened the door to our apartment. In the moment before the hall light went off, they turned and saw me. As they moved on, our neighbor from the upper floor came running down the stairs. I grabbed her and pushed her inside our apartment and slammed the door.

Outside, we could hear the men storming about. Desperately, we sought to hide. Danny helped our neighbor climb into a crawl space above our bedroom; I went in behind her with Yael in my arms. Then Danny grabbed Einat and was dashing out the front door to take refuge in an underground shelter when the terrorists came crashing into our flat.

They held Danny and Einat while they searched for me and Yael, knowing there were more people in the apartment. I will never forget the joy and the hatred in their voices as they swaggered about hunting for us, firing their guns and throwing grenades. I knew that if Yael cried out, the terrorists would toss a grenade into the crawl space and we would be killed. So I kept my hand over her mouth, hoping she could breathe. As I lay there, I remembered my mother telling me how she had hidden from the Nazis during the Holocaust. "This is just like what happened to my mother," I thought.

As police began to arrive, the terrorists took Danny and Einat down to the beach. There, according to eyewitnesses, one of them shot Danny in front of Einat so that his death would be the last sight she would ever see. Then he smashed my little girl's skull in against a rock with his rifle butt. That terrorist was Samir Kuntar.

By the time we were rescued from the crawl space, hours later, Yael, too, was dead. In trying to save all our lives, I had smothered her.

The BBC gives a rather more sanitized account of the crime: "Qantar . . . attacked a block of flats in Nahariha in 1979, killing a father and his daughter."

Narbacular? what the heck does that mean?

What has Jesse been up to? Quite simply, Narbacular Drop:


The premise of the game is that you can create two portals, a red and a blue one, to go through the game. If you enter the blue portal, you will come out the red portal, and vice-versa. As you can see in the above picture, I ran into the wall and was shot into the air because my other portal was on the ground. I also placed a portal on the ceiling and made a portal under the box, and the box came out of the ceiling.


Here, I can be seen trapping some frog dude in a cage by making a portal in the cage, and then creating a portal under him. He fell sideways into the cage.

The game's official website (which sometimes exceeds its bandwidth limit for the day) can be found here. If you cannot download the game from there, you can download the game from here.

Thanks to Kum for showing me Valve's new game, Portal. The makers of Narbacular Drop are working with Valve to create Portal, which is how I found this game.

By the way, I have the world's fastest time to beat the game: 1:28. Second place is 1:45. I emailed my run to the website admin, but if it fails to show up there in time, just ask and I can email it to you. However, please play the game through before you watch my or anyone's speed run, as there are spoilers for how to beat the levels.

***EDIT: My fastest time is now 1:11.

Restore Marriage Canada! Newsletter

Restore Marriage Canada! Newsletter

Does this make anybody else shudder? I opted in to their website newsletter so that I could stay informed of what they were up to.

It's about Harper's decision to allow Parliament to consider whether to take another look at same-sex marriages:

"What this means in the simplest terms is that if this measure passes Parliament, then we will still have a showdown over marriage itself at some future time. But if it fails, it is unlikely that Parliament will consider restoring traditional marriage in Canada until the damage to the very fabric of our society is obvious. By then, it will be too late to reverse that damage.

And make no mistake. Unless we restore traditional marriage, that damage to our society is inevitable."

Sometimes, I feel as if I'm the only person that considers this ordeal to be a question of human rights... But at least all you intellectuals that read my blog are on the same wavelength with me here. [Cuz you guys aren't idiots]

What REALLY bugs me is black people or female people that oppose the same-sex marriages. Isn't it obvious to them that they'd be slaves or unable to vote if they had the same mindset a few decades ago?

hope is emo

By Crista Flanagan

DIE HOPE!

500 gigahertz? lara croft's boobs for a major rendering upgrade!?

From Popular Mechanics

Yes. The chip above, from IBM, contains 500 GHz of raw CPU power. I want that thing in my pants. And then in my computer; what a sexy piece of technology.

More:

• 500 GHz - 500 000 000 000 cycles per second; this thing is over 150 times the speed of your computer, averaging just over 1 000 000 fps in Doom 3 when running SLI. (I might have made that up)
  
• To run at these speeds, the chip has to be cooled to 4.5 Kelvins. Bummer? Not really; the chip still runs at 350 GHz when at room temperature. I can live with that... I guess.
  
• Chip can theoretically support 1 THz (terahertz), or 100 GHz, even at room temperature. Dude.

Here's a movie for those of you who like those moving pictures.
(You will be directed away from the site)

another jesus christ post

Warning! Do not look at the picture below if you won't like it!

By Jeff MacDonald

"One of the points of the recent 'Capitalist Pig' comic was this: How many of you thought, 'Why are those people getting so worked up over that [Muhammad] comic? It's only a comic, we Christians wouldn't have done that, no way.'" - Jeff MacDonald

It's true, Jeff. So true.

white ninja has weird feet

By White Ninja Comics

Saskatoon's most well known comic. Actually, Saskatoon's most well-known anything.

jezze izza cat!

By Jesse

Today, my best friend finally decided to put his foot down and discontinue playing WoW. He smashed his WoW CD's, uninstalled the game, and gave his account to a friend who changed his password for him.

I congratulated him. He thanked me.

The next words out of his mouth were, "So now I'm playing Heroes of Might and Magic 3! What a kick-ass game!"

whee!

Probably by getfirefox.com

See? Even Microsoft Internet Explorer is excited about the Nintendo Wii.

lol... tasteless humour...

By Javier Prato

This is pretty ironic... :D and no, I'm not just posting this because I'm Jewish. And no, I'm not endorsing this kinda stuff. And no, I don't think Natalie Portman is all that attractive.

One of the above sentences is a lie.

AMV Hell

By www.amvhell.com

Just because I'm a fan of Kirk. ^_^

play faster, trumpets! faster! muahahahaha!

From Nintendo.com

The part that makes me want a Wii, odd as it may be, isn't Mario, Link, or Samus. It's the conducting 'game' that has me interested.

good thing im so photogenic

From hlcomic.com

If you've played through Half-Life 2 and haven't read Christopher Livingston's "Concerned" yet, you're missing out.

March 30, 2006 (by "clates")

By clates, powered by vimeo.com

Taken in Burnaby, BC, Canada.

the real reason to make "the switch"

From ellenfeiss.net

This was a real commerical produced by Apple. It was pulled from the air shortly after publication for drawing "the wrong kind of attention" to their product.