New episodes return next week. I think it’s the best show on TV, and although some elitist Arrested Development fans think it’s not even in the same league, I think it has taken pages from both that excellent show and Office Space to create one of the best sitcoms ever made. I enjoy this show for many reasons. One of them:
Pam. 
I’ve never had an affinity for Apple products. I don’t understand what gets people’s hearts all aflutter over their hardware or software and what inspires such love for a corporation. My iPod works fine, but the interface is laggy for what it is. I’m considering flashing my firmware to rockbox but I don’t want to risk damaging the device… we’ll see. iTunes is crap. It eats memory for what it does - foobar is light years better in terms of responsiveness and customization. Also, for whatever reason, anytime I try to close iTunes on my computer, the thing never closes right and just hangs and waits for me to kill it manually. Quicktime also sucks, mpc is better. I was always kinda hoping that iTunes would just sit idly on my computer and not bug me too much, but now I get daily reminders that I really really should update my browser to Safari 3.1 for Windows and oh what a handy dialog box we have here for you to click ok to and start using our wonderful browser. Because apparently Firefox isn’t any good, or something.
In summary: fuck that.
Safari is a terrible browser - it must be bad for even Mac users to want to switch to Firefox. But for Windows, Safari is even worse. They didn’t even try to make the hotkeys match Windows standards - you need to use Ctrl + Shift + [ or ] to switch tabs versus Ctrl + Tab or Ctrl + Shift + Tab - and it’s not remappable. You have to resize the window using the lower right corner only. And of course, their awful, awful anti-aliasing which makes the fonts look fungus-covered. Add that to the awful crashing problems and recent devastating security concerns and you’ve got a recipe for disaster, particularly compared to the consistently awesome Firefox.
But to top it all off? Using Safari on Windows is in violation of their own EULA (via Slashdot). Installing Safari is only legal on Apple-branded hardware. Let the lawsuits commence for all the suckers who blaze through those things without reading them, right?
Regardless, my real complaint is that I hate being annoyed by little “install me!!” buttons popping up all the time. I hate when Windows tries to automatically update and I hate even more when software I only use with my nose pinched tries to unload more of its crap onto my hard drive. That’s a step above malware practices.
This is absolutely goddamn awesome. Tons of television shows and movies free to watch, commercial-free (if you use Firefox+Adblock which everyone should) and simply awesome. NBC + NewsCorp = lots of free shit for people to enjoy! For example, the entire series of Arrested Development? This entire season of The Office? How about taking an hour and a half to rewatch The Usual Suspects?
Plus, embedding. For example:
I am not going to get any work done today.
Nothing much to add here. He might have meandered a bit but he is more of a Clinton sympathizer than myself. Hopefully this will resonate with some people on the fence - this cannot go on, for the good of the Democratic party.
Geraldine Ferraro, an old, irrelevant hag and former vice presidential candidate on the Mondale ticket in ‘84, made news this week by saying the following retarded things, an initial comment followed by a response to the inevitable outrage caused by her initial remark:
“If Obama was a white man, he would not be in this position. And if he was a woman (of any color) he would not be in this position. He happens to be very lucky to be who he is. And the country is caught up in the concept.”
“Any time anybody does anything that in any way pulls this campaign down and says let’s address reality and the problems we’re facing in this world, you’re accused of being racist, so you have to shut up. Racism works in two different directions. I really think they’re attacking me because I’m white. How’s that?”
Yes, a black man with the last name Obama and the middle name Hussein has it really easy running for President in this country and this climate. The poor white woman with the last name Clinton and all of the considerations, history, donors, and political machinery associated with that is definitely the underdog in this primary fight.
Completely ridiculous.
And the Clinton campaign refused to take action on these sentiments (mere days after calling for the head of Samantha Power, an Obama aide who simply called Hillary a ‘monster’ and immediately apologized) , instead trying to portray Obama as the one playing the race card and using “false, personal and politically calculated attacks” by calling Ferraro’s comments for what they were. The Clinton campaign “disagrees” but doesn’t see fit to fire Ferraro, who is an official, high-ranking fundraiser for the campaign.
It would be mind-boggling if the Clinton strategy hadn’t shown itself to be more than willing to use racial tactics in South Carolina and now has admitted that it will stoop to any level to win this nomination.
But what about the flipside? If Obama has gotten ahead because of his blackness, is it now legitimate to ask how Clinton got where she is? Here’s my take: Hillary Clinton would not be where she is today if not for her gender, her husband’s political abilities, her husband’s political successes, and her husband’s infidelities. These are all true, and yet if any member of Obama’s campaign had said a single one of them, Clinton would be screaming her victimhood from the rooftops.
It is absolute hypocrisy, but not surprising in the least given how Hillary has decided to run her campaign.
NEWS ALERT: GOVERNOR SPITZER’S FACE IS IMPLODING
For those out of the loop, Gov. Eliot Spitzer (D-NY) was caught soliciting high-priced prostitutes and doing a bad job of hiding it. I’m not one to defend his actions - no kind of sex is worth $5500 per hour. He’s been a major failure as governor anyways, completely unable to achieve anything and becoming the polar opposite of his “Sheriff of Wall Street” image that he painstakingly groomed before running for governor. But what does rile me up about all of this (besides Spitzer’s obvious moral failings) is the predictable hypocrisy coming from the Republicans. Quick rundown of Republican scandals in the past two years alone:
All I’m saying is it takes a hell of a lot of audacity for the Republicans with a history like that, spanning only two years, to call out the Democrats for being “corrupt and hypocritical”.
In conclusion, Spitzer should resign - and so should Craig, Vitter, and any others who have betrayed the public trust and gotten into office cursing Bill Clinton’s infidelities or any other faux-moral bullshit. One of particular humor is the act of claiming homosexuality is sexual deviancy while committing adultery. Guess what, Republicans; one of those two is condemned in the Ten Commandments you love so much, while the other is confined to obscure passages in Leviticus and Romans. And maybe someone should also explain that when Jesus said “love thy neighbor”, he didn’t mean that in the Biblical sense.
Just want to run down a few of the better articles I’ve read over the past few days:
Chicago Tribune: Clinton’s experience claim under scrutiny
Gary Hart via HuffPo: Breaking the Final Rule
Domenico Montanaro via FirstRead: ‘Different Standard’ For HRC
Andrew Sullivan: The Clinton Rules
Jonathan Alter via Newsweek: Hillary’s New Math Problem
And a quick video link via Dailykos: McCain/Clinton 08
Some decent reporting in the wake of Hillary “huge comeback” on Tuesday that will accrue her around 8 delegates - for perspective, about 5% of their pledged delegate deficit.
Again, I will repeat this: Hillary Clinton will not be the Democratic nominee. All she is doing right now is helping John McCain by spending the next seven weeks in Pennsylvania telling everyone there how unelectable Barack Obama is.
I’m slightly ashamed to say that I am a gear whore. I love lenses, I love cameras, I love the technology that goes into them and I love the new possibilities that additions to the system provide. I am a Canon man first and foremost - they have great lenses at decent prices, but the options are infinite. I have a hefty camera that has amazing high ISO performance and blazing 6.5 frames-per-second, a very sharp third-party general use wide aperture zoom, a telephoto zoom L series (one of the sharpest zooms ever made), and an off-camera flash with manual power control if I need it. This should be more than enough to keep me busy, but…
It’s difficult to keep busy in photography during the cold winters in NY, especially doing the wander-around-and-find-interesting-shit type of photography that I do. I don’t want to spend the entirety of my out-of-work free time driving somewhere interesting to take photos, I’ve explored most of the immediately interesting places near my apartment, and I’m too conspicuous with my current setup to get candid street shots. And unfortunately sometimes it takes a shiny new lens to motivate me to get out into the cold for photos. I want to get into prime lenses - non-zoom, single focal length, very wide aperture. The 50mm f/1.8 is a great starter, but I sold that to my brother along with my old camera and I want something a bit better - quieter autofocus, higher quality optics. Mainly primes are great because they are small and unobtrusive - they allow for some very sneaky shots despite the huge SLR you might be lugging around. Plus they force you to be creative by using your feet to zoom rather than just rotating the ring. Technically speaking, they also allow a very small depth of field to allow for maximum artistry in your photos.
My two top contenders are the 50 f/1.4 and 85 f/1.8. The 50 is a more useful general purpose focal length and 1.4 is a very wide aperture allowing for low light photos and razor thin depth of field. However the 85 is listed as one of the best deals in lenses but is more useful in portraits and the types of things I don’t typically do. Or should I splurge and go for the 100mm macro so I can do shots like these? And this is where I run into trouble - analyzing the gear far more than taking the photos. The toy-buying phase of photography is great fun, but it can only take you so far if you aren’t swimming in gold coins (this is probably the peak of that mountain). In reality, keeping up with photography is difficult, stressful, draining, and even dangerous. After getting deep enough, you learn to start seeking the best light (hour after sunrise, hour before sunset), scoping out areas days in advance for the best angles on the shot you plan on taking, scouring the streets alone searching for just one or two interesting shots of abandoned warehouses and tenement slums. Wandering the seedier parts of town with $3000 worth of gear is not a comfortable experience, which makes it more tempting to stick to the safer and more boring places… but you can only visit the park so many times
As much of a pain as this winter as been, I expect a great spring and summer. There’s a park very close nearby that’s right on the highly polluted Onondaga Lake, and despite the fact that it’s closed at nights I think I will be able to park nearby and wander around with my tripod. It’s much more difficult to wake up and go out shooting Saturday mornings knowing it’s going to be below freezing. Warmer climates should encourage further exploration.
Let’s hope so at least, for the sake of keeping the only hobby I’ve ever had that gets me away from the computer.
I love the word postmortem, by the way. It’s by far the coolest term you could use to talk about things you’ve learned in hindsight. Also probably the most succinct. And most metal.
BioShock, along with Portal, are probably the two most listed contenders for game of the year in most gaming mags and sites, both for uniquely awesome reasons. Portal started as a side project by six kids from the Nintendo-affiliated Digipen Institute of Technology, known as one of the premier schools for game design. It’s a relatively short affair - the game can be beaten in the area of about four hours of playtime which may seem short compared to the 100 hour Final Fantasy style sagas but is really a perfect length game for most people, particularly adults who don’t have the entirety of summer vacation to devote to a single game anymore. Portal lets you pay your $20 (or as part of the $50 Orange Box which is the goddamn best deal ever in gaming: HalfLife2 + Episodes 1 and 2, Team Fortress 2, and Portal all in one pack), spend a weekend or long night playing it, and get out. Though some people complained about the ’shortness’ of the game… well, screw those people. Short and sweet is the new hotness. It’s becoming plainly obvious that many developers these days are artifically extending their single player campaigns in order to create the 8-10 hour “experience” that gamers apparently demand. These forced extensions can bcome painfully obvious though - some of these 8-10 hour games are like watching a four-hour extended cut of Die Hard 4. All games have a particular length that works for them - whether it be four hours for portal or 80 for Suikoden. Hopefully the success of Portal makes directors realize that it’s not always longer = better when it comes to games.
But that was a total tangent - let’s get back to BioShock. I played it this past week, a pirated copy which I feel awful about. Piracy in PC gaming is really becoming a severe problem (I feel another tangent coming on, skip to the next paragraph if necessary). A story I read quoted the director of THQ saying that PC piracy essentially killed a studio, Iron Lore, that created the fantastic Titan Quest series of games. Piracy in games is different than pirating music or movies. Most people who play PC games are smart enough to pirate them, and it’s estimated that 50% of sales are lost due to piracy. This is costing severe talent in the gaming industry with geniuses becoming unwilling to put in the 80+ hour weeks to build a game if they can’t break even, let alone be profitable doing it. It’s also pushing good developers over to consoles where piracy is much less rampant - only having to develop for one set of specs also helps, versus the infinite number of hardware combinations possible with PCs. Personally, I love buying games, especially through products like Valve’s Steam program/platform that lets me buy a game directly online, download it immediately from their hugely piped servers, and play it almost immediately - then uninstall and reinstall as necessary as long as I have access to my account. But still, a new game usually costs at least $50 - add that to the fact that I need a $250+ upgrade to my computer to play the games the way they’re supposed to be played… I can buy a goddamn console for that amount of money, and I need to upgrade far more often than if I stuck to my Xbox360. But now that I’m out of college and have a steady income, I feel that I should support the games I love - I don’t want to pirate another PC game as long as I live. Will I break that promise? Yes. But I’ll at least vow to purchase the game if I enjoyed it afterwards. I guess that’s only fair. I still give no such automatic promises to movies or music however.
Seriously though, BioShock. It’s awesome. The setting is the first thing that stands out as you play the game - it’s set in the 1960s in an underwater art deco objectivist dystopian city called Rapture dominated by people gone mad due to genetic over-experimentation. The objectivist/Randian motifs are everywhere and the commentary is not subtle for those familiar with her ubercapitalist philosophies. This game is not just a flashy FPS-cum-RPG but also demands that the player examine morals, free will, and the aspects of pure capitalism that led to the downfall of Rapture. Games often try to make people think, but it’s the rare one that succeeds. BioShock not only succeeds in making us think, but is also a very enjoyable gameplay experience featuring a healthy mix of the FPS and RPG genres as mentioned above. I won’t get too in-depth with a review; if you care enough, read Sean Molloy’s writeup for 1up or any of the glowing reviews gathered on Metacritic. Granted, most game reviews are written by enthusiasts were an 8 is below average (because these dudes just looove games sooo much, brah). But in this case, the 10s garnered are more than worthy. This is the type of game that elevates the entire medium and allows developers to rethink their boundaries.
I can’t take the complete lack of context/history anyone has in our media for politics. I hate how completely they buy into spin without doing any sort of actual journalism. Going back just TWO WEEKS, we see quotes from Clinton aides saying “After March 4th, we’ll be even in delegates”. Want to know why they said this? Because they were up by twenty points and forfeited every state over the past month to focus all of their efforts there. And yes, they won both, and it has been expected all along that they would win both, but now they are claiming “momentum” and “comeback” status (for at least the second time in the past month and a half might I add) and the media is buying right into it. Yeah, winning by about 10-15 points less than you planned on two weeks ago? What a huge victory! Still behind by 150 delegates meaning you need around 60% of every remaining vote to get the nomination, including liberal Oregon and 40% black Mississippi (amongst many other states strong for Obama)? Wow, she’s on the path!
It’s such bullshit I can’t even wrap my head around it. The media just loves the conflict and the fight, they want this shit to go on all the way to the convention. The Republicans are eating this up, it’s better than they ever could have imagined. Yesterday, Hillary said that she has a lifetime of experience, McCain has a lifetime of experience, and Obama has a speech. Yes, she compared herself in a good way to John McCain, and she said that Obama is less able to lead the country than McCain. This is the kind of shit that will be used every five minutes in a general election. As I’ve said all along and it’s only been proven more and more, this isn’t about the Democratic Party for her - if it was, she’d be out today because she still has no clear path to win the nomination. It’s about her, it’s about vanity, it’s about destroying the other guy no matter what it does to him in the general against McCain. I used to play World of Warcraft a lot on a free for all PvP server and it’s a pretty fun little situation - you watch a guy on the other team fighting two or three mobs and getting down to like 10% of his health, and then you one-shot him and kill the mob for experience/loot (yeah that’s right, I have about zero qualms about dropping meganerd references). The RNC has no problem playing that role of asshole onlooker, and Hillary is helping them by crossfiring Obama. Over these next seven weeks until what will ultimately be another no-gain of delegates in PA , she is going to keep running those Republican-style fear-mongering 3AM ads and torpedo Obama’s general election run. Thankfully McCain is weak enough that I think Obama can beat him anyways, but with him able to pull out all sorts of quotes Clinton’s going to come up with over the next almost two months, it’s going to be very tough.
McCain is the nominee now. He has the backing of Bush and the RNC. They are going to take this time to define Barack Obama as a pansy liberal effete, and he will not have a chance to respond because Clinton’s vanity run insists on continuing despite the straight math against her. So congratulations Hillary - thanks for running a scorched earth run to the White House and not caring about the damage done to the party in the meantime. I mean, hell, your Senate seat’s safe, so who cares? As long as you’re ok, that’s all that matters in the end.
Just another relic of the selfish, me-first boomer generation - I’ll be glad when these bastards are out of politics forever.
Quick edit: Although I am very proud of Obama - his concession this evening was gracious and still uplifting. That’s the kind of thing that makes him special - when he loses, he doesn’t piss and moan and whine about unfairness, he comes out and admits the loss. Everyone remember back to the Potomac Primary in February? If you just listened to Hillary’s speech, you wouldn’t have even known there were primaries happening that day. God, she is one of the worst people in politics today.
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