Posts from — August 2008

Well, color me surprised.  I never though my blog would last longer than a Virgin Comic.

Back in 2006, I reported that Virgin had opened a joint venture with Gotham Entertainment to take advantage of a growing comic book and graphic novel market.

According to AWN, Virgin Comics produced 17 comic series in two years, as well as 18 trade paperback collections and three hardcover titles. The owner to the rights to these properties is unclear.

Started by Richard Branson, Deepak Chopra and his son Gotham Chopra, the company’s original goal was to create comics inspired by Indian and Hindu mythology for license out to film and merchandise companies to build global franchises.  Great idea!

As part of their work, Deepak Chopra wrote a biography of Buddha in comic form.  Bad idea!

AWN also reports:

Virgin also created a Director’s Cut line, featuring comics from Hollywood players like actor Edward Norton (DOCK WALLOPER), director Guy Ritchie (GAMEKEEPER) and director John Woo (SEVEN BROTHERS). Virgin hoped to turn these projects into major films.

Virgin’s Voices comic line featured works from actor Nicolas Cage (VOODOO CHILD), adult film star Jenna Jameson (SHADOW HUNTER) and musician Dave Stewart (ZOMBIE BROADWAY).

Ed Norton!??  Deepak Chopra??  Jenna Jameson??   Hmm..  I think they should have looked for more folks like John Woo and Guy Ritchie – at least they make a bit of sense.

Just because a person has had every major orafice of their body violated on camera does not mean that they will make a good comic book.  Maybe it was just the irony of Jenna Jameson making Virgin Comics?

Do other industries do stupid sh*t like this?  Never mind.  Don’t answer that.  I don’t think I could stomach the truth.

No, really. They do. At least in California.

California legislators have passed AB 2270, a bill that basically allows the government to confiscate your water softener if a non-elected board decides that local salinity is too high or harmful to the environment.

You can read the amended text here.

The juicy part is here:

SEC. 4. Section 13148 is added to the
Water Code , to read:
13148. Notwithstanding Article 1 (commencing with Section 116775) of Chapter 5 of Part 12 of Division 104 of the Health and Safety Code, if the state board or a regional board makes a finding at a public hearing that the control of residential salinity input will contribute to achievement of water quality objectives, any local agency that maintains a community sewer system in an area affected by the finding may by ordinance take action to control residential salinity inputs, including those from water softeners, to protect the quality of the waters of the state.

So basically, after we have spent $2500 to make our water more normal for everyday use (we have 26 grains of hardness!), they can come in and simply remove my unit, without any compensation at all for my cost.  We bought the unit for medical reasons (my daughter has very dry skin), and yet there is no allowance even for that.

I swear our politicians are dead set on making the United States a modern Gulag.

While we did buy the unit to help my daughter’s dry skin, its a simple fact that hard water also costs a homeowner money by greatly damaging pipes and plumbing, increasing the cost to operate appliances and by making clothes wear out faster.

Hard water is also BAD for the environment, as it forces the use of more soap and detergent for all household and commercial cleaning applications.  That means that MORE, not less chemicals are introduced back into the environment when the entire goal of the proposed bill is to reduce environmental impact and to increase water serviceability through recycling.  Sacramento is sometimes nothing more than an expensive idiot farm.

Here’s an idea – why don’t we have a referendum to vote that next year, politicians can only REMOVE laws from the books – they can’t write new ones for a whole year.  Something tells me the benefit to society would be tremendous.

Please join me in telling the Governator to VETO this assinie bill.  Its easy to do – just go to: http://savemysoftener.com/ and follow the directions.

Ajax is all the rage for web development these days.  For some reason, it seems that an obligatory part of using Ajax is sporting a snappy little spinning dohickey that lets people know when stuff is happening.

Ajaxload is a neat little service where you can easily make your own animated Ajax load graphic with custom color designs.  Its free and quite easy to use.

My geekness approves.

Here’s an example:

Wow, these are really beautiful!

Amazing what a 4th generation, 15 megapixel CMOS can do…  I love to shoot ambient light, so the low-noise of these really makes me drool!

These photos found on Canon Rumors.

Well, the wait is finally over.  The age old question of “What’s Next” for Canon’s non-pro digital SLR lineup has finally been answered.  In a fairly odd way, I might add…

Behold, the Canon EOS 50D:

Canon EOS 50D

Canon is a leaky product company, and the 50D is no exception.  Apparently someone inadvertently put up a Chinese web page a few days early, only to have it taken down shortly after.  Then, a scant three days after the first blunder, test shots and product pictures started showing up on other web pages that disappeared fairly quickly.  What could Canon do but finally clean up the mess and make an official announcement?

Mistake or Marketing?  Who cares, as long as the product is real! And, this time, it is…

Here are the specs:

• 15.1 megapixel APS-C sized CMOS sensor (not a full frame…)
• DIGIC 4 image processor, up to ISO 12800 support
• 3.0-inch LCD with face detection Live View
• HDMI output
• 6.3fps burst mode
• same AF system found in Canon’s 40D with new Microadjustment feature

Apparently it will be ready for the holidays (shipping in October) for an estimated $1,599 with Canon’s EF 28-135mm f/3.5-5.6 IS USM zoom lens and in a body-only package of $1,399.

Now that this is cleared up, how about something similar happening for the long rumored Canon EOS 7D? Apparently, it is supposed to be a full frame $1900 body-only beauty.

Rumored EOS 7D

Just when I thought it was safe to upgrade… *SIGH*  Still, $500 more for a full frame sensor MAY be worth the extra price and the wait.  The final specs will tell.

Too bad these other items seem to be going on the fritz at the same time:

• Our video camera
• Our main family room 65″ Mitsubishi Widescreen Television
• Our Logitech Harmony 880 Universal Remote that makes all of the techno magic happen with a single press of the button.

Oh, yeah, and I’m supposed to be building a new home office in one bay of my 3 car garage, buying new furniture for our master bedroom so that we can give our older stuff to my baby boy who is due late in October (just like the EOS 50D), AND resurface our pool after this summer season, because the plaster is falling apart right before our very eyes.

Just like me, when I think of all these things we have to pay for.

Oh well… To quote a good friend of mine: “It’s just money.  I can make more.”

**caps off the bravado with a sheepish grin**

There is a lot of advice out there on how best to move your iTunes collection from your old PC to a new one.  This is the best way that I’ve found so far.

The only thing that I would add to the instructions is that you want to make sure to Deauthorize your old computer before you trash it, reformat or anything like that.  If you don’t, the songs that you have purchased from iTunes will always have a fantom “use” out there.  You can usually have Apple wipe them all out, but sometimes they can get finiky, so better to do the housekeeping now rather than having to fight with Apple later.

Happy moving!

Wow, I can’t vouch for the validity of this post, but it certainly makes me question if Asus is the partner to trust.

Check out: 10 Secrets To Getting Better Tech Support From Asus

The sad part is that I don’t think this is so unusual when it comes to the PC market.  I typically do not even assume that I’ll ever be able to talk to a PC part manufacturer.  I count on them to make updates to thier BIOS, etc. but I never beleive I’ll get a response.

Perfect example of this – I bought a CoolerMaster Cosmos case for my last rig build, and it had a few challenges.  I contacted CoolerMaster several times, and have NEVER received a reply.

That’s just fracking sad.

And, trust me, Apple is no better, as many in the post comments mention.  I’m sure you’ve heard the stories of people trying to get iPod or iPhone repalcements.  Not fun!