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You are viewing the most recent 25 entries.
8th November 2009
nsight7 @ 5:23pm: Motorola Android vs Apple iPhone
 I will not say much that is substantial about this topic. It has already been beaten to death across the internet anyhow. That said, I got an iPhone almost two months ago. It is a very good device! Devices like this are the future, and the iPhone itself is probably responsible in large part for cell phone companies getting on the ball and really stepping up their game. I mean until devices like the iPhone existed, what real need was there for 3G? The Motorola Android is probably the first phone that really ups-the-ante for the iPhone, the first phone that will really cause Apple to have to step its game up a bit. The features it really has going for it are a separation between the general processing and graphics processing (this isn't a big deal now, but it could be shortly as I suspect game-play and multitasking would benefit greatly from it), a better camera (5MP vs 3MP, and low-light condition photography), and an open-development environment. The rest of the advantages are trivial in my view though, from the mundane (voice GPS turn-by-turn) to the overrated (true multitasking). I won't even address the mundane advantages of the Droid, as apps for doing these sort of things are either already available or are on the horizon. Things like multitasking and a physical keyboard, I will address though. Multitasking on a smartphone is vastly overrated in my opinion. The devices these days are getting complex enough and computationally intensive enough that battery life is a VERY real issue. One of the big reasons I steered clear of the Blackberry Bold, for instance, was that all its ability came at a cost, namely that a standard day of use would absolutely necessitate a recharge. True multitasking serves to drain these little batteries relatively quickly. I somewhat prefer Apple's current alternative in the form of push-notification, in which certain apps can push out notifications of mail, messages, et cetera (the list isn't large now, but it is growing). The advantage here is obviously that you get the benefit of using various apps in near-tandem without the battery drain that accompanies true multitasking. Of course I think there is some room for real multitasking, I just think that battery life is and processing power on mobile phones are probably not up to task for a satisfactory implementation of these capabilities yet. The iPhone finds a good balance in the compromise between functionality and power, particularly since you don't lose that much functionality in the compromise. Then again, if you must have true multitasking, you could always jailbreak the phone. Next, I will concede that some people do better with a real keyboard. I think this is a compromise of sorts, since virtual keyboards don't have parts that break such as keys and rollerballs, but seem to provide a better typing experience for many. However, from all I have read, the implementation on the Droid is all about fail. Barely raised keys and poor separation of keys makes it somewhat tedious to type on when compared with other physical keyboards. For my part, I like virtual keyboards better because I don't want to deal with possible physical keyboard issues and I don't type any slower on a virtual, but if you must have one, the Droid version is flawed. One last point, I don't buy into the hype over the resolution of the Droid screen. I think that if the screen is too small, the resolution is all for naught. Let me put it this way, would there be any point to 1080p on a 12-inch screen? Stuff would look just as good on a screen that size at 720p resolution. The analogy, I believe, holds for every video I have seen of the Droid thus far. The extra resolution doesn't add a whole hell of a lot on a screen so small. I do find the open-development environment appealing, but I think as more phones start using Android, problems may reveal themselves. I think part of the appeal in going with the iPhone is part of the appeal of going for Apple in general, namely that the hardware and software are designed to work in tandem. Basically, open-development is a big question mark for me. For computing, going the Apple route would cost more and do less for me. For smartphone use, I kinda doubt the benefit of open-development is as tangible, but it could be great. Time shall tell. In general though, I like where phones are going without respect to the iPhone/Droid debate, that being toward mobile computing. I like that many different forms of functionality are being integrated into single devices. For instance, when I had separate devices for taking pictures, for using the phone, for listening to music, et cetera, I tended to do less of each (except for using the phone, which has continued to maintain its normal pace). Now I listen to more music and taking more pictures/video simply because I always have the device with me. Moreover, it allows me to do things that I can't do otherwise. For instance, if I need directions I don't need to print them out beforehand, or if I need to find the cheapest gas or movie times, I don't need to head back home to figure it out. My email is always available to me as well. I don't need a computer in front of me for access to email that might be timely in nature. Of course I would like that extra 2MP and low-light picture taking on the camera. Damn that would be good!
9th November 2009
purplehaze9 @ 8:25am: 19 votes wtf
 Thought this would be the least likely week where I would be stepping toward elimination. I thought I killed. I just think it's weird that I am actually doing worse than my introduction week when I believe that this piece is way better than it. P.S. Vote For Me
8th November 2009
homestar @ 5:02pm:
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homestar @ 9:03am: raaage
 dear brothers, if you ever argue outside my room again about whose turn it is to feed, the cats, I will feed BOTH OF YOU to the cats. I have WORK in the morning, dammit. this waking me up at 4am nonsense needs to STOP. not love, your sister
Current Mood:  annoyed
purplehaze9 @ 5:49pm: An observation about the Main Event
Darvin Moon is the worst player ever. Wow. How did he get so far?
7th November 2009
sailornash @ 11:06pm: Writer's Block: Opposites attract (sometimes)
Religious beliefs has to be the same. No excuses there. No other discrepancy, other than incompatible genders or sexual orientations of course, will cause more stress in a relationship or subsequent marriage. Other than that, however? I am of the belief that opposites attract, but only within certain tolerances. Polar extremes will not mesh at all, as there is no common ground. The most extreme hardcore punk rocker would hardly be able to communicate with a sheltered, timid church mouse. Someone so adventurous they always want to be out and be active, if not be risking their lives rock climbing or hang gliding, would be as weighted down with a homebody as this laid-back individual would be in a constant state of stressful anxiety from being pushed so far out of their comfort zone. Meanwhile the homebody will only bore the thrillseeker to madness. Such comedic pairings only work in fiction. However, in general opposites do attract because what is strange and mysterious is also fascinating. No one wants to be with someone just like themselves; most people, deep down, do not like themselves or at least dislike a good many of their own character flaws. If your mate knows nothing different, does nothing different, and brings nothing different to the table, then it's hardly much of a relationship at all. There are no new experiences. Nothing new to learn about the other person. All that can be said here is that you get to have sex, but one could debate that since it's a constant struggle to keep things exciting in a relationship, this aspect shall soon suffer as well. For me, personally, I'm a very serious and hard-working individual. After work for the most part I'm rather laid back, and when I do go out I usually stick to my usual haunts. I deal with stress well, and while I'm the pillar of strength for so many people I'm able to do so by taking so many burdens upon myself. I hold it all inside, and carry my emotional pain until it wears me out. I worry and I brood. In my case, I need a girl who's fun and carefree. I'm a good provider and take pride in protecting those I care about, so she can be weak and frail, needy and dependent by contrast. But she needs to be sweet and caring, compassionate and able to tend to my emotional needs that I so blatantly neglect even as I provide for those physical and financial ones in much the same way. I take charge and am highly organized; I need someone more easygoing and spontaneous to bring balance to the pairing. I'm far too independent for someone to try and boss me around, but at times when I'm stuck in a rut I may need gentle urgings to sweet-talk me into doing the things that in the long run would be best for me, even if it's simply going out when I'm content enough to spend the evening in my recliner. Though dissimilar, I still would prefer a few common interests - hobbies, similar tastes and the like - but that's not the main thing as much as it'd be nice to have a few things we could share and enjoy together. Perhaps the best example I could give is one that is pathetically geeky, but it is not unlike the serious, brooding fighter and the cute schoolgirl who befriends him in virtually every Anime series. But so far, there is no Kagome for this Inuyasha. There is no Tohru Honda for this Kyo. There may never be. I wish I had an angel, for one moment of love...
Current Mood:  lonely
Current Music: Nightwish - I wish I had an Angel
sailornash @ 7:24pm: This night will hurt you like never before
 I know I've mentioned this on my Twitter feed - after all, that's where I originally found it. But I'm going to repost this here as well, because it sincerely is the single most baddass Sailor Moon AMV that I think I've ever seen. Of course, if you think you can top that, feel free to link one in your reply. Sappy love songs, character profiles, and other such things are common enough, but truly kick-ass music videos from this series admittedly are kind of rare.
Current Mood:  impressed
Current Music: Nightwish - Wish I Had an Angel
homestar @ 7:14pm: i just. what.
 I had kind of a bizarre dream last night I've been debating about posting. Mostly because it reveals my inner ~*creepy fangirl*~, but honestly it was just the most LUCID dream I ever had so I think I will. It's ... weirdly upsetting? ( ...and it involves the Nostalgia Critic. And a MAJOR tmi, but it's brief. Actually, you probably figured it out already, being a very clever FList. )tl;dr bizarrely realistic sex dreams ftw?
Current Mood:  embarrassed
homestar @ 6:59pm: wha?
 I am home from work and mom is making CHICKEN CUTLET. and CRESCENT ROLLS. this is truly the greatest day. fucking cold in my house, tho.
Current Mood:  cold
6th November 2009
homestar @ 7:00pm: YAY.
 So I was like 'this song cannot get any better'. I was wrong. There's a Mandarin version, too, but I prefer Cantonese. I also think there's one more version (since apparently the film was dubbed in China three diferent times, but Jackie Chan is Li Shang in every version HOW COOL.) I also really wanna watch Jackie Chan Adventures really really bad. DOES ANYONE REMEMBER THAT SHOW. please say yes.just look at his face as he sings. like he's ready to cry because he believes so STRONGLY in its message. ilu jackie chan jackie chan >>>>>>>>>>> donnie osmend
Current Mood:  amused
kelenar @ 10:12am: M-M-M-MULTIKILL
 My D&D group wiped last night. We'd been investigating this slavery ring, and were attacking a stronghold belonging to it. Since the Lawful Good types were worried about the slaves, they refused to back off once we started fighting, since the slaves could be moved or punished once the people in the fortress realized we were attacking. (My True Neutral Wizard was rather less enthusiastic, but long since learned to not argue with the Paladin over these things.) Which means that we took no extended rests... which, well, is a bad thing in 4e. We even beat up the guy who ran the place enough that he retreated to get reinforcements, at which point the DM reminded us repeatedly that we had the way clear behind us if we wanted to go heal. And warned us that we would probably all die if we chased him. Everybody agreed that it would be lame to just retreat and heal mid-battle with a ruthless villain who was going to keep tormenting dozens of innocents, though, so we charged on in. My character was actually the last to die, though, and as the entire party except the cleric was laying on the floor dying, I got a critical hit with Magic Missile and killed the boss... pretty much the best way for a Wizard to go down. My plan had been to teleport away afterward, since I had multiple spells and abilities to let me run, but the guards attacked in a different order than I was expecting and put an end to that. It was probably the most cheerful party wipe ever, since everybody agreed both that we weren't willing to retreat and that we understood the consequences. As our characters hit the ground, people were already discussing what classes they wanted to play next. Incidentally, I hate how easy resurrection is in D&D, so I'm actually pretty glad it ended like this. Having most of us die and then just going 'OH BUT THE GUY WHO ESCAPES RESURRECTS YOU ALL' would be lame beyond words. I'm thinking I'll go Striker once we start back up. Controller is kind of boring at low levels--lots of 'enemy gets -2 to their attacks until the end of your next turn' and such. There's really very little they can do to actually control the battle until the higher levels.
4th November 2009
sailornash @ 11:06pm: Also?
 Fuck you, Yankees. You go to Hell and you die.
Current Mood:  displeased
sailornash @ 9:55pm: Asleep at the Keys
 Personally, I blame the sun. Today, I fell asleep at my desk. Completely started snoozing right there in my big, comfy office chair. Think I was gone for at least an hour if not an hour and a half. I ran out of one of my migraine meds, you see. I'm on one preventative medication and three (three!) to manage the pain when the brain-crushing trauma hits anyway. Guess which one I ran out of? If you figured it was the one that keeps these things from hitting, or at least cuts the frequency, intensity, and duration of them significantly, then you'd be right. I would say that it's not a problem, but it kind of is. But I can adapt. Donning my shades indoors "Hollywood" style, I spent much of the day in my darkened office lit only by the natural light filtered in through the window rather than the harsh florescent lights from above. And then I proceeded to do both jack and squat for hours and hours on end. I think the boss is keeping me there just for spite, really. I mentioned how that, while I was willing to give them two weeks as a professional courtesy, I'd much rather go ahead and pack my box that evening and leave straight away. After all, I had just spent two whole weeks training the new guy on all my responsibilities only a month ago when he first started...not much reason to spend two more training him on the same now. The boss, however, decides to make me wait out the full two week period. Even though the first thing he does is pull all my tickets and assign them to the other two members of my department, ordering me not to work any more tasks and only remain on-call to assist them as needed. And I do answer questions whenever they're asked, but even so I've only worked perhaps one hour in the past week and a half. Yet I'm being forced to stay there simply because I've stated that I want to leave early, and that my new boss wants me to start there as soon as they can spare me here. He's obviously doing it just to piss me off. But, I've got to fill my hours with something. The first day, I caught up on my tech blogs and RSS feeds. Reading up on important technical things that I should be keeping tabs on but never had the time due to always being so overburdened. Things that the boss frowned upon, thinking they were unimportant because they didn't directly relate to any measurable immediate gain. I finally got tired of that after a while so eventually I logged in and loaded up my GHOTS email and webpages and started reading paranormal news sites and having discussions with the other team members. I was subtle at first, but eventually I quit caring. They couldn't fire me, and if they wanted me to do work all they had to do was tell me what they wanted and I was more than willing to help. Today, after I finished reading every single article GHOTS or TAPS had ever posted online, I finally got tired from all that self-study and just went to sleep. I had no work to do. Nobody had any questions they needed from me, nothing they needed training on. The lights were out because my eyes were sensitive due to migraine. The room had been lit up well enough from the window, but because of the time change three days ago it had already started to get unexpectedly dark outside. I had been reclining my aching head back anyway...so, I just went on to sleep. Yeah, he's trying to piss me off the only way he still is able by forcing me to stay, now knowing how unhappy I am there. I tried to argue back that it's just costing him money to keep me around, sitting idle and doing nothing. For a penny-pinching miser such as himself that's nearly a low blow. When that failed to work, perhaps due to him being without balls, it actually has been kind of fun pushing the envelope more and more to see how much I can get away with. (Tomorrow night is my "jailbreak party" my coworkers are throwing in my honor. I fully expect to show up on my last day completely hung over, if not still somewhat drunk.)
Current Mood:  lazy
sailornash @ 9:38pm: At least I tried
 I wanted a nice, fresh, healthy piece of fruit. I look in the icebox. I don't have any fruit. I do, however, have a six-pack of Woodchuck Cider. ... Guess what I'm drinking now?
Current Mood:  silly
homestar @ 5:00pm:
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homestar @ 7:38am:
 *looks up how to walk to school* :[ I wish I was better with directions and could recall what we did yesterday. Thank god I'm getting a ride home tho. woo. h8 you septa.
Current Mood: annoyed
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