t 'n t luoma

Don't You Feel Safer Now?

So we just went through airport security (kudos to the Columbus airport for having 100% free WiFi).

I expected that they would take our water bottles (the exact same thing you can buy 10 feet later for 20% more).

I didn’t, but should have, realized that they would take Ethan’s juice box. That’s right, the US Government is keeping you safe.... from juice.

]]> But the real clincher to me, the thing that makes me realize that yes, Thank God^H^H^HI mean George W Bush, we are finally safe because we have “random” passenger screening for extra security checks.

We wouldn’t want to profile anyone, of course, because there has never been any proof whatsoever that one group of people has been more involved in trying to plan terrorist attacks on the country (remember Timothy McVeigh was as "all American" as anyone), so the best thing to do is rely on a computer to generate random passengers to be screened.

And do you know how good the government’s “random” generator is?

Well when we flew to San Diego in April, Ethan was randomly selected one the way, and on the way back. Wow, weird coincidence, right?

And today he was randomly screened again.

Conclusion? Either Ethan has just done the equivalent of getting struck by lightning while holding a winning lottery ticket, or the random generator that the government is using is complete and utter crap.

So feel safer now as you bask under the warm glow of everything that the government has learned in the 5 years since September 11th. Which is to say: how to make a bunch of completely useless safeguards that make no one safer, while stealing a 4 year old’s juicebox and randomly screening him 3 out of 3 times.

Complete and utter morons.

You know, now that the government has successfully undertaken the important task of “Under God” out of the pledge of allegiance, maybe they ought to work on removing the words “land of the free” from the Star Spangled Banner.

I fully expect to now be whisked off to Syria for interrogation under torture for questioning the divine wisdom of the government. Or maybe added to the “No Fly” list.

CNet's Exaggerations May Kill Kittens

Is there some sort of a bonus system at CNet for writers who can make inflammatory statements? Do they get paid extra based on the number of page views each article generates? Because if that’s true then we can understand that they are just taking a page out of the tool’s box of hackneyed journalism tips for generating ad revenue.

Here’s the latest round of lies, damned lies, and CNet “Reporting” (with apologies to actual reporters for lumping them in with this sort of crap).

]]> First of all, the headline: Security Bites Podcast: Macs face Wi-Fi hijack risks. Certainly that’s one way to put it. Here’s another: “Apple releases security update for Wi-Fi to fix a potential security hole with no known exploits.”

Yeah, I know, not nearly as sexy as the original. It does have the advantage of being true, but let’s not let that get in our way, shall we?

The same article goes on to state:

A month-and-a-half ago, Apple dismissed claims that Macs could be hijacked via Wi-Fi. This week, however, the Cupertino, Calif., company released security updates for a trio of flaws in Mac OS X that could be exploited to do just that.

The paragraph contains two links to two other articles. Let’s deal with them one at a time. The first is to MacBook "hack" still stirring controversy which is dated August 18, 2006 3:48 PM PDT. Today is September 22, 2006. The patches were released yesterday (September 21st). So it’s a month and about 4 days since this report, but CNet claims it was a month and a half ago. Why the exaggeration? Is it supposed to make Apple seem slower in responding than they really are? I mention this because it shows that CNet is clearly exaggerating, which can be proven simply by looking at the timeline.

When did Apple make a statement? According to Macworld, it was on August 17, 2006 4:33 pm ET which you can verify by reading MacBook Wi-Fi hack didn’t use Apple drivers. So CNet claims that Apple dismissed these claims a month and a half ago, but really it was about a month and 4 days. Since when is 4 days equal to half a month? Only in CNet world.

So we are 6 words into CNet’s coverage and we’ve already identified a factual error of exaggeration. If this was a college course in journalism, I think the grade would be at a B or C depending on your instructor.

Now let’s look at the content of that statement. CNet “staff” wrote: “Apple dismissed claims that Macs could be hijacked via Wi-Fi”. Hrm. They did? Where was that?

CNet links to itself (the “MacBook ‘hack’ still stirring controversy” article linked above) where it is reported that Apple’s reply was:

But the SecureWorks researchers have still not shown any proof that Apple Computer’s wireless hardware and software is flawed, despite the claims that it was vulnerable, Lynn Fox, an Apple spokeswoman, said in a statement. “SecureWorks has not shared or demonstrated any code that is relevant to the hardware and software that we ship,” she said.

Pardon me, but there seems to be a rather wide stretch of road between Apple “dismissing” claims that Macs “could be” hijacked via Wi-Fi and Apple saying “No one has shown us anything proof or demonstrated how this can happen.” The difference is significant. It’s the difference between Apple saying “Macs are completely safe!” and Apple saying “There are no problems we are aware of, despite claims that there are problems.”

That’s a world of difference. CNet is overstating what Apple said, and when Apple said it.

If you want to know precisely what was said, here is a quote from the Macworld article mentioned above:

“Despite SecureWorks being quoted saying the Mac is threatened by the exploit demonstrated at Black Hat, they have provided no evidence that in fact it is,” Apple Director of Mac PR, Lynn Fox, told Macworld. “To the contrary, the SecureWorks demonstration used a third party USB 802.11 device–not the 802.11 hardware in the Mac–a device which uses a different chip and different software drivers than those on the Mac. Further, SecureWorks has not shared or demonstrated any code in relation to the Black Hat-demonstrated exploit that is relevant to the hardware and software that we ship.”

Once again, Apple didn’t say there was no chance of a problem, just that there was no evidence of a problem.

The second link CNet makes is to the new patches: “This week, however, the Cupertino, Calif., company released security updates for a trio of flaws in Mac OS X that could be exploited to do just that.” The article links to New Apple patch plugs Wi-Fi hijack flaws, which is, on the whole, a bit more balanced. For example, that article states:

There are no known exploits for the vulnerabilities addressed by the update, Apple said. This means people should not be under immediate threat of attack.

I love the way that they say “should not be” as if to imply “you might be” rather than “it’s damn highly unlikely.”

What it doesn’t say, but should, is: “This means people should not be under immediate threat of attack, despite previous claims that there were known exploits, which there’s still no evidence of whatsoever except a video of an exploit which in all likelihood didn’t use the drivers which were patched today anyway.”

What should have been reported is that Apple, when presented with the possibility of flaws even when no flaws were demonstrated, set about to conduct a security audit, found some flaws which were not part of the original allegations, and patched them before any exploits were made known.

Instead, CNet went after the “juicier” story that Apple was only now fixing flaws that had been shown to it 35 days earlier. Oh, I mean “a month and a half earlier.”

So, in sum, what we have learned is this:

Mac users were never vulnerable to any known threat
Apple took the possibility seriously enough that they went searching for possible problems when the issue was raised without any supporting evidence (this is was CNet refers to as Apple “dismissing” the idea)
Roughly one month after the claim-with-no-proof was made, Apple patched both its Intel and PowerPC hardware to be more secure from flaws which were never known to have ever been exploited anywhere by anyone, even those who made the initial claims of having knowledge of a security problem.
CNet overstated both what Apple said and when they said it

For a better and easier to understand translation of what Apple’s latest security patches do, see The AirPort Security Update and the Supposed MacBook Wi-Fi Hack. In particular note this paragraph:

“No known exploit” does not just mean that there aren’t any attacks in the wild; it means no one has demonstrated to Apple a way to take advantage of these frame validation issues. They fixed them to eliminate potential exploits, not to address actual, known exploits.

Finally, in closing, although no kittens have been demonstrated as being killed by the slipshod reporting at CNet, the most I can say is that kittens should not be under immediate threat of attack.

iTunes Art

Ok, so I was browsing the iTunes ~~Music~~ Store today and came across this image.

]]> Now, mind you, I realize that there’s not a red blooded male on the planet who hasn't used the opportunity to admire a young lady’s necklace as a front for admiring her neckline. It may be nearly as American as apple pie (or at least as American as American Pie). In fact, on an episode of House, Dr Chase said to a teenage boy getting a spinal tap: “Hey isn’t that a nice necklace Doctor Cameron is wearing?" aka “Hey kid, from this angle you can totally see down her shirt, which will distract you from the pain of having this needle shoved in your spine.”

And really, if you could distract a teenage boy getting a needle shoved in his spine and refused... well that’s just mean.

Anyway, back to the picture at hand. My reaction wasn’t quite “that’s in poor taste” (there’s not even a cleavage line or anything, it’s purely hinted at)... but not quite “purely innocent” either (I think it’s the open button that tips the scale).

Someone in the art department at the iTunes Store had a chuckle putting this together.

I was at the iTunes Store because I ordered some iPod accessories from someplace having a "Buy for $25 and get a $25 iTunes gift certificate" sale. I bought two such items. Their website accidentally charged me $30 for one of them. I emailed them and they said “OOps, we'll fix that. Would you like your $5 back or another $10 in iTunes?” Given that shipping was a total of $10, I took the extra iTunes stuff and broke completely even on the deal. The only annoying part was having to copy and paste 60 separate codes from my email to iTunes. The system is definitely not designed for entering a lot of them at once.

A sided note: these “free songs” at the iTunes Store are just that: free songs. It is not the same thing as having $60 worth of credit at the iTunes Store. You can buy 60 songs. You cannot buy a complete album and get the album discount. You cannot buy videos. You cannot buy audiobooks. Just songs.

I asked Tracey for some suggestions because I had to use the certificates by the end of September. At first I thought she was going to have trouble too, but then she found the “iTunes Essentials” (basically a “Greatest Hits” collection). She went through each decade, lingering just a bit too long on the ’80s, but we are what we are. (No I will not post a list of what we bought there, because some of it is just too embarrassing... yes, much more embarrassing than admitting the whole necklace/neckline thing, which 90% of guys (at least hetero guys) will admit to... and 10% of guys are liars.

A Better Nike + iPod Armband

My recent complaint against the Nike+ Sport Armband (you know, the one that doesn’t let you see the screen?) led me to checkout other options.

Even worse, I actually used the thing and found it very uncomfortable. My biceps are not by any stretch of the imagination “huge” but the “One Size Fits All” Nike+ Sport Armband is decidedly too small to wear comfortably. It has a Velcro connector and I was constantly thinking it was going to come off. With about 1" more of fabric they could have made it much more human-being compatible.

My search led me to the Sports Sleeve for iPod nano by Belkin. Its description reads:

Now you can power and play your iPod nano on the go.

Which made it sound like the dock port was accessible even when the Nano was in the case. However, since this was my third armband, I wanted to be sure. I emailed their support, who said that yes indeed, it was.

So I ordered one.

Or at least I tried.

]]> I am one of those weird folks who will pay a little (not a lot, but a little) extra to order something directly from the place that makes it. For example, if this armband was on sale at Belkin.com for $15 (it is) and at Amazon.com for $12 (it is), I’ll buy it from Belkin. Why? Because I believe that if I have problems, Belkin is going to be more interested in solving it than Amazon.com

One problem though... I couldn’t buy it from Belkin.com. Whenever I tried to “Add to Cart” it told me that my shopping cart was empty. Another time I tried and was told (by Safari, Camino, and Opera) that the site was using weaker encryption. Opera made my change a preference setting to try and buy it. At least one of the other browsers simply refused to let me proceed.

So finally I tried Amazon.com. Now you will see it listed for $12 (1). Unfortunately it doesn’t see from Amazon itself, but through one of its “Marketplace” resellers. What this means is that most of the prices you see are a complete lie, and they will hit you with “Shipping and Handling” charges.

For example, TechNGnet claims to sell it (via Amazon) for $12 but charges $6.33 for shipping, which you can’t tell until you add it to your cart. This despite the fact that their published shipping rates indicate only $1.50/lb. (My UPS tracking page eventually indicated that the package weighed .70 lb.)

Likewise, Crutchfield sells it for $15 but charges $7 for shipping ($22 total).

The lowest listed price was infiniteelectronix2 at $9 and $5 for shipping ($14 total). BlueProton sold it for roughly the same amount.

I emailed Amazon.com and complained about this, and told them that it made me less likely to trust any of their Marketplace Businesses when people could get away with what I consider to be a scam. Listing one price for shipping when I click on the link for your shipping info, but giving me another when I “Add to Cart” is a bait-and-switch, pure and simple.

So finally I went to Buy.com, for no other reason than I had used them before. Right there on the Buy.com page for Belkin iPod nano Sports Sleeve it showed me their price plus their shipping cost (as well as several other merchants and their shipping costs as well).

I bought it, they shipped it, I got it.

YES! I believe this will work just fine. It has a nice human-compatible sized band which (unlike the Nike+ version) does not rely on the blood-pressure cuff method of holding the Nano to your arm.

You can indeed see the screen and access the dock connector. In fact it even comes with a clear, custom sized screen protector for the Nano (something they ought to tell you!).

I haven’t even taken the plastic protecter off that Apple ships the Nano with because I haven’t had a case for it and hadn’t wanted to risk the screen. Now I will take that off and put this new one on.

Also, the armband can slip off and you can use the silicone case to keep the Nano in your pocket. It adds very little weight or thickness, and would provide (I think) just enough protection for the average “Oops I dropped the Nano onto the kitchen floor” type of accident most of us are most likely to have.

There is a cut-out for the hold switch on top and the scroll wheel and buttons are directly accessible (and of course not protected, but to me I’d rather have them within reach).

My only complaint? Well, look at the image again. They are selling a white case with a black/grey armband. If I had a black nano, that would be fine, but I would have much rather had a white armband for my white Nano. You’d think a company like Belkin would be savvy enough to attend to a detail like that.

Still, it was clearly visible in the image on Belkin’s web page, so I can’t say that I was too surprised. It just strikes me as odd. Not as odd as not being able to see the screen in the first place, but odd.

Now I just have to get the Nike+iPod sensor calibrated properly. I tried it out over the weekend and it was only recording 0.70 or 0.80 mile for each 1.0 mile that I walked. I tried to calibrate it but when I pressed the “Stop Calibrating” button (after having walked a known-mile stretch) the Nano replied (I’m paraphrasing) “You said you were going to walk a mile, but you’ve only walked 0.8 mile. Do you want to continue or cancel calibrating?” to which I said “Whu-huh? Why isn’t there an option for “Ok so you’re trying to calibrate this and you’re telling me that for every 0.8 mile we detect you are really walking 1.0 mile. Do you want me to adjust the sensor accordingly?”

If/when I get that figured out, I’ll let you know.

Meanwhile, if anyone does want a Nike+iPod Sports Armband, please let me know (email me at luomat AT gmail DOT com)

Sigh. Being fat and out of shape is so much less of a hassle. Not to mention cheaper. Doritos don’t need an armband. (2)

Footnotes:

A note on pricing: I’ve rounded off the numbers in this article, because I find the whole $x.95 or $x.99 pricing thing insulting to my intelligence. If I see “$11.94” I think “$12” and I consider iTunes songs to be $1 each. ↩
Associated medical costs of being fat and out of shape not taken into consideration in this estimate. And if there is an armband out there for Doritos, please don’t tell me about it. As far as I’m concerned the only appropriate Dorito accessory would look something like this:
↩

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iPod + Nike FAQ

After reading the DaringFireball Linked List, specifically Multiplayer Game of the Year (more specifically Multiplayer Game of the Year (full post)) and thought to myself, “Ok, time to get off your duff and do something.”

This summer has been awful for exercise. It’s been horribly hot and I haven’t had any racquetball partners.

But the fall is fast approaching, so I finally broke down and bought the necessary add-ons: a Nike + iPod Sport Kit, and a Nike+ Sport Armband (Black/Red), and a Sportsuit Sensor+ for iPod nano so I could use the Sport Kit with any sneakers, not just the $100 pair that Nike wants to sell me.

I already regret buying the armband. It is incredibly poorly designed.

Why? Well look here at one of the main 3 pages for the iPod Nike: “Run”

What do you notice? How about the fact that the iPod Nano screen, when hooked to the Nike+iPod sensor, provides all sorts of visual (as in “see them with your own two eyes”) bits of information.

You might think that the armband designed by Nike, which is, you may notice, one of the two brand names mentioned in the name “Nike+iPod” would be savvy enough, perhaps, let you see that visual information?

You would be wrong with a capital W because the Nike armband completely covers the screen.

Well done there, design team. Why didn’t you just make this Nike+iPod kit for the iPod Shuffle if you’re NOT GOING TO LET ME SEE THE SCREEN. Argh.

That’s not all the G-in-Genius going on here.

On page 16 of the Nike + iPod User Guide (4.2MB PDF) (which is also printed with the kit) you will read: “Answers to frequently asked questions about Nike + iPod: Go to www.apple.com/ipod/nike/faq.html.”

Notice that I didn’t make that a hotlink? Yeah, you know why? Because the page doesn’t exist. Nice. You don’t get a 404 page, you get redirected to http://www.apple.com/ipod/nike/.

Where you would notice, again, the information from the Nike+iPod sensor shown on the iPod screen.

(And yeah, if you look closely you’ll also notice someone using the armband and you can’t see the screen, but I had just assumed it was dimmed.)

Nike + iPod Frequently Asked Questions (Technical)

iTunes Music Store: Nike Sport Music Frequently Asked Questions

Apple - Support - Nike + iPod Sport Kit - Service - Service FAQ

So there ya go. Now I need to find a new armband that will work with the Nike + iPod senor and show me the diggity dang screen.

Hotels and WiFi

Days Inn Atlanta Downtown (which is in easy walking distance of the awe-inspiring Georgia Aquarium) cost us $75 a night with no advanced notice for a room with two beds.

The Sheraton Buckhead Atlanta wanted $179 a night for a room with two beds.

Now I can personally attest that the two rooms are very similar, both of the TVs are about the same, and the beds seem equally comfy. The hotels seem equally clean.

So why is it that the Days Inn can provide free high speed wireless internet (150kbps downloads) but the Sheraton wants $10 for 24 hours?

This is not the first case in which a “cheaper” hotel will offer free wireless, while a “higher end” hotel will charge for it.

What kind of sense does that make?

Tivo Owner's Guide: How to watch David Letterman's Late Show

Everyone with a TiVo knows that any hour of broadcast TV is really only 45 minutes long (at most). Late Night TV can be even less.

But for me, I've got The Late Show with David Letterman down to about 15 minutes, even though it is scheduled for 62.
]]>
Opening Credits and Introduction (11:35-11:37 p.m.)

Skip this. The TiVo already tells you who is on, and if you can’t read, Dave will tell you anyway.

HOW TO SKIP: Fast forward until Dave starts talking. Then give it a few more seconds. He is going to say “Thank you very much” about 15 times while a trumpet plays some brain skewering high pitched note for no reason other than to kill dogs. Clearly Paul Shaffer hates dogs and doesn’t want any in New York.

Monologue (11:37-11:41)

Watch this, there’s usually 3 good jokes in it. If you hit #3 and are running behind, you may just want to fast foward.

WHEN TO FAST FORWARD: As soon as Dave starts to introduce Paul, press Fast Foward (1). This will help you avoid another musical flourish designed solely to injure any dogs not killed by the intro.

Opening Segment: (11:41 - 11:55)

These are almost always completely useless and unfunny. Keep the TiVo on Fast Forward #2. This way you will bypass Rupert G or the fat guy on the yellow bike or some stupid intern situation.

They will also recap whoever is on the show. Again, press “Info” if you haven’t seen this already. Any audience participation will also take place here (chatting with someone in the audience, Stump the Band, Know Your Cuts of Meat, Know Your Current Events [which was funny, once, 6 years ago]...)

DO NOT get sucked in if you see them cut to something on the roof. Yes, we all like it when they dump stuff off the roof but that is at least 10-15 minutes away. First they are going to milk the setup until the teat falls off.

Commercial Break (11:55 - midnight)

Obivously skip this, but don’t stop just because the show comes back

Re-Entry Mini-Segment (12:00 - 12:03)

There is often another unfunny allusion back to something that happened earlier, or something coming up later (listen for the phrase: “Let’s check in with Rupert G” or “What’s going on up on the roof?”)

Possibly this is where you will get your Top 10 list, of which 3-4 will be really funny, as in you can tell them to someone else later who didn’t see the show and they’d laugh.

Then again, you might get a “Will It Float?” which will throw the schedule off by 3 minutes.

Note: There is usually 30-60 seconds of build-up to the Top 10 list between the time the topic is announced and when the list actually starts, so feel free to hit the +30 button once, at least, before it will begin.

Another Commercial Break (12:03 - 12:06)

Apparently the rules for how often you can have commercial breaks change after midnight, because this would never happen during a normal show, but they go to another commercial break, promising to come back with the first real guest.

Actual Interview! (12:06 - 12:16)

Usually the guest will come out immediately after the commercial break, unless they are still working on some setup for dropping watermelons on pool cues or whatever.

If the guest is someone of actual importance (as opposed to, say, a movie actor/actress out shilling for their latest piece of genius) they will still be there after the break. Otherwise, it’s on to something else. Probably that watermelon thing.

A 12 minute commercial break interrupted by something meaningless (12:16 - 12:28)

The rules are relaxed, but they still have limits. I mean, you couldn’t actually show 12 minutes worth of commercials in a row, right?

So here’s what they do (this is an actual log from an actual recent show):

12:16-12:20 — Commercial break

12:20-12:22 — Some stupid thing with the guy with red hair who annoys me with every breath he takes.

12:22-12:25 — Commercial break

12:25-12:25 (37 seconds) — Camera pans over the audience while someone made balloon animals

12:25-12:28 — Commercial break

12:28-12:28 (32 seconds) — More witty banter between Paul and Dave before Dave introduces the musical guest)

12:28-12:33 — musical guest, of which I listen to 10-15 seconds before deciding that yes, they too are crap like 258 of the previous musical guests in the past year

12:33-12:37 — Commercial break. This actually marks the end of the recording because although it is already scheduled to run 62 minutes, they still don’t make it on time and therefore they cut they end off and you don’t get to see it unless you have adjusted to record an extra minute, or if you watch the Late Late Show.

So if you add that all up you get about 4 minutes of monologue and about 10 minutes of interview, and about 1 minute to decide whether the musical guest is any good. You may need another minute or two for the Top 10 list, but they don’t do that every night.

I have just saved you 47 minutes. You’re welcome.

Footnotes:

Note: On our TV, if you press Fast Forward on the TiVo once while you have the captioning turned on, the captions still appear, so if you are really curious you can see it without hearing it. But you’ll want to press Fast Forward twice to save time once you realize that you really aren’t missing anything. ↩

Wanted: Movie Recommendations

I recently signed up for Blockbuster Online. I’m taking suggestions for movies I ought to watch.... or avoid at all costs. (Leave a comment to this message with yours).
]]> Why Blockbuster Online instead of the better-known Netflix?

Simple: With Blockbuster Online I get a coupon every week for a free in-store rental. Rentals are about $4.50/movie. If we use all 4 of the coupons (and so far we have) it pays of the cost of Blockbuster Online. 1

The turn-around speed has been pretty good. I get an email from them when something is received, and later that day another one goes out, and it is usually here in 2-3 days. About all I can say against it is that it appears that if movies are received back on a Saturday, nothing happens until sometime Monday.

There are a couple of up-shots to the whole deal. You’ve probably heard about the whole “End of Late Fees” thing that Blockbuster has been promoting for awhile now. You’ve probably also heard that it isn’t so much that they stop charging you late fees, it’s that you get to keep the movie longer, but if you keep it too long you effectively buy it from them at a price that they set. 2

Sidestepping the whole debate, the fact is that the price you pay for to buy the movie you don’t return (call it “$X”) takes into account the amount of your initial rental fee (call it $4.50). $X of course changes depending on what movie it is, otherwise I wouldn’t have called it $X. But if you have ever rented a movie and thought: “Wow, that’s pretty cool, I wish I had bought it (generally $15-20) rather than renting it. If you buy it after you rent it, you’ve spent extra money ($4.50 for the rental plus $15-20 to buy it). You could wait and see if it ends up on the “Previously Viewed” table and hope you get there before anyone else, but who has that sort of free time?

Well we’ve already bought one movie that we rented using the in-store coupon. So the $4.50 that we saved on the initial rental then gets applied to the cost of buying it.

Not a bad deal. Of course it depends on the movie, as I said before (remember $X?) and my guess is that you will get it for a better price if it is a newer release and they are likely to get stuck with a bunch of copies of (what do they tdo with 87 copies of The Ringer that they guaranteed to have in stock after the 34 people who actually wanted to see the movie have rented it?)

This works out for Blockbuster, of course, because we peruse the “Previously Viewed” racks when we go into the store and have bought several (yesterday’s big find was The Incredibles which is currently Ethan’s favorite movie).

It also works out for me because: A) there are a lot of movies which never make it to Gallipolis; B) even if they do make it here, we rarely get out to the movies, and C) I like a lot of movies that Tracey doesn’t. So, for example, I’ve seen both Saw and Saw II (and enjoyed both).

However, the problem is that there are a lot of movies out there that I know I’ve never heard of, and going by random reviews has not worked well on a few occasions, namely this one (yes, I get why it’s supposed to be funny, but with a few exceptions, the movie wasn’t) and that one which was so bad that I really think it might have been the first movie to go from “So godawful that it ruptured the very fabric of space and time with the sheer overpowering force of its mediocrity.” to “Proof that Jesus died in vain.” (Both of those quotes are lifted directly from Mr Cranky.com which is always a delightful place to go after you’ve seen a movie you didn’t like. He actually liked it more than I did and deemed it only “Consistently annoying” — high praise indeed!)

Actually, Mulholland Drive (which is the 2nd movie above, in case you don’t know how to figure that out) reminded me of Superman.... no, not the new one, one of the old ones. Remember when Lois Lane died and Superman is so upset that he flies around the earth so fast that it spins the other way, and therefore (wait for it) causes time to travel backwards? (Brilliant!)

Well, after watching Mulholland Drive, I wished Superman would come spin the world back around on its axis so that he could prevent me from ever being born. Yes, that’s how bad it was. I have no one but myself to blame. I believed some review I read somewhere which said that if you liked Memento then you’d like Mulholland Drive. (Actually I take back what I said before, I would like Superman to prevent that person from ever having been born... is that wrong?) Well I really enjoyed Memento because like any really good movie, it makes you want to watch it again immediately so you can know at the beginning what you don’t find out until the end. Some great movies (12 Monkeys, Shawshank Redemption, The Game, and Se7en, to name a few which come to mind right away) make you want to see them again, but it’s never the same because “the secret” is out and the suspense is gone. The next best thing is to watch it again with someone who has never seen it and watch their expression as it unfolds, and marvel as you watch their Movie Virginity get swept away...

(By the way, don’t mistake Mulholland Drive for Arlington Road which was also a good suspense-but-not-scary movie with Tim Robbins, Jeff Bridges, and Joan Cusack. That’s a good movie too.)

Ok, where is all of this going? Well, I want you to feed my Blockbuster queue. Suggest movies that you love, especially (but not only!) ones that you think probably were not seen by a lot of people. (Extra credit if you link to IMDB.com.) Note: I will briefly turn off the need for you to be a TypeKey user to post comments here, at least for a few days.

It doesn’t need to be some fancy art-house black-and-white sub-titled tragedy about how crappy the world is, nor should you prevent yourself from suggesting popular movies that might have been overlooked, such as Playing By Heart (a chick-flick, but a good one) and Sneakers which seemed to go right under everyone’s radar but I thought was pretty good.

ALSO feel free to post about the movie that everyone else loved but you hated. For example: Titanic which was only good because what’s-his-name died at the end.... DiCaprio... who was also in the oh-God-please-let-me-take-an-ice-pick-to-my-brain-this-is-so-dull Aviator and Gangs of New York. They were almost as bad as my least-favorite of all-time movie Conspiracy Theory which I am convinced had a completely different ending when it was originally written, but was corrupted much the way that the sub-plot movie in Short Cuts which starts off as a movie script where the lead actress (“Who must be played by a nobody!”) dies after the lead actor (“Who must be played by a nobody!”) gets made into a movie where Bruce Willis eventually saves Julia Roberts “because the test marketing showed people hated the other ending”). Conspiracy Theory could have turned the audience on its ear by making Mel Gibson the unexpected bad guy, or by killing off his character (or both!) but in the end it chickened out and went for the safe Hollywood ending.

So, let me have it... what are your favorite and least favorite movies? Feed my queue!

Footnotes:

Plus, I’m sick of companies which sue to keep a monopoly on an idea. Patents are not supposed to be anti-competitive, or at least shouldn’t be, IMO, and in this case, as the customer “MO” is all that matters. If Netflix can sue Blockbuster over rentals through the mail, why can’t Blockbuster [or whoever “invented” the idea] sue Netflix over the idea of renting movies rather than buying them?! ↩

NJ sued Blockbuster over that one (printer-friendly) and I guess they might be right that it’s “deceptive” but I don’t know anyone of sound-mind over the age of disaffected college students who didn’t figure out that there was some fine-print somewhere. I love how Blockbuster has new ads where someone says “Great! I can keep it forever!” and someone else says “I think you’re a little unclear on the meaning of rental” or some such. ↩

Airport Extreme Connection

So before we left to go over to my sister’s I had to hop online to check something. I don’t remember what, it’s really inconsequential.

“Hopping online” at our house is done through the Airport Extreme’s built-in 56K modem. That was the main reason that I bought this model. We have no other options out here in the boonies except for dialup, but I didn’t want to lose the convenience of WiFi.
]]> I looked around but did not find many other models of router (nevermind wireless routers) which had a 56K modem in them. Apparently the world is moving on, and some of us are being left behind. Heck, even Apple has ditched a built-in modem in its computers, which may be fine for desktop computers but seems too soon for portables. After all, there is not WiFi everywhere, but phone lines are pretty much ubiquitous. (More on the modem in a moment.)

The Airport Extreme is expensive. It will run you $200 at the Apple Store, $196 at Amazon or $180 for academic Apple users, or $170 refurbished (when available). The refurbished site will remind you that the original price was $250.

Yowza.

Is it too expensive? Well, that depends.

If you have a regular always-on broadband connection and that’s all you need, it’s probably easily $150 over what you need to spend.

If you’re a Mac user need a wireless router with a dial-out modem, good luck finding another option. I found one router (which did not have WiFi) which had a built-in modem, but it had been discontinued. The Airport modem can be easily controlled and monitored through the Menu Bar in Mac OS X. 1

You also get a network printer (you can connect a USB printer — any USB printer, including that crappy $35 HP inkjet that they convinced you to buy before you found out that the ink cartridges are $40 to replace — and make it into a network printer, available from any computer on the network. 2

That’s pretty cool too.

And, of course, if you have a recent Mac, you’ll save $50 on a Apple USB Modem ($44 for academic users).

The modem also can be configured to let you dial in to your network (something that the only other non-wireless router with modem I found could not do). How many people will use this? I don’t know, but if you’re going to spend $200 for a wireless router with a built-in modem, you want it to make every option available.

It can also easily be extended through the Airport Express or a Linksys router.

So I’ve been fairly pleased with the whole thing, but I was surprised when even a Mac Sales Guy at an Apple store had no idea how the modem worked.

It’s fairly simple.

First you click on the Airport icon on the menu bar and you will see the dropdown shown here. Follow the icon to the right (shown here next to “Home 2”) and you will see the Connect/Disconnect option.

There is one little thing that I would like to point out, namely this:

If you are using the modem to connect, this is the screen you will see. Note that the phone number and account name have been redacted.

Now you’ll see that there are several settings there, from 30 seconds to 30 minutes.

Idle timeouts are tricky things. Namely, they are easily fooled. If you have, say, your email client set to check for mail every 10 minutes, and walk away from your computer, it will probably never trigger an idle timeout (this is true for all idle timeouts, not just Airport Extreme’s).

Likewise if you have an Instant Messenger program or RSS reader or some such, they too will usually send traffic over the line that makes it look like the account is active. (Or if you run Windows and made the mistake of installing WGA.)

Well, as it happened, I had set the idle timeout to never. This might not have even mattered, for the reasons stated above, but after I “hopped on” I apparently forgot to disconnect. Honest mistake.

Only problem: we left to go visit my sister before coming back. So we returned tonight and the internet connection has been up for 1 day, 16 hours, 23 minutes, and 05 seconds.

OOps. (Fortunately our voicemail works even if the phone is busy!)

I don’t suppose many people ever get to see what it looks like to be online for over 24 hours via an Airport Modem... so now you know. Don’t you feel better knowing that?

Footnotes:

Windows-only users will be less enthralled with the built-in modem of the Airport Extreme as Apple provides no way to dial the modem manually. This means that you pretty much have to set it up for dial-on-demand, which assumes that your phone line is always available. ↩

See Airport Printing with Unsupported Printer for more information on how to use any printer you want with an Airport Extreme. ↩

Palm Addicts: Ringo Review

Ringo Review just posted to Palm Addicts site.

TJL's Palm Addicts posts

I mentioned the other day that I am writing for Palm Addicts. Here is a list of my posts so far. I think I got them all.
]]>
2006-04-24: How my Treo 650 spent its vacation (hint: it didn't get a vacation, I did!)

2006-04-29: Associate Writer: TjL

2006-04-29: BackupBuddy.Net in public beta

2006-04-29: How I Save Money (and new mobile-friendly Amazon.com!)

2006-04-29: Treo 700a followup

2006-04-30: Re: Memory Cards Could Pose Threat to Apple iPod

2006-04-30: The Convenience of Convergence

2006-05-01: How I Use My Palm to Avoid Wasted Time

2006-05-02: How I Use My Palm to Enjoy a Beautiful Day

2006-05-03: How I use my Palm accessories

2006-05-04: HIUMP: Favorite Mobile Sites

2006-05-04: How I use my Palm in the movie line

2006-05-04: Review: Mobile TS (RDC for Palm)

2006-05-06: Opera Mini on Palm (and your desktop)

2006-05-09: Avoid a soft reboot when switching batteries

2006-05-09: Error when installing ACT Link for Palm

2006-05-09: Mac Users: Sync to Windows in Virtual PC using Bluetooth

2006-05-10: Mobile RSS that syncs with your Desktop/Laptop

2006-05-12: A Dirty Job: A Novel (a|e)book

2006-05-12: What games are on your Palm?

2006-05-15: 700p = note the fine print and read between the lines

2006-05-16: 700p Marketing Speak has been bugging me all day

2006-05-16: BackupBuddy Net Coupon Code

More Star Wars Lore

Star Wars DVD Sets of Tomorrow by Lore Sjöberg (which may be the coolest name ever) is a new article at Wired.

Lore offers some thoughts on possible additional boxed Star Wars DVD sets, including:

The Just-Better-Effects Edition
This edition redoes all the special effects -- every single one throughout the entire series, using the best technology available, applied by the guys who did the Lord of the Rings movies. Nothing else is touched. No dialogue is changed, no scenes are added, no new characters are included. Can you imagine how much Star Wars fanatics will love this one? They'll be standing in line outside every place in town that sells DVDs, dressed in Jedi robes and elaborate rancor costumes. What a bunch of hard-core geeks. I'd better preorder my copy now.

I’d order one, but online. It was bad enough that I had to stand in the ticket line with those people when the movies came out.

I still wouldn’t be surprised if George Lucas released an official DVD of The Phantom Edit as I suggested earlier.

Lore also hit the nail on the head with this comment:

The best part is that the original-release DVDs include the special-edition DVDs as well. So people who bought the special edition when they really wanted the original version will have to buy the special edition again, and people who didn't buy the special edition because they only care about the original version will have to pay more to get the special edition anyway! Yes! Use your aggressive feelings! Let the hate flow through you!

Mac Users: Sync to Windows in Virtual PC using Bluetooth

PalmAddicts recently invited me to be an Associate Writer (aka blogger :-) for their website. No pay, but occasionally a piece of software to review.

I need to start linking to some of my posts over there, because it’s very hard to search. This is my most recent article, and the one that I’m most pleased with so far:

Mac Users: Sync to Windows in Virtual PC using Bluetooth.

Star Wars Episode 7: How to Squeeze Every Last Dime from Your Biggest Fans

You might think I would be thrilled to hear they are coming out with the original, unaltered, Star Wars trilogy on DVD. Especially if you knew that I once watched Episode IV some 20+ times in one month when it was on HBO. Or if you knew that Tracey and I had once watched all three original movies in the theater on the same day.

But I’m really not. In fact I don’t remember the last time I felt this betrayed.

]]> John Gruber cited this:

In response to overwhelming demand, Lucasfilm Ltd. and Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment will release attractively priced individual two-disc releases of Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi. Each release includes the 2004 digitally remastered version of the movie and, as bonus material, the theatrical edition of the film. That means you'll be able to enjoy Star Wars as it first appeared in 1977, Empire in 1980, and Jedi in 1983.

from http://www.starwars.com/episode-iv/release/video/news20060503.html and then added his own words:

Bastards. I broke down and finally bought the current DVD trilogy collection just a few months ago — now I’ve got to pay for it yet again just to get the versions of the films that I really want. If they ever diddle with the Han-vs.-Greedo scene again, they ought to have Han shoot George Lucas.

I couldn’t agree more. But then it got worse. I went to the official press release page, and what image do they have as part of the release?

For those of you either too young to remember, too old to remember, or if you have suffered a traumatic blow to the head since 1977, Luke and Ben go into Mos Eisley to hire a ship. They agree to pay Han an excessive amount of money to get them to where they need to go.

Just after they leave, a bounty hunter named Greedo (above right) comes in, seeking to take Han Solo to Jabba the Hut - or to take the money he owes Hut. Greedo talks on and on, while Han unbuckles his holster and shoots Greedo under the table.

I saw the movie in 1977 or 1978 at about 5 years old, and even I recognized this for what it was: pure cleverness on Han’s part. Someone was essentially trying to rob Han in a crowded bar, and Han shot him. Nothing that Greedo wouldn’t have done if the situation were reversed.

Now fast forward 20-ish years. The movies are re-released with improved sound, scenes added in, etc. Most of which were completely unnecessary and added nothing to the storyline, but instead served the purpose of letting Lucas a) show off and b) gouge his fans for another $7/ticket. But they didn’t just add things. They changed things. Changed things. Lucas created the defining myth of a generation, and then 20 years later he changed it.

One of the most useless and aggravating changes was the scene with Han and Greedo. In the new version, Greedo shoots first and misses. Mind you, Greedo is approximately 3 feet from Han, so shooting and missing is completely and utterly stupid. In addition, there would be no reason for Greedo to shoot Han. Han already told him that he doesn’t have the money on him, so shooting him would gain him nothing. Sure I suppose he could bring Han’s corpse to Jabba, but that wouldn’t be nearly satisfying. But there is nothing and no indication that Greedo is going to shoot.

Why does he shoot?

Well because apparently Lucas decided that it made Han look bad to have shot first.

Look bad? The man is a criminal, a smuggler, a scoundrel (by some accounts), and this is what you think makes him look bad?

What’s worse, Lucas adamently asserted that the original versions would never be released on DVD. They said it would take too much work (read: I want you to like the new versions, so open wide and take it. This won’t hurt a bit).

So we bought the original series on VHS. Then they released the widescreen original versions on VHS. ARGH! So we bought that too (since otherwise you miss stuff, like, oh, I don’t know, off the top of my head, you miss Luke letting go of whatever that thing is that he was holding onto after Darth Vader cut off his hand. In the non-widescreen version, all you see is Vader looking at Luke, and then looking down. Next thing you know, Luke is falling down the shaft. Did he slip? Did he lose his balance? You’ll never know!!!

When the new versions came out, we bought them on DVD. Because we’re fans, that’s why.

So I currently have three versions of the original trilogy in my house, including two in VHS, just waiting to break down over time as the tape decays. The picture and sound aren’t nearly as good, and when I finally get that 80" LCD, the flaws will be more obvious.

Now Lucas, who must need a new yacht, has decided that he’ll let me buy another copy of the movies I already own on DVD, and this time he’ll “throw in” the original versions.

Oh, and did you catch the part where it sounds like they will be selling each of the 3 movies separately? Apparently George wants the 100 foot yacht instead of the 80. You can currently get the boxed trilogy for $37 on Amazon.com. That’s $12.33 per movie. But if they sell them separately, you can bet they will go for $15 - $20 per movie. So that’s at least $3 extra.... times, let’s say they sell 3 million copies.... geez, George, you can have a different yacht for each day of the week, solely by sticking each of your fans just a little more.

Great. Thanks George. First you make these horrible remakes of your original movies, then you make three more completely lame prequels, none of which comes close to matching any of the 3 original movies, and now this. I hope it was worth it. I’d say more about what I really think of you for this, but it’s a family site and I never know who’s reading. The good news for you is that you ought to be able to buy plenty of sleeping pills so you never have to lie awake at night and think about how you’ve totally and completely screwed your fans multiple times for the past decade after we waited a decade for the additional movies you promised.

I used to be upset that you decided that you wouldn’t make episodes 7-9 which you had talked about a long time ago. After seeing episodes 1-3 I realized I didn’t care and I was a bit relieved. Whatever magic making powers you had died on or about “Return of the Jedi”. And I do mean the original.

There was nothing worth seeing in the re-releases. There was nothing worth seeing, and certainly nothing awe-inspiring, about episodes 1-3. (Don’t even get me started on the scene where Han steps on Jabba. As if.)

Remember when Han was being loaded into the carbon freezing chamber, and Leia said “I love you” and Han said “I know”? Remember how you reportedly worried that people would laugh, and that at the screening they did laugh, but Harrison Ford said “But it was the right kind of laugh”? Remember that? Did you screen episodes 1-3? I don’t mean in a room filled with lackeys and yes-men. Did you go out and slip into a showing and watch it? Did you hear them groan? Did you hear them laugh in what was definitely the wrong way? Did you see them wince when you tried to write romance scenes?

What happened to you between Empire and Phantom Menace?

Ah what do you care.... you’ll have plenty of money for the rest of your life, and will never see nor care about the feelings of one of your former biggest fans. I won’t even be surprised when you release a DVD of The Phantom Edit in a few years when you realize that you’d really like a 17th summer home. I hear southern France is nice.

And before you complain about the idea that you would ever sink so low, may I remind you that your contempt for your fans extends far enough that you are also offering your fans the chance to buy a T-shirt that says “Han Shot First” for $16. Apparently the “I live in my parents’ basement” T-shirts didn’t market well?

Given that you apparently had the idea for the whole “trilogy times three” (I mean two) plotted out in 1977, I can’t help but wonder if you didn’t make some of the changes to the original trilogy in the 1990’s realizing that there would be increased marketing opportunites for the two sets of DVDs, that you could get people to buy both by first saying that there wouldn’t be any DVDs of the originals, and then changing your mind later.

Man, that Phantom Edit thing sounds even more likely the more I think about it.

Once I thought you were the most creative mind to have ever indelibly touched my life.

Now I just see you as, well, just another greedy grown-up.

Yet another reason my Mac is smarter than your PC

My Mac knows that when I press the Volume Up button while the computer is muted, it means that I want to !&*^*&!-ing UNMUTE the computer.

My PC, on the other hand, seems to think I’d like to spend several minutes checking the connection with the speakers, checking the Control Panel settings, the settings in Windows Media Player, the headset, etc.

In what world is it logical that when I’ve press Volume Up roughly 6,278 times should the computer think “Yeah, he wants the volume maxed out, but muted.”

The fact that it may be supercalifragilistically stupid of me not to press the Mute/Unmute button is utterly and completely beside the point. The computer is supposed to make my life easier. It should not require me to think about how it works, it ought to anticipate what I would want and how I would work.

Windows XP doesn’t do that. Mac OS X does.

Is it a little thing? Of course. But add it together with all the other little things and it makes a big difference.