Snopes.com has posted their "Jest in Time II". Snopes is a website that sets out to debunk internet rumors. The seemingly junk mail you get from friends and family that talk about how Castro almost played for the Yankees and other assorted goodies like that they take and research. When they find the answer they post whether or not it is a true story. Some people send in stories that are actually jokes but these people are too gullible to see that. They post up some of them here for our reading pleasure. Check it out here.
A word of warning: This will be a recurring post. As in this post will be updated frequently. You may want to bookmark it.
The State was a half hour long sketch comedy television show, broadcast on MTV from 1993 to 1995. The show combined kooky characters and bizarre scenarios to present sketches that won the favor of its target twenty-something audience. The cast consisted of 11 twenty-something comedians who created, acted, wrote, directed, and edited the show. Several memorable characters were created for the show, and for a short time their catch-phrases entered into popular lingo (see below). Often, the cast would appear as themselves and address the audience to promote fake "contests" or to deliver mock public service announcements. Much like Monty Python, The State's sketches were sometimes "linked" to each other in some way. A punchline or image that ended one sketch often provided a lead-in to the next. As with many MTV shows, each episode featured clips of popular alternative music of the time, used as background music to various sketches.
Thanks Wikipedia! The point of this post is to link to The State videos that can be found on the Internet. Let's Begin
Episode 101
A search on YouTube for The State 101 turned up nothing
Episode 102
A search on YouTube for The State 102 turned up nothing
Episode 103
Episode 104
A search on YouTube for The State 104 turned up nothing.
Episode 105
A search on YouTube for The State 105 turned up nothing.
Episode 106
If you have any links to the full videos please send them in. I plan on finding them all one way or another.
There is a video up on Google from the Flex Your Rights Foundation about how not to get arrested. It's 45 minutes long, which IS long. However, I ended up watching the whole thing. It is also branded by the ACLU or American Civil Liberties League. I don't agree with a lot of their politics but if you randomly have drugs in your car or throw parties hosting drugs or just brake the law randomly with something you could normally hide from your parents you should probably watch this. What would be easier is to not do anything illegal. However it is nice to remember that we have rights and we should stand by them. My favorite? I have the right not to self incriminate. So when a cop asks if I know why he pulled me over instead of saying "Because I was speeding?" I should just wait for him to tell me. As soon as I tell him I was speeding I give up the right to not self incriminate.
One entry found for google. Main Entry: goo·gle Pronunciation: 'gü-g&l Function: transitive verb Inflected Form(s): goo·gled; goo·gling /-g(&-) li[ng]/ Usage: often capitalized Etymology: Google, trademark for a search engine : to use the Google search engine to obtain information about (as a person) on the World Wide Web
The new OS X update 10.4.7 has been found to phone home. It's nothing like the recent news about Windows XP that phones home all the time to find out whether or not your copy of Windows XP is valid, even if it has already determined that it is valid. With Apple's OS X update it's not so bad, whenever you launch the OS X Dashboard it checks to see if you have the most recent version of your installed widgets. I would call it a feature. Other people would call it spyware. In a way I agree that they should have asked me if I'd like to enable this new feature available in 10.4.7. The next time I launch OS X's Dashboard a window could have popped up to say "OS X can check to make sure you have the most up to date versions of your widgets. Would you like to automatically connect to the internet periodically to check?" Now would that be so hard?
MacOSXHints has posted a workaround to make it not connect to the internet if you are that much against it. It is a little involved so if you are not comfortable with the command line I'd suggest waiting for the enevitable update that will let you choose wheter or not to connect. MacOSXHints says to do this:
Login with an administrative account and open Terminal, then execute the following command:
$ sudo vi /etc/mach_init.d/dashboardadvisoryd.plist
When asked for a password, retype your own password to verify that it's still you and not someone else. Next type an i to enter input mode, and add the following two lines below the line that reads <dict>:
<key>Disabled</key> <true/>
Press Escape to leave the edit mode and type :wq, followed by Enter, to save the file and quite the editor. The file is saved and mach_init.d won't start this process anymore. Now type the following command:
$ sudo vi /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.dashboard.advisory.fetch.plist
and enter input mode once again by pressing i, and after the line that reads <dict>, we also add the lines:
<key>Disabled</key> <true/>
Leave the input mode and save the file as before. Now restart your computer, and this process won't start automatically.
Have you heard about the supposed new MP3 player from Microsoft? The MP3 player that is going to be the iPod killer? Gizmodo is posting news that Microsoft is planning on giving away music that you already bought from iTunes to try and encourage you to buy their Microsoft branded MP3 player. That is great news if you have been looking for an alternative to the iPod but have been using one for a long time. I'm sure there are people out there that are ready to give up on the iPod but I just don't see why. The only real complaint I've actually heard is that it gets scratched easily. However if you care about your iPod getting scratched you could just buy an invisible shield for it. I would also recommend a Foofpod to carry it around. Both great products that I myself use.
The strange news about this is if Microsoft did scour your iTunes music to see which songs you have bought and then gave them to you they would still be obligated to pay a licensing fee. This leads me to believe that if they did do this with your iTunes purchased music that they would have to put a price limit on it. Hopefully the iPod will be wireless by the time Microsoft comes out with their wireless MP3 player.
Apple has released a $899 iMac only for educators and students. The new iMac sports a 1.83Ghz Intel core duo, and it has built in iSight much like all the other new computers Apple is releasing. It also comes with Tiger and iLife '06. According to the Apple Store Website the new iMac is shipping within 24 hours. The downside? Integrated graphics as well as no superdrive make me sad. Then I look at the price again... $899! Seriously, that is pretty sweet.
The UK based Music label trade association BPI has issued proceedings on June 29 against the operator of AllofMP3.com. A UK High Court gave them permission to serve those proceedings in Russia. That means that even though AllofMP3 is based in russia the case against them can be heard in a UK court. This doesn't sound like good news for the folks over at AllofMP3.com. We'll see how this unfolds.
Looking to buy a new MacBook? You have a few more options.
For those of you still thinking about buying a new MacBook a few new options have opened up for you. Apple retailers are now selling two more models. A white MacBook with 1 GB of ram as well as an 80 GB hard drive for $1449. That's $150 more than the midrange model now for upgraded 512MB ram and 20 more GB of HDD space. They are also selling a black model named the "Macbook Ultimate" which will have 2 512MB sticks of RAM for a total of 1GB. This is going to run you $1599, $100 more than the $1499 black MacBook they started with. Personally I'd stick with doing those upgrades myself, but that's just one mans opinion.
Codeweavers has announced that they are going to be shipping CrossOver Mac by late July or early August. What crossover allows for is running Windows applications under OS X without needing to install Windows. It will only work with the new Intel based Macs and will only support a limited amount of software. The direction this is headed is still pretty exciting. It would be great to be able to run any Windows software on my Mac. Check out their Product Page.
Wired has an article about how to know if the NSA is secretly spying on you. Basically what it comes down to is this. On your windows box goto Start/Run and type in "CMD" without the quotes. Then run the command "tracert nsa.gov", again without the quotes. If you see sffca.ip.att.net then your packets are being snooped upon. They also mention that if you have any traffic from att.net then there is a good chance you are being watched as well. If you are runnning Mac OSX open up Netwrok Utility and do a Trace Route to nsa.gov. Basically a Trace Route does exactly what it sounds like. It traces the route between your computer to any address on the internet and will show you where you traffic is funneling through along the way. Anywhere along there people can see what you are doing. So be wary of that next time you are doing something on the internet you wouldn't want other people to know about. If you are on linux you already know the proper commands to check ;)
Here is a story about a nigerian scammer that got scammed. Shiver Metimbers runs a wesite called 419eater.com which is currently down at the time of this posting. 419 is another common named used to refer to the oh so familiar Nigerian scams you've seen in your email. Read the full story here. Also, just for the record, never give out your bank account details to anyone. Especially not someone requesting they be able to deposit large sums of money into your account. All they are going to do is siphon large sums of money out of your account. It's nice to hear about someone sticking it to these ruthless scammers.
This sounds like a great piece of software. I can't actually try it yet as I don't ahve my phone, but basically you install this on your cell phone and then enter in the barcode number for something you are interested in. It then comes back and tells you the best online prices and also gives you reviews. Sure I suppose if you could get on the internet with your mobile device you could just navigate to Google and put in the barcode but isn't this so much more fun?
